The Darling Dahlias and the Texas Star

“Using him?” Lizzy asked.

“Well, of course! That’s what the letter says, anyway. Here. Read it for yourself.” She thrust the letter into Lizzy’s reluctant hands.

The letter was written in a distinctive back-slanting hand, in purple ink on a dusty-pink paper. It was not dated.

Dear Mrs. Kilgore,

I’m sorry to write you again, but I think you should know that your husband is still seeing Miss Dare. This picture was taken in New Orleans and it proves what I’m saying. It would be one thing if she loved him from the heart, but she doesn’t. She doesn’t love any of the men who think she does and who give her money to support her expensive habits. They’re just saps and suckers that she uses, then throws away when she’s done, like a piece of trash. Like Pete Rickerts, who crashed his airplane because he was so crazy in love with her. She is a terrible person who goes around destroying marriages, tricking men into giving her money, and making a mess out of innocent people’s lives. She must be stopped. If you love your husband, you’ll do whatever it takes to protect him from her. And do it before she wrecks his life—and yours and your little girl’s.

With all best wishes,

Your Friend

Lizzy went back and reread the sentence about Pete Rickerts, remembering that he was the pilot who had died on Miss Dare’s ranch. Had he been one of Miss Dare’s lovers? Had he crashed his plane on purpose?

She felt the skin prickling between her shoulder blades. “She must be stopped.” Stopped how? Who’s going to stop her?

She folded the letter and handed it back. “What . . . what do you think it means, Mildred?”

Mildred didn’t answer Lizzy’s question. She put the letter back in her book, her mouth hardening. After a moment, she said, “Obviously, the woman has no soul. She has made a mess out of many lives. The lives of many innocent children, like my little Melody.”

By this time, Lizzy could hardly think of anything to say. Her conjectures had been redeemed by the facts, as Mr. Moseley would say, but she felt no satisfaction. She managed, “But maybe it’s not as bad as you think, Mildred. Maybe—”

But Mildred wasn’t listening. “I’m sure Roger believes that he is very special to her. But he is obviously just the next man in a long line of . . . of suckers.” Mildred’s words were like acid. “He must be in love with her—or think he is—or he wouldn’t be behaving the way he is. I can’t tell him that she’s using him to get whatever she wants—love, admiration, money—”

“Money?” Lizzy asked sharply. “You mean, there’s money involved?”

“Is there ever,” Mildred said, with a bitter little laugh. “The first letter claimed that Roger was writing checks to her out of his business accounts, using the name Lily A. Star.” She gave a sarcastic laugh. “Lily Dare, the Texas Star. If she was trying to hide what she was doing, she didn’t try very hard. Even a dummy could get that one.”

Lizzy frowned, wondering how the letter writer knew about the checks. It had to be someone close enough to Miss Dare to know where her money was coming from. But maybe—

“That’s an easy claim to make,” Lizzy said, and asked the question she knew Mr. Moseley would ask in this circumstance. “Is there any evidence? Do you know whether it’s true?”

Mildred pressed her lips together to keep them from quivering. “Yes,” she said, lowering her head. “I waited until he was out of the office one day and went through the ledger. In the last six months, he wrote three checks to Lily A. Star, for a total of nine hundred dollars. I have the canceled checks.”

Lizzy flinched. Nine hundred dollars was a lot of money, especially these days. And Mildred had known this for a while. No wonder she had been looking wan and worried.

Mildred’s voice was choked but the words came out in an explosive rush, as if they had been bottled up for too long and the speaker felt a terrible pressure, a push to get them out in the open air, once and for all.

“The dealership is in a terrible situation these days, Liz. Nobody’s got the money to buy anything, and months go past when not a single cent comes in—not even the money that’s owed on time payments, thousands and thousands of dollars. Roger has had to lay off poor Freddie Mann in the repair department and Duffy Peters from sales, and both of them with wives and children at home. I helped Roger get that dealership started with the money I inherited from Daddy, and I’ve been using it to support this house and the hired help. But if things keep up as they are, there’ll soon be nothing left of Daddy’s money, and what we’ll do when it’s gone, I have no idea. Just no idea!”