Authors: Unknown
It suddenly occurred to Annie that she had left her purse inside the parlor. “Dammit!” she said. She had no money, no driver’s license or ID, no clothes, nothing! Just a stupid wedding gown.
She could not risk going back. It was now or never.
Chapter One
“G
in.”
Darla Mae Jenkins made a production of discarding her playing card and laying the others out so they resembled a fan. She gave her boss a smug look. “You owe me thirty-five cents,” she said in a drawl thick as gravy.
Sam Ballard gave a grunt of displeasure as he looked over her cards. Darla had been known to cheat on more than one occasion, and he wasn’t about to be taken in by the unscrupulous cardsharp. “You know what I think, Darla Mae? I think you’ve tucked a few aces in that fancy new garter belt you recently purchased.”
“Why, Samuel Aaron Ballard, I cannot believe you’re accusing me of cheating. You know darned good and well I’m as honest as a barn is broad.” She suddenly stood, hands on hips, hazel eyes clouded with suspicion, and demanded, “How do you know about my new garter belt?”
“I should not have to remind you that word travels fast in small towns, and Pinckney is no different.” He smiled. “Remember when this was
the place to
be for root beer floats, hanging out with friends, and catching up on the latest gossip.”
“Yeah,” she said. “Just walking in the door brings back a lot of fond memories.”
Sam glanced about the Dixieland Café, which sat in the very heart of downtown Pinckney, Georgia. It had been built in 1913; the town had given birth to it after the courthouse was built and merchants began opening shops on the square and needed a place for lunch. Sam had a copy of the first menu which listed the Blue Plate Special—one meat, two side vegetables, and a biscuit for a quarter.
It had played a role in the Civil Rights Movement with lunch-counter sit-ins, and it had miraculously survived The Great Depression. Jimmy Carter had eaten at the Dixieland while campaigning in 1976 and again in 1980, both times giving short speeches and going on about what good food the restaurant served, especially the chicken fried steak which later earned the name,
The Jimmy Carter Special
.
Sam had purchased the café shortly after it had been scheduled for demolition. Everybody in town thought he was crazy, him being fresh out of law school with no practice to speak of and even less money; but he could not just sit back and watch the Dixieland get the wrecking ball. He’d used the same skills—carpentry and construction work—that had paid his way through college and law school, to get it cleaned up and operational. He had replaced the torn red vinyl that covered the stools sitting at the counter, as well as the seats in each booth. Volunteers, those who were equally opposed to the city tearing it down, helped Sam bring it back to its former glory, although it had taken almost a year to do so.
At least a dozen grainy, black and white pictures hung from the walls, photos of horse-drawn buggies, women in long dresses, children playing in the dirt street, back when time seemed less hurried. He’d had the pictures restored, enlarged, and reframed.
If someone had asked Sam if he needed the headache of running a restaurant, he would have said, “No way in hell!”
but the Dixieland was more than a restaurant. Sam felt he had torn a page from a history book and brought it to life.
“He checked his wristwatch. The breakfast and lunch crowd had come and gone, and the “early birds”—seniors who came in around five p.m. and ordered from a menu that offered a discount—would bring a new wave of business. In between shifts, employees from surrounding businesses often took their coffee breaks at the restaurant so they could enjoy a slice of pie as well.
Darla smoothed the wrinkles from her uniform and gave her light panty girdle a tug. Sam complained on a regular basis that her skirt was too tight and too short, but Darla claimed it helped her tips. Besides, Darla did what Darla wanted, and nobody could tell her otherwise. But the truth was, when Sam looked at it from a business standpoint he knew he had a goldmine in her. The customers loved Darla because she was fast on her feet, quick-thinking, had a fun sense of humor, and was, among all things, trustworthy, except when it came to cards. Sure, the truckers loved her long legs and shapely behind, but the woman offered so much more.
“You’re right about the gossips in this town,” she said. “If I had a nickel for every one of ‘em, I wouldn’t be waiting tables for a living. A girl can’t so much as kiss a man goodnight on her front porch without everybody and their mamas knowing it.”
“Perhaps you should try to be a little more discreet, Miss Jenkins.”
“What are you talking about? I’m the queen of discretion.”
“Which explains the eighteen-wheeler parked in front of your mobile home last weekend,” Sam said.
