Spare Change (Wyattsville #1)(7)

The second night they stopped in Georgia; but then the car began overheating and they had to make numerous stops. At the end of the third day they’d only gone as far as Jacksonville. Even though they’d crossed over into Florida, it was another three-hundred miles to reach their destination. Olivia, no longer fussy about where they bedded down, said, “If you’re weary of driving we can honeymoon right here.”

“Nonsense,” he answered. “I promised you two weeks in Miami Beach, and that’s what you’re going to get.”

“If you’re sure…” she noticed a bit of weariness around his eyes.

When they finally arrived at the Fontainebleau on Tuesday, the tenth day of their marriage, the spasm knotting Olivia’s back relaxed a bit. “See,” Charlie said, “I told you, nothing to worry about.”

Olivia knew better—tomorrow would be the eleventh day. Regardless of what the gypsy had said, anything could happen. One of them could drown in the swimming pool, or get a severe sunburn, possibly be mugged by some drunken sailor. “I don’t know about you,” she told Charlie, “but, I am thoroughly exhausted. Let’s just stay in bed all day tomorrow. We’ll order room service, enjoy the view from our window.”

“Yes, indeed,” he said with the slyest of winks, “that sounds good to me.”

So on the eleventh day of their marriage, they did just that. In the morning they ordered up a tray of bacon and eggs; at noon they called down for sandwiches, and in the evening the tuxedoed waiter delivered a cart with chilled champagne and candles. After drinking such a sizeable amount of champagne, Olivia could barely open her eyes the next morning, but when she did the first thing that came to mind was that the eleventh day of their marriage had come and gone without disaster. She bounded out of bed, ready, she claimed, for a dip in the pool.

Day after day, they swam in the pool, warmed their toes in the sand and walked along the beach; they dressed in their finest clothes and dined in restaurants with crystal candlesticks and starched tablecloths. Every evening they drank glasses of dark red burgundy and toasted their love. Here’s to us, they’d say, reminding themselves how fortuitous it was that they’d found each other.

On their eleventh day in Miami, Olivia suggested they play it safe—avoid the swimming pool with its ten feet of water where a person could drown, skip the beach where sand crabs and jelly fish could attach themselves to a person’s skin, stay out of the sun which could quickly blister any spot not slathered with sunscreen. Charlie, who could almost swear there was a bucket of salt water sloshing around in his left ear, agreed; so they held hands, strolled Collins Avenue and shopped the boutiques. Olivia bought tee shirts in every imaginable color, sunglasses circled with rhinestone trim, three ceramic flamingos and a conch shell with a dolphin painted on the side of it. On the way back to the hotel, she spied another souvenir stand and claimed that she had to stop for some post cards to send to the girls at the Southern Atlantic Telephone Company.

Charlie, who’d had enough of looking at such bric-a-brac, claimed he’d prefer to wait outside. While standing in the shade of a green awning fanned out across the front of the True Love Jewelry Shoppe, he noticed a display of necklaces hanging in the window and in he went. Twenty minutes later, when Olivia came out with two ashtrays and a handful of postcards, he was holding a small white bag in his hand.

“What’s that?” she asked.

“You’ll find out soon enough,” he said with a grin.

That evening, after he’d zipped the back of her dress, Charlie told Olivia to close her eyes; when she did, he fastened the pendant he’d bought around her neck. He placed her in front of the mirror and then said, “Okay, now you can look.”

Olivia, who had an untold number of superstitions, gave a gasp of horror when she saw the pendant. “It’s an opal!” she said. “Opals bring bad luck. Last year a woman wearing an opal ring was found dead in a ditch.”

“Nonsense,” Charlie said, “that was just a coincidence.”

“Oh, really? What about Kathleen Riley, she bought a pair of opal earrings and her house burned to the ground the very next day!”

“Things like that happen.”

Were it not for the fact that Charlie had hung the pendant around her neck with the most genuine look of love in his eyes, Olivia would have ripped it off and dropped in right into the wastebasket. Were it not for the fact they were on their honeymoon she would have hidden the treacherous piece of jewelry in the darkest corner of some cupboard, but as it was, she obligingly wore it to dinner.

Halfway through the lobster bisque, Charlie said he felt a touch of indigestion coming on and without another word he collapsed and fell forward into the bowl of soup.





Susanna Doyle

When I married Benjamin, I never figured to live the life of Riley; but I did believe we’d move to New York City so I could make something of myself. It ain’t like I lied about my ambition—right off, I told him, I got singing talent but I need to be in New York where there’s opportunities. I was working in the shipyard then, making real good money. But Benjamin, who can be a real charmer when he wants to, says for me to quit my job, because we’re gonna get married and he’s gonna take care of me. He didn’t say word one about moving off to some God-forsaken farm where there ain’t nobody but chickens and pigs to hear me sing.