Between Heaven and Texas (6 page)

C
HAPTER 10

 

“G
ood riddance,” Dutch mumbled through a mouthful of turkey and cranberries. “It's worth giving up child support just to be done with him. And to keep his hands off the ranch. Who needs him? We take care of ourselves and our own.” He used his fork to point toward a serving bowl. “Lydia Dale, pass me some more of those potatoes, will you?”

Lydia Dale quickly complied with her father's request, then turned to nine-year-old Jeb, who was sitting slumped in his chair, kicking the leg of the dining room table with the toe of his shoe.

“Jeb, why don't you take your sister into the TV room? Go watch the parade. You don't want to miss seeing Santa Claus.”

“The parade's already over,” Jeb grumbled, giving the table leg another thump. “And there is no Santa Claus.”

Cady dropped the fork she had been using to carve a crisscross design into her mound of uneaten mashed potatoes. “There is too! And he's going to bring me a Cabbage Patch Kid for Christmas. Isn't he, Momma?”

Lydia Dale arched her eyebrows. “Not if you keep shouting at the dinner table, he won't. Go on, you two. Jeb, see if you can find out what channel the game is on.”

Dutch grinned at his grandson and scooped up another forkful of potatoes. “Cowboys versus Cardinals. We wouldn't want to miss that, would we, Jeb?”

The boy didn't answer. Instead, he got up from his chair and whispered a question in his mother's ear.

Lydia Dale frowned as she listened, then said, “I won't. You go on now. And take your sister with you, you hear?”

“Yes, ma'am.” Jeb rolled his eyes and grabbed his sister's hand. “C'mon, shrimp.”

“But we didn't have any pie yet,” Cady protested.

Mary Dell, worried about the dark circles under Lydia Dale's eyes and the fact that she'd barely touched a bite of the Thanksgiving feast, stepped in.

“I'll bring your pie into the TV room. We can all have dessert while we watch the game. You save a good spot on the sofa for me and Grandma Silky. I heard the cheerleaders are trying out some new uniforms today. If we pay real close attention at half-time, I bet we can figure out how to copy the pattern. But you've got to help us, all right?”

Cady, whose stated goal in life was to be a Dallas Cowboys cheerleader and who had asked her aunt and great-grandmother to sew her a pint-sized cheerleader's uniform for Christmas, nodded and ran from the room. Jeb trailed behind her, slowly.

Dutch frowned. “What's the matter with that boy? Doesn't he like football?”

“He doesn't like people talking mean about Jack Benny,” Lydia Dale said. “Neither do I, Daddy. Not in front of the kids.”

Dutch squirmed in his chair. “I'm sorry, honey. I'll mind my tongue in front of the children. But don't forget that you're my little girl too. You can't expect me to just sit back and say nothing when I see Jack Benny treating you so bad.”

Dutch scowled, reached for the cut-crystal bowl of cranberry sauce, and plopped a big spoonful on his already heaping plate. Taffy had scolded him about watching his blood sugar earlier, but Dutch didn't think he ought to have to worry about his blood sugar on Thanksgiving. Besides, he always ate more when he was upset, and this divorce had him wolfing down his food so fast he hardly had time to taste it.

“I don't know how he could desert his wife and children, not to mention his unborn child,” Dutch said, nodding at the seven-month mound that swelled under Lydia Dale's red plaid maternity smock, “to take up with that slut Carla Jean . . .”

Taffy gasped. “Dutch!”

Silky looked up from her plate. “Oh, for pity's sake, Taffy. Now that they kicked you out of the Women's Club, you can stop putting on airs. It's not like we've never heard the word before. Besides, I think Dutch has it about right.

“Lydia Dale, I think you're crazy to let Jack Benny get away with paying no child support, but,” Silky said, “maybe your daddy is right. Maybe it's worth it just to see the back of him. And to get him to give up this crazy idea that he could lay claim to half our ranch! I'd rather drop dead of dysentery than see one acre of land pass out of the Tudmore line. I don't know what Jack Benny was thinking, supposing we'd lie down for that.”

