Before I could ask Aunt Maggie what murder she was talking about, Aunt Nora called us to dinner. “We’ll talk about it later,” was all Aunt Maggie would say as we went into the dining room.
I suppose Aunt Maggie’s announcement should have affected my appetite, but it wasn’t the first time my family had sent me after a killer. Admittedly, I’d gone after the first one on my own, but after that, my family had come to expect it of me. Since I hadn’t heard of a death in the family or of anybody in the family getting arrested, I wasn’t as worried as I might have been otherwise.
Besides which, Aunt Nora is one of the best cooks in the known universe. She doesn’t cook anything fancy, but what she can do with chicken and dumplings is fancy enough for me, especially with collard greens and biscuits on the side. As for dessert, Aunt Daphine may not cook as well as Aunt Nora, but nobody can match her apple pie. She’d brought two of them to make sure there was plenty for everybody, which there was, but just barely. There’s a reason that people in Boston get hungry when I tell them about my trips to North Carolina.
Aunt Daphine was sitting next to me, and she said, “Laurie Anne, you know I didn’t mean for Aunt Maggie to do that to her hair. I wanted her to come down to the shop so I could fix it for her.”
“I know,” I said.
“But no, she couldn’t do that. Instead she uses some box of hair color that’s probably as old as she is, and then blames me when it comes out looking like that.”
“I know.”
“I could bleach it and put in some decent-looking color but she won’t let me. She says she’s going to let it grow out. Can you imagine what it’s going to look like in two months?”
I tried, I really tried, but I just couldn’t. “Will you do me a favor and send me a picture?”
That broke her up, which made me start laughing. Augustus, who was sitting across from me, joined in heartily, and I hadn’t even realized that he was listening. In fact, he kept laughing after Aunt Daphine and I stopped.
When he finally quit snickering, I said, “Augustus, tell me about Germany. Was it as beautiful as it looks in the postcards?”
He smiled slowly, and I couldn’t help noticing how much he looked like Paw, our late grandfather. Normally that would have been a compliment. Paw had been a slight man with light blue eyes, a good chin, and a smile that hardly ever went away. Augustus had the same features, but his eyes were distant and his smile didn’t seem to be aimed at me, or at anybody else in the room. He looked worn, stretched thin in a way Paw hadn’t been except in times of bad trouble.
He said, “It was about like you’d expect. Everything was real old. Sometimes I swear I could just feel the age seeping into me. There were some good places to party, though. Some real good places.”
He stopped, and I waited for a minute, expecting details, a funny story or two, something. But he didn’t seem to have anything else to say. “Where all did you go?” I asked.
He thought it over, chewing slowly. “Worms, of course. That’s where I was stationed most of the time. Little place, but they got a big old church there. I went inside it once.”
From across the table, Richard asked, “Isn’t that the cathedral where Martin Luther posted the Diet of Worms?”
“A diet of worms?” Vasti said. “Who would eat that?”
I think she was kidding.
As for Augustus, he nodded, but didn’t say anything else.
I said, “You went to Paris, too, didn’t you? What was it like? Is the food as good as they say it is?”
“It was all right. I don’t remember much about the food.”
“Is Paris where you got that smelly-good-em you’re wearing?” Arthur asked.
Now that Arthur mentioned it, Augustus was kind of fragrant. I’d noticed it when we sat down, but I’d blamed it on Vasti, who never thinks that less is more, especially not when putting on perfume. Tonight Augustus smelled nicer than she did.
Vasti must have thought so, too, because she said, “You could have brought me some French perfume.”
All Augustus said was, “I didn’t do much shopping.”
Richard caught my eye, and I shrugged, this time meaning that I didn’t have any idea of what was wrong with Augustus. The last time we’d seen him, he’d been chattering a mile a minute about all the sights he wanted to see in Europe. He’d spent months reading up on European history, art, and food. Now he acted like it was no big deal. Of course, it had been a few years since I’d seen him. Though both he and I had been home to visit since then, we’d never been there at the same time. I’d have thought Aunt Nora would have told me that he’d changed so much, but maybe it had happened so gradually that she hadn’t noticed.
I tried again to draw him out. “It must be strange to be out of the army after all these years. Do you think you’re going to miss it much?”
He just shook his head and took another bite of his food.
“What are your plans now?”
“I haven’t got any.”
“Why didn’t you reenlist?” Vasti asked. “It’s not like you’ve got a job here.”
“He can have himself a job at the mill any time he wants,” Thaddeous said heartily. “All he has to do is come by.”
“I just might do that,” Augustus said. “Maybe next week.”
But I heard Uncle Buddy mutter, “He’s been saying that ever since he got back.”
“Augustus is taking some time to catch his breath,” Aunt Nora said. “Jet lag and all.”
“Jet lag is a killer,” I said. “It took Richard forever to get over his when he got back from England.” Richard nodded, but both he and I knew that it had taken him no more than a week to get back to normal. Augustus had been back nearly a month. Something was wrong, and no matter what Aunt Nora said, she thought so, too.
