Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe

JANUARY 8, 1938

Ever since Idgie had put the picture of Miss Fancy the Elephant up at the cafe, Onzell and George’s youngest child, Naughty Bird, had been fascinated. She would beg her daddy to take her to Avondale Park so she could see the elephant; and today, that’s all Naughty Bird had on her mind.

She had been sick for over a month now. Dr. Hadley had just told them that pneumonia had set in, and if they couldn’t get her to eat, he didn’t see how she could live out another week.

Big George was leaning over the bed with an uneaten bowl of oatmeal, pleading with her. “Please, won’t you eat a bite for Poppa? Just one little bite for Poppa, baby. What you want, baby? You want Poppa to get you a sweet kitten?”

Naughty Bird, who was six and weighed only thirty pounds, just lay there, listless, with her eyes glazed over, and shook her head.

“You want Momma to fix you some biscuits?” Onzell said. “You want some biscuits and honey, baby?”

“No ma’am.”

“Miz Idgie and Miz Ruth’s here. They done brung you some candy … won’t you eat a bite?”

The little girl turned her head toward the wall covered with magazine pictures and mumbled something.

Onzell leaned down. “What, baby? You say you want some biscuits?”

Naughty Bird said, weakly, “I wanna see Miz Fancy.”

Onzell turned, with tears in her eyes. “See what I mean, Miz Ruth. She got it in her head to go see that elephant, and ain’t nothin’ else gonna do, and she ain’t gonna eat till she does.”

Idgie and Big George went out on the porch and sat on the faded green tin chairs. He stared out in the yard.

“Miz Idgie, I cain’t let my baby die before she sees dat elephant.”

“Now, George, you know you cain’t go in Avondale Park, they just had a big Klan meeting over there the other night. As soon as you set one foot in that gate, they’d shoot your head off in a minute.”

Big George thought it over and said, “Well then, they’s gonna hafta kill me, cause dat’s my baby girl in dere and I’d rather be dead in my grave than let anything happen to her.”

Idgie knew he meant it.

This six-foot-five giant of a man, who could pick up a full-grown hog and carry it like it was a sack of potatoes, had such a soft spot for his little girl that he would leave the house whenever Onzell gave her a whipping. And when he came home at night, it was Naughty Bird who would run and crawl up him like a tree and hug his neck. She could twist him around her little finger like he was the red on a barber pole.

That year, he had ridden the streetcar over to Birmingham to buy her a snow-white Easter dress, with shoes to match. Easter morning, Onzell had managed to get Naughty Bird’s nappy hair all up in pigtails and tied them with white ribbons. When Sipsey saw her in that white dress, she had laughed and said she looked just like a fly in a pan of milk. But Big George didn’t care if she was black as midnight and had nappy hair: he’d carried her to church with him and sat her on his lap, like she was Princess Margaret Rose.

So the sicker Naughty Bird became, the more Idgie worried about Big George and what he would do.

Two days later, it was cold and wet after a hard rain. Stump was walking home from school down the railroad tracks, smelling the strong wet pine smoke rising up from the houses along the way. He was wearing brown corduroy pants and a leather jacket that had seen better days. He was chilled to the bone.

When he got home to the cafe, he sat by the wood stove in the back, his ears burning as they thawed out, listening to his mother.

“Honey, why didn’t you wear your hat?”

“I forgot.”

“You don’t want to get sick, do you?”

“No ma’am.”

He was glad to see Idgie come in. She went over to the closet and got her coat and asked him if he wanted to drive over to Birmingham, to Avondale Park, with Smokey and her. He jumped at the chance. “Yes ma’am.”

“Well, come on then.”

Ruth said, “Wait a minute. Do you have homework?”

“Just a little.”

“Do you promise to do it when you get back, if I let you go?”

“Yes ma’am.”

“Idgie, you’re coming right back, aren’t you?”

“Sure. Why not? I’m just gonna talk to the man.”

“Well, all right, but get your hat, Stump.”

He ran out the door. “ ’Bye, Momma.”

