CHAPTER SEVEN.

Ford No wonder she's so skinny, I thought. She worked like a dozen demons on speed. She ran up and down stairs all day long, answered questions from countless workmen, and cleaned up messes. Part of me said I should help, but the larger part of me said I wanted no part of the chaos. Instead, I took on the job of connecting that old house to the twenty-first century. After I got Jackie to find an electronics store nearby, I spent a day purchasing equipment to set up an office with a computer system and music-which I needed for inspiration. I also went through some of the volumes in the library: Nothing valuable, no first editions, but there were some excellent books on North Carolina history, flora, and fauna.

However, as far as I could find, not one book in that home library mentioned Cole Creek. Either those books had been purposely left out or removed-or the town was too small to warrant anyone making a record of its history. I discarded that theory, though. It was my observation that people loved their small towns and wrote lots about them.

On Thursday morning an invitation came to attend an afternoon tea party in the local park. I probably wouldn't have attended, but Jackie was about to come apart with wanting to go so I said I'd go, too.

Five minutes after I left the kitchen she was thundering up the stairs, almost knocking a painter down. Curious, I followed her. I found her sitting on her bed holding a dress that should have been consigned to a ragbag.

Ah, clothes for the party, I thought, that was her concern. Jackie'd told me she'd seen some old clothes in the attic so I mentioned them.

If I'd been blocking the doorway, I'm sure she would have knocked me down and walked over me on her way up to the attic. As it was, she ran under my arm so fast I was nearly spinning.

We searched through some old boxes, found her clothes, and had about forty minutes off before one of her workmen came and got her. After she left, I sat there for a few minutes and felt kind of good. I'm not sure what it was about Jackie, but when I was around her I didn't feel that deep sense of grief that I'd had since Pat died.

When I thought about that, I decided I needed to start dating. Jackie was beginning to look too good to me. When she put on that lacy blouse, she'd looked like a woman. In her T-shirts and jeans, she was resistible, but in that lacy, feminine garment she looked... Well, she looked too d.a.m.ned good.

And since she'd made it clear that she wasn't interested in me in any way except to write her paychecks, my pride wasn't going to allow me to make overtures to my cute little a.s.sistant.

By Friday afternoon, the house didn't look half bad. I'd been so busy setting up my office and sorting out the library that I'd paid little attention to what Jackie was doing. Maybe she'd told me she and the auctioneer had worked out some deal, but I didn't hear her, so early Friday when the trucks pulled up in front of the house and I saw them moving furniture in, I protested. But it seemed that some rich old lady had died in the next county over and her adult kids had wanted all the contents of their mother's house sold. So Jackie had used the proceeds from the auction of the Belcher goods to buy the woman's furniture. And when it arrived, Jackie ran around like an insane person, directing four men about where to put couches, chairs, and tables.

During that chaos, I locked myself in the library and refreshed my mind on what had made Frank Yerby's books sell so well back in his day.

At one, she knocked on the door and handed me a tray full of food, and at three she knocked again, this time dressed for the party. She had on that white blouse that I'd found for her, and a pair of black trousers with big legs, like something from a Carole Lombard movie, and she looked good.

"Go get dressed," she ordered me in the same tone she'd used on the movers.

I laughed at her, but I also went upstairs and put on a clean shirt and trousers.

We walked down the street together, saying not a word, and after we rounded the corner of the house next door to the park, we had only seconds to look at the scene before people descended on us. There were picnic tables loaded with food, and probably about fifty people milling about. Musicians were in the bandstand tuning up and getting ready to play. Children, in their Sunday best, were sedately walking about, looking for the second when they could escape their parents' eagle eyes and do the things they'd been warned not to do. All in all, it looked like a pleasant gathering, and Jackie and I headed straight for the food tables.

I tried to stay with Jackie because, basically, I don't like strangers, but she was Little Miss Gregarious and disappeared within seconds.

