Stardust A Novel (19 page)
“Not the cottages. Something else.”
“All right.” We fell in stride, silence heavy like the air around us. “I’ve been meaning to ask about your trip. How was it?”
His face clouded as he shrugged. “Hard. I’m sure you could relate. Burying those you love is never easy.”
The stormy blue of his eyes stole the air from my lungs. “The woman who called? She died?”
“Betty? No, her husband. Complications from his injuries in Korea. We were in the same platoon.” He spoke in a flat tone, his eyes aimed at his shoes.
“I’m sorry.”
“We all carry the ghosts of our pasts, I guess. You. Catfish. Me.”
Silence deafened me, waiting for him to continue, hoping he wouldn’t.
His Adam’s apple bobbled in his throat. His eyes were still moist when he looked at me. “Come on, let me show you what I’ve been thinking.”
He led me to the clearing out back. Leftover lumber dotted the area in various grids. He pointed under the trees. “What do you think of putting a few picnic tables over here? There’s nice shade, and I could get Catfish to help me cut trees for the lumber we’d need.”
“You’re assuming, of course, we’ll have guests who will want to take advantage of a picnic spot.”
“We already have the barbecue. In the summer, people would prefer to eat outdoors rather than take whatever they’ve cooked back to their cottages.” He raised his eyebrows in a questioning look.
“I had thought of adding a swing set or something for children to play on.”
“I’ve laid that out over here. We’ll want it far enough away from the cooking area to be safe. Cecil has all sorts of pipe and junk behind his shop I could salvage. We’d have to get new chains and seats for the swings. Maybe later add a teeter-totter and some sidewalks.”
“Don’t get carried away. We haven’t even had our first customer yet.”
“You will.”
“I guess that means you’re going to stick around awhile.”
“I’ve no place else to go.” His voice was upbeat, but the way his shoulders drooped and his eyes remained dull made me think he would carry the scars of his friend for a long time.
I was an expert on scars.
Late in the afternoon a man with a crew cut and ears that reminded me of doorknobs approached the counter. “It says you have a vacancy. Any chance you can put up a family of five?”
I smiled, giving him the information about the cottages and the rate per night. I’d rented four cottages since noon. I grabbed the key from its hook. “Let me show you before you decide.”
As we walked across the parking lot, his wife and three small boys with the same round ears as their father and bounding with energy joined us. “This room has a hide-a-bed that should work with the size of your boys here. And there’s a hot plate and separate sink in the kitchen corner. You’re welcome to use the community icebox on the stoop behind the laundry.”
His wife, a petite blonde with a headscarf tied under her chin, said, “I love it. We’ll take it.”
She and the boys stayed behind while the gentleman went back with me to make the arrangements. After he paid for one night, I gave him a welcome packet with a map of places to eat in Mayhaw and information about fishing on the bayou. “Ruby’s Café is nice for a family. Just half a block down.”
“What about fish we catch in the creek?”
“We have the icebox, but I’d rather you keep them in an ice chest until you can cook them. We have cooking facilities behind the Stardust. If you need an ice chest, Cecil across the road has a couple different sizes, and the ice plant is two blocks down, take a left, and go till it dead-ends. You can’t miss it.”
He thanked me and left. Personal service was one of the things I hoped would make guests comfortable and want to return for another stay. Peter’s plan for the picnic tables and swings for the kiddos added to my excitement, and I allowed myself to daydream. Happy children racing through the grass, playing tag or Red Rover, and squealing with laughter on the swings.
No Vacancy
would flash across the slim rectangle at the bottom of the Stardust sign, and people would drive away disappointed to see we were full.
If only we could’ve stayed at that cute place with the cottages that looked like postcards from Switzerland.
It was a silly fantasy, but one that was materializing before my eyes. Five of the eight available cottages already rented. And as I strutted around, feeling all smarty-pants, Aunt Cora’s voice from the past popped into my head, “Pride cometh before a fall. So get yourself down off that pedestal and make yourself useful.”
One thing about Aunt Cora, she wouldn’t abide boasting or sassing in any form, especially if it was your own accomplishments that swelled your head. The air in the office was stuffy, even with the fan going. Or maybe it was me feeling the rush of excitement and realizing my folly in being boastful. I pulled out the rubber band holding my topknot and shook my head, letting my hair fall to my shoulders. Although my neck was damp with humidity, it was freeing and made me feel a bit giddy.
I looked in on the girls in the quarters. “Want to come outside for a while?”
Rosey had a pencil propped on her ear. “After awhile. I’m the schoolteacher, and Avril’s my pupil. She has to finish her coloring before she can have recess.”
“Alrighty, then. I’ll be on the steps out front having a glass of tea.”
If anything, it was more stifling outdoors, like the world was holding its breath, waiting to exhale. Overhead, the sky had taken on a pale, watery color. We’d have rain before morning as sure as my name was Georgia Lee Peyton. I hoped it didn’t ruin the holiday for those tucked in my cottages. I slipped off my sandals and wiggled my toes on the warm wooden boards beneath them. When I looked up, Mary Frances was headed my way, a stern look on her face.
She didn’t waste any time with greetings. “Guess you’re so busy you forgot about fixin’ supper.”
“Hello to you, too. And no, I didn’t forget supper. I thought we’d have grilled cheese tonight since I don’t know who might be coming next for a room.”
