Sweet and Deadly aka Dead Dog

8

AFTER THE SHOCK, fear, and joy of the weekend, Monday began badly. Catherine wanted to wear something she had never worn to the office before, in Randall’s honor. But her closet held only the unexciting shirtwaists she had worn as a freshman in college, when girls still wore dresses to class. She had worn them all scores of times.

If Randall and I go out this weekend, I’ll have to go to Memphis one evening this week and buy something to wear, she thought cautiously. I’m damned if I’ll wear one of these.

She pulled on her least-faded dress, in a snit of anger at herself.

“Morning,” she said curtly to Leila Masham as she entered the Gazette’s front door, which faced onto the town square. Her temper was not improved by the sight of long-legged Leila in a brand-new summer dress that bared Leila’s golden shoulders. The girl flagged her down with an urgent wave, so Catherine had to stop instead of marching through the reporters’ room.

Catherine expected inquiries about the weekend’s big incident, but single-minded Leila whispered theatrically, “Tom came in early this morning!” The girl’s brown eyes were open wide at this unprecedented beginning to a Monday.

“He didn’t have to drive down from Memphis,” Catherine whispered back, reminded of Leila’s infatuation in time to stop herself from saying, “So what?”

“Was she down here?”

“She” must be Tom’s fiancée.

Leila would have to find out sooner or later.

“They broke up,” Catherine said expressionlessly.

She had given Leila the keys to heaven.

“Ooh,” Leila said, as if she had been hit on the back.

Catherine shook her head as she crossed the reporters’ room to her desk. Tom was hard at work already, typing furiously, taking swift sideways glances at the notes by his typewriter. He acknowledged her with a look and a nod that said he didn’t want to be interrupted, and hunched back over the keys. His long thin fingers flew.

“Such activity on a Monday,” Catherine muttered, whipping the plastic cover from her own typewriter. Then she realized that Tom was writing what would be the lead story, about Leona’s murder. She paused with her hands in her lap, the cover clutched half-folded between her fingers.

I have a lot to do, and this can’t get in the way, she told herself sternly. She stuffed the cover into its accustomed drawer with a resolute air, and pulled out a sheaf of papers from her Pending basket. As she flipped through them, she kept an ear cocked for Randall’s voice.

Gradually, as she became caught up in her work, she forgot to listen. When that dawned on her, she thought, All to the good.

She was studying the layout of her society page-which she briefly sketched out as it filled up-when she realized with a jolt that Randall was standing at the other side of the desk.

I’m as bad as Leila, she thought ruefully.

“Movie in Memphis Friday night?” he asked.

She nodded.

“Won’t you smile, Sphinx?”

She smiled.

As he walked through Leila’s room into his office, she typed cheerfully, “The mother of the bride wore beige silk…”

Catherine polished off two weddings with dispatch. She was glad she didn’t have to actually attend the ceremonies. She usually dropped by the bride’s house and extended her regrets, leaving a form to fill out that made writing the stories practically automatic.

Bridesmaids’ names and places of residence, descriptions of everyone’s dress, and details of the decorations at the short Southern reception. Groom’s employment, bride’s employment (this last recently instituted). Honeymoon itinerary.

Summer and Christmas were the wedding seasons. May was parties for graduates. Obituaries and children’s birthday parties, anniversary celebrations and dinner parties, trips and out-of-town guests filled up the rest of the year. All of these appeared on Catherine’s society page except the obituaries, which were scattered through the paper as fillers. Catherine wrote those as well-unless the death was unusual in some way, in which case Tom picked it up.

Leila buzzed Catherine’s extension more often than any other. At the little paper, Monday and Tuesday were the busiest days, the two days before the paper came out, when people realized they had to contact her before the weekly noon deadlines. The Gazette was printed on Wednesday morning, distributed Wednesday afternoon.

This Monday was no exception. Catherine worked steadily through the morning, taking notes from callers and typing them up as soon as possible.

By eleven, her desk was an impossible clutter. It was time to review what she had done and what she had left to do. Four weddings. One for this Wednesday’s paper, three for the next issue. She carefully dated them. She had taken two more weddings back to the typesetter the previous Friday. She checked: yes, the accompanying pictures were attached to her new copy.

She put the copy in a basket and sorted through the other sheets of flimsy yellow paper. A little social note about the Drummonds’ progress in Europe: that should please the old couple when they returned and read the back issues. A bridal shower. A baby shower. And two children’s birthday parties. Catherine wrinkled her nose in distaste.

