Savannah Blues Read online

  Savannah

  Blues

  Mary Kay Andrews

  This one is for my big sis, Susie, with love.

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  The rapping at the front door of the carriage house…

  Chapter 2

  Of course, once I’d calmed down from my encounter with…

  Chapter 3

  James Aloysious Foley leaned back in his chair and studied…

  Chapter 4

  I turned up the air conditioner on the pickup truck…

  Chapter 5

  James Foley held his breath as he watched the two…

  Chapter 6

  “Eloise Foley!” Merijoy Rucker’s eyes went all crinkly with delight…

  Chapter 7

  Right after Tal announced he was in love with somebody…

  Chapter 8

  Merijoy Rucker knew something was up. Not for nothing was…

  Chapter 9

  Weezie was shaking and milky-pale by the time she got…

  Chapter 10

  The day after Anna Ruby Mullinax’s memorial service, I went…

  Chapter 11

  Within a month it was in all the papers, the…

  Chapter 12

  The doors at Beaulieu were supposed to open at 8…

  Chapter 13

  “Tell me the game plan again,” BeBe said, slapping at…

  Chapter 14

  Jethro barked.

  Chapter 15

  The redbrick police barracks was at the corner of Habersham…

  Chapter 16

  I spent the night in jail. That much I could…

  Chapter 17

  I closed and locked the door behind me and took…

  Chapter 18

  On the Monday morning after my arrest, I had a…

  Chapter 19

  James parked his car beside the navy blue sedan, in…

  Chapter 20

  When I was just a little kid, we’d go out…

  Chapter 21

  Daniel let go. I climbed down off the chair.

  Chapter 22

  Daniel had the radio in his truck turned to a…

  Chapter 23

  I could hear the phone ringing as I unlocked the…

  Chapter 24

  I was just taking the last of the cheesecakes out…

  Chapter 25

  Time was running short. Half a dozen times Friday morning…

  Chapter 26

  Amazingly, he was still standing there when I opened the…

  Chapter 27

  The Ruckers’ garden reminded me of a painting I’d seen…

  Chapter 28

  “How’s the potpie, Weezie?” Randy boomed from his end of…

  Chapter 29

  “Are you mad at me?” Daniel asked after I threw…

  Chapter 30

  Daniel screeched off in the truck, laying rubber, not an…

  Chapter 31

  Saturday. Six A.M. I struggled out of bed and into…

  Chapter 32

  I was unloading the truck when BeBe pulled into the…

  Chapter 33

  James caught up with Jonathan near the Spanish-American War monument…

  Chapter 34

  “Weezie? Pick up the phone, Eloise. I know you’re there.”

  Chapter 35

  I really did need help moving all that heavy furniture,…

  Chapter 36

  “Whew,” Daniel said as he stepped into the living room…

  Chapter 37

  We left the oak stuff in Daniel’s truck in Thunderbolt…

  Chapter 38

  “Two point five million dollars,” James said, taking off his…

  Chapter 39

  By Tuesday, I’d sold Cousin Lucy’s furniture for seven hundred…

  Chapter 40

  Jethro was hiding under the kitchen table when I got…

  Chapter 41

  Convincing Mama to let me take her to lunch took…

  Chapter 42

  After a fruitless half hour of searching for Mama, I…

  Chapter 43

  I stopped at my parents’ house on the way back…

  Chapter 44

  True to its name, La Juntique was mostly junk, with…

  Chapter 45

  “Two strikes,” Daniel said. “I think there’s another antique store…

  Chapter 46

  “This isn’t what you think,” I said. “Tal left a…

  Chapter 47

  When I woke up, Daniel was nibbling on my ear.

  Chapter 48

  James pushed through the door to his office, concentrating on…

  Chapter 49

  James eased himself into a rocking chair and took a…

  Chapter 50

  “Mama?” I poked my head around the doorway of my…

  Chapter 51

  “We could check Daniel’s personnel file. From the restaurant,” BeBe…

  Chapter 52

  On the way home from Guale, I drove by the…

  Chapter 53

  I drove directly to Uncle James’s house on Washington Avenue.

