The Cherry Cola Book Club (13 page)

T
he phone rang at a quarter to ten the next morning in Maura Beth's purple bedroom. The depression she had retired with the night before was still very much hanging over her, and she hadn't yet made a move to throw back the covers and get her day started. It all meant that she was going to be late for work, with Renette holding down the fort until she showed up. As a result, she picked up the receiver trying to make her “Hello?” sound like it wasn't the first word she'd uttered since opening her eyes.

“I didn't wake you up, did I?” said the familiar but discerning voice on the other end of the line.

“Oh, no, I've been up for an hour, Connie,” Maura Beth answered, continuing to press the envelope.

“Well, I won't keep you in suspense. All is well. Stout Fella came through beautifully,” Connie continued, her voice full of energy and optimism. “There were no complications, whatsoever. The artery was completely cleared, and there was no blockage in any of the others. He's been in his room most of the morning, and Becca is in with him now just beside herself with relief. It's the funniest thing you've ever seen. She alternately kisses him on the cheek and scolds him like a child for putting them both through all this. But he really loved your balloon bouquet! Douglas and I managed to blow up one of each color, and we even wrote a message or two with the marker without popping them. If I still sound a little winded, that's why.”

Maura Beth suddenly felt like a schoolgirl waiting for a juicy piece of gossip. “Ooh, what did you write?”

“Well, I wasn't Dorothy Parker, you understand. ‘Get well soon' was about it. But we told him it was all your idea, and he said to be sure and tell you what a big kick he got out of it. He also said he hadn't had anyone bring him balloons since he had his tonsils out as a boy. He says when he gets back and into the swing of things, he's going to come to every meeting of The Cherry Cola Book Club with Becca just to show his appreciation.”

“That makes my day!” Maura Beth exclaimed. “Frankly, I didn't sleep well last night, worrying about how the procedure would go. And about our little book club, if you want to know the truth.”

Connie made a sympathetic noise under her breath. “Well, the procedure part is looking real good now. The doctor predicts a full recovery if Stout Fella will just behave himself. Let's take the rest one step at a time. Meanwhile, you'll let everyone know the latest, won't you?”

“Will do. And you keep these good reports coming!”

After they'd hung up, Maura Beth yawned, stretched, and threw on her bathrobe. Then she trudged into her kitchenette, poured herself a glass of orange juice, and began making phone calls. Miss Voncille was the first person on her short list, but there was no answer at 45 Painter Street—which seemed odd so early in the morning. On the first try, however, she got through to Periwinkle, who was elated with the good news and prognosis, as well as properly supportive of Maura Beth's concerns about the future of the book club.

“All you have to do is reschedule, honey, and I'll help you promote it at The Twinkle, as usual,” Periwinkle told her. “And this time, everyone'll show up hale and hearty without so much as a sniffle.”

“Hope so,” Maura Beth replied, trying her best to sound upbeat.

“Sure they will. I'll talk up your club like nobody's business, especially to all the cute fellas that come in.”

Maura Beth ended their conversation with a resigned chuckle. “Yeah, well, I wish there were as many people out there—male or female—who like to read as there are who like to eat. You take care now.”

Another call to Miss Voncille still found no one home; then Maura Beth took a deep breath as she dialed Councilman Sparks's office number. She really didn't want to talk to him at all, but temporarily shelved her equivocal feelings for him to do the right thing.

But when she told him the news, she discovered to her surprise that she needn't have bothered.

“Thanks for your call, Miz Mayhew, but I already know he's out of the woods. I phoned up there myself a little while ago and spoke to Becca. We certainly wouldn't want to see anything happen to Mr. Justin Brachle, what with all he's done for Cherico in recent years.”

Maura Beth didn't try very hard to prevent a cynical tone from creeping into her reply. “Yes, I'm sure you're glad everything went so well. He'll probably be wheeling and dealing again in no time.”