Ruth handed Idgie his hat. “Try to get back before dark.”

“I will. Don’t worry.”

They piled into the car and headed to Birmingham.

At twelve o’clock that night, a frantic Ruth received a phone call from Smokey, saying not to worry, that they were all right. He hung up before Ruth had a chance to ask where they were.

At five forty-five the next morning, Ruth and Sipsey were in the kitchen getting ready for the breakfast crowd. Onzell had stayed home with Naughty Bird, who was getting worse. Ruth was a nervous wreck, worrying over Stump, Idgie, and Smokey, who had not come home yet.

“She’s gonna be back,” Sipsey said. “Dat’s jest her way, she’s always runnin’ off. You know she ain’t gwine let nothin’ happen to dat boy.”

An hour later, while Grady Kilgore and the boys were having their morning coffee, they heard a horn blowing, coming toward the cafe. Then, from far off, they heard the sound of Christmas bells jangling, getting louder and louder. They all got up to look out the window and couldn’t believe their eyes.

Next door, at the beauty shop, Opal, who had just slung a teacup of bright green Palmolive shampoo at her six-thirty customer’s head, looked out the window and screamed so loud that it scared poor Biddie Louis Otis nearly half to death.

Miss Fancy, all decked out in her leather ankle bracelets, with her bells and her bright purple feather plume, was happily strolling by the cafe, her snout waving in the air, thoroughly enjoying the scenery. She headed over the tracks to Troutville.

When Sipsey came out of the kitchen and saw the huge animal floating past the window, she ran into the ladies room and locked the door behind her.

A second later, Stump burst into the cafe. “Momma! Momma! Come on!” And he ran out, pulling Ruth behind him.

As Miss Fancy sauntered down the red dirt roads of Troutville, doors started flying open and the air became filled with the sounds of children screaming with delight. Their dumbfounded parents, many still in robes and pajamas, with their hair still done up in rags, were speechless.

J. W. Moldwater, Miss Fancy’s trainer, was walking beside her. He had been in a bout with old man whiskey last night and had come out the loser. He was now wishing that the children, who were running along beside him and jumping up and down like Mexican jumping beans, screaming in loud, ear-piercing squeals, would be quiet.

He turned to Idgie, walking along with him. “Where’s she live at?”

“Just follow me.”

Onzell, still in her apron, ran out of the house and yelled for Big George. He came around the side of the house holding the hatchet he’d been chopping wood with, and stood there for a minute, not believing what he was seeing. Then he looked at Idgie and said softly, “Thank ya, Miss Idgie. Thank ya.”

He put his hatchet against the side of the house and went inside. Carefully, he began wrapping the thin little girl up in a quilt. “Der’s somebody dat come all the way from Birmingham to see you dis morning, baby …” And he carried her onto the front porch.

When they came out, J. W. Moldwater nudged his wrinkled friend with a stick, and the old circus veteran sat up on her hind legs and greeted Naughty Bird with a loud trumpet.

Naughty Bird’s eyes lit up and filled with wonder at the sight in the yard. She said, “Ohhhh, it’s Miz Fancy, Daddy … it’s Miz Fancy.”

Ruth put her arm in Onzell’s and watched as the trainer with the hangover led the elephant to the edge of the porch. He gave Naughty Bird a five-cent bag of peanuts and told her she could feed them to her if she wanted to.

Willie Boy could only be seen peeking through the window. The other children had also kept their distance from this big, gray thing, the size of a house. But Naughty Bird had no fear and fed her the peanuts, one by one, while she talked to Miss Fancy like an old friend, telling her how old she was and what grade she was in.

Miss Fancy blinked her eyes and seemed to be listening. She took the peanuts from the little girl, one at a time, as gently as a gloved woman getting a dime out of a change purse.

Twenty minutes later, Naughty Bird waved goodbye to the elephant and J. W. Moldwater began the long walk home to Birmingham. He vowed that he would never take another drink and would never, ever get involved in an all-night poker game with strangers.

Naughty Bird went inside and ate three buttermilk biscuits with honey.