The Darling Dahlias and the Texas Star

But by that time, the Darling city fathers had built a twenty-mile railroad spur connecting Darling to Monroeville and the L&N, and farmers and timber merchants could get their beef, poultry, and lumber to markets around the state, which made them—some of them, anyway—wealthy. The wealthier farmers and merchants got together and bought a large piece of land from the Little family. On it, they built the Cypress Country Club and Championship Golf Course, and then they bought property and built houses as close to the golf course as they could get. It was exclusive, and they liked that.

Lizzy was thinking about all this as she swung off Country Club Drive and into the Kilgores’ circular driveway. Mildred and Roger lived with their young daughter, Melody, in a large plantation-style white house a short walk from the ninth green. As Lizzy rode up, she saw that Mildred’s car—a snazzy-looking 1932 blue Dodge Roadster with chrome wheels—was parked in front of the house. She gave it an envious glance. Mildred’s father’s money had set Roger up in the Dodge dealership, and Roger thought that letting his wife drive the latest model was good advertising.

Lizzy leaned her bike against the wrought-iron fence, went up on the impressive plantation-style portico, and rang the brass doorbell. The door was opened by Mildred’s colored maid, Ollie Rose, dressed in a black uniform, spotless white apron, and perky white cap. Mildred had kitchen help, as well. The Kilgores were among the few Darlingians who could still afford to keep full-time servants.

Lizzy followed Ollie Rose through the big house to the back veranda. There, Mildred was stretched out on a cushioned chaise longue, a pitcher of cold lemonade and two glasses on the glass-topped table, beside a large crystal bowl filled with plump, pillowy purple and blue hydrangeas.

From the veranda, Lizzy could look out across Mildred’s camellia garden. It was planted around a rustic pergola and a native stone fountain, with a greenhouse off to one side. Lizzy knew that Mildred had spent a lot of money on her garden, and if there was a camellia anywhere in the world that she didn’t have, she would pay any price to get it. What’s more, she had a gardener who worked three days a week—full time during the annual December Home and Garden Tour. Many of her camellias were in bloom then, and people came from as far away as Montgomery to admire their spectacular beauty.

Lizzy’s own garden was filled with pass-along plants that hadn’t cost her a red cent. But she could not really begrudge Mildred her garden or her gardener—or, for that matter, her stylish clothes or her big house and servants. Mildred had inherited a sizeable fortune from her father (one of those who had grown wealthy planting cotton) and Roger was a respectable Darling businessman. How the Kilgores chose to spend their money, Lizzy always told herself, was no business of hers.

But her friendship with Mildred (which went all the way back to elementary school) was sometimes complicated by a few uncomfortable feelings of . . . well, envy. Lizzy wasn’t jealous of Mildred’s money and easy life, exactly. But she had to admit that every so often she felt a few sharp prickles of resentment. It usually happened when Mildred went out of her way to tell her about a Mediterranean cruise that she and Roger were planning or some extravagant trip they had taken to New York or Chicago or San Francisco.

There hadn’t been much of that kind of talk lately, however. Mildred and Roger didn’t seem to travel together as much as they had in the past. But Mildred’s splendid camellias were a sight to behold, and Lizzy could never in the world bring herself to criticize somebody who spent her money on flowers.

As Lizzy came up behind Mildred, she saw that her friend was reading a letter. Mildred glanced up, saw Lizzy, and hastily slipped the letter between the pages of a book that was open on her lap, her cheeks flushing a dull red. A plump, rather plain-looking woman, she had a too-high forehead, a too-long nose, and a receding chin. But she made up for her plainness by choosing expensive, smart-looking clothes and wearing them with panache. This evening, she was dressed in a yellow-and-red flowered cotton sundress with a flared skirt and perky bunny-ear straps that tied over her bare shoulders.

“My gracious, Elizabeth Lacy,” she said in her usual Southern drawl. She closed her book with a solid thump. “Just look at you. You are sweatin’ like a field hand and your face is as red as a firecracker. You walked all the way here?”

“Rode my bike,” Liz said, wiping the sweat off her cheeks with her forearm.

“Serves you right, then,” Mildred said in a scolding tone. “All you had to do was ask and I would’ve driven over and picked you up. It is just too hot to go riding that bicycle of yours all over creation.” She looked down at her book as if to make sure that the letter wasn’t visible. Then she reached over and picked up the pitcher of lemonade. “You need to sit down and cool yourself off.”