“Hmmph.” She pulled her cigarette purse from her pocket, fished out a Pall Mall, and lit it.
I patted the step beside me. “Have a seat.”
We sat without talking, her puffing, me watching the newest guests unload their car and disappear into their cottage.
Mary Frances spoke first. “How long do you think O’Dell was in the bayou after he drowned?”
The question came out of nowhere. I wasn’t even certain I’d heard her right, but her eyes were steeled on me, waiting for an answer. “I don’t know. Why do you ask?”
“I remembered something while we were at the cemetery… a phone call.”
“From O’Dell?” My stomach clenched, and I wasn’t sure I wanted to know.
“I think it was about a week before they found him. I wasn’t thinking too clearly then.”
She hadn’t thought clearly since Earl died, but I didn’t remind her of this. “You remembered it now, though.”
“Earlier. I’ve been beating my brains out trying to think it all out. He had something to tell me and wanted to do it in person.”
“Any idea what?”
Fiona Callahan. Was that it?
“No, but he acted nervous. Do you think someone could’ve killed him? Either on purpose or by accident?”
“No. Sheriff didn’t find anything unusual. O’Dell didn’t have any enemies that I know of.”
She sent a few puffs of smoke out into the already stale air, then turned abruptly to me. “Who was the woman O’Dell was seeing? You said he had an insurance policy in her name.”
“He did. I still have it in my bedroom. Do you suppose that’s what he wanted to tell you? Maybe let you hold on to it?”
“I’d think he would give it to her, so that doesn’t make sense. Nothing does. Maybe he had second thoughts and was thinking of coming back to you.”
“Then he would’ve called me, don’t you think?”
“Would you have taken him back?”
“Children should have a daddy. For them I suppose I would have. It’s not something I dwell on in light of what happened. I’ve wondered, though, what I should do with the policy.”
“Burn it. That’s what I would do.”
“I don’t know.”
Wheels crunched on the drive as a station wagon pulled to a stop. A head popped out the window on the driver’s side. “Ya got any vacancies?”
“Yes, sir. Come on in and I’ll set you right up.”
Mary Frances threw down her cigarette butt and ground it out with her shoe. “Looks like it’ll be awhile on those grilled cheese sandwiches.”
“It does. Unless you want to get things started. I’d like that… to have you be more a part of the family activity. Maybe even help out some in the office.”
“Not tonight.” She shuffled off as the man introduced himself and rented a cottage for the entire weekend.
Only two vacancies.
My dreams came in fits and spurts that night. No matter what position I tried, I couldn’t sleep. And then when I did, everything was twisted and bizarre. I blamed Mary Frances, but the rain pounding the windows might’ve been partially responsible. Oddly enough, the girls didn’t come running into my bed as they usually did even though fierce streaks of lightning lit up the windows. Thunderclaps shook the walls, and with each one, a vision of O’Dell being swept through the bayou, the water engorging his body, leaching it of all its color, ricocheted through me.
I got up and put the kettle on to make myself a cup of tea. Worrying the sheets into tangles certainly hadn’t helped. And whatever O’Dell intended to tell his mother now rested in the bosom of the bayou—bobbing along the dark waters among the cypress.
I’d nearly finished my tea when the buzzer sounded in the office.
Who on earth would be out on a night like this?
I started to ignore it, then thought better of it. What if it was Mary Frances? Or someone in need of a dry spot to get in out of the rain? Aunt Cora’s warnings of all the awful things that could happen zipped through my mind, but I grabbed my robe and went to open the door.
A man of sixty or so ducked in the door, his hair plastered to his head, clothes sopping wet. “Sorry to be so late.” He took a good look at me, then stammered, “Y-you… you’re not Doreen. Or Paddy. Mighty sorry, ma’am. Didn’t mean to bust right on in.”
“It’s fine. I’m Georgia Peyton.”
“Are you open? The light was on. I got a late start, didn’t figure on the rain being so blasted hard. Only thing that kept me from running my car into the bar ditch was seeing the neon sign.”
“I’m glad it was a beacon for you. Are you a friend of the Palmers?”
“Of sorts. I reserve a room for every weekend during the summer starting with Memorial weekend. Didn’t Doreen tell you?”
“No.” I told him about Paddy’s passing and Doreen moving to Oklahoma. That I was the new owner.
“So sorry to hear about Paddy. Fine fellow. Any chance you have a room?”
“Two left. Take your pick. Number one or nine.”
“Nine suits me. I can show myself in.”
He fished a wad of bills from his wallet and passed them over to me. “We’ll settle the bill later. I’m ready to get these wet things off and get some shut-eye. The fish’ll be biting like piranhas at first light with the bayou stirred up like this.” He took the key, scribbled his name in the guest log, and showed himself out. He’d written Malcolm Overstreet, a name I didn’t recognize. Oh, well. He’d paid me a hefty amount. I gave him time to get to his car before I turned out the porch light.
One cottage left. It wasn’t a matter of pride. I was merely doing what I was meant to do—provide a spot for weary bodies and happy vacationers. I stood at the window and peered through the rain at the neon sign. The red and blue and yellow letters swam together, a wavy welcome even in the storm. I rested my chin on the sill and let the glory of it wash over me.