The last society editor had started this practice, and it was a sure-fire paper seller, but Catherine had always felt it horribly cutesy to write up infants’ birthday parties. The stories were invariably accompanied by amateurish pictures taken by doting grandparents: pictures featuring babies sitting more or less upright in highchairs, often with party hats fixed tipsily to their heads. Catherine had long wanted to discontinue this feature, but in view of the papers it sold (every child having multiple relations who were sure to want a copy or two), she had never discussed it with Randall. The Gazette needed all the revenue it could get.

The Gerrard family was well enough off, but only because a wise forebear had made it legally impossible to put family money into the paper. Several generations of Gerrards had gotten ulcers achieving solvency for the Gazette.

One of the birthday stories for the upcoming issue was complete, with story written and picture attached. The other was written, but there was no picture. Catherine remembered as she read the first line of copy that this was Sally Barnes Boone’s baby’s party. It had been held at grandfather Martin Barnes’s house; and Catherine recalled that Mrs. Barnes had assured her that she would bring the picture in before Monday noon.

Catherine glanced at the clock. Damn, she should call. But she felt awkward about phoning the Barnes home. They might resent her telling the sheriff about Martin’s proximity to Leona’s dumped body. Barnes’s wife Melba had a reputation for being unpredictable.

I guess she’s one of those well-known Delta eccentrics that Sheriff Galton was so proud of, Catherine thought sourly. I’ll wait until tomorrow, she equivocated. Maybe someone’ll show up with the damn picture.

She hadn’t had time to pay attention to what Tom was doing. Now she saw him through the picture window that made the reporters’ room a sunny fish-bowl. He was striding toward the courthouse, which sat in the center of the square, his camera in hand.

That meant he had already turned in his Leona Gaites story to Jewel Crenna, the typesetter. Catherine wanted to read it, and she had to take her copy back to Production anyway. She gathered up a sheaf of yellow paper and went through the swinging door to the big production room.

It was not exactly silence that met her as the back-room staff observed her entrance, but there was a definite, abrupt halt of activity. Catherine stopped right inside the door, surprised.

They want to ask me all about it, she realized after a second. No people on earth were as curious as people working in any capacity for a newspaper, she had found after she had started work at the Gazette.

Now Catherine straightened her shoulders, set her lips, and refused to meet the glances that sought to stop her.

Garry, the foreman, and Sarah, the senior paste-up girl, wouldn’t have the face to accost her directly, Catherine figured rapidly, but she dreaded encountering Salton Sims, the pressman. He would ask anyone anything he wanted to know.

Catherine nipped quickly into the typesetter’s cubicle. Jewel Crenna was hard at work and notoriously temperamental on Mondays and Tuesdays, so Catherine leaned against the wall behind her without speaking, and scanned Jewel’s In basket. It was full to the brim with additions to ads, and last-minute amendments to stories Jewel had set the previous week. Catherine added her own sheaf to the pile and began searching the hook that held processed galleys of type. Jewel would have set Tom’s story as soon as it came in, so the staff could read it.

Jewel glanced up once to identify the intruder in her bailiwick, and then her eyes swiveled back to the typed page held by a clamp in front of her, her fingers moving surely and with a speed that Catherine envied.

Jewel was a tall woman with suspiciously black hair and clear olive skin. She was a handsome woman with strong features and a tart tongue that knew no hesitation, a tongue that was widely supposed to be the cause of her two divorces.

Catherine had always had a sneaking admiration for Jewel, well mixed with a healthy fear. Jewel was an uninhibited shouter when she was irritated, and shouting people had always cowed Catherine completely.

Catherine skimmed through the justified type, getting the gist of Tom’s well-written account. She raised her eyebrows when she found herself quoted. She hadn’t said anything like what Tom had blithely invented. He must have felt free to take liberties since he was quoting a fellow reporter.

Oh well, she shrugged. The quotes were undoubtedly better copy than anything she had actually said; and they were truthful in content, if not in source.

She was so absorbed in reading that it was a while before she realized that Jewel’s fingers had stopped moving-an incredible event on a Monday. Catherine looked up to find Jewel facing her, broad hands fixed on her knees.

“I hope I haven’t bothered you,” Catherine said instantly. She didn’t want Jewel to let loose with one of the pithy phrases she used to blast disturbers of her peace. Jewel was aware that she was indeed a gem to Randall and the Gazette.

The whine of the press, stopping and starting as Salton Sims overhauled it, made Jewel’s cubicle a little corner of isolation.

“I hear you told the police you saw Martin close to where they found that Gaites woman,” Jewel said abruptly.