“He was thinking it would play out exactly how it did,” Donny said, pausing to pick a shred of turkey out of his teeth. “He never cared about the ranch. He just wanted to get out of paying child support. He was bluffing all along.”

“I disagree,” Aunt Velvet said, raising her fork and pointing it at her nephew-in-law. “Now, Donny, if you knew the history of the town the way you ought to, you'd know that every Benton born shares two qualities: a hunger for real estate and a willingness to do just about anything to get hold of it. How do you think they came to own so much of Too Much? But I don't think Jack Benny came up with this plan himself; he's not bright enough for that. This has Marlena's fingerprints all over it.”

Velvet, much more interested in the conversation now that it had turned to matters historic, cleared her throat.

“This didn't start with Taffy and Marlena, you know. The enmity between the Tudmores and Bentons stretches all the way back to 1845 and the early days of Texas statehood, when the Bentons made an unsuccessful grab for this very piece of land,” she said, pointing her fork to the green carpeting and, presumably, the brown earth that lay hidden under the floorboards of the house. “The Bentons have an insatiable desire for property, especially if they can come to it by underhanded means. It's in their blood.”

“If that's so,” Donny countered, “then why did Jack Benny give in so quick when Lydia Dale said she'd give up her right to child support if he gave up his claim on the ranch?”

“Because,” Silky said, “Jack Benny is greedy and broke. His daddy won't give him a dime. Marlena Benton carries a lot of influence with the women of this town, but none at all with her husband—or her son. Try as she might, she never could control that boy. If she had, he might have turned out to be a halfway decent man instead of still
being
a boy—or at least still acting like one. She spoiled that child.”

Velvet clucked her tongue. “Well, if you ask me . . .”

Lydia Dale, who had been quietly sawing her turkey into smaller and smaller bites, looked up from her plate. “Could we talk about something else?”

“Lydia Dale is right,” Taffy said, raising her napkin daintily to her lips. “We shouldn't be talking about Jack Benny that way. He's still Jeb and Cady's father, and with the baby coming in just a couple more months . . .”

She turned toward Lydia Dale with an expression of motherly concern.

“Honey, are you sure you want to go through with the divorce? This . . . infatuation of Jack Benny's is bound to burn itself out. Marriage is a two-way street, you know. Maybe if you could just try a little harder.”

Mary Dell could see her sister's jaw tighten at Taffy's suggestion, but she didn't say anything, just sat silently staring down at her bulging stomach.

“Momma!” Mary Dell shouted. “How can you say such a thing? Lydia Dale did everything she could to keep her marriage together. Nobody could have done more!”

“I'm not saying she didn't, Mary Dell. I'm just suggesting that she could give it a little more time, try to see things from Jack Benny's perspective, figure out where and why things started to go wrong or what more she could have done to make things work.”

“Like what?” Mary Dell scoffed.

Taffy cast her glance upward, her eyes drifting to and fro as if some new insight regarding her daughter's failed marriage might be written on the popcorn ceiling. “Well. For instance, like trying harder to get along with her in-laws.”

Mary Dell's face flushed. She was used to Taffy's thoughtless comments, her self-absorption, her obsession with being accepted into the town's social circles, but this was too much. She was about to lay into her mother and rise to her sister's defense, but was interrupted by the sound of silverware being dropped on Taffy's best china with a clatter and Grandma Silky's raspy bark.

“Oh, for heaven's sake, Taffy! Your own daughter is seven months pregnant by a cheating husband who deserted her for some round-heeled barmaid, and you're
still
going on about Marlena and getting tossed out of the Women's Club?” Silky shook her head, her expression a mixture of fury and hopelessness.

“I'm not going
on
about it,” Taffy said in a defensive tone. “Of course I care that Lydia Dale is suffering. But I'm suffering too, you know. This is the first time in ages that I won't be able to go to the Christmas Ball. And I've lost all my friends . . .”

Silky sat up a bit taller, locking eyes with her daughter over the top of the wicker cornucopia stuffed with orange and yellow chrysanthemums.