I was left to be "welcomed." This consisted of being overtaken by the mayor of Cole Creek and the head librarian, Miss Essie Lee Shaver.

Just looking at the two of them made me blink in wonder. The mayor- I'm not sure he had a name but was always referred to as "Mayor"-had on a green coat and a gold brocade vest. He had a huge reddish blond mustache and a body like Humpty Dumpty. His belt must have been fifty inches around, but his legs were as thin as a whooping crane's, and his tiny, shiny, black shoes would have fit a toddler. He also had a high-pitched voice that I had difficulty understanding.

I was standing there listening to him, trying to keep my eyes on his and not look him up and down in amazement, when Jackie came by, a full plate of food in her hands, and said under her breath, "Follow the yellow brick road. Follow the yellow brick road."

After that I had a hard time keeping a straight face, for the mayor did indeed look like a tall Munchkin.

It was a long time before the mayor wound down, finished his speech of welcome, and Miss Essie Lee took over. She was tall, thin, even flatter chested than Jackie, and she had on an old blouse very much like the one Jackie was wearing. I kept waiting for the mayor to take a breath so I could tell Miss Essie Lee that I liked her blouse-and thereby maybe be forgiven for our disastrous telephone conversation-but the mayor kept talking.

Jackie was near the two picnic tables that looked as though a couple of cornucopias had been working all night, and she was laughing with about a dozen people. I was torn between jealousy and annoyance. I'd like food and laughter, too, so why wasn't she rescuing me?

I was so distracted by the matter of food that I missed what the mayor was saying.

"So you can see that it was all a mistake," he was saying. "The kids made up a story to explain what they'd found. And Miss Essie Lee thought you were someone pretending to be the ill.u.s.trious writer you are and that's why she hung up on you."

There was a woman standing to one side of the picnic tables. She was quite handsome in a way that I liked. She had an oval face and dark eyes, and long, straight chestnut hair that hung to her waist. She was wearing a black T-shirt dress and little sandals. She was listening to something Jackie was saying, and when she turned and glanced at me, I smiled at her. She didn't smile back but she didn't break eye contact either. I was about to excuse myself from Mayor Munchkin, when Miss Essie Lee took my arm and led me away. With regret I glanced back at the dark woman by the picnic tables, but she was gone.

With a sigh, I gave my attention to Miss Essie Lee. She and I were alone now, half hidden from the others by overhanging trees, and she was telling me something she seemed to think I should know.

It took me several moments before I realized that my worst nightmare was coming true. Miss Essie Lee Shaver was telling me some story she thought I should write. Since this woman ran the local library, the place where I hoped to do some research, I couldn't be rude and walk away. I had to listen.

She seemed to think that because I'd bought "dear old Mr. Belcher's house" that I was dying to hear about the great romantic tragedy of Mr.

Belcher's only child, Edward. She was going into detail about how Edward Belcher was a saint of a man and when he was fifty-three years old, he'd asked the beautiful Harriet Cole, twenty-seven years his junior, to marry him.

The name "Cole" perked up my ears. I said, "As in Cole Creek?" and that's when I was told that the town was founded by seven families and, yes, Harriet Cole was a descendant of a founding father.

As Miss Essie Lee chattered on, a man carrying a plastic cup full of liquid strolled by. I was tempted to offer him a hundred bucks to get me something to drink. Instead, I looked back at the librarian.

She was saying that the dreadful Harriet Cole had wanted nothing to do with the "lovely" Edward.

I refrained from making a comment about age and youth not mixing, something I was seeing every day in my own house.

Seems the beauteous and young Ms. Cole had eloped with a handsome young man who'd come to town to manage the local pottery.

I stood there waiting for the rest of the story, but that seemed to be all of it. Miss Essie Lee closed her mouth and said not another word. As I looked at her, I thought, Why has she told me this long-winded story about true love thwarted? The word "distraction" came into my mind. Maybe she was using the unrequited love story to entice me away from the devil story.

