king Donald F. Gowdy. For the past two decades she has headed the philanthropic foundation he created, the D.F. Gowdy Charitable Trust.
“I’ve been spending my father’s money all my life,” she says.
I’d never met Ariel Wilburger-Gowdy, but I certainly knew about her good works. The Donald F. Gowdy Foundation is one of the bright spots in Hannawa’s struggling economy. It provides the seed money for inner-city businesses. It helps poor kids go to college. It supports the arts, helps battered women, teaches English to immigrants, spays and neuters cats and dogs, plants flowers in the city’s dreary parks. Oodles and oodles of worthwhile things.
I moved on to Violeta Bell:
If the Queens of Never Dull have a leader, it’s Violeta Bell.
“I guess I’m the burr under everybody’s saddle,” says Bell. “But the homestretch is no time to slow down.”
Bell is also the only member of the foursome to admit her age. “I’ll be 73 in August.”
This brings a disbelieving guffaw from Kay Hausenfelter. “She also claims to be Romanian royalty,” she says.
The playful Bell pretends to be insulted. “I will be 73 on my next birthday,” she insists again. “And if it hadn’t been for the damn Communists and their crazy ideas, you’d all be curtsying and calling me queen for real.”
Whether she’s a real queen or just one of the Queens of Never Dull, it is a fact that for nearly three decades the never-married Bell owned and operated Bellflower Antiques.
She’s lived at the Carmichael House since her retirement eight years ago.
Bellflower Antiques was once the gemstone of Puritan Square, the snooty shopping centre on West Apple Street designed to look like a quaint English village. I was never inside the shop-its By APPOINTMENT ONLY sign successfully kept riff-raff like me away-but I had driven by it a million times on my way to JCPennys. I read on:
Gloria McPhee is the only member of the Queens of Never Dull with a husband.
“It’s strange that Phil and I ended up in this little cubbyhole,” she says, referring to their spacious, glass- walled unit on the top floor of the Carmichael House. “Our whole life together was houses, houses, houses.”
While McPhee worked as a real estate broker, her husband, Philip, ran a residential pest extermination business. Before they moved into the Carmichael, they lived in an eight-bedroom Tudor on Merman Avenue.
“Before you think me high and mighty, let me tell you about all the crummy little houses I lived in first,” McPhee says.
I tried to finish reading Gabriella’s story while Ike showered. But the rattling of the spray on the shower curtain made it impossible for me to concentrate. So I put the paper down for later and washed the breakfast dishes.
Ike put on his suit and went to church.
I put on the CELLO EVERYBODY! sweatshirt and took James for his walk.
The sweatshirt was a gift from Ike. The romantic old fool had given it to me for Valentine’s Day. It came with the Yo-Yo Ma CD he got for pledging $120 to PBS.
3
Wednesday, July 5
Eric Chen pulled the Mountain Dew bottle off his lips and sniffed at my hair like a truffle-hunting hog. “You’re not spontaneously combusting are you?” he asked.
We were clicking our way up the tile-walled stairway to the third floor. The building has an elevator, of course, but it’s as slow as molasses. Anybody who has to get to a desk before noon takes the stairs. “I take it you didn’t come downtown for the fireworks last night,” I said, pulling my head out from under his.
“And you did?”
“As a matter of fact, I did.”
It took the young genius half a flight of steps to put two and two together. “Ah-you went with Ike.”
“He’s a Republican. What can I say.”
Eric opened the door for me. “So that’s your smoldering love I smell.”
We started across the empty newsroom toward the morgue. “No-that’s the smoke and ash from $40,000 worth of fireworks you smell. There was a damn temperature inversion halfway through the big show. It was like Pompeii.”
I couldn’t blame Eric for being surprised. Or for teasing me. For years I’ve been poooh-poohing the city’s schemes for luring suburbanites downtown. The annual Fourth of July “Star-Spangled Salute to the American Family” is its most atrocious effort. They cram Main Street with carnival rides and booths. The city surrenders the sidewalks to rock bands and hip-hoppers. They befoul the already tenuous air with barbecue sauce and overflowing Port-a-Potties. They finish off the four-day extravaganza with The Hannawa Symphony’s stale tribute to John Philip Sousa and, of course, the damn fireworks, the stench of which I couldn’t shampoo out of my hair.
Eric went to his desk to do whatever it is that he does. I went to mine to get my mug. The message light on my phone was blinking. It was Suzie Burns, the newsroom secretary. Her sugary southern Ohio twang almost always signals a hellish turn of events. “ Hiya, Maddy. It’s Suzie. Mr. Tinker wants to see you in his office-right away please!”
“Good gravy,” I growled. “Doesn’t anybody realize a woman my age needs to ease into her day slowly?”
I went to the cafeteria and made my tea. Then, with my mug in front of me like a Crusader’s shield, I headed for Tinker’s office.
Tinker was not alone. Police reporter Dale Marabout was there. Features editor Nancy Peale was there. And Gabriella Nash was there, bawling like a three-year-old who’d ridden her tricycle off the end of the porch.
Tinker smiled weakly at me. “I was hoping you could help Miss Nash through this.”
My first thought was that they’d fired her. That she’d made up a lot of stuff in her story. My second thought was that this was no time for me to gloat. That there’d be plenty of time for that later. I kneeled by Gabriella’s chair and patted her shoulder. “What’s this all about, dear?”
Tinker answered for her. “One of the garage sale ladies was murdered.”
That brought an anguished squeal from Gabriella and a fresh gush of tears. My knees were already beginning to hurt but I stayed put. I even offered the girl a sip of my tea-which she actually accepted. “That’s just terrible,” I said. “Which one?”
Dale provided the facts. “Violeta Bell. They found her on a mat in the fitness room. In her undies. Shot three times in the chest.”
Nancy provided the context. “Gabriella is afraid her story had something to do with the murder.”
“Oh, for Pete’s sake,” I snarled. I took my mug away from Gabriella. Struggled to my feet and headed for the door. “I’ve got work to do.”
Nancy bristled at me. “It was her first story, Maddy.”
I bristled right back. “Let’s hope it’s her last.”
Tinker’s hairless head turned into a giant salad tomato. He let me have it. “She admires you, Mrs. Sprowls. For some reason.”
After hearing that you’d think I’d feel awful and apologize, wouldn’t you? But I didn’t feel awful and I sure didn’t apologize. I just fumed while Tinker called me every name in the book. Gabriella, strangely enough, sniffed back her tears and came to my defense. “Leave Mrs. Sprowls alone. I wish I had her backbone.”
Now I did feel awful. I reached out and gently scratched Gabriella behind her ear, the way I scratch James when he surprises me with respect. “What do you say you and I take a walk to the cafeteria,” I said. “Get some fresh tea and maybe one of those big cookies in the vending machine.”
And so we went to the cafeteria. I made the tea and Gabriella bought the cookie. We sat at the table by the plastic bamboo plant. I snapped the cookie in two and gave her the bigger half.
She took a chipmunk-size nibble. “I guess I’ve set the women’s movement back a few years, huh?”
I wasn’t in the mood for a cute back-and-forth. I just wanted to scare some maturity into the girl and get back to my desk. I took the biggest bite of cookie I dared. “That story you wrote wasn’t about you, Gabriella. It was
