Hotspur

CHAPTER 19

“There’s no hope. I don’t care if I live or die!” Alice Ramy cried, teetering on the brink of hysteria.

She’d held herself together when Ben Sidell visited her. Now Tedi, Edward, Sybil, and Ken had come by to express their sympathy. Sister Jane had also come with them after Tedi had asked her please to do so. Alice couldn’t put a good face on it any longer.

Tedi, perched on the edge of the wing chair where Alice sat crumpled, said, “You do care. You must care.”

“Why?”

“For Guy,” Tedi responded.

“He’s dead. Dead.” She stared at Tedi with vacant eyes.

“You already knew that, didn’t you?” Edward tried to be consoling, but this wasn’t the path to take.

“No! I prayed he had run away. I didn’t want him to be a murderer, but I didn’t want him dead.”

Sister, standing by the other side of the chair, said, “Alice, I believe Nola and Guy died together. If not at the same moment, then because of each other. I pray their souls rest in peace, but I know mine is in a state. I want to find their killer or killers.”

“How?” A flash of life illuminated Alice’s eyes; anger, too. “Especially now. Too much time, Sister, too much time.”

Sybil, sitting across from Alice with Ken by her side, spoke up. “Fate. It’s fate that they died and now it’s fate that they have reappeared. We’re supposed to find the killers.”

“Fate is just an excuse not to do your homework.” Alice smiled ruefully, tears in her eyes now. “When Guy brought home a D in geometry he said it was fate. I said fate is just an excuse not to do your homework. It stuck. There is no such thing as fate.”

Resting a strong hand on Alice’s shoulder, Sister leaned down. “Then let’s do our homework. Try to remember—”

Alice interrupted, “I have!”

“Things can pop into your head at strange times. Come to some hunt breakfasts. Talk to the gang. Something might click,” Sister encouraged her.

“Nobody wants to talk to me.”

“Of course they do,” Tedi said warmly.

“Xavier keeps chickens,” Edward said, smiling.

“Fighting chickens,” Tedi sniffed.

“Not illegal to keep them. Just illegal to fight and bet on them,” Ken responded, trying to humor her, calm her. He didn’t really know what to say.

“Guy used to come home from those cockfights plucked cleaner than the chickens. I don’t believe he ever won a red cent.”

“He won sometimes,” Ken said, trying surreptitiously to check the time. “I was there. You just never saw a penny, Alice, because he spent it on wine, women, and song.”

“Guy could be very naughty.” Alice couldn’t conceal a note of pride. After all, how many women bear a son who is widely considered movie-star handsome?

Tedi, having a different take, said, “So could Nola, unfortunately.”

“Oh, Tedi, she was high-spirited,” Sister said.

“High-spirited with other women’s husbands.”

“Mother,” Sybil exclaimed.

“You thought I didn’t know. Nola was a bad girl. I loved her. I couldn’t help but love her, but men were chess pieces to her. Every man a pawn and she the only queen.”

A moment of embarrassing silence followed, broken when Alice surprisingly said, “She met her match in Guy. That’s why they fell in love. Both of them wild as dogs in heat.” She looked fleetingly at Edward, then Tedi. “Forgive me.”

“It’s the truth,” Tedi agreed.

Edward, not knowing about all of Nola’s amours, shifted uncomfortably in his chair. No father likes hearing these things about his daughter. Tedi certainly had never told him. Nola was the apple of his eye.

Ken, sensing Edward’s pain, said, “Dad, she wasn’t as bad as all that. Nola was a terrible flirt. She didn’t, well, you know . . .”

Tedi knew that was a flat-out lie but decided to let it pass. No point going into the details in front of everyone. It wouldn’t help Alice.

“Come to our hunt breakfasts. Reacquaint yourself with your neighbors and friends,” Sister said, again extending the invitation. “We go out cubbing Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays. If weather’s iffy, I change around the days, but call me up. Once formal hunting starts October twenty-sixth, I’ll send you a fixture card.”

“You’re just trying to get me to let you hunt here. Guy used to beg me to let you do it, but I still won’t. Poor little foxes.”

“Those poor little foxes make fools of us all. But Alice, you know that’s not why I’m here. I mean it. Come out and see us. You’ll be surprised how friendly everyone is. All of Guy’s friends are there. You know Ralph and Xavier. Ronnie Haslip, of course. Ken will be there on Saturdays; sometimes he can squeeze in a weekday. Oh, the Franklins. The boys in their mid-forties—they’re all Guy’s old running buddies.”

“Maybe.”

“Alice, excuse me, but I have to go. Richmond business calls.” Ken stood up.

“Haven’t been to Richmond since 1986.” Alice noticed her mantel clock had stopped running. She’d forgotten to wind it.

“Downtown is a little sad. No Miller and Rhoads, no Thalheimer’s.” Ken mentioned the great department stores that used to draw shoppers like a magnet in the old days. “But it’s much the same. What’s changed is the West End. The shops, the businesses, Alice, they’re all the way out to Manakin Sabot on Broad Street. You just wouldn’t believe it.”

“Don’t want to see it.” Her obstinacy was returning, which meant she felt better.

“If you change your mind, I’d be happy to take you down. Be fun to find some fall clothes,” Sybil suggested.

Ken smiled. “Sybil, we need to build a new wing on the house for all your clothes.”

“She always looks so nice,” Alice said. “Thank you, Sybil, but I think I’ll pass on Richmond.”

Ken walked over, took both of Alice’s hands in his, leaned down, and kissed her on the cheek. Sybil also leaned over to kiss her good-bye. Alice hadn’t been kissed since Paul died in 1986. She craved human touch but didn’t realize it.

“You take care now. And you call me if you need anything,” Ken said warmly.

After Sybil and Ken left, the four contemporaries remained quiet for a few minutes.

“You’ve kept the place up,” Edward complimented her.

“Full-time job. Wouldn’t be so much work if it weren’t for the chickens. I change their water every day. I scrub out their coop every day, too. Doesn’t stink like chickens can, you know.”

“That’s wonderful.” Edward nodded pleasantly.

“Edward, Tedi, were you afraid Nola would run off with Guy?”

“Yes,” Tedi forthrightly answered for both herself and her husband.

“I was, too. I always assumed you didn’t think my boy was good enough for her.” An edge sharpened Alice’s voice, not the most melodious in any circumstances.

“No, Alice, that wasn’t it.” Edward approached this with his usual tact. “A fire that flames that blazingly hot can turn to ashes in a heartbeat.”

Tedi’s eyes searched out her husband’s. She had underrated him. Like most women she felt she understood emotions far better than men. Edward might not choose to talk about emotions, but he understood them, a real victory.

“I thought of that, too.” Alice glanced down at her crepe-soled shoes, then up again at Edward. “It scared me. For him, I mean. I don’t think Guy had ever truly been in love until Nola.”

“For what it’s worth, I think she loved him,” Sister said. She moved to sit opposite Alice.

“Did you?” Tedi genuinely inquired.

“I did. I didn’t know what would come of it. They both had a history of being carefree, if you will, but there is something to be said about the changes that happen to you when you meet the right one. One does settle down eventually.”

“I thought she’d throw him away.” Alice didn’t sound rancorous. If anything, she was grateful to finally be able to speak about this.

“I did, too,” Tedi said. “It wasn’t Guy. Don’t get me wrong. It was money. Nola loved money. She might have married him, but it would have fizzled. And regardless of what you might think, we did not spoil either of our girls. Yes, they both went to the best schools, but they didn’t get cars handed to them on their sixteenth birthdays. They had to earn the money. And every summer each one took a job. Oh, it might have been something fun like working on a ranch in Wyoming, but still, it was the beginning of responsibility. And, well, it’s as clear as the nose on our faces, Sybil was by far the more prudent, the more sensible. Nola worked, but she spent it as fast as she made it. Then she’d run out and come begging. I certainly never made up her debts, but I think”—Tedi nodded at Edward—“her father may have.”

“Once or twice, my dear, I didn’t make it a habit.”

“Oh, Edward.” Tedi didn’t believe a word of it.

“She wouldn’t have had money with Guy,” Alice argued. “Burned a hole in his pocket. He could have made money. He had the brains for it, but not the discipline. But he was only twenty-five when he died. Almost twenty-six. I’d like to think he would have found something to gainfully occupy him.”

“I’m sure he would have,” Sister said. She had seen Ralph, Ken, Ronnie, and Xavier each settle down and prosper. She thought Guy would have come ’round, too.

“Perhaps the fates are kind,” Tedi said, smoothing her skirt. “Nola and Guy were killed at the height of love, the first blush. They never knew disillusionment.”

“I told you I don’t believe in fate,” Alice stubbornly insisted. “And I don’t see how dying at twenty-five can be considered kind. So they would have fought. Guy would have gotten drunk or picked up sticks and left for a while. He would have recovered. She would have, too. It’s all stuff and nonsense, this love business.”

“Not when you’re young and maybe not when you’re old. I might be seventy-one, but I tell you, let another woman go after Edward and I’ll knock her sideways.”

“You flatter me.” Edward smiled. “I’m the one on guard here. I have a wife who looks thirty years younger than myself. It can be quite nerve-racking. Why, one of Ken’s friends tried to woo her at a company gathering over the Fourth of July.”

“Now who’s the flatterer?” Tedi shook her head.

“Well, I’m the cynic. Year in and year out Paul Ramy brought me flowers on my birthday, chocolates on Valentine’s Day, and usually a charm for my charm bracelet at Christmas. That was it. No variety and no spontaneity. I think Guy became romantic just because his father wasn’t. Now, my son always brought me little presents, even as a child.” She stopped herself and swallowed. “When Ben Sidell came here I thought it was more questions. I didn’t think I’d find out what happened to Guy.”