Probably to change the subject, Aunt Nora said, “Are you feeling all right, Richard?”
“As far as I know. Do I look sick?” he said.
Richard’s dark brown hair was as disheveled as ever, but he looked good to me, especially those eyes of his, which were enough to make any woman fall in love with him.
“Not at all, it’s just I haven’t heard you say anything from Shakespeare since you’ve been here.”
Richard looked sheepish as I said, “He’s giving it up for a while. We were out with some friends, and Richard laughed at them for talking shop. He said they don’t know how to draw the line between work and real life. Then our friend Libby said he had no room to talk because he couldn’t quit quoting Shakespeare if his life depended on it, and everybody else agreed with her. Richard wanted to prove them wrong, so he’s vowed not to say anything Shakespearean until classes start up again.”
“How would they know if he did it when they’re not around?” Thaddeous wanted to know.
“They trust him, for one,” I said. “And I’m watching him, for another. There’s money riding on this, and I get a cut if he loses.”
Everybody laughed while Richard tried to look injured. “Apparently some people find the habit annoying, though I can’t see why.”
“It’s not a bit annoying,” Aunt Nora said, which was awfully nice of her. “It’s just that sometimes it’s hard for us to make out what you’re talking about.”
Thaddeous asked, “How long has this been going on?”
“One week, six days, and eighteen hours,” Richard said glumly. “Which means that I’ve got two weeks, two days, and fourteen hours to go.”
Everybody laughed again, except for Aunt Maggie, who was shaking her head like she couldn’t figure out what was so funny. I’ve always thought that deep down Aunt Maggie is amused by me and Richard, but it must be real deep down, because she sure doesn’t let it show.
Changing the subject again, Aunt Maggie said, “Arthur, I spoke to Evan Cawthorne the other day, and he wants to know if y’all have done anything about the town line yet.”
“He knows I’m doing everything I can,” Arthur said. “I want to buy that property as much as he wants to sell it, but that map is nowhere to be found.”
“What map is that?” I asked.
“The map that shows where the border between Byerly and Rocky Shoals is,” Aunt Maggie said. “You know Tight as a Tick Flea Market where I set up?”
I nodded.
“Evan Cawthorne is the man who owns the lot, and Arthur wants to buy it.”
“For a secret business deal,” Vasti said. “I can’t tell you any details right now.”
I already knew what her secret was, and from the expressions on faces around the table, everybody else did, too. Vasti isn’t very good at keeping secrets. She was talking about Arthur’s plan to relocate his car dealership. Since there’s not a lot of public transportation in North Carolina, and none in Byerly, cars are mighty important. Arthur’s business was booming, and he needed space to expand.
Aunt Maggie went on. “Evan wants to sell, but he can’t until they figure out which town the land is in.”
“I thought the flea market was in Byerly,” Richard said.
“Part of it is,” Aunt Maggie agreed, “but part of it’s in Rocky Shoals. The lot is right on top of the town line. According to Byerly maps, most of it’s in Byerly, but according to Rocky Shoals maps, most of it’s in Rocky Shoals.”
“Our map predates the Rocky Shoals map by a month, so that should settle it,” Arthur said indignantly. “But the Rocky Shoals town clerk noticed that our map is a hand-drawn copy, and they insist on seeing the original.”
“What happened to the original?” I asked.
“It’s been misplaced,” Arthur said.
Vasti said, “Can you imagine that? Is that any way to run a city? Thank goodness Arthur is on the city council to make sure things are done right.”
Aunt Maggie looked skeptical, but all she said was, “Evan’s probably got a place in his bank account waiting for that money so he can watch the interest grow. I never saw anybody so close with his money as Evan Cawthorne.”
“You can’t blame him for being careful,” Aunt Nora said. “If I’d spent my childhood never knowing where my next meal was coming from, I’d be thrifty, too.”
“Thrifty?” Aunt Maggie snorted. “Evan Cawthorne is as tight as a tick, and you know it. Where do you think he got the name for the flea market?” Aunt Maggie turned back to Arthur. “What do you want me to tell him?”
Arthur mumbled something about what he’d like to tell him, and Vasti said, “I’d think Mr. Cawthorne would have more important things to worry about right now, what with that man getting killed over there. I hear he bled—”
Uncle Buddy said, “Not at the table. That kind of talk upsets Nora.”
Actually, it was Uncle Buddy who had the queasy stomach, but even Vasti knew better than to point that out. I wished he’d let her keep talking because that was probably the murder Aunt Maggie had mentioned earlier. Since we couldn’t talk about that, we talked about the rest of the family.
Aunt Edna and Caleb were still getting along like gang-busters, but there was some debate as to whether or not Linwood was going to break them up. Caleb was the first man Edna had dated since the death of her husband, and Linwood wasn’t happy about it.
