Hidden Riches (32 page)

“Ana Mae always brought you chicken,” JoJo said. “You mentioned that when we all talked on the phone. They weren't paying attention,” she added with a nod toward Clayton and Delcine, “but I heard you.”

Bell nodded, beaming, as he rubbed his substantial belly. “Yes, she did. And on more than one occasion we went to the butcher shop for fresh chicken that she fried up right in my kitchen.”

JoJo went to the quilt and pointed to the block with the plate of fried chicken. “This quilt block is about you,” she told Bell. “Every one of these blocks represents something Ana Mae loved.”

While JoJo pointed out all the elements of the quilt for Bell, Maria transformed the conference room table into a dining table. She'd either found one somewhere in the office or run out and purchased a tablecloth to protect the conference room table. Then with the help of Junior himself, who wasn't going to trust this special delivery to any of his regular drivers—they would, undoubtedly, fail to glean any important information on the goings on that had everybody wondering who was gonna win the pool—laid out a spread of Carolina-style ribs and pulled pork, his special sauce, coleslaw, baked beans, potato salad, homemade rolls, and several gallons of sweet tea.

“There's some red velvet cake and a sweet potato pie for dessert,” Junior said.

He hovered, hoping for an invitation to stay. But Rollings thanked him, and efficient Maria hustled him out of the conference room, closing the door behind them.

“A heart attack on a plate,” Delcine muttered when Junior left, noting the lack of a single fresh green dish.

But she, like all the others, ended up sucking the bones on the melt-in-your-mouth ribs.

Conversation at the table was pretty much nonexistent until both David Bell and Reverend Toussaint almost simultaneously sat back with a “Whew!” and rubbed their stomachs.

“Now that's what you call good Southern eatin',” the CEO said.

Teddy, looking around for more ribs, eyed the quarter rack still on Delcine's plate.

“Here,” she said, passing the plate across to him. “You pack it away just like my son.”

“Thank you. Granna Mae said the food in Carolina was good, but she never said it was this good.” He sent a sly glance in his father's direction. “I see why the two of you had a ‘special' relationship.”

“Now, Teddy, you're giving these folks the wrong impression,” David Bell said. He looked at the people gathered around the table. “I . . . I meant what I said at Ana Mae's funeral and then later on the phone with you all. That woman meant the world to me.

“She knew Teddy and I were—well, I suppose estranged is the polite way to put it. What I didn't know is that she'd launched a search for him.”

“I wasn't lost, Dad.”

“You were lost to me. I didn't know where you were or what had become of you.”

Teddy spread his hands out in a look-at-me gesture. “I'm fine, clearly.”

Twin snorts came from opposite ends of the table as both Rosalee and Delcine let their opinions about tattoos and piercings be known without saying a single word.

“Granna Mae accepted me for who I am,” he said.

“And what, exactly, are you?” Delcine asked.

“An artist,” the young man replied.

“And a quite accomplished one, if I may say so myself,” the proud father declared.

“Granna Mae was my patron.”

“The virtuous woman,” Reverend Toussaint intoned at the same time Archer muttered, but with a smile, “Here we go again.”

By the end of dessert, David Bell explained to them all his fried chicken connection to Ana Mae Futrell.

“She never would let us fly her in for our annual board meetings,” he said. “She'd just get on that Greyhound bus and ride all those hours up to Columbus. And she always brought with her, just for me, a basket of her fried chicken. Best meals I ever ate were with Ana Mae sitting in our corporate dining room and in the kitchen at my house.

“She also showed me, last year, the big blue ribbon she won for beating out some little scrawny woman named Lizbeth Hornsby, who thought she could fry up some chicken better than my Ana Mae.”

That elicited laughs around the table.

Rosalee got up and came around the table to tap Everett Rollings on the shoulder. “Can I talk to you for a minute,” she said. “In private.”

“Of course,” he said. “We can talk in my office.”

Rosalee grabbed her handbag and followed Mr. Rollings through a door that he held open for her. When they were alone, he folded his arms across his chest.

