The Darling Dahlias and the Texas Star

“I see.” Lizzy suppressed a smile. Henrietta Foote’s Flying Circus—it didn’t have quite the right appeal.

Charlie nodded. “At the time, she had a big, fancy ranch house on three thousand acres of Texas rangeland west of town. That’s where she gave her parties. And when I say parties, I mean parties.” He picked up an empty Hires root beer bottle and tapped his cigarette ash into it. “Henrietta’s friends from the West Coast—Hollywood types, mostly—would fly their own planes in for a weeks-long, round-the-clock open-door, open-bar party. Her bar was stocked like a San Antonio bawdyhouse. There was enough offshore rum, bathtub gin, and south-of-the-border tequila to keep her pals drunk as skunks for a month. And she had a big swimming pool where everybody skinny-dipped whenever the spirit moved them—which it did, very often.”

“Oh, my,” Lizzy said weakly. She had never been to a party like that, of course, but she had read about them. The magazines on the rack over at Lima’s Drugstore—Hollywood Life and Silver Screen and such—were full of stories about the sensational goings-on at such parties.

Charlie eyed her, judging her response, then went on. “Some years ago, a guy—Pete Rickerts—died when he flipped his plane when he was landing on the airstrip on her ranch. It was a dangerous strip, too short and full of potholes. Her pilot friends had been telling her so, and warned her to do something about it before somebody got hurt. She laughed at them. She said she didn’t have any trouble landing there. It was a test of flying skill, she said. After Rickerts died, she went out and made a dozen landings, touch-and-gos, just to prove it could be done.”

He gave her a level, questioning look. Lizzy thought she should say something but she couldn’t think what to say, other than, Is that why she calls herself a Dare Devil? But she couldn’t make herself say it.

“Well.” He tapped his fingers on the scarred top of his desk. “You can bet your sweet life that Rickerts’ pals weren’t too happy about the way she was showing off.” He stopped and gave that some thought, then said, as if to himself, “Could be that something like that was behind what happened in Pensacola. The sabotage, I mean. Somebody trying to get even.”

By now, Lizzy was both intrigued and troubled. She wasn’t a risk-taker herself. She was by nature a cautious person, and anyway, you didn’t get many opportunities to practice taking chances in Darling, where nothing much ever happened. Still, she admired gutsy women, and Henrietta Foote wouldn’t have become Lily Dare if she wasn’t willing to take chances. But Charlie’s story about Rickerts’ death made it sound as if the Texas Star didn’t have much concern for the safety of others.

“You were there, I guess,” she hazarded. “At the parties, I mean.”

“I was. We were . . . friends, you might say.” Charlie gave a dry chuckle. “While it lasted. Her friendships never last very long.”

Hearing his tone, Lizzy’s curiosity mounted. What kind of friends had they been? she wondered. Charlie wasn’t a handsome prince, by any stretch of the imagination. But he had a certain cynical charm, a wide experience, and a sharp intellect, which made him attractive to some women—to Fannie Champaign, at least.

Fannie, the newest member of the Dahlias, owned Champaign’s Darling Chapeaux, on the other side of the square, and employed Lizzy’s mother to help her make hats. (The job, Lizzy felt, was a miracle, since it kept her mother busy and out of Lizzy’s hair.) Several months ago, Fannie and Charlie had become an item, at least in the minds of the Darling ladies. They were frequently seen at picnics and church suppers together and at the movies on Saturday nights. And the last time Lizzy got a shampoo and set at Beulah Trivette’s Beauty Bower, she had heard from Bessie Bloodworth (who was getting her hair permed in Beulah’s electric perm machine) that Fannie was expecting a marriage proposal. That bit of gossip had disturbed Lizzy, because Charlie Dickens did not seem to her to be the marrying kind. She sincerely hoped that Fannie wasn’t about to get her heart broken.

But she could understand why certain women found Charlie appealing, and she guessed that an adventuresome woman like Lily Dare might be more to his taste than quiet, sweet-natured Fannie Champaign. Had Charlie and the Texas Star been . . . lovers, once upon a time?