The Darling Dahlias and the Silver Dollar Bush

“That figures,” Sherrie muttered. “Could be anybody underneath one of those white sheets. Could be Jesus himself, and nobody would ever know.”


“Sounds like it was a good thing Buddy Norris got there so fast,” Verna said. She frowned as Sherrie adjusted Melba Jean’s collar, which had got all crooked. “Did Mrs. Barbee happen to notice whether they came in a car?” That would be the first thing Ellery Queen would want to know. “If they did, what kind of car was it?”

“No idea,” Melba Jean replied. “But Mr. Hart says he bets he can come up with a list of names today or tomorrow, when them dirty sheets start showing up at the laundry.”

*

Bessie Bloodworth heard about it right after breakfast, when she walked from the Magnolia Manor to the town square to do the shopping for the rest of the week. It was a cool, sweet, peaceful April morning in Darling, and Bessie thought the wisteria and peonies and azaleas were all at their prettiest.

She went first to Lima’s Drugs to pick up some things the girls had asked for. Leticia Wiggens had given her a dime for a jar of Dew Deodorant (“When nervousness makes you perspire, DEW will keep your secret”). Miss Rogers wanted a six-cent bar of Camay (“The soap of beautiful women”). Mrs. Sedalius, who was always worried about offending, had given her twelve cents for a bottle of Listerine (“The mouth rinse that ends halitosis!”). And when Bessie happened to pass the rack of hair care items, she picked up two ten-cent Fashionette hairnets (“Made of human hair, sanitary & dependable”) for herself. Money might be hard to come by, but a person had to have her hairnets.

Mr. Lima rang up her purchases and gave her change back from a dollar. He was dressed in his white pharmacist’s coat, with his gold-topped pen tucked in his left breast pocket and his gold-rimmed glasses perched at the end of his long nose. Putting Bessie’s items into a paper sack, he said, in his usual dry way, “I reckon you heard what happened last night, Miz Bloodworth.”

“No, I don’t think so.” Bessie stared down at the change in her hand. “Excuse me, but I think you owe me a dime.” She put the coins on the counter. “Count it for yourself, Mr. Lima.”

It took a moment to straighten that out. Yes, he really did owe her a dime and she intended to insist on it, since this was the second time he had shortchanged her in the past month. If he was that desperate, he ought to be honest and raise his prices.

When she was satisfied that she had the correct change, she put it into her coin purse and asked, “What happened last night?”

“Mr. Johnson’s house was vandalized. Purple paint thrown all over his porch.” Mr. Lima raised his voice to greet Leona Ruth Adcock, who had just come in. “G’mornin’, Miz Adcock. Haven’t seen you for a while.” To Bessie, he added, “And this was after some of the Klan got run off by Deputy Norris.”

“Oh, my!” Bessie exclaimed. “Purple paint!”

“Blue paint was what I heard,” Leona Ruth said crisply. “And they ripped up all of Mrs. Johnson’s flowers out in back. G’mornin’, Bessie.”

“Ripped up the flower bed! Now, that’s going too far,” Bessie exclaimed indignantly. Voleen Johnson, a Dahlia, was very proud of her all-white flower bed, which she paid a yardman to tend because she didn’t like to get dirt under her fingernails. “G’mornin’, Leona Ruth.”

“Lucky he wasn’t tarred and feathered,” Mr. Lima growled. “That’s what they was fixin’ to do when the deputy showed up.”

“But why would anybody want to do all that?” Bessie asked, and then remembered what Earlynne Biddle had said, the day they were canning rhubarb. “Oh, I guess people are upset because of the bank closing.”

“Upset!” Mr. Lima snorted. “Mad as hell is more like it, if you ladies’ll excuse my French.”