  Chapter 54

  As we pulled up into the Ruckers’ driveway, Merijoy emerged…

  Chapter 55

  After we left Merijoy Rucker’s house, Jonathan took me back…

  Chapter 56

  James sat down at the desk in the house on…

  Chapter 57

  “What do you think they’re doing in that warehouse?” I…

  Chapter 58

  Saturday nights, James had a gin and tonic promptly at…

  Chapter 59

  “Tell me again how this scam of Hargreaves’s works,” Daniel…

  Chapter 60

  BeBe waited until we heard Jonathan’s car pull out of…

  Chapter 61

  After Daniel left, I was in shock. He hadn’t yelled,…

  Chapter 62

  Mama cocked her head and gave me a coy look.

  Chapter 63

  When I came downstairs in the morning, Tal was gone.

  Chapter 64

  James fidgeted with his collar. He straightened his tie, coughed…

  Chapter 65

  Merijoy Rucker’s face was flushed with excitement.

  Chapter 66

  “Absolutely not,” Merijoy said, looking from me to Liz Fuller…

  Chapter 67

  Hargreaves sat back in his desk chair and gave me…

  Chapter 68

  “Has he said anything about me?” I asked BeBe. She…

  Chapter 69

  I was sorting through a box of old sterling flatware…

  Chapter 70

  I stopped blotting my dress with the edge of the…

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Books by Mary Kay Andrews

  Credits

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  Chapter 1

  The rapping at the front door of the carriage house was unmistakable. Her. I could see Caroline DeSantos’s slender profile through the frosted glass inset of the front door. She had started by ringing the bell, once, twice, three times, then she began rattling the doorknob with one hand and banging at the brass knocker with the other.

  “Eloise? Open up. I mean it. That beast of yours did it again. I’m calling the dogcatcher right now. You hear me? I’ve got my cell phone. I’m punching in the number. I know you hear me, Eloise.”

  She did indeed have something that looked like a phone in her hand.

  Jethro heard Caroline too. He raised his dark muzzle, which has endearing little spots like reverse freckles, his ears pricked up, and, recognizing the voice of the enemy,
he slunk under the pine table in the living room.

  I knelt down and scratched his chin in sympathy. “Did you, Jethro? Did you really pee on the camellias again?”

  Jethro hung his head. He’s just a stray, but he almost never lies to me, which is more than I can say for any other male I’ve ever been involved with.

  I patted his head as a reward for his honesty. “Good dog. Help yourself. Pee on everything over there. Poop on the doorstep and I’ll buy you the biggest ham bone in Savannah.”

  The banging and door rattling continued. “Eloise. I know you’re home. I saw your truck parked on the street. I’ve called Tal. He’s calling his lawyer.”

  “Tattletale,” I muttered, putting aside the box of junk I’d been sorting.

  I padded toward the front door of the carriage house. The worn pine floorboards felt cool against the soles of my bare feet. Caroline was banging so hard on the door I was afraid she’d break the etched glass panel.

  “Bitch,” I muttered.

  Jethro barked his approval. I turned around and saw his tail wagging in agreement.

  “Slut.” More wagging. We were both gathering our resolve for the coming barrage. Jethro crawled out from under the table and sat on his haunches, directly behind me. His warm breath on my ankles felt oddly reassuring.

  I threw the front door open. “Sic her, Jethro,” I said loudly. “Bite the bad lady.”

  Caroline took half a step backward. “I heard that,” she screeched. “If that mutt puts a paw in my garden again, I’m going to…”

  “What?” I demanded. “You’re going to what? Poison him? Shoot him? Run him over in that sports car of yours? You’d enjoy that, wouldn’t you, Caroline? Running over a poor defenseless dog.”

  I put my hands on my hips and did a good imitation of staring her down. It wasn’t physically possible, of course. Caroline DeSantos stands a good four inches taller than I do, and that’s without the four-inch spike heels she considers her fashion trademark.