“Yes,” Catherine admitted cautiously, wondering at Jewel’s interest.

“Now Melba Barnes has got it in her head Martin was out at that shack meeting Leona Gaites for some fun, and found her dead,” Jewel said contemptuously. “As if Martin would have anything to do with a plucked chicken like Leona Gaites! That Melba hasn’t got the brains God gave a goat.” Jewel paused invitingly, but Catherine prudently kept her mouth shut. The light was dawning about Martin Barnes’s presence on that road Saturday morning. He hadn’t been riding his place at all: he had been at Jewel Crenna’s house by the highway.

“Martin’s a little upset about your telling Jimmy Galton you saw him,” Jewel said amiably. “But he knows you had to do it; why the hell wouldn’t you? Course, he was out to my place, not riding his land. Melba still ain’t put two and two together-Martin and Leona, ha!-but she decided there was something fishy about Martin being out that morning. Up in the air she goes, stupid bitch! ‘Martin,’ I says, ‘just ignore her.’ When he comes home from church yesterday, she busts out crying and tells him now everybody’s gonna know that he’s cheatin’ on her, how can she hold her head up, what about the kids (and them all grown), and so on and so forth.”

Jewel’s voice had risen in a whiny and accurate imitation of Melba Barnes. Now she resumed her normal robust tone. “But I told Martin that Catherine Linton, she was smarter than Melba, she might figure it out; though of course,” and Jewel raised an emphatic eyebrow, “she wouldn’t tell no one. ‘She’s a good girl,’ I said, ‘she’s always kept her mouth shut tighter than a clam.’”

Jewel gave Catherine a firm nod of approval and dismissal, and Catherine silently replaced Tom’s story on its spike and sidled out of the cubicle. She walked through the swinging door back into her own domain, knowing she had gotten a direct and forceful order to keep her nose out of Jewel’s business.

Really, I think she overestimated me, Catherine thought with wry amusement as she rolled more paper into her typewriter. I don’t think I ever would have thought of putting that particular “one and one” together. There’s a woman with nerve. She makes me feel like I just graduated from diapers.

Then Catherine frowned and let her fingers rest idle on the keys. Would Martin Barnes have paid blackmail to keep his affair with Jewel a secret? Jewel would have said, in effect, “Publish and be damned,” but Martin Barnes was a different kettle of fish. Based on her limited knowledge of Melba Barnes, Catherine decided that if Melba had good grounds for divorce, she would take Martin for whatever she could get. And that would be a considerable sum.

Maybe Martin had gotten sick of blackmail. The pressure of trying to have a surreptitious affair in little Lowfield, added to a bad relationship with a jealous wife, might have tipped Martin’s scales toward violence; especially with the additional squeeze of having to pay hush money.

Sheriff Galton hadn’t mentioned how much cash he had found in Leona’s house. Had it all been blackmail money? How many people in Lowfield had secrets they would pay to keep hidden?

A week ago Catherine would have said, “Not many.” But yesterday Tom had told her about Jimmy Galton Junior’s drug sales. Today Jewel Crenna had told her she was having an affair with a prominent planter.

How many more people had mud tracking up their homes? And Sheriff Galton had hinted strongly at some other illegal activity the former nurse had engaged in.

It’s a comment on how I felt about Leona, that I can accept the fact that she was a blackmailer, without being awfully surprised, Catherine reflected.

The swinging door rocked back and forth as Salton Sims, the Gazette’s press operator, came through. Salton approached everything at an angle, so until the moment he ended up at the side of her desk, Catherine had hopes she would be bypassed. Salton had appeared to be heading toward the filing cabinets.

“I missed seeing you when you was in the back,” he said cheerfully.

Catherine’s heart sank. No escape. Salton was known and dreaded throughout the county for his complete tactlessness and his equally complete determination to have his say.

“Bet that ole Leona Gaites was a sight with her head bashed in,” Salton began. “Bloody, huh?”

Catherine cast around for help, but Tom was still away at the courthouse.

“Yes, Salton, she sure was, and I’d just as soon not discuss it, if you don’t mind,” Catherine said hopefully.

Salton stuck his hands in the pockets of his grease-soaked jump suit and grinned at Catherine.

“Well, you know what I say?” he asked her.

“I’ll bet you’re going to tell me.”

“Damn right! No one can call me two-faced.”

Boy, that’s the truth, she thought.

“I say,” he continued, “that it’s a good thing.”

