Cold Tea On A Hot Day. Curtiss Matlock Ann

up in the Smoky Mountains.

      Her eyes moved to the small picture of her ex-husband that she kept, still, on her desk.

      Stuart James grinned at her from the photo. She picked it up, remembering how handsome she had found him the first time she had laid eyes on him, remembering how wonderful he had made her feel when he touched her body. Stuart was a man who greatly enjoyed making love.

      Into these deep thoughts came the sound of childish voices. She blinked and got up, following the sound to the back door.

      Willie Lee and Corrine, with the dog between them, sat on the back stairs in the dappled morning sunlight that shone through the trees. They did not hear her footsteps, and she was able to watch them for some minutes through the screen door.

      Corrine was talking to the dog, right along with Willie Lee. And she was actually smiling.

      

      “Ma-ma…Mun-ro needs to come, too.” He spoke as if scolding her for not remembering the dog.

      Marilee looked at her son and then the dog. “Okay, Munro…get in.”

      As she backed the Jeep Cherokee from the drive, she gave thanks for the all-purpose vehicle. She supposed she might as well accept that the dog was destined to go everywhere with them. He could, in Valentine, America.

      

      A new vehicle, a yellow convertible BMW, was parked in the block of spaces behind The Valentine Voice building. The top was down, and with a raised eyebrow, Marilee peered into the vehicle, noting the soft leather seats. Obviously, coming from Houston, Tate Holloway was unaware of how serious dust could be in this part of the country.

      The two-story brick building that housed the newspaper had changed only marginally since it was first built in 1920. The back area of the first floor, which had once housed the printing press, had been converted into a garage and loading area. Printing was now done by a contract printer who did a number of small-town newspapers; The Valentine Voice was one of the last small-town dailies in the nation.

      The front half of the first floor was pretty much as it had been built. The original bathroom had been enlarged and a small kitchen sink area added. Several offices had been made by adding glass partitions, one of which had dark-green shades all around and a door with a dark-green shade. The name on the glass of the door read: Zona Porter, No Relation, Comptroller. Everyone respected that Zona preferred privacy. One could go in and speak to Zona in the office, but Zona rarely came out. Had a bathroom been installed off her office, Zona would not have come out at all. She had her own refrigerator, coffeemaker, cups, glasses, tissues. She did not care to touch things after other people.

      E. G. Porter’s original office remained at the right, with tall windows that looked out onto the corner of Main and Church Streets.

      Entering through the rear door, Marilee felt a little like she was leading a parade, with the children and the dog Munro trailing behind her.

      Leo Pahdocony, Sr., a handsome dark-haired Choctaw Indian who wore turquoise bolas, shiny snakeskin boots and sharply creased Wranglers, was pecking away at the keyboard of his computer and talking on the telephone at the same time, with the receiver tucked in his neck. He gave her a wave and a palm-up to Willie Lee.

      His wife, Reggie, a petite redhead who handled news in the schools, churches and most of the photography, popped out of her swivel chair and came to greet them with delight. Reggie, who had for the past five years been trying to conceive another child, extended her arms to capture the children in a big hug. Corrine managed to sidestep her way to Marilee’s chair and sat herself firmly, but Willie Lee, always loveable, let Reggie lift him up and kiss him.

      “You gave us a scare, young man, running off,” Charlotte told him, coming forward with messages for Marilee.

      Willie Lee said, “I did not run off. I was coming home.”

      “Uh-huh. Good thinking.” Charlotte turned her eyes on Marilee. “Tammy phoned. She’s got a horrible toothache.”

      Marilee saw that Charlotte was thinking the same thing she was: that Tammy had a job interview elsewhere. Without Miss Porter’s money pouring in, no one expected the newspaper to continue much longer than a year, if that.

      A pounding sounded from the office of the publisher. Marilee looked at the closed door and noticed that Muriel Porter’s name plaque was gone, leaving a dark rectangle on the oak.

      Pounding again.

      “He’s hangin’ pictures,” said Imperia Brown, smacking her phone receiver into the cradle. “It’s drivin’ me crazy. I’m outta here.” She grabbed up her purse and headed for the front door.

      Charlotte strode over to the large, gilded frame of the newspaper’s founder’s portrait now propped on the floor against the copy machine, and said to Marilee, “He took down Mr. E. G. first thing.” Charlotte definitely disapproved.

      “Might be one of us next,” Reggie said.

      Marilee and Charlotte cast each other curious glances, and Reggie said she wondered if Ms. Porter might not be feeling her skin crawling at the removal of her daddy from the wall.

      “I’ve been halfway waitin’ for the wall to cave in, E.G. having his say from the grave,” she said.

      “The walls are apparently holding,” Charlotte said, “and he’s hanging them with all sorts of pictures. He has one of him with President Nixon. I don’t know why he’d want to advertise it,” she added.

      “He has one of him with Reba,” Reggie put in with some excitement. “He did a feature piece on her for Parade Magazine.”

      Reggie had every one of Reba McEntire’s albums. She suddenly grabbed up a pen to hold in front of her mouth like a microphone and began singing one of Reba’s songs. This was something she often did, pretending either to be a singer or a television commentator. Reggie was every bit pretty enough to be either; however, she could take clowning and showing off to the point of annoyance, as far as Marilee was concerned. Right then was one of those points, and Marilee felt her temper grow short as Reggie kept jutting her face in front of Marilee’s and singing about poor old Fancy.

      “Reggie, would you keep an eye on Corrine and Willie Lee for me?” she said, thus diverting the woman to more quiet childishness, while Marilee went to their publisher’s solid oak door and knocked.

      The sound of hammering drowned out her knock, and she had to try again, and when still no answer came, she poked her head in the door. “Mr. Holloway?” She was unable to address him as Tate, being at the office.

      He turned from where he was hanging a picture. “Marilee! Come in…come in. Just the person I’ve been waitin’ for. You can come over here and help me get this picture in the right place.”

      It was a picture of him with Billy Graham, black-and-white, as all the photographs appeared to be. He placed it against the wall and waited for her instructions, which she gave in the form of, “Higher…a little to the left…a little lower. Right there.”

      Having, apparently, a high opinion of her ability to place a picture, he marked the spot and went to hammering in a nail.

      In a flowing glance, Marilee, wondering how an accomplished journalist of Tate Holloway’s wide experience would manage in tiny Valentine, took in the room. The sedate, even antiquated office that had belonged to Ms. Porter was gone. Or perhaps a more accurate description was that it was being moved out, as pictures and books and boxes full of articles, a number of them antiques, were in a cluster by the door. Next to that, in a large heap, lay the heavy evergreen drapes, which had been ripped from the long windows, leaving only the wooden blinds through which bright light shone on the varied electronic additions: a small television, a radio scanner, a top speed computer and printer, a laptop computer, and one apparatus that Marilee, definitely behind the electronic times, could not identify.

      The major change, however, was to the big walnut desk, which had been moved from where it had sat for eons in front of the windows,