  She flushed. “I’m warning you. That’s all. For the last time. There’s a leash law in this town, as you well know. If you really loved that mutt of yours, you wouldn’t let him run around loose all the time.”

  She really was quite lovely, Caroline. Even in Savannah’s ungodly summer heat, she was as crisp and fragrant as a just-plucked gardenia. Her glossy dark hair was pulled off her neck in a chignon, and her olive skin was flawless. She wore lime green linen capri slacks and a matching linen scoop-neck blouse that showed only a tasteful hint of décolletage. I could have gone on living a long time without seeing her that way, that day.

  “Oh,” I said. “Jethro is running around. Is that what’s bothering you about my poor little puppy? But you’re an expert at running around, aren’t you, Caroline? I believe you and my husband were running around on me for at least six months before I finally wised up and kicked him out.”

  I’d kicked Tal out, but he hadn’t gone far. The judge in our divorce case was an old family friend of Tal’s daddy, Big Tal. He’d given our 1858 townhouse to Tal in the property settlement, and only after my lawyer raised the god-awfullest ruckus you ever heard, had he tossed me a bone—basically—awarding me the slim two-story carriage house right behind the big house.

  Tal installed Caroline in the big house the minute the paperwork was completed, and we’ve had a running back-fence spite match ever since.

  My lawyer, who also happens to be my uncle James, talked himself blue in the face trying to persuade me to sell out and move, but he knows better than to try to make a Foley change her mind. On Charlton Street I’d make my stand—to live and die in Dixie. Move? Me? No sirreebob.

  Caroline flicked a strand of hair out of her face. She looked me up and down and gave me a supercilious smile.

  It was Thursday. I’d been up at dawn cruising the still-darkened lanes of Savannah, trying to beat the trashmen to the spoils of the town’s leading lights. I looked like hell. My junking uniform, black leggings and a blue denim work shirt, was caked in grime from the Dumpsters I’d been digging through. My short red hair was festooned with cobwebs, my nails were broken, and peeling paint flakes clung to the back of my knuckles.

  The day’s pickings had been unusually slim. The two huge boxes of old books I’d pounced on behind an Italianate brownstone on Barnard Street had yielded up mostly mildewed, totally worthless Methodist hymnbooks from the 1930s. A carton of pretty Occupied Japan dishes rescued from a pile of junk at a house on Washington Avenue hadn’t turned up a single piece not chipped, cracked, or broken. The only remotely promising find was an old cookie tin of buttons I’d bought for two dollars at a yard sale I’d nearly passed up on my way back to the carriage house.

  It was that box of buttons I’d been sorting when Caroline had mounted her assault on my front door.

  Now there was a soft pooting noise behind me. Caroline literally looked down her long, Latin nose at me and curled her full-blown upper lip. “My God,” she cried. “What is that wretched smell?”

  I sniffed and looked over my shoulder at Jethro, who was slinking in the other direction.

  “It’s not Jethro,” I said, leaping to my dog’s defense. I pointed over at the wrought-iron railing in the entryway, where I’d draped the tattered hooked rug I’d been trying to air out before bringing it inside.

  “It’s probably the rug,” I said. “I got it out of an old crack house on Huntingdon. I think maybe it’s got fleas.”

  Caroline jumped back as though the rug were a live skunk.

  “I can’t believe the filthy garbage you drag back here,” she began. “It’s appalling. And it’s no wonder I have to have the house sprayed twice a month. I told Tal, ‘Weezie is infesting our house.’ ”

  Behind me, in the vest-pocket living room, my telephone was starting to ring.

  “Gotta go now,” I said. “Got a business to run.” I slammed the door in her face and turned the dead-bolt lock.

  Jethro licked my toe in gratitude. “Ro-Ro,” I said gently, not wanting to hurt his feelings, “that was bad. No more bologna sandwiches for you, little buddy.”

  I caught the phone on the fourth ring.

  “Weezie, wait ’til you hear.”

