"I a.s.sure you, the sign's not meant to be vulgar. I'm going to write up a little story about why I chose the name. I'll post it by the doors."

"We're also here about your lack of personal ethics and compa.s.sion in stealing this s.p.a.ce from another tenant."

My mouth popped open. "Excuse me?"

"You offered terms that the other prospective renter couldn't match. You outbid her, deliberately."

"Now look, that's not true. You can ask the mayor."

Mrs. Red Hair, G.o.d bless her, blurted out, "Maybe Ingrid misunderstood Ida's decision. After all, no one can talk Ida into doing something she doesn't believe in, so it could be that Ida just didn't want to rent the shop to Ingrid's daughter-in-law-"

"Nonsense, Eustene," Adele said, her voice full of warning. "Be quiet."

Eustene-Mrs. Red Hair-blanched. The others looked at their leader worriedly.

Adele scowled at me. "Look to your conscience and seek redemption. We'll put you on our prayer support list. Good afternoon."

She turned and marched out with her troops behind her. Eustene glanced back at me and offered a wistful little wave. "Pride and Prejudice," she mouthed.

I strode next door. A customer was purchasing a sheet cake with "Happy Birthday Melvin" written on it in blue icing. Ingrid's a.s.sistant, a stocky, sour-faced Cherokee Indian named Betty Halfacre, never blinked at me when we pa.s.sed on the street. She didn't blink now.

"Where's Mrs. Beechum?" I demanded.

"Too busy for you to be botherin' her," Betty Halfacre growled.

"Then she'll have to make time for botherin'."

I darted around a display case, pushed past a swinging door, and strode into a large, commercial kitchen. A pair of ap.r.o.ned women turned from their work areas to stare at me. I saw Ingrid through the open door of a cluttered little office. I saw no sign of Wee-Wee Bob, as I'd started calling him. Ingrid scowled up from her desk. Pink reading gla.s.ses teetered on her nose. A blue bandanna jauntily covered her hairnet. A gleaming pendant hung over her Falcons football jersey. Mother, the pendant spelled in tiny diamonds. As I entered the office, she touched it with a fingertip, as if to ward off evil.

I crowded up close to her desk and leaned over her. "Stop telling everyone I cheated to get the shop s.p.a.ce."

She tossed her gla.s.ses aside. "You have a bad reputation. I can't stop rumors."

"You know I didn't bribe your cousin Ida to choose me as a tenant."

She stood, thrusting her face up to mine. "I never said you did. But what people decide about your behavior is your problem, not mine."

"Look, I'm sorry you wanted this shop for your daughter-in-law and you didn't get it. But please stop punishing me for a dispute that's really between only you and Mayor Walker."

The blood drained from her face. "Who told you about my daughter-in-law?"

"Could I talk to her for you? Has this shop-rental issue caused some kind of family rift?"

Ingrid slammed a fist on the desk. "You stay out of my family business. Now get out! Get out!"

I was stunned at her sudden distress. I saw pain and humiliation in her face. Wee-Wee Bob darted into the office and began barking. Betty Halfacre showed up with a rolling pin in one stocky brown hand.

I left before I got clobbered or Bob peed on my tennis shoes.

That night I pondered Ingrid's fervent reaction as I stared at myself in the mirror of my bathroom medicine cabinet. I saw reddened eyes that had once been a clear, bright green, skin that had once been porcelain but was now too pale, and a mop of dull brown hair tied up in a brown scrunchie. There was a coffee stain on my pajama top, and my fingernails looked as if I'd clawed concrete with them. Did I seem pampered and conniving to Ingrid? Did I look like a threat to her private miseries?

"The name's Reynolds. Jayne Reynolds," I deadpanned in a tired James Bond voice. "And I like my vanilla latte shaken, not stirred."

I might as well try to shake things up.

Magnolia Manor Nursing Home was located across from the library on North Bigelow Street. Even in late autumn, vibrant green magnolias towered over the pleasant two-story building like loyal guardians. I faced two-dozen sweet-looking elderly men and women seated on either side of a long table in the cheerful activities room. Some sat in wheelchairs, others in upholstered folding chairs with their walkers and canes beside them. I had covered the table with white linen and matching napkins, delicate dessert plates, and my personal collection of unmatched teacups and saucers, some of them antiques. I'd laid out sterling silver teaspoons with colorful enamel handles. Small baskets of cut flowers decorated the table's center, along with two silver-and-porcelain teacake stands filled to overflowing with cookies, pastries, and biscotti.

