Rowing in Eden by Elizabeth Evans Read Free Book Online

the road at the bull and said, “My dad always told us, ‘When you’re in the market for a bull, make sure you get a bull that looks like a bull,’” and that line was now a family joke, something one of them could say when a conversation came to an awkward silence:
    â€œWhen you’re in the market for a bull, get a bull that looks like a bull.”
    Franny inspected the Life on her way back to the house. Some layout person had cut into the photo of the four U.S. soldiers on the magazine’s cover in order to make one soldier’s head lap the red block containing the bold white letters spelling out “LIFE.” That soldier wore a silver ring on his finger that might have been a wedding band. He and another soldier were helping a third soldier—an injured man—cross a field while a fourth man, mouth screwed into an odd grimace, looked on.
    The first page of the magazine showed a photo of a model in a kerchief. “Do you have to hide your hair to look prettier?” askedthe advertisers at Clairol; and, next, there was the actor Louis Jordan, behind a pair of Foster Grant sunglasses. The magazine’s many advertisements for liquor showed people having a wonderful time at elaborate parties. A model in a gold swimsuit and gold bathing cap and goggles promoted Revlon’s new frosted lipstick and nail polish colors. Sugar and Ice was a faint, iridescent pink and Frosted Malