The Darling Dahlias and the Cucumber Tree

Listening, Myra May thought that Mr. Johnson sounded just a bit too dramatic, which was unlike him. He usually talked like butter wouldn’t melt in his mouth, and here he was, sounding like a Hardshell Baptist preaching Armageddon.

A few moments later, Mr. Johnson asked Myra May to connect him, long distance, with a man in the banking division of the state comptroller’s office in Montgomery. The conversation was too technical for Myra May to follow, but the gist of it seemed to be that Darling Savings and Trust was about to be put on the list of “troubled banks.” Myra May recognized this term because she had read it in the Mobile Register when a half-dozen Florida banks had failed the previous year. There was something about “undercapitalization” (she had no idea what that meant) and “unsecured loans” (that one she understood). But the central problem for the bank seemed to be, as Mr. Johnson put it darkly, the “malfeasance of a trusted bank employee,” who would be arrested as soon as the investigation was completed.

They hung up and Myra May sat there at the switchboard, feeling so sorry for poor Alice Ann that she could cry. And so angry at Mr. Johnson—that proud, puffed-up little man who was rich enough to buy and sell half the town and didn’t hesitate to foreclose on any poor soul who got behind on his payments—that she could just about spit nails.

While she was thinking this, there was a call from Florence Henderson, asking to be connected to her elderly mother so she could see if she needed any groceries from Hancock’s, since Florence was coming to town to shop. Her mother asked her to get a loaf of bread, a pound of sugar, and a box of Kellogg’s Corn Flakes, which should come to a total of eighteen cents (five cents for the bread, five for the sugar, eight for the corn flakes), which Mrs. Hancock should put on her mother’s account. Then Mr. Snow at the Farm Supply wanted to talk to Calvin Combs so he could ask about payment on an overdue bill for seeds planted the year before. It was a big bill, too, nearly nine dollars, but all Mrs. Combs could say (Mr. Combs was out in the field) was that they would try to pay something—maybe fifty cents—the next week or the week after. Last year’s crop hadn’t done too well because of the drought.

As she plugged in these calls, Myra May kept thinking about Alice Ann, trying to come up with something she could do to help. She knew very well that Alice Ann didn’t have it in her to steal money. What’s more, she was a Dahlia. The Dahlias ought to stand up for one another when there was trouble.

Finally, she rang Alice Ann’s number. When Alice Ann said hello, in a tired, unhappy voice, she said, “Alice Ann, honey, I’ve been hearin’ about your troubles. I wish there was something I could do, but I just can’t think what. Still, I want you to know that your friends don’t believe a word of it. Not a single, solitary word.”

There was a click on the line and then another and another, and Myra May said firmly, “Miz Perkins, is that you? Mr. King? One of the Barrett sisters? This is a private call, if y’all don’t mind. Miz Walker and I would appreciate it if you could just hang up now.”

Then she waited, counting the clicks. One, two.

“One more,” Myra May said sternly. “Maybe you don’t know it, but listenin’ to private conversations is against the law.” The third receiver went down.

By this time, Alice Ann was crying as if her heart would break.

“Oh, Myra May,” she sobbed, “I can’t thank you enough for callin’!” The words came tumbling out, all in a hurry. “Yours is the first friendly voice I’ve heard all day, and it sounds so sweet. I’ve been feelin’ all alone out here, just me an’ Arnold, and neither one of us knowin’ what in the world we ought to do. They won’t let me work at my window at the bank and I know I’m goin’ to be fired. Mr. Johnson took me into his office and him and the bank examiner kept askin’ me how was it I took all that money and what did I do with it, and I kept sayin’ I didn’t take any money so how could I tell them where it was?” She gulped. “But they say they’ve got evidence against me, Myra May! They say I might could get arrested!”

“What kind of evidence?”

“They say it’s in the bank records, although they won’t tell me exactly what records. And Arnold, poor man, he wants so bad to help but he can’t do a blessed thing. Seems like everybody is against us! It’s a terrible, helpless feeling. Why, I’m so discomboobilated that I can’t even think what I’m goin’ to feed poor Arnold for his supper!”