'You know, some people pay other people good money for what you're doing for these three weddings,' Michael remarked.
'Not enough,' I said, fervently. 'They can't possibly pay them enough.'
'I don't mean to be nosy,' Michael said, 'but your mother does seem to have a lot of very definite ideas about what she wants done, and you always seem to be the one who ends up doing everything. I was wondering ... uh ...'
'Is she always like that, and why do I put up with it?'
'Well, yes, more or less.'
'She's not usually this bad,' I said, with a sigh. 'I think it's sort of a loyalty test.'
'Loyalty test?'
'She's making me pay for having taken Dad's side in the divorce.'
'Did you really?' Michael asked. 'Take his side, I mean.'
'All three of us did,' I said. 'At least, Mother wanted a divorce and Dad didn't, and neither did Pam or Rob or I. If that counts as taking Dad's side, then yeah, I took his side. Still do. So it's my theory that Mother's making us all jump through hoops to pay for it.'
'If the question ever comes up, I am firmly on her side in any and all disputes, no matter how ridiculous,' Michael said.
'Good plan,' I replied.
'Unless, of course, you're on the other side.'
'Foolhardy, but I appreciate the thought.' It did take most of the afternoon to squelch the costume idea even with Mother, Mrs. Fenniman, and Pam helping out. Somewhere along the way, Mother promised Eileen that we would hold a costume party sometime between now and her wedding. I left them trying to settle on a date and retired to the hammock to fall asleep over chapter three of my mystery.
Thursday, June 23
And so for the fourth straight day in a row I drove in to Be-Stitched. Alone. Without telling anyone where I was going. Maybe that way I could finally sneak in my own fitting.
Michael looked up at the sound of the bell and I could see him suddenly grow tense. Or tenser; he hadn't really looked relaxed when I came in. Great, I thought, we're driving him crazy too.
'Yes?' he said, and glanced behind me at the door. I turned and looked, too. No one was there. Odd.
'Which one is it now?' he asked.
'Which one what?'
'Which one of them? Your mother, or Eileen, or Scarlet O'Hara--I mean, Samantha--'
'Just me. I was supposed to come by for a fitting, remember?'
'And no one else found any reason to come along? Like the last three days? No last-minute inspirations? No urge to ask how the latest alterations are coming? No kibitzing?'
'Just me.'
'Amazing,' he muttered. 'An absolute bloody miracle.'
'You're in a good mood.'
'Sorry. We just had an absolutely horrible fitting with another bride. I had to stand there and be polite while her mother accused me of everything from incompetence to lunacy, and then when she started on Mrs. Tranh and the ladies, I lost my temper. I don't care if the whole town thinks I'm an idiot on top of everything else, but I won't have the ladies blamed for something that's not their fault.'
'I saw them on my way in; let me guess: the dress was much too small, particularly in the waist, and according to the mother you must have messed up the measurements.'
'Are you psychic?' he asked in surprise.
'No, but I have Mother and the Hollingworth grapevine.'
'They just left ten minutes ago; don't tell me the old ... lady was on the phone already telling everyone about it.'
'No, although I'm sure that's on her afternoon agenda. But it's been all over the grapevine for two weeks that her daughter is pregnant, which could certainly tend to make the measurements you took a month or two ago obsolete.'
'Wish I was on the grapevine,' he complained. 'I had no idea why she was so touchy about my suggestion that the kid had gained a few pounds until Mrs. Tranh explained it to me.'
'I just found out this morning myself. You have to be able to translate. No one comes right out and says 'So-and-so is getting married because she's pregnant.' They talk about a 'sudden' marriage, with a little pause before the word sudden.'
'So they got married suddenly merely means that it surprised the hell out of everyone, where as they got married ... suddenly means at the point of Daddy's shotgun.'
'Precisely. He died suddenly meant nobody expected it; he died ... suddenly means call the medical examiner; it could be homicide.'
'Do you have a lot of homicide around here?' he asked.
'This summer is practically a first. That was just a hypothetical example.'
'I see.'
'If you listen closely for that little beat, you can start picking up all sorts of useless information. Being down here for the summer, I seem to be regaining all my lost small-town survival skills.'
'Any advice for dealing with the irate mother?' he asked.
'Let Mrs. Tranh and the ladies handle it. Now that they know, I'm sure they can guesstimate what size she'll be in two weeks.'
'I'm sure they can, but what if her mother starts bad-mouthing the shop all over town?'
'Don't worry about it; everyone knows being abused by that particular grand dame is a normal rite of passage for the local merchants. Besides, she and Mother loathe each other, so I'll tell Mother about it at lunch. By dinner, your side of the story will be all over town.'
'I'd appreciate that. I'd hate to be responsible for running Mom's business into the ground while she's laid up. And speaking of business,' he said, briskly changing tone, 'let's have Mrs. Tranh get your dress.'
Having seen the pictures, I thought I would be prepared for Samantha's hooped monstrosity. But I'm sure Michael and Mrs. Tranh were disappointed at the look on my face when she came trotting out with the dress and held it up.
'Oh, dear,' I said.
'I'm crushed.' He chuckled. 'You'll break the ladies' hearts.'
'Don't get me wrong. It's lovely. Lovely fabric. Wonderful workmanship.'
'But not the sort of thing you'd ever think of wearing.'
'Or inflicting upon an unsuspecting friend.' I walked around and looked at it from another angle. 'Somehow I wasn't expecting the hoops to be quite so ... enormous.'
'Although my experience is limited to this summer,' Michael said, 'I've evolved a theory that bridesmaids' gowns are generally chosen either to make the bride look good at her friends' expense, or to force the friends to prove their devotion by having their pictures taken in a garment they are mortally embarrassed to be seen wearing in public.'
'You've left out inflicting acute physical torment,' I added. 'Think of Eileen and her velvet and these damned corsets.'
'True. When I publish the theory, I'll put you down as coauthor.'
'Well, let's get this over with,' I said, following Mrs. Tranh behind the dressing-room curtain.
Several of the ladies had to help me get into the dress. I made a mental note to ask Michael if we could hire some of them to help out on the wedding day. And when we finally got me into the thing, I realized that in my dismay over the enormous size of the skirts, I had failed to notice the correspondingly tiny size of the bodice.
'I feel as if I'm falling out of this,' I said, more to myself than anyone else, since obviously Mrs. Tranh and