If this went well, I'd hold teas for every civic group in Mossy Creek. I'd dispel all rumors that I was an evil outsider. "My name is Jayne Reynolds," I said. "I want to welcome you to Magnolia Manor Tea Time, courtesy of my new shop, The Naked Bean."

An elderly man cupped a hand to one ear. "What did you say was naked?"

"The bean, Arnold, the bean," a woman shouted back.

"What the h.e.l.l does that mean?"

"Just shut up and listen," another elderly man bellowed.

"Why don't we just enjoy some tea?" I said.

I began pouring samples and telling the group about different tea flavors and rituals. They sipped and nodded and seemed to be enjoying my little speech, until suddenly one wizened man set his cup down so hard it rattled the saucer. "You said this is chamomile tea?" he asked.

"Yes."

"That's the one that makes people sleepy. I don't do drugs."

I smiled. "It has a very mild effect. Hardly noticeable. It's not a drug."

"I don't know about that! I feel awful drowsy." He sat back in his wheelchair, shut his eyes, and dropped his chin to his chest. His breathing quickly softened, and he made little snoring sounds.

I stared at him in dismay. This was ridiculous. The others muttered worriedly to each other "You never know!"

"My grandma always said she turned blue from drinking a wild root tea!"

"Doctor Champion warned me not to try herbs!"

A woman abruptly yawned, pushed her table setting away, then pillowed her head on her arms. "I can't keep my eyes open. Oh, lord, we've been dosed with a potion."

Another woman nodded off next to her, and then a third. An old fellow leaned against his snoozing friend in the wheelchair and dozed off, too. A man at the end of the table wheeled himself to a corner and cushioned his head against a wall.

Six of my audience members were now in dreamland, insisting I'd drugged them with chamomile tea.

The others looked at me in alarm.

"It's not the tea, I promise you," I said with all the calm I could muster.

"Nurse!" Everyone who wasn't sleeping began thumping their canes and pounding the table. One elderly lady squealed, "We've been poisoned!"

A young nurse's aide ran in. She halted abruptly at the sight of a half-dozen old people facedown and snoring. "I better get help."

I watched in horror as a bevy of anxious attendants woke up the sleepers, checked their blood pressures, and listened to their hearts. The home's director hurried into the room. "I don't know what caused this, but no one seems harmed," she said, yet stared at me oddly.

"Chamomile wouldn't hurt anyone. I swear to you!"

"Of course it didn't do this. I don't know what happened, but we'll look into it." She gave me another awkward look. I knew I wouldn't be invited back.

"Good riddance to the old farts. Leaves more food for the rest of us," a frail little lady chirped, as she reached for her teacup and a handful of biscotti. She munched happily and sipped the suspicious tea with no narcoleptic effect, then filled her napkin with gingersnaps, pralines, chocolate puffs and shortbread. "My daughter Eustene said to get some of your shortbread cookies for her."

Eustene. Mrs. Red Hair, my secret admirer. If I hadn't been numb with despair, I might have laughed.

I tried to pretend a public relations disaster had not permanently damaged my business, but word traveled fast. I got angry phone calls from several of my victims' relatives.

Katie Bell, the business manager of the Mossy Creek Gazette, showed up at my shop right away. I had been planning to run a small weekly ad. Katie Bell looked at me sadly. "You might want to think about running that ad this week. You know-to do some damage control."

My face burned. I pictured what I might say in public defense: CHAMOMILE NOW-NOT HARD DRUGS LATER JUST SAY YES TO EARL GREY.

THIS IS NOT YOUR BRAIN ON TEA.

I closed the shop and went upstairs. I sat in my apartment with the curtains drawn. Emma curled up in my lap but growled each time I hugged her tightly.

She only had so much sympathy for drug pushers.

For the next few days, I laid low. Adele Clearwater and her friends strode past my windows with their noses up and their lapel-pin crosses gleaming in the sun. Maggie Hart, a fellow shop owner and free spirit, wandered in wanting to buy "that tea that put the old people to sleep," and asked me with a grin if I thought it would work on her own mother. The minister of the Mossy Creek Unitarian Church brought me an invitation to sign up for the church's weekly tai chi cla.s.s.

I couldn't decide where I stood with the townsfolk. Either I was a joke or a witch.

"Oh, don't worry about it, honey," said Rainey, the town hairdresser. "If the Unitarians are cultivatin' you, it just means they think you're a liberal."

I trudged outside one afternoon pretending to sweep my doorsill but really just wanting everyone to see I was too proud to hide any longer. Ingrid lounged on the bench between our shops, her blue-jeaned legs crossed at the ankles, a cigarette dropping ashes on a hunting jacket she wore over her chef's ap.r.o.n. Wee-Wee Bob huddled next to her, dressed in a fuzzy orange doggie sweater. He looked like a caterpillar with ears.