If she was, it wasn't going to work. My a.s.sistant had told a murder story as though she'd been there, and days after she entered this town she'd had a vision of the future. No, I don't think a story of lost love was going to pull me away.

When Miss Essie Lee stopped talking, I thought, now I can get away. I can go get food and drink and seek out the woman with all that hair.

But I couldn't move. I'd heard that writers were cursed with a need to write so, like I had to breathe, I had to hear the end of this story. "What happened to them?" I heard myself ask.

"Died young, of course," Miss Essie Lee said, as though she were disappointed that I, a best-selling writer, had to ask. "Love like that can't live long." She said this as though it were a given, like water being wet.

I wanted to ask which love, the love between the two who eloped, or old Edward and young Harriet? But the look on Miss Essie Lee's face didn't allow me to ask questions. "Perhaps I could visit your library and you could tell me more," I said, then was rewarded with a brilliant smile from her.

Nice teeth, I thought.

"Yes, you do that," she said, then, abruptly, she turned and walked away.

Freedom! I made a beeline for the food table.

By the time I got there, most of the food was gone and some people were already leaving. Three five-year-olds were under the bandstand and wouldn't come out no matter what their parents threatened them with.

Jackie was talking to two women, but they moved away when they saw me. Being "famous" was like that. Either people pushed and shoved to get near me or they ran away at first sight.

"It's a nice group," Jackie said, lifting up a cloth on a bench to reveal a full plate of food. "I saved this for you. So what did ol' Starch and Vinegar want with you?"

Smiling, I took the food. "To distract me with another story."

"Let me guess. About the seven-"

"Founding families," I said, letting her know that I'd learned something.

"What was she telling you?" Jackie asked, nodding toward Miss Essie Lee.

"She seemed to be very serious."

"Old love story," I said. "I'll tell you later. Who was the-"

"The woman with the long hair? The one you were making ga-ga eyes at?"

"I wasn't-" I began, but decided not to let Jackie get to me. "Yeah, that one," I said. "Married?"

"Twice," Jackie answered, looking at me hard but I wouldn't meet her eyes. "But divorced both times. No kids. She's forty-two and she's a personal a.s.sistant to D. L. Hazel."

From her tone of voice, I knew I was supposed to have heard that name before but my mouth was full of some barbequed chicken that was so delicious I couldn't think. Years ago I'd heard something that had stayed with me. "No Northerner ever ate anything he could sell and no Southerner ever sold anything he could eat." The food on my plate verified that, so I didn't pause in eating to try to guess who D. L. Hazel was.

"Sculptor," Jackie said. "Pieces in some of the major galleries in the U.S.

and in lots of museums."

"Did you know that before today?" I asked, biting into corn bread with whole pieces of corn in it.

Jackie smiled. "Naw. Rebecca Cutshaw told me. She's the woman you were hyperventilating over."

I looked at Jackie. Was she teasing me or was she jealous? She was smiling in a way that I couldn't read.

"See the blonde woman over there?" Jackie asked.

I looked to see a small, sweet-looking dumpling of a woman who was talking earnestly to a little girl in a white dress with a big mud stain on the skirt. The two of them made me smile. It was obvious that they were mother and daughter, but they seemed to be exact opposites. In spite of the dress with a big blue sash (left over from a wedding?) I was sure the girl was a tomboy. She had red hair in pigtails, freckles, and feet that, even in patent leather Mary Janes, looked made for climbing trees. But her mother looked as though she were made for bubble baths and clinging helplessly to some man's arm.

"I like her," Jackie said firmly. "Her name's Allie and she's nice." She was looking at me as though I was expected to understand something.

I paused with a chicken leg to my mouth. "You mean you like her?"

"Would you get your mind off s.e.x for ten seconds? I mean she's nice and she has a sense of humor and it's your house but do you mind if I have friends over?" she said in one breath.

I was so relieved I ate the chicken leg in two bites. It didn't matter to me what my a.s.sistant's s.e.xual inclinations were, of course, but-Jackie was staring at me. "What?" I asked.

