At thirty-four, Frank Bennett was a vain man. His black shoes were always shined to a high spit polish, his hair was always brushed, his clothes were perfect, and he was one of the few men who received a manicure at the barbershop every week.
You could say he was a dandy. You could say he was handsome, in a black Irish sort of way, with that head of thick hair and the steel-blue eyes; and although one was made of glass and the other was just as cold as shiny, it was hard to tell which was which.
But above all things, he was a man who got what he wanted, and he wanted Ruth Jamison. He’d had just about every available girl around, including, and preferring, the black girls he would take by force while his friends held them down. Once he had them, he was not one to want them again. One pale-blond woman, who lived on the outskirts of town now, had a little girl that looked like him, but after he had blackened her eyes and threatened her child, she no longer made any claims on him. It was clear he did not have much interest in used women. Particularly if he had been the one who’d used them.
But in town, he was known as a hale and hearty fellow, and he decided that he needed to have sons to carry on the Bennett name; a name that didn’t mean anything to anybody, except that he was a man who owned a lot of land south of town.
Ruth was young, pretty, certainly untouched, and needed a place for herself and her mother. What could be better? Ruth was flattered; she couldn’t help but be. Wasn’t he the most eligible man around? Hadn’t he courted her like a gentleman and charmed her mother?
Ruth had come to believe that this handsome young man loved her, and that she should and therefore did love him.
But who could have known that all the shiny shoes and flashy three-piece suits could never cover up the bitterness that had been growing in his heart all these years …
Certainly no one in town guessed; it took a complete stranger. On the night of Frank’s bachelor party, he and a group of men had stopped by a bar for a few drinks, on the way to a cabin where three whores from Atlanta had been hired for the night. An old bum, passing through, had wandered into the bar, off the street, and was watching the party of young men from across the room. Frank did what he did to all strangers: He walked over to the man, who was obviously in need of a drink, and slapped him on the back. “I’ll tell you what, old-timer, if you can tell me which one of these eyes of mine is glass, I’ll buy you a drink.”
His friends laughed because it was impossible to tell, but the old man looked at him and without a beat said, “The left.”
His friends roared, and although Frank was taken aback, he laughed it off as luck and threw a half dollar on the bar.
The bartender watched the party of men leave, and then said to the old man, “What’ll it be, mister?”
“Whiskey.”
He poured the old man his shot. A little later, the bartender said, “Hey, old friend, how were you able to tell his left eye was glass right off the bat like that?”
The old man drank his whiskey and said, “Easy. The left one was the only one with even a glimmer of human compassion in it.”
APRIL 28, 1926
Idgie, who was now nineteen, had driven over to Valdosta almost every month for over two and a half years to watch Ruth going to and from church. She just wanted to make sure she was all right, and Ruth never knew she’d been there.
Then one Sunday, quite unexpectedly, she drove up to Ruth’s house and went to the front door and knocked. Idgie herself had not known she was going to do it.
Ruth’s mother, a frail woman, came to the door, smiling. “Yes?”
“Is Ruth home?”
“She’s upstairs.”
“Would you tell her that a bee charmer from Alabama is here to see her?”
“Who?”
“Just tell her that a friend of hers from Alabama is here.”
“Oh, won’t you come in?”
“No, that’s all right. I’ll just wait out here.”
Ruth’s mother went in and called up the stairs, “Ruth, there is some kind of a bee person here to see you.”
“What?”
“You’ve got company on the porch.”
When Ruth came down, she was taken completely by surprise. She walked out on the porch and Idgie, who was trying to act casual even though her palms were sweaty and she could feel her ears burning, said, “Look, I don’t want to bother you. I know you’re probably very happy and all … I mean, I’m sure you are, but I just wanted you to know that I don’t hate you and I never did. I still want you to come back and I’m not a kid anymore, so I’m not gonna change. I still love you and I always will and I still don’t care what anybody thinks—”
Frank called down from the bedroom, “Who is it?”
Idgie started backing down the porch stairs. “I just wanted you to know that—well, I gotta go.”
Ruth, who had not said a word, watched her get into the car and drive off.
There had not been a day when Ruth had not thought about her.
Frank came down the stairs and out on the porch. “Who was that?”
Ruth, still watching the car that was now a black dot down the road, said, “Just a friend of mine, someone I used to know,” and walked back into the house.
APRIL 6, 1986
Mrs. Threadgoode started talking the minute Evelyn set one foot in the room.
“Well, honey, Vesta Adcock has lost it. She came into our room about four o’clock this afternoon and grabbed up this little milk-glass slipper that Mrs. Otis keeps her hairpins in, and said, ‘The Lord said if the eye offends thee, pluck it out,’ and with that, she slung it out the window, hairpins and all, and then she left.
“It upset Mrs. Otis something awful. After a while, that little colored nurse, Geneene, came in with Mrs. Otis’s slipper she had gotten out of the yard and told her not to be upset, that Mrs. Adcock had been throwing stuff out of everybody’s room all day … said Mrs. Adcock was as crazy as a betsy bug and not to pay attention to her.
“I tell you, I’m lucky to have the mind I do have, with all that’s going on out here … I’m just living from day to day. Just doing the best I can, and that’s all I can do.”
Evelyn handed her the box of chocolate-covered cherries.
“Oh thank you, honey, aren’t you sweet.” She sat there eating for a moment, pondering a question.
“Do you reckon betsy bugs are crazy, or do people just think they are?”
Evelyn said she didn’t know.
“Well, I know where the expression cute as a bug comes from, because I happen to think there is nothing cuter than a bug … do you?”
“What?”
“Think there’s anything cuter than a bug?”
“I cain’t say I’ve looked at too many bugs to know if they’re cute or not.”
“Well, I have! Albert and I would spend hours and hours looking at them. Cleo had this big magnifying glass on his desk, and we’d find centipedes and grasshoppers and beatles and potato bugs, ants … and put them in a jar and look at them. They have the sweetest little faces and the cutest expressions. After we’d looked at them all we wanted to, we’d put them in the yard and let them go on about their business.
“One time, Cleo caught a bumblebee and put it in the jar for us, and he was a precious thing to look at. Idgie loved bees, but my favorite is the ladybug. That’s a lucky bug. Every bug has a different personality, you know. Spiders are kind of nervous and grumpy, with teeny heads. And I always liked the praying mantis. He’s a very religious bug.
“I could never kill a bug, not after seeing them up close like that. I believe they have thoughts, just like us. Of course, that has its bad side. My snowballs around my house were all dog-eared and eaten up. And all my gardenia bushes are chewed down to the nub. Norris said he wanted to come over there and spray, but I didn’t have the heart to let him do it. I’ll tell you one thing, a bug wouldn’t stand a chance at Rose Terrace. A germ would be hard pressed to survive in this place. Their motto here is: ‘It’s not enough to look clean, it’s got to be clean.’ Sometimes I feel like I’m living in one of those cellophane sandwich bags, like the ones they used to sell on the trains.