“You and the reverend were giving me quite a few stares earlier,” Rollings told her. “I assume that you want to explain what was on your mind.”

“You assume right, Mr. Rollings.”

Rosalee opened the clasp on her purse and pulled out a sheet of paper that was folded in quarters.

“I went to the newspaper office to look up some old birth announcements. I got a little distracted 'cause there's a lot of interesting stuff in those old files. Things I'd either forgotten about or never even knew. But that's neither here nor there. You know how the hospital used to send out the names of all the babies born and the newspaper put them in under the birth announcements?”

Rollings nodded. “You thought you could find Ana Mae's son in those old records?”

“Exactly,” Rosalee said. “There was no way to keep that information out of the paper back in those days. So I figured I'd go and look through all of the old issues to see if I could find when Ana Mae had a baby.”

Rollings smiled. “That was good sleuthing on your part. But as you now know, Ana Mae's son was born in Virginia, not here in North Carolina.”

“Uh huh,” Rosalee said, unfolding the paper she'd pulled from her pocketbook. “But I came across some other news that knocked me for a loop. I was able to make a copy on the Xerox machine at the newspaper office.”

She handed him the paper.

Rollings looked at it, and his smile disappeared. He swallowed hard and cast stricken eyes at Rosalee. He was so embarrassed that his hands shook. “What are you going to do with this information? Who are you going to tell?”

Rosalee shook her head. “It ain't my business to tell anybody anything, though I kind of reckon that Ana Mae knew that already,” she said with a nod toward the photocopied news item.

Everett Rollings's mouth was in a thin line. “Yes, she knew. I was actually just thinking about that quite recently.”

“Well, I'm not telling anybody,” Rosalee said, “except for Reverend Toussaint. I told him 'cause I needed to ask him what to do.”

“That's what you were talking to him about earlier?”

She nodded. “You got lucky,” she told him. “With all that was going on around here back then. That was some week.”

“The explosions over at the mill,” Rollings said nodding. “I remember. There were reporters from all over the East Coast here when that happened. My father provided the services for many of the families who lost loved ones.”

“So a little announcement way in the back of the paper probably got overlooked that week. The birth notices weren't even in the usual place on page two, but they were there.”

Rosalee indicated the photocopy in his hand. “That Fisher boy is your boy,” she said. “I don't know how y'all all managed to keep it quiet all these years. I have one question for you, Mr. Rollings, and you can tell me to mind my own business if you want to.”

Rollings pursed his mouth, but nodded.

“Do they know? Your son Trey and that Fisher boy, do they know they brothers?”

“Rosalee, I'd rather not discuss . . .”

She held up a hand to stop him. “That's all right,” she told Rollings. “Like I said, I can mind my own business.” She nodded toward the photocopied birth announcement he held and said, “I just wanted you to know that there is a public record out there.”

“Thank you, Rosalee, for your discretion.”

Rosalee shook her head. “Don't thank me,” she said. “I reckon if Ana Mae could keep a big secret like she did, I figure I can try.”

Back in the conference room, it was close to seven when Rollings brought them all back around to the business of Ana Mae's legacy.

“Mr. Bell, I believe you have a presentation to make.”

Bell got up and retrieved a briefcase from the credenza.

“Ana Mae never missed a shareholders' annual meeting. She said she liked getting away on a little vacation every now and then. None of us based in Columbus quite viewed the city as a vacation mecca, but we loved Ana Mae dearly. She kept us grounded. Even though she wasn't a part of the day-to-day operation at Zorin Corporation, she kept us rooted and grounded in the need for our products and always reminded us that we weren't just making money, we were making life better for the millions of people and companies that rely on us for their cleaning needs.”

He pulled a framed document from his attaché case. “We were going to surprise her this year. The board of directors voted to name her our first annual stockholder of the year. So I'd like to present this to . . .” He looked around the room, trying to figure out who was supposed to get it.

Delcine, as the oldest, started to get up, but Everett Rollings cleared his throat . . . loudly. She paused and all eyes turned toward Clayton.

“I guess that would be me,” he said, rising.

Bell read the proclamation declaring Ana Mae Futrell the Zorin Corporation's Most Valuable Stockholder.

“We had another little token of appreciation, even though no one had figured out how to make Ana Mae actually take it. I hope you'll accept it, Dr. Futrell. Maybe you and your sisters can work something out.”

“What is it?” Rosalee asked.

David Bell grinned. “A real vacation. Two weeks at a resort in the Grand Caymans.”

As one, everyone at the table shook his or her head.

To a person, each one knew there was no way Ana Mae would have gotten on a plane to fly over any water to go anywhere. She wouldn't even fly over dry land.

Ana Mae Futrell's life and loves were grounded on God's green earth.

 

J
oJo came up with the idea.

It was such a good one that Delcine found herself irritated that she failed to think of it first.

Almost a year to the day of Ana Mae's death,
The Legacy of Ana Mae Futrell: A Life of Love in Quilts
was published by the University of North Carolina Press.

While JoJo came up with the idea for the book, Ana Mae had all but written it already, with her binders and notes and photographs of quilts she'd made through the years. All of the recipients of Ana Mae's quilts were delighted to be included in a book featuring her work. Those who still had a quilt made by Ana Mae posed for new pictures and sat for an interview to create a little blurb about why they'd held onto it and what the quilt and Ana Mae had meant in their lives.

Josephine Futrell not only moved back to North Carolina and into the house on Clairmont Road in Drapersville where she, Ana Mae, Clayton, and Delcine grew up, but also took back her maiden name after divorcing Lester. He'd put up a fight about Ana Mae's millions, claiming in the divorce that since Nevada was a community-property state, he was owed half.

It took a team of divorce lawyers from the firm Matthews, Dodson, and Dahlgren of San Francisco to convince him that JoJo had no money since Reverend Toussaint had solved the quilt clues and then given all the money he would have claimed to Clayton, Ana Mae's son.

Still grumbling about being cheated, Lester finally disappeared, much the way Winslow Foster would soon disappear into a federal prison. He'd been convicted on a three-count indictment and was awaiting sentencing. For her part, Delcine and her children were getting settled in a smaller but still impressive Alexandria, Virginia, home that she now owned free and clear—a gift from her brother-nephew.

Until all of the legalities with the ex- or soon-to-be ex-husbands were fully settled, the Futrell sisters enjoyed generous monthly stipends that somehow were deposited into their bank accounts.

JoJo, who wasn't a writer, drafted the foreword and introduction for the book. It was a rambling thank-you letter to her sister.

Archer Futrell-Dahlgren made sure all of the legal documents were in place so one hundred percent of the proceeds of the sale of the book went to Ana Mae's favorite charities and the Granam Foundation's Student Scholarships fund.

Delcine's contribution was a short history of Ana Mae's life and times. Clayton Futrell, who still shied away from the Howard name, wrote the afterword and insisted that the two author photographs on the flap include not just a picture of Ana Mae in her Sunday best, a photo taken on an Easter Sunday, but also the one existing picture of his mother, Ana Mae Futrell, and his father, Toussaint le Baptiste.

It was one of the photos in the memento box JoJo discovered in Ana Mae's closet.

The snapshot, taken on a long-ago Fourth of July, was, Clayton suspected, also the very day he was conceived. In it, a very young Ana Mae gave the camera a shy smile as she waved a small American flag, and a beaming Toussaint had his arm boldly wrapped around her shoulder, declaring to any who would see that she was his girl.

“Thank you, Clayton,” Reverend Toussaint said.

“For what?”

The two men were walking together across a lush lawn on a warm but pleasant August day. The resemblance between them was evident now that they and everybody else saw what was right in front of their eyes.

“For not shutting me out of your life this past year. You had every right to.”

Clayton shook his head. “How could or would I do that?”

Toussaint just smiled.