Ingrid looked up at me with narrowed eyes and a cool smile. "Knocked out any old folks lately?"

"You're evil."

"I hear you offered to host a tea for the garden club, and they turned you down. Said they'd rather not be poisoned with nightshade and foxglove." She chortled.

"No, they just said their programs were already arranged for the next few months."

Ingrid took a drag off her cigarette. "I always cater their meetings for free. My mother was a founding member."

"You could provide the food, and I could provide coffee and tea. If you were willing to work with me."

She ground the cigarette into the dirt of an empty flower pot beside the bench. "Either you have no pride, or you just never give up."

"I'm not going to let you shut me out of the local circles."

"Oh, I'm just getting started."

Before I could say anything else, the rumble and diesel scent of a large tour bus engulfed us. The driver opened the door with a hydraulic swoosh and waved at us as he bounded to the sidewalk.

"h.e.l.lo! I'm driving the Senior Adventurers Club of Paw Gap Baptist Church. They're from up near Asheville. We're on our way to the dog tracks in Florida. Mind if I let my group take a break here?"

Both Ingrid and I snapped to attention. Snagging a full tour bus in November was a rare feat. We were hungry Eskimos competing for a beached whale. Ingrid beamed at the driver. "Why, lord, hon, you just unload those hungry folks right here at my door."

This was war. I plastered a sugary smile on my face. "I bet you're so tired from driving that bus," I crooned to the driver. "Please come into my shop and have some fine imported coffee and pastries-complimentary."

The man swivelled from me to Ingrid. "Why, thanks, both of you ladies!" Behind him, the Paw Gap Senior Adventurers began to crowd into the door well, peering out at us.

Ingrid waved at them. "You folks look hungry for some stick-to-your-ribs Southern baking. I'm having a special today. Fifty percent off on everything in the bakery."

"I'm offering complimentary coffee or tea for everyone," I called loudly, "and a buy-one-get-one-free deal on my stock of gourmet Swiss chocolate bars."

Ingrid's control began to fray. "Just don't drink her chamomile tea," she yelled. "Unless you want to sleep for the next twenty-four hours."

I faced her. "You take that back!"

"Make me." Ingrid scooped a handful of dirt and cigarette ashes from the flower pot. And flung it.

I stood there in absolute, skin-p.r.i.c.kling disbelief as the mixture peppered my face and hair. "Arrrr," I think I said. I lurched to the flower pot, grabbed a fistful of soil, and hard-lined a wad of dirt right into the center of Ingrid's white ap.r.o.n.

Bob yelped wildly and peed on everything in sight. "Now you've done it," Ingrid muttered. She threw another volley. Blat. She got me on one arm. I fired back. Whump. Damp dirt rained from her hair. She yipped and threw again. Then me. Then her. Then me. We both looked like earthworms.

Suddenly, the bus huffed away in a cloud of diesel smoke.

Silence descended.

Ingrid and I stared at each other with our fists drawn back, leaking dirt from our fingers. Shame flooded me. Around us, Pearl Quinlin, Rainey, and Dan McNeil, who owned the town fix-it shop, watched in shock. Our tale would be told around Mossy Creek dinner tables and hearths for years to come. The dirt duel at high noon.

Ingrid's face turned as white as mine felt. We both fumbled for our door handles then rushed inside our shops. I put up a Closed sign, turned off the lights, then sat on the floor behind the counter with my head in my dirt-encrusted hands.

That evening, I heard a knock at my apartment door. I dragged myself out of my living room recliner and peered wearily through the small security window. A white-bearded old gentleman stood on my landing. Though dressed in a work coat and overalls, he made me think of Santa Claus. I opened the door.

"Yes, may I help you?"

"Miz Reynolds, my name's Ed Brady. I live outside town. I heard about your troubles with Ingrid Beechum. It's time to speak my mind before things get more out of hand."

I sighed. "Don't worry, Mr. Brady. I won't throw any more dirt at Ingrid. Or anyone else."

He smiled. "Reckon you and her were buildin' up to a showdown. Good you got it out of your systems."

"Thank you, but I'm very ashamed of my behavior."

"Well, Ingrid's got plenty to be ashamed about, too." He cleared his throat. He looked very tired, and I felt sorry for him. "Listen here, my wife is in the nursing home. She ain't well enough to come to any talks or play no games; she just stays in bed. I go over there every day to see her. While I'm there I keep up with the news. I heard about your tea party, and I did some snoopin' for answers."