“Maybe not quite wheeling and dealing. His wife was more reserved. Her exact words were, ‘He'll go back to work within reason, this time.' She also said he'll have to change some bad old habits of his for good. I imagine she's going to lay down the law to him now. But it's fitting that you called me anyway. If you can work it in, I'd like to talk to you about your future here in Cherico. Would it be possible for you to come to my office around four-thirty this afternoon?”

Maura Beth felt a spurt of adrenaline in her veins and reacted without even consulting her schedule. “I see no reason why I can't do that. But do you mind my being frank with you and sparing myself some anxiety? Will this be good news or bad news for me?”

“That's entirely up to you, Miz Mayhew,” came the emotionless reply. “I look forward to seeing you then.”

She hung up and closed her eyes. All sorts of paranoid scenarios swirled throughout her brain. Would she soon be looking for another job? Should she have been more proactive in sending out résumés long before the ultimatum because The Cherico Library was basically the dead end she didn't want to face? Four-thirty seemed an eternity away to find out what was actually going to happen, but she would try to make an ordinary day of it until then.

Temporary relief from the uncertainty came through in the form of a third phone call attempt to Miss Voncille, which finally worked like the proverbial charm.

“Oh, I'm so thrilled for him—and Becca, of course!” Miss Voncille exclaimed after Maura Beth had delivered the happy update. “I'll go ahead and call Locke right after we hang up. I know he'll feel the same way.” There was an awkward pause highlighted by a sharp intake of breath at the other end, and Maura Beth could sense there was something more to come.

“Do you have a moment?” Miss Voncille added finally.

“For my most loyal library user and the consummate historian and genealogist of Cherico, I always have time.”

“Thank God, there's more to me than that now,” she began rather breathlessly. “I wanted you to be the first to know—and I want to delay this just the way the kids do these days, so here it comes now . . . wait for it . . . wait for it . . . I'm officially back in the saddle again.”

“No!”

“Yes!”

“Was it in your jungle lair?”

“No, in his very formal Perry Street residence, if you please.”

They both found themselves laughing like girlfriends, and Maura Beth said, “Oh, I couldn't be happier for you—and Locke, too, of course!”

“I feel so naughty. I was part Melanie, part Scarlett, and I just got home a few minutes ago.”

“Scandalous!” Maura Beth exclaimed, picking up on the playfulness. “But it makes sense to me now, since I haven't been able to reach you for the last half hour.”

There was another rush of air at the other end. “I guess the next step is for us to become a permanent item. We talked about it seriously, of course, and we're going for it. Can you believe it?”

“Of course I can.”

“This is turning out to be quite a day so far,” Miss Voncille continued. “Becca's husband on the mend, Locke and myself starting up at our age. I wonder what will happen next?”

Maura Beth sounded more upbeat than she felt. “Well, they say good things come in threes.”

 

The first thing that seemed out of kilter to Maura Beth when she arrived for her four-thirty appointment with Councilman Sparks was the fact that his secretary, Nora Duddney, was missing and unaccounted for. There had never been a time when Maura Beth had entered his office that the blankest, dullest person in the universe had not been at her desk staring at her computer monitor, unable to utter more than two words of passable conversation.

“In case you were wondering, Nora is no longer with me,” Councilman Sparks explained the minute Maura Beth walked in, apparently reading her mind. “Please, step into my office and make yourself comfortable.” He went in and pulled out her chair and then seated himself behind his desk. “First things first. I think we're both pleased that Justin Brachle is doing so well.”

“Yes. We had quite a scare last night, didn't we?” she replied. “But it looks like we're going to have a happy ending. All these advances in modern medicine never cease to amaze me.”

“Good choice of words,” he continued. “The happy ending part, I mean. We all want that, don't we?”

Maura Beth could only guess where he was going with that but played along as calmly as she could, despite her quickening heartbeat. “We do.”

Whatever it was Councilman Sparks had on his mind, he was obviously in no hurry to reveal it. He used the awkward silence that ensued to tap his ball point pen on his desk in erratic, Morse code fashion. It soon became nothing short of annoying to Maura Beth.

“I do think we should be candid with each other today, Miz Mayhew. Or may I call you Maura Beth after all these years?” he said finally.

“Yes, to both,” she answered, feeling as if his line of questioning was completely unnecessary. “I mean, yes, we should be candid, and, yes, you may call me Maura Beth.”

“Good.” He let that rest for an uncomfortable length of time and then resumed. “Maura Beth, we're about three months out from the afternoon I advised you to try and turn your library around. That means you have less than two months left. You've had no increase in your circulation figures, and despite your Herculean efforts, that little book club of yours with the cutesy name has a membership I can count on one hand and a thumb, if I'm not mistaken.”

Maura Beth glanced down at the Persian carpet as she spoke. “You're not mistaken. People just haven't signed up like I'd hoped they would. Maybe Cherico really isn't all that interested in literary things. Perhaps I miscalculated, but I don't want to give up yet. Tara wasn't built in a day.”

He made a perfunctory effort to smile and then leaned forward, boring into her with his eyes. “Cut out the fiction and try to be realistic. I've always admired your spunk, and I've said as much to you several times. But this just isn't working for you right now. I never thought it would.”

Somehow, she found the courage to verbalize her worst fears. “Are you firing me or asking me to resign?”

She was surprised to see him flash that smile of his. “Neither, exactly. I'd like to suggest an alternative to you. I think the library situation is hopeless even though your time is technically not up yet. However, with Nora now gone, I'll have an opening for secretary right here in my office.”

Maura Beth slumped in her chair at what she considered to be a lukewarm proposition at best. She couldn't imagine doing anything with her life other than being a librarian. “So my future here in Cherico is to become your secretary and forget all my training?”

“I'm just trying to make the best of a bad situation,” he insisted. “You'd be an asset to this office, and, frankly, anyone could see that Nora was not. I owed her father a few favors when I first got elected and was stuck with her up until now. Basically, she has the personality and IQ of a persimmon, but I'm established enough now that I don't have to worry about what her father will say or do about me firing her. But, you, Maura Beth, would make anyone who came through my office door feel welcome and special. I've seen how you handle yourself at these library meetings. But then, that's what I've always found most attractive about you. That glowing innocence of yours, the expectations you arrived with fresh out of school. It flows out of you like your beautiful red hair.”

Maura Beth began to feel distinctly uncomfortable. “Aren't you getting a little too personal here again? These odes to my follicles are getting old.”

He tapped his pen on the desk again while mulling things over carefully. “I certainly don't mean to offend you, but let me put it this way. I didn't pay that much attention to you when you first came to Cherico. I approved your hire and forgot about it because the library has never been one of our priorities. But you have a way about you, and people took notice. Evie and I had dinner one night with Miss Voncille at The Twinkle, and all she did was rave about how cooperative you were with her ‘Who's Who?' organization. I believe her exact words were, ‘She's the sweetest thing to ever walk the streets of Cherico.' Of course, we knew she really didn't mean it the way it sounded.”

Maura Beth's eyes widened even as she chuckled under her breath. “Thank goodness for small favors.”

“My point is that you'd be a vast improvement over the nonentity who greeted my visitors, and with the money we'd save by closing down the library, your salary would take quite a healthy leap. You've worked hard these past six years, and you deserve more money for the effort you've made. But this is practically the only way I can reward you,” he concluded.

“Not to mention that you had the time of your life sitting back in your chair and doing your best to keep things stirred up at all my meetings.”

He rolled his eyes and screwed up his face for a moment. “Okay, I plead guilty to reading up on the classics to offer extremely literate criticism during sessions of The Cherry Cola Book Club. And by the way, I wasn't kidding when I said that Atticus Finch is the perfect man by any reasonable standard. Anyway, you have to know that Cherico isn't the center of the intellectual universe. The men folk talk college and pro sports all up and down Commerce Street, and the ladies complain about their husbands and children and exchange recipes at all the beauty parlors. I'd say literary criticism is way down the list of their topics to discuss. Do you really think you can ever pull this off?”