“They never get any time alone,” Aunt Nora said. “Here they decided to go to that convention, and Linwood just had to tag along. If having him and Sue and those four kids of theirs along doesn’t discourage Caleb, it must be love.”
Uncle Roger and Aunt Ruby Lee were constantly busy because Roger’s Ramblers kept getting more and more popular. Uncle Roger’s road trips and the carousing that went along with them had broken up their first marriage, but when they remarried, Aunt Ruby Lee decided to go along and manage the group so Uncle Roger could concentrate on the music. To everybody’s surprise, she was turning out to be one heck of a manager. As Aunt Nora explained, “The club owners see those big blue eyes and all that blond hair—”
“And her—” Augustus started, and knowing how buxom Aunt Ruby Lee is, I thought I knew what he was about to say.
But Aunt Nora cut him off. “And her figure, and they think they’re going to be able to pull the wool over her eyes. But before they know it, they’ve promised her twice as much money as they meant to, and free drinks for the band. I don’t know how she does it. She’s starting to set up dates for the kids’ band, too.”
Aunt Ruby Lee’s three children had started their own band. “Have they settled on a name?” I asked.
“Not yet,” Thaddeous said. “Right now they’re going by the Carolina Cowboys, but they don’t like it much.”
“I have a wonderful name for them, but they won’t use it,” Vasti said. “I think they should call themselves the Byerly Buckaroos.”
I could see why they wouldn’t. The Byerly Buckaroos sounded like a kid’s cartoon show to me. That brought us to Aunt Nellie and Uncle Ruben, and I asked why they weren’t there with the rest of us.
Aunt Daphine said, “They’re cleaning out their store. They got the landlord to let them out of the lease, but they have to get everything out of there tonight.”
“Already?” I asked. “What happened? I thought a video rental place would go over great in Byerly.”
“It would have if they’d had anything anybody wanted to see,” Thaddeous said. “They got a good deal on a bunch of tapes, and it didn’t occur to them that the reason they were so cheap was because most of them were movies nobody had ever heard of. Half of them wouldn’t even run on a regular VCR.”
“They didn’t buy Beta tapes, did they?” I asked.
Thaddeous nodded.
Even when Aunt Nellie and Uncle Ruben had a good idea, they still managed to wrest defeat from the jaws of victory.
“How are the triplets?” I asked.
“Still chasing everything in pants,” Vasti said with a sniff.
I thought about reminding her how man-crazy she’d been before marrying Arthur, but decided to be nice. “They aren’t still stuck on Slim Grady, are they?” Slim played guitar for the Ramblers, and last summer, Carlelle, Ideile, and Odelle had all set their caps for him, which had caused no end of trouble.
“Lord, no,” Aunt Nora said. “They’ve gone through two or three fellows each since then. Now they’re down at the beach looking for new ones.”
“I don’t think those three are ever going to settle down and raise a family,” Vasti said. “Which reminds me, Arthur. We have to be sure and get home early. You saw the calendar today, didn’t you?”
Arthur turned beet red, and I didn’t blame him. The whole family knew that he and Vasti were trying to have a baby, but we really didn’t need to know the particulars.
Vasti said, “What about you, Richard? Isn’t your clock ticking?”
She was referring to his biological clock, which I know he knew, but he assumed an innocent expression, held up his watch hand, and said, “It’s digital—doesn’t tick.”
While Vasti was trying to come up with an answer, Aunt Nora shooed us away from the table. I offered to help clean up, but she never lets me. The only one she would let help was Aunt Daphine, and that was so they could gossip.
Richard and I went to sit in the living room with everybody else, but Vasti hadn’t been kidding when she said she wanted to get home early. She didn’t even sit down—just pulled on Arthur’s arm and said, “We have to get going, honey. We don’t want to miss our chance.” His face went red again.
I’d expected to spend the evening visiting, but Aunt Maggie said, “I think we’ll be getting on home, too. I’ve got some business to discuss with Laurie Anne and Richard, and I’d just as soon do it in private.” She looked directly at Vasti when she said it. Telling Vasti something is like announcing it over a bad loudspeaker. Everybody around hears it, but the details get garbled.
We didn’t leave right away, of course. Goodbyes in Byerly are long, drawn-out affairs, even when the people involved are going to see each other again the next day. With Richard and me just in town for a visit, it took even longer, and required many hugs, promises to spend lots of time together, and a few tears from Aunt Nora. I’m not sure why she was crying, but Aunt Nora doesn’t really enjoy a family event unless she gets a chance to cry about something.
So it was more than half an hour later that Arthur, Vasti, Aunt Maggie, Richard, and I finally got out the door. Then, despite her claiming to be in a hurry, Vasti had to tell me a half a dozen tidbits of gossip about people I barely knew and tell me how pale I looked. I was going to remind her that the weather in Boston doesn’t make it easy to get a tan, but Richard spoke up first to tell her that it was the contrast between my soft brown hair and deep brown eyes that made my skin look so fair. That hushed her up long enough for us to jump into the car with Aunt Maggie.