“Taffeta Tudmore Templeton, you listen to me. Those women are not your friends. If they were, they'd have stood up for you against Marlena, voted down her motion to vote you out. But they didn't. They went along in lockstep with Marlena because that's what they do. They are never going to change.

“Frankly, I'm glad you're out of that silly club. Now maybe you'll start acting sensible. Maybe you'll finally see who and what really matters. Your children, your grandchildren, your husband, your family. Because these are the people who care about you, Taffy. We are the ones who love you.”

Taffy wiped her nose with her napkin. “I know, Momma,” she said. “But it's not just that. I'm worried about my daughter too.” She looked at Lydia Dale. “I don't want you to end up all alone and with no friends, like me. Face it, with three little children, you'll be hard-pressed to find another husband. That's why I think you ought to give Jack Benny a little more time to come to his senses. Maybe go see one of those marriage counselors.”

Lydia Dale lifted her head. Her eyes were dry, but her voice was choked. “It's Thanksgiving. There must be better things to talk about. Something we're thankful for. Anything but Jack Benny. Please?”

Mary Dell glanced toward Donny, a question in her eyes. He gave his head a quick jerk, a smile twitching at the corner of his lip, giving Mary Dell tacit permission to go ahead and say what she had to say.

“As a matter of fact, we do have something to be thankful for. We weren't going to say anything until after supper, but . . .” Mary Dell grinned. Her eyes lit up like blue beacons.

“We're pregnant! Donny and I are going to have a baby!”

Mary Dell, who had mentally rehearsed this moment for weeks, had expected a response of whoops and hollers, hugs and handshakes. Instead, her declaration was met with an awkward silence. Donny realized what was going on.

“It's different this time,” he assured them. “Mary Dell is already five months along. We waited to tell you until we knew for sure. The doctor says everything is just fine.” Donny put his arm around Mary Dell's shoulders, beaming with pride.

“In another four months, our son, Howard Hobart Bebee, will be born. We're going to name him after my daddy. If he turns out to be anything like the old man, the world had just better watch out!”

Donny gave his wife a smacking kiss, and the room erupted into exclamations and applause. Taffy jumped out of her chair to give her daughter a kiss and her son-in-law a hug, then collapsed into another chair, so overcome with hiccups and happy tears that Dutch had to pour her a glass of water.

Aunt Velvet, who hated emotional displays, said, “Well, that's just wonderful news! Howard Hobart Bebee. There was a Hobart family who settled in Too Much back in the 1890s. They didn't stay. The parents passed on, the son was killed in the Great War, and the daughter married an oilman and moved to Houston. I wonder if your daddy was any relation? I'll have to look it up,” then pressed her fist against her mouth for a moment before whisking away Mary Dell's empty wineglass and scurrying into the kitchen to fill it with milk.

Grandma Silky, who, over the years, had spent hours on her knees praying for this, squealed, lifted her hands high, and shouted, “Thank you, dear Lord!”

After seeing to his wife, Dutch squeezed Mary Dell in a big bear hug and lifted her off the ground. “If that don't beat all! And here I just thought you was getting fat like your old man!” He punched Donny in the shoulder and declared him a prime bull before pouring himself and his son-in-law two fingers of good bourbon.

Donny, who had never before broken his post-nuptial vow to steer clear of the hard stuff, clinked his glass against his father-in-law's before toasting his unborn child and tossing the bourbon back in one gulp.

While Taffy was sitting in the chair, one hand resting against her heart to check for palpitations, and Aunt Velvet was in the kitchen pouring the milk, and Grandma Silky was walking around praising Jesus, and Dutch was pounding Donny on the back to keep him from choking to death, Lydia Dale gave her sister a hug.

“I'm so happy for you!”

“Me too!” Mary Dell laughed, hugging her sister back, but when she pulled away, Mary Dell could see that something was bothering her.

“Are you all right?”

“Yes. I'm fine. I mean . . . it's not anything I should bother you about, not right now anyway. It's just that . . . you and Donny sent me another check. Now that Jack Benny isn't helping out on the ranch, I don't feel right about taking the money.”

Mary Dell waved her hand. “Don't worry about it. Jack Benny was never that much help anyway. And you've got to live on something, don't you?”