She waved off the remark. “Oh, that was just an uncle visiting.”
Sam nodded. “Ah, yes, another uncle.”
“Don’t get smart with me, Sam, or you’ll be looking for a new waitress.” Darla used that threat on a regular basis, but Sam knew she wasn’t serious.
She glanced out the front window of the cafe as she spoke. “Great balls of fire! Would’ja get a load of that!”
Sam swiveled around on the red vinyl counter stool and gave a low whistle at the sight of the white stretch limo sitting in the middle of Main Street. “Well, now. I wasn’t aware of any celebrities visiting Pinckney. Must be here for the Okra Festival,” he added. He’d barely gotten the words out of his mouth before he noticed smoke seeping out from beneath the hood. “Uh-oh, looks like trouble in Tinsel town. I’d better go see about it.”
“Hey, wait for me,” Darla said, following him out of the restaurant.
A number of people had already gathered on the sidewalk, including Mott Henry, the town drunk. From the looks of it, he hadn’t shaved or bathed in days. He watched the excitement for a moment, then turned and moseyed down the sidewalk toward the liquor store, obviously more interested in buying his next bottle than the commotion in the street. The Petrie sisters, still spry in their eighties, stood at the edge of the crowd, each holding a brown sack from Odom’s Grocery. They craned their necks to see over a group of teenage boys.
“Is anyone in there?” a man in the crowd called out. “You can’t see diddly with them tinted windows.”
“I can’t figure it,” Darla said. “Why would anybody put tinted windows in a danged limo? Shoot, if I was riding in one of those suckers, I’d want the whole world to see.”
Sam was amused by the town’s response to the limo. One would have thought a flying saucer had just landed on Main Street, and everybody was waiting for the hatch to open. It just proved the town needed more in the way of entertainment.
Mechanic, Bic Fenwick, owner of Fenwick’s Towing and Garage, happened by at that moment in his tow truck. He parked on the side of the street, climbed from his truck, and hurried over. “What’s the story here?” he asked Sam.
Sam shook his head. “I just got here. Darla and I saw smoke coming from beneath the hood. I figured I should investigate.”
Bic knocked on the driver’s window. “Hey there, did you know you got smoke comin’ out from under your hood?”
Sam chuckled. “I’d say it was a given, Bic.”
“Well, you never know what people can see with them tinted windows,” Bic said. He pressed his face against the window and squinted. “You want me to take a gander at what’s under your hood?” he shouted, as if the tinted windows might interfere with the person’s hearing as well. Sam figured whoever was in the limo was getting a good laugh.
The window whispered down some five or six inches. Sam found himself looking into a pair of incredibly pretty green eyes, so pretty, in fact that he tried to think of the exact color and decided they must be what people referred to as Kelly-green. Her face was equally pretty, framed by hair the color of ripened wheat. Some kind of net clung to the fat curls, and Sam thought he caught sight of a pink tiara.
He leaned forward. “Excuse me, miss, but you can’t leave this thing sitting in the middle of the road. You’re blocking traffic.” As if to prove his point, a man in a pickup truck blew his horn. Sam waved him around.
Annie gave an enormous sigh. As if her day had not been bad enough. She had spent the last half hour trying to make it from the interstate to the town of Pinckney before the limo died because she could not bear the thought of walking eight to ten minutes in her wedding gown. Not only that, she was furious with Snedley. How could a paid chauffeur not know the limo was on the verge of having major problems? She supposed she should cut him some slack because his prostate problem had probably garnered much of his attention.
“Did you hear me, miss?” Sam asked. “You’re going to have to move your vehicle. You’re blocking traffic,” he repeated.
Annie could not hide her annoyance. Did the man think her daft, for Pete’s sake? She knew she was blocking traffic, but there wasn’t a damn thing she could do about it. “Thanks for your input, Einstein
,
“ she said loudly, “but it won’t budge so I don’t have much choice in the matter.”
Bic looked at Sam. “Einstein?” he repeated. “I don’t think she appreciated what you said.”
“Well, lucky for me I’m not trying to win a popularity contest,” Sam told Bic, even though he was peeved that the woman had resorted to name calling. “I need for it to be gone before my early bird customers arrive,” he added.