“Salton!” She shouldn’t have been shocked, but she was. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Leila come into the room and begin filing at the bank of cabinets. Maybe Leila’s presence would inhibit Salton, who thought all females under twenty were sacred. But no such luck.

“No, Catherine, you just think about it. It was a good thing. Leona was a godless woman.”

“Godless?” repeated Catherine weakly. How long has it been since I heard anyone called that? She wondered. Only Salton would use that adjective.

“Sure, sure. I know for a fact, from a lady I won’t name, that she killed babies.”

Catherine finally understood what Leona had used some of Dr. Linton’s equipment for. She glanced at Leila desperately and saw that Leila was shaken to the bone, staring in horror at Salton’s broad face.

“I guess you mean that she performed abortions,” Catherine said slowly.

“That’s what a lady told me,” Salton said with satisfaction.

“But they’re legal,” Catherine protested. “You can get them thirty miles away in Memphis.” Were they legal in Mississippi? She couldn’t remember.

“Too many people from here go to Memphis every day,” Salton rebutted. “Any kid from here who went to Memphis for a thing like that would be caught in a minute. And what teenager could leave here for two days to go to Jackson, without their parents finding out what for and why?”

“True,” Catherine admitted.

“Well, back to that cursed old press,” Salton said happily, and wandered swiftly through the door, by some trick appearing until the last minute to be on a collision course with the wall.

Abortions. Wonderful. Abortion and blackmail payments: what a legacy I’ve inherited! That’s where those medical instruments went: Leona was supplementing her Social Security.

Catherine caught herself bundling all her hair together and holding it on top of her head, a nervous habit she thought she had discarded with college exams. But she remained like that, both elbows out in the air, until she caught sight of Leila, whom she had completely forgotten.

Leila seemed equally oblivious of Catherine. She was still looking at the swinging door through which Salton had passed, her face so miserable that Catherine felt obliged to ask her if she was feeling sick.

“Listen,” said Leila urgently, then stopped to look back through the archway that led into the reception area. There was no one there, but Leila came and sat close to Catherine’s desk. The girl was still clutching a handful of bills she had been filing.

“Listen,” she said again, and hunched over until her face was five inches from Catherine’s. Catherine had to resist an urge to lean back.

“I’m listening,” Catherine said sharply. She had an ominous feeling she was about to hear yet another secret.

“She did,” Leila hissed dramatically.

“Perform abortions?”

“Yeah, sure,” Leila whispered. “Listen, I know you won’t tell on me…”

Everyone certainly seems to be sure of that, Catherine thought fleetingly.

“…but she ‘did’ me. It’s like Mr. Sims says, how could I just tell my parents I was going to be out of town for two days?”

“When was this?”

“Five months ago.”

After Father died, Catherine realized with relief. Leona just kept some of the equipment when Jerry bought the rest. At least it wasn’t while her Father was alive.

“I went up to Memphis and asked, but it was awful expensive.”

“Leona was cheap?”

“Oh, yeah, compared to Memphis. But I think she charged more later. I was one of her first.”

Catherine felt sick.

“I’m sorry, Leila.” It was all she knew to say.

“Oh, well.” Leila waved a polished hand to dismiss her former predicament. “What I’m scared of,” she went on urgently, “is the sheriff will tell, if he finds out. My parents, you know. I mean, what if Miss Gaites kept records?”

“Come on, Leila,” Catherine said tartly. “She would hardly have a receipt file!”

Leila pondered that.

“I guess you’re right,” she said. “I mean, she was breaking the law. So she probably wouldn’t have written anything down. And you had to pay her cash.”

Catherine imagined Leila trying to write a check for Leona’s services and winced.

Leila, now that her immediate fear was banished, looked brighter by the second. She straightened her shoulders, leaned back in her chair, and gave her pink fingernails a once-over. Catherine was glancing at her notes surreptitiously, longing to return to something normal and humdrum, when the girl began to frown.

“How did you know about Tom’s fiancée?” Leila asked abruptly.

“What?” Catherine made herself pay attention.

“Tom,” Leila prompted. “When did he tell you?”

“That they broke up?” Catherine made an effort to remember. “I guess it was yesterday.”

“He over at your place?” asked Leila, with badly feigned indifference.

“Oh,” Catherine said, enlightened. “No, I went over to his house” (that just made it worse, she saw instantly) “and he happened to mention it in the course of the conversation.”

And I was trying to do her a good turn, Catherine reflected gloomily, as Leila shot her a look and rose from her chair. Leila returned to her filing, back pointedly stiff, slamming home the drawers of the cabinets with all her strength.

It seemed a good time to go to lunch.