"Baby-sitting. I told Allie that Tessa, that's her daughter, could stay at our house-your house-on Thursday afternoons. Is that all right?"

"I guess so," I said tentatively. How was I going to work with women giggling in the parlor and kids screaming in the backyard? But then I hadn't worked in the peace and quiet of the last six years, so maybe noise would help.

Before I could say any more, Nate came up to us. He reminded me of myself. He'd had a hard time in his life, with his parents dying when he was four, and afterward having to live with his half-crippled grandmother. All his life he'd had to work for anything he had.

The evening we'd spent hooking up the electronic equipment had been enjoyable, and I'd vowed to help him all I could. But it had been Jackie who'd helped him the most when she'd given him about a ton and a half of junk.

"Granny says thanks," Nate said, looking embarra.s.sed, but my eyes were on Jackie. She'd said some pretty lascivious things about this boy, so I was wondering if she really would try to seduce him. "She asked me if there was anything she could do to repay you."

"She was doing us a favor by taking that stuff off our hands," I said. Jackie and I hadn't talked about it, but I was glad she hadn't asked Nate for a share of the proceeds of the sales. "There's more in the attic. Maybe next week you could stop by and take another load away." Hard as I tried, I couldn't see that Jackie was looking at the boy with l.u.s.t in her eyes.

"Didn't Jackie tell you?" Nate asked, enthusiasm in his voice. "I'm going to be working at your house all summer. I'm your new gardener. Oh!

There's-" He cut off and I turned to see what he was gaping at. The girl I'd taken to the hospital, her arm in a cast, had just arrived.

"Go," I said and the boy was away in a flash. I looked at Jackie. "Don't you think you could have informed me about who I was hiring?"

"And interrupt Mandingo?" she asked. "Besides, I only hired him so I can seduce him-when I'm not in bed with Allie, that is. Look! There's Rebecca, your heartthrob," she said, as she walked away.

I wasn't going to let Jackie's remarks bother me, so I sauntered over to introduce myself to Rebecca. "h.e.l.lo," I said. "I'm-"

"Ford Newcombe." She was even prettier up close. "We all know who you are: our resident celebrity. So, tell me, Mr. Newcombe, how do you like our little town?"

"Actually, I haven't seen much of it." I was hinting that she might give me a tour.

When she sipped at her drink, I caught a whiff of bourbon and wondered where they were serving booze. "If you walked from your house to here then you saw the whole town."

There was some underlying tone of anger in her voice that was turning me off. "True," I said, still smiling, "but there's the surrounding countryside that I haven't seen."

When she drank more and didn't say anything, I tried again. "I bought a big gas grill and I need help in breaking it in," I said in what I hoped was a charming way. "Maybe next Friday you could come for dinner."

"Can't," she said. No excuse. No regret. Just "can't."

"Sat.u.r.day?" I asked.

"Can't," she repeated, then drained her gla.s.s and walked away.

So much for being the town "celebrity," I thought. I couldn't even get a date.

"Struck out, huh?" Jackie said, coming up behind me.

"No, I... She..."

"Don't get too upset about it. Allie says Rebecca has a problem." Jackie made a motion of drinking. "Come on," she said, "let's go talk to Allie."

I'm not sure exactly what happened after that, but four hours later we were having a dinner party at my house. After I bombed out with the tipsy Rebecca, people began coming up to me to ask for my autograph and I was kept busy for a while.

Eventually, though, the band put away their instruments, the party was over, and Jackie came and got me. She wrapped both her arms around one of mine and pulled me away from the people surrounding us.

"Really!" she said. "I've never seen anyone like you. Why are you so rude to people who work for you, but so nice to the ones who act like you're their ticket to stardom?"

"It's a matter of money," I said, suddenly happy because the party was over. "I can take all my frustrations out on people I pay, but I have to be nice to people who pay me. You know, the people who buy my books."