* * *
Eleven hours later, Grace glided onto Interstate 285 in her white Jaguar, allowing Sarah Vaughan’s heavenly voice to fill the space in the scented leathery world of the car. Immediately she noticed it: No commuter congestion! Grace smiled. Atlanta’s traffic agreed with her state of mind today. Tryouts were over and they had given her what she had hoped for: the makings of an outstanding team. She was glad she had been able to include Tracy Sullivan, but even without Sullivan, she could have created a championship group this year, she was sure of it. Dent, Toni, Pat, Sandra—with them alone she could have molded a winning unit. But now that she also had Sullivan, her chances were increased tenfold. She thought briefly about Sullivan, about this shy girl who had, in a span of three weeks, made Grace break so many rules. What was it about Sullivan that made it so easy to relent? True, Sullivan could play, that was obvious. But so could Eldridge back in ’88, but that hadn’t stopped Grace from keeping the girl off the team when she missed a day of tryouts. And other girls had come through her program who were natural athletes—Trendenberg and Lisa McShay, for two. But even for them she had not felt the—what was it, the softening, maybe?—that she felt whenever she scolded Tracy Sullivan. And Lord knows the child had amassed reasons for scolding! Tardiness the first week. Dressing out of regulation in Toni’s yellow shirt. Letting her mind wander during role call. Engaging in noncommissioned sports play before class time. Missing tryouts! And, adding insult to injury, coming up to the office uninvited. Yes, Sullivan had outdone any others Grace had known—with the exception of Wanda Carver. But Carver was a special case, a mother-orphan suffering from arrested development, and so people expected her to commit infractions and get away with it. But Sullivan—yes, there was something about her that struck a chord in Grace that she was not sure had ever been struck before. She was just not sure what it was.
The phone at her elbow rang. She knew who it was—he never forgot the important moments. She used the remote to lower the volume on the car stereo and picked up the receiver.
“Yes, Darrel.”
“How’d you know it was me?”
“You’re the only one who calls me on this phone.”
“You ain’t very popular, then,” he teased.
“You’re the only one who has this number.”
“Oh. Then that means I’m special, then.”
“Maybe,” she teased.
“So how’d it go?”
“Great. I feel really good about this group.”
“Another set of winners?”
“Seems so. Where are you?”
“The office.”
Grace’s good mood slipped. “You didn’t go home today?”
“Nope.”
The good mood crashed. “Darrel! You promised you’d go home!”
“I couldn’t get away, Grace.”
“You promised me you would at least drop by and check on that woman. She is a stranger, after all.”
“I didn’t promise you, Grace, I said I’d try. What? You think she picked up the house and ran away with it? Come on, Grace. You don’t have to worry about Mrs. Gentry. She’s good people.”
“Darrel, I swear I don’t know how you make it in business, as gullible as you are. What do you know about this woman?”
“I know she’s a good person.”
“How do you know that? Because she can cook well? Because your pastor says so? Did you do the background check on her yet? Please tell me you had it done. I told you last week to have it done.”
“We haven’t gotten it back yet, Grace.”
“Darrel—” She decided any further conversation was useless. She picked up the remote and raised the volume on the stereo. Sarah was debating the beauty of differences in the song “Let’s Call the Whole Thing Off.”
“Goodbye, Darrel.”
“What? You mad now?”
“Goodbye, Darrel. I’ll see you when you get home. If we still have a home when I get there.”
She hung up. Fifteen minutes later, she drove the Jag into its spot in the Gracewood garage and turned off the engine. She had been relieved, moments ago, when she saw that Mrs. Gentry’s green sedan was not parked in the driveway, where it had been that morning. Good. The last thing she wanted was to face the woman at the end of the day. Grace grabbed her leather organizer and Gucci shoulder bag from the passenger seat and walked into her home. She would see for herself what damage Darrel’s maid had done.
She immediately noticed the three small stacks of neatly folded clothes sitting on the laundry table—and was immediately embarrassed by them. Grace walked over, peeked inside the laundry bin. It was an oversized canvass container located at the open end of a chute that originated in the master bath upstairs. The bin was empty, which meant Mrs. Gentry had, indeed, washed loads of clothes. Grace’s face warmed bashfully at the idea of a stranger’s hands touching her intimate apparel. But it was her own fault, and she knew it. In her quest to ban Mrs. Gentry from the bedroom, she had forgotten to also restrict the woman from touching the clothes that descended from the bedroom. Grace walked over to the two frontload washers and pulled open their doors. She did the same with the two dryers. All four were empty of clothes, which meant Mrs. Gentry had folded everything she had laundered. Despite feeling embarrassment, Grace was impressed by the old woman’s initiative and diligence, and she decided that rather than restrict Mrs. Gentry from doing laundry, she would simply exclude her underwear from the clothes she sent down the laundry chute.
Grace went to the kitchen. Immediately, she noticed the floor. Its marble-gray tiles were washed clean, and the air in the room was scented with a lemony-floral fragrance. Grace looked around. The black countertop and huge aluminum sink were spotless. The idea of something different—added—caused her to look at the bulletin board in the corner of the room. Sure enough, there was a note pinned to its porous surface. Grace walked over and read it. MRS. NELSON, HOPE YOU ENJOY THE DINNER. I USED NO MEAT!! TODAY, I CLEANED THE LOWER LEVELS AND WASHED SOME CLOTHES. MONDAY, I’LL CLEAN THE UPPER LEVEL AND WASH SOME MORE. MRS. GENTRY. Grace sighed. The note’s presence annoyed her—a note seemed too personal, somehow, too forward of the old woman, with whom Grace desired little communication. They weren’t to be friends, after all. At the same time, contradictorily, she appreciated being informed about what Mrs. Gentry had done in the house. It was reassuring—like a report Julia might give about the goings-on in the athletic department.
Grace looked at the stove. Dinner, Mrs. Gentry had said in the note, but the stove was clean and empty. Grace walked to the huge wall oven and pulled it open. Cold and empty, so she went to the refrigerator, opened it, and immediately saw in the clean bright whiteness the added presence of two round bowls with plastic lids, a stoneware pan covered by aluminum foil, and a casserole dish the glass lid of which was peppered on the underside with moisture. The sight both annoyed and pleased her. Hadn’t she told the woman she didn’t have to cook? Grace looked through the dishes. Whole-kernel corn. Asparagus spears. Baby potatoes. And something that looked like eggplant casserole. She was hungry, but the sight of the food did not stimulate her desire to eat. The thought of a stranger’s preparing food in her kitchen—touching the tops of her spice bottles, plundering the contents of her fridge, placing sweaty foreign hands on her dishes—felt to Grace like a greater invasion of privacy than did the act of cleaning.
Grace closed the fridge—she would let Darrel eat Mrs. Gentry’s food first, when he came home, to make sure it was safe. She grabbed an apple and a pear from the fruit bowl on the breakfast table and walked through every room on the first floor, then went downstairs to Darrel’s Den, to see what changes Mrs. Gentry had made there. Afterwards, she returned to the kitchen, satisfied that the woman had left a pleasing mark on the bottom floors of the mansion. Maybe, just maybe, having a maid won’t be such an ordeal, after all. She just hoped that Darrel, with his gullibility, hadn’t brought a mad woman into her home.