He was propped up in our bed against a number of pillows, with blanket and comforter tucked over and around him, books and magazines spread out on the bed, a tray of tempting liquids and curative medications on the bedside table, the humidifier steaming up the room, the television on, and the remote at hand.
“What more could I want?” he asked, indicating it all with a wave of his arm.
“Well, you might need something.”
“Then I’ll get up and get it. Go on, Julia, and enjoy yourself. I’ll be fine.”
So I went, but I didn’t much enjoy it. Sue had all the felt, rickrack, sequins, glue, and you-name-it needed to make ornaments for decorating Christmas trees at the chosen nursing homes. Plying a yarn-threaded needle to sew two halves of a star together, I sat at her dining room table along with Rebecca, Emma Sue, Callie, and Sue.
Noting with relief that neither LuAnne nor Helen was there, I wondered if it was because I was. If they were avoiding me, I determined I would not let it bother me. But of course it did—until something came up that bothered me even more.
No one had said anything about our reduced number, although Sue commented on how busy everyone was and left it at that. In fact, hardly anyone had anything at all to say, seemingly engrossed with the work in hand.
It wasn’t until Callie asked what I’d thought about the commissioners’ meeting that the conversation took on a life of its own.
Answering carefully, I said, “I was disappointed that they didn’t have the courage to vote publicly, but I guess that was too much to ask.”
“Well,” Callie said, “I knew before I left what they were going to do. While everybody was milling around, I went down the hall to the restroom and passed a room where the commissioners were putting on their coats. They were standing around, talking in sort of an impromptu closed session. Except it wasn’t so closed, because the door was partly open. So I listened.”
“That’s eavesdropping, Callie,” Rebecca said with a note of rebuke.
“No, it wasn’t. If they’d wanted to keep it secret, they should’ve shut the door. Anyway, Pete Hamrick was really holding forth about the number of people who’d been there and about how they couldn’t be expected to make a judgment with everybody and his brother criticizing everything they did. Then,” Callie went on with emphasis, “he told them—and I heard this as plain as day—that they’d better not get cold feet, because, he said, there’re always some people against progressive ideas. Then he said something about their having the authority to override the zoning board, and they’d better stick to their promise when the time came. And,” she concluded, “according to the newspaper, it looks like they did.”
My heart sank, as what I’d thought was going on had indeed been going on. I did, however, hold my peace, not wanting to air my concerns with those who were hardly affected by Madge’s invasion of a neighborhood.
I was surprised, though, when Sue said, “I thought there was something fishy about it from the start, and that just proves it.”
“I figured it was, too,” Rebecca said. “Pete Hamrick has been in the library almost every week since this all started, looking at law books and historic records and books on upgrading small towns. I know,” she went on, “because he came to the reference desk and asked for help to find what he wanted. I guess,” she said, with a wry twist of her mouth, “he thought that reference librarians were so wrapped up with Dewey decimal numbers, they couldn’t put two and two together.”
“Well,” Emma Sue said, “just don’t get crosswise of him. You know I’m not one to talk about people, but I’ve heard he has a one-track mind when he wants something. He can be very nice, but he’ll run over you if you’re in his way. But,” she cautioned, “I did not hear that from Larry, who would never compromise the sanctity of the pastor’s study.” She stopped and primly nodded her head. “I heard it at the beauty shop, which means that it wasn’t privileged information.”
Feeling that I was among sympathetic friends, I was tempted to release some of my outrage at both Madge’s high-handedness and the commissioners’ underhandedness. I was afraid, though, that once I started, I might also reveal the hand that Mildred and I were about to deal to those who thought they’d already won the pot.
I’ve never played poker, but I know the vocabulary and I’m not unfamiliar with high-stakes games. So I bit my lip and pondered this new information.
—
Studying on what had been said as I drove the empty streets toward home about ten-thirty that cold December night, I couldn’t wait to tell both Sam and Mildred what Callie had overheard. And to tell them what Emma Sue had said about Pete Hamrick, who now seemed up to his neck in monkey business as well as commissioners’ business. The decision to grant a zoning variance, even though disguised as a conditional-use permit, had apparently been cut-and-dried before Pete Hamrick had banged down the opening gavel. And furthermore, Madge had known there’d be no problem before she’d first put a foot in the Cochran house. I’d call that public corruption, wouldn’t you?
Driving slowly toward home, going in and out of spots of light from the streetlamps, I turned with no particular aim in mind onto Jackson Street—just taking the long way home. A few cars were parked along one side, but no one was out in the bitterly cold night. I had the long, straight, tree-lined street all to myself.
As I approached the Pickens house from a few