“How come you’re worried about people parking at the curb?” Bic asked. “You’ve got that big parking lot on the side and back of the restaurant?”
“Because a couple of my early bird customers are in wheelchairs, and some of the others just have a hard time getting around. It’s easier for their families to park in front of the restaurant and help them to the door.”
“I’ll see what I can do,” Bic said. “Maybe I can figure out what’s causing all that smoke.” He addressed the woman inside of the car. “Miss, do you see a hood release in there?” he asked and told her where to look for it. He glanced at Sam and rolled his eyes. “’Least that’s where you’d find a hood release in most cars. No telling where they put ‘em in these big suckers.”
“Probably next to the wet bar and Jacuzzi,” Sam said quietly. The woman in the car might have the prettiest green eyes he’d ever seen, but damned if he was going to get involved in a verbal tussle with her. Sam heard a metallic click, and Bic opened the hood. Smoke billowed out like a mushroom cloud. “Jeez, Louise!” Bic said, backing away from the vehicle and snatching a cloth from his back pocket which he used to wipe his face.
“What’s going on here?” a voice said.
Sam turned and found himself staring into Sheriff Harry Hester’s face. He was so bald that most folks called him Howie—for Howie Mandel—behind his back.
Bic answered. “This here limo is putting out more smoke than a bonfire. I’m trying to figure out what’s causing it.”
Sam leaned close to the sheriff. “There is a lady inside. I may as well tell you, she’s a bit mouthy.”
“Oh, yeah?” Hester said. “We’ll see about that.”
Sixty-year-old Marge Dix elbowed her way through the crowd. Most considered her a sourpuss. “Would you just look at that?” she said, her voice bristling with indignation. “Here we have starving people in this world, and we got folks driving cars the size of mobile homes. I hope whoever it is doesn’t plan on settling in Pinckney. I just can’t abide such vulgarity. Makes me ill, that’s what it does.”
Darla, who had been quiet up to that moment, pretended to give Marge a sympathetic look. “Then I wouldn’t look if I were you, Marge, honey,” Darla said. “If something made me that sick, I’d march right home, lock the doors, and pull the shades.”
Marge regarded Darla. “The Bible says we should store our treasures in heaven.”
“Some of us don’t want to wait that long for nice things,” the waitress replied.
Sheriff Hester stepped closer to the limo and tried to peer at the woman through the crack. “Miss, I need to see your driver’s license,” he said, “and I may as well tell you, a little kindness goes a long way in this town so you might want to be a bit more tolerant of our citizens.”
“You go, Howie,” Darla said.
Hester shot her a dark look. “Watch it, Darla Mae, or I’ll write you a ticket for having an eighteen-wheeler parked in your front yard last weekend.”
Annie gave another sigh. She should have taken a chance and gone back inside the church for her purse. She wished she could magically disappear; instead, it looked as though she was going to suffer her share of indignities.
“I’m sorry Sheriff, but I do not have my license with me.” Annie waited, knowing he would derive a great deal of pleasure from that fact.
“Oh, really?” Sheriff Hester looked about the crowd. “Seems these rich folks don’t have to follow the same rules as the rest of us,” he said.
“That’s precisely what I’m talking about,” Marge Dix said to Darla. “Some people think they are better than us normal folks.” Marge looked at the sheriff. “Driving without a license carries a stiff fine, doesn’t it, Sheriff Hester?”
Sam frowned. He’d never cared for Marge Dix who was, the town busybody.
“A fine?” Hester said. “Oh, yes. Not to mention possible jail time.” A smile twitched the corners of his lips. He was obviously enjoying himself. “She’d better show me a registration for that thing, or there’ll be a hanging in the courthouse square.” Several in the crowd chuckled.
Darla threw up her hands. “I don’t believe what I’m hearing.” She looked at Sam. “Do something!”
Sam pulled Hester aside. “I would tone it down if I were you,” he told Hester. “You don’t want to get hit with a lawsuit. If someone can afford to drive a car like this they probably have enough money to keep a lawyer on retainer.”
Annie was past being angry; she was furious. The man was no better than her father; out to make people feel small and stupid. “Then get your rope ready, Barney Fife,” she yelled as loud as she could, “because I don’t have the registration either.”
Darla laughed out loud. “You go, girl!” Several of the onlookers cheered.