  It was BeBe Loudermilk, my best friend, whose mother, exhausted after having had eight previous children in ten years, had settled upon the name BeBe, and the French pronunciation of “Bay-Bay,” for her ninth and last child.

  To BeBe, being last meant she was always in a hurry, always trying to catch up. She was a human hurricane who never wasted time starting a conversation with any conventional pleasantries such as “Hey” or “How’ve you been?”

  “Go ahead and guess,” she urged.

  “You’re getting married again?” BeBe had only ditched husband number three a few months earlier, but like I said, BeBe’s a fast worker. And she never liked being without a man.

  “This is serious, Weezie,” BeBe said. “Guess who’s dead?”

  “Richard?” I said hopefully. Richard was BeBe’s second husband, the one who’d had the unfortunate proclivity for phone sex. BeBe was still fighting with the phone company over all the bills Richard had run up calling 1-900-YOU-SKRU.

  “Be serious now,” BeBe demanded. “Emery Cooper called me this morning. You know Emery, don’t you, darlin’? He’s a Cooper-Hale Cooper, you know, from the funeral home? He’s been pesterin’ me to go to dinner for weeks now, but I told him I never date a man until he’s been divorced for at least a year. Anyway, Emery’s cute, but he’s got children. You know how I am. And I don’t like the idea of necking with somebody who works with the dead. Is that awful of me?” She didn’t waste any time waiting for an answer.

  “Anyway, Weezie, Emery let it drop that Anna Ruby Mullinax died last night. In her sleep. Ninety-seven years old, did you know that? And still living in the same house she was born in. Of course, Cooper-Hale is handling the funeral arrangements.”

  Jethro was licking my toes again. He wanted out. But I hated to have him pee
on any more camellias until Caroline cooled off. I cradled the phone to my ear.

  “That’s nice, BeBe,” I said. “Listen, could you call back? I’ve got to take Jethro for a walk right quick.”

  “Weezie,” BeBe exclaimed. “Don’t you get it?”

  “What? Emery Cooper wants to get into your pants? Does he smell like formaldehyde, do you think?”

  “No,” BeBe said. “He smells lovely. Like money. But child, I’m worried about you. Didn’t you hear what I said? It’s Anna Ruby Mullinax. That house she lived and died in? It’s Beaulieu, honey. Now what do you think about that?”

  I felt a little tingle on my neck. Beaulieu. I looked down at my forearms. Goose bumps.

  “You said she was ninety-seven,” I said, my voice shaking. “Were there any survivors?”

  “Not a living soul,” BeBe said triumphantly. “And Emery says the house is jam-packed with old stuff. Now. Who’s the very best best friend in the whole wide world?”

  “You are,” I assured her. “I’ll call you later.”

  Chapter 2

  Of course, once I’d calmed down from my encounter with Caroline, I was able to put Anna Ruby Mullinax in context with Beaulieu, the crumbling Mullinax rice plantation on the Skidaway River, seven miles outside of town.

  She was the last of the Mullinaxes, one of those “fine old families” whose members claimed to have come over in 1733 with General James Oglethorpe’s first shipload of Georgia settlers, who, incidentally, were definitely not the deadbeats Yankee history books would have you believe. Don’t ever mention the words “debtors’ colony” in Savannah—not if you know what’s good for you.

  At one time, according to my mother, who keeps up with this sort of thing, the Mullinaxes were the richest family on the coast, and Beaulieu was the grandest plantation house in the South, the very last working rice plantation in Georgia, up until 1970, when Hurricane Brenda rampaged south out of Charleston, and the tidal surge blew just enough salt water into the rice canals to ruin the crop and the Mullinax fortune.

  Funny. The year the Mullinaxes lost their money was the same year I was born.

  I’ve looked it up. Nineteen seventy was also the year the Beatles broke up, Nixon was president, US forces invaded Cambodia, and The Partridge Family was a smash hit on television. Hard to believe that was also the year Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin both died. And they were only twenty-seven. Not to mention it was the year of Kent State and four dead in O-hi-o.