The Darling Dahlias and the Naked Ladies

But Buddy was a different matter. If push came to shove, he might—just might—be useful in dealing with Mr. Gold. For one thing, he was enterprising, and even ambitious, always looking for a way to stand out from the crowd. He was smart: he had bought a mail-order how-to book on scientific crime detection from the Institute of Applied Sciences in Chicago and taught himself how to take fingerprints, identify firearms, and take “crime scene” photographs. He had taught himself to shoot, too. Verna knew this for a fact, because he’d rigged up a shooting range in the pasture behind the Norris house and spent a couple of hours a week (and way too much expensive ammunition) practicing with his service revolver, much to the consternation of Mr. Norris’ old horse Racer, who lived in that pasture and hated loud noises. And because he had only recently celebrated his twenty-fifth birthday, Buddy was inclined to believe that he was immortal, which made him brave, as well as reckless. If there was trouble, Deputy Norris might be a good man to have around.

But there wasn’t any trouble just yet, Verna thought. And there was no point involving Buddy until she had some idea what kind of situation she’d be asking him to get involved in. Still staring out the window, she thought for several moments, then turned and went to the telephone again.

She rang up Coretta Cole, her part-time assistant in the probate clerk’s office, to see if she could come in the next morning, instead of her usual Tuesday. When Coretta agreed, Verna thanked her, hung up, and stood for a moment, debating whether to telephone Myra May or walk up the street to the diner and have a conversation with her in person.

She decided on the conversation, since the favor she had to ask was a little complicated and might require that Myra May bend a few rules. She would rather ask the favor face-to-face. And she certainly didn’t want to risk anybody listening in.

She pulled on a cardigan over her housedress and went out into the quiet Sunday evening twilight.





NINE


Beulah’s New Customer When Beulah Trivette woke up on Monday morning and began to think about the week ahead, she counted herself as the luckiest woman in Darling—and with good reason. She herself was beautiful, a fact that she recognized every time she looked into the mirror and saw her blond curls, her dimples, her generous mouth, and those cornflower blue eyes. What’s more, she had a deep-seated artistic appreciation for true beauty. And even better, she had the privilege of spending all day, every day (except Sunday, of course), making ordinary women pretty and pretty women beautiful. Which as she saw it, was one of the worthiest occupations any woman could be lucky enough to choose.

Beulah’s natural sense of beauty had been enhanced by a degree (the certificate was framed and hung on the wall at her haircutting station) from the Montgomery College of Cosmetology. She saw herself as a true artist, especially where hair was concerned. She could cut the latest bob, manage a marcel iron, work miracles with a curling iron, and color hair in all shades. In fact, Beulah sometimes worried (just a little) that her training and talents were wasted in Darling, for most of the ladies who came to her Beauty Bower merely wanted a quickie shampoo and set, or a trim and shampoo, and sometimes a permanent wave. They plucked their own eyebrows, used lemon to bleach the age spots on their hands, and even made their own dry skin lotions, rather than purchasing the products she displayed on glass shelves beside the door. Still, Beulah was for the most part happy and fulfilled in her work, even though she occasionally wished for a greater artistic challenge.

Of course, a big chunk of the reason for Beulah’s happiness was the fact that she owned her very own Beauty Bower, which was a beautiful place to work. The first thing she did when she and her husband Hank bought the house on Dauphin Street was to paint a beautiful sign for the front of the house and decorate it with a basket of lush pink roses. BEULAH’S BEAUTY BOWER BLOOMING SOON!! (In addition to her other talents, Beulah could paint beautiful pictures of flowers.) While she was doing this, Hank enclosed the screened porch across the back of the house so it would be comfortable during cold weather and installed two shampoo sinks and haircutting chairs and two big wall mirrors in front of the chairs. He also wired the place for electricity so that Beulah could have the latest beauty equipment. The new Kenmore handheld hair dryer she coveted, for instance, and the electric permanent-wave machine with amazing drop-down curlers that heated the hair to create a long-lasting curl, not to mention the electric hot water heater, which meant that there’d be no more pouring hot water out of teakettles and pitchers, with the danger of scalding somebody. Beulah added the finishing touches, painting the wainscoting peppermint pink (her favorite color), wallpapering the walls with fat pink roses, and spatter-painting the pink floor with gray, blue, and yellow. Then she painted out the BLOOMING SOON on the sign and replaced it with BY APPOINTMENT & WALK-INS WELCOME and she was in business.