“And I want to thank Archer too. He set up everything at the foundation after I resigned from the church.”

“That's Archer, Mr. Find It and Fix It,” Clayton said, shaking his head. “He came clean with me not too long after we were all here for Ana Mae's funeral and that video will.”

“Came clean?”

Clayton nodded. “He and Ana Mae had been in cahoots with each other for almost a year before she died. Archer and I were going through a rough patch about that time. I thought he was seeing someone else and wanted out of our relationship. It turns out he was wrestling with his conscience and a pretty big conflict of interest. Ana Mae was his client.”

“I thought Rollings was her lawyer,” Reverend Toussaint said.

Clayton chuckled. “Yeah, he is too. Last summer Lester groused that for a bunch of dirt-poor folks we sure had a lot of lawyers. Anyway, Ana Mae hired Archer to do some legal research for her. Among other things, she wanted my niece Crystal found, and she wanted David Bell's son found.”

“She didn't trust Rollings to do that?”

“It wasn't a matter of trust,” Clayton looked at the man who was his biological father. “She told Archer she wanted to keep family business in the family, and Archer was family. Just like she considered all of the Good Redeemer Academy students her grandkids, she also claimed Teddy Bell and Jeremy Fisher as her own. If you use Ana Mae's definition of ‘family,' I have a whole town of sisters and brothers running around here.”

The corner of Toussaint's mouth edged up.

Clayton paused. “There's something else,” he said.

Toussaint turned when he realized that Clayton was no longer walking next to him as they crossed the graveyard.

Something that looked like fear flashed in the older man's eyes. “What is it?”

Clayton reached into his suit jacket's inner pocket. He pulled out a piece of paper and held it out, his hand shaking a bit.

“Ana Mae wanted Archer to destroy this,” Clayton said, “to leave well enough alone, so to speak. He said he tried to, several times, including while we were here for her funeral, but he couldn't bring himself to do it.”

“Wh-what is it?”

Clayton handed the somewhat crinkled paper to Toussaint, who unfolded it but didn't take his eyes off of Clayton.

“It's okay,” Clayton said. “Look at it.”

When Reverend Toussaint did, his breath caught, and he jerked as if he'd been hit.

“But I thought . . .”

“I did too,” Clayton said. “Somehow, Ana Mae got and held on to the original.”

The piece of paper was Clayton's original and official birth certificate from the Commonwealth of Virginia. On the line where it said
MOTHER
was
Ana Mae Berdette Futrell.
At
FATHER
was neatly printed
Toussaint le Baptiste.
The line for the baby's name read Clayton Howard le Baptiste Futrell.

Toussaint's gaze locked with Clayton's. “I . . . I don't know what to say.”

“I wanted you to know,” Clayton said. “And,” he added with a shrug, “this wasn't something for over the phone.”

“Thank you,” Toussaint said, clasping his son's shoulder. “Thank you for showing me, for sharing with me that gift from Ana Mae.”

They resumed their walk to the area at Antioch Cemetery where Futrells who'd passed on to glory made their final resting place.

“You didn't need to resign from your position at the church,” Clayton said. “You loved the Holy Ghost Church of the Good Redeemer.”

“I still do,” Reverend Toussaint said. “I'm still a member, just not on the leadership team.”

“What happened between you and Ana Mae was a long time ago. A really long time ago. What happened then shouldn't matter now.”

As one they paused before Ana Mae's grave at Antioch Cemetery. Both carried long-stemmed red roses.

“People aren't very forgiving in this day and age,” Reverend Toussaint said. “Besides, with all of the money coming in to the foundation from Ana Mae's investments and everything else, somebody needed to keep an eye on things and make sure the folks who need it most get what they deserve to make their own stamp on this world of ours.”

“Let the dead teach the living,” Clayton said.

“Exactly.”

The two men stood together, silent for a moment, each lost in his own thoughts about the life and the legacy of the woman they both loved. And then, as one, Clayton and his father placed the roses at Ana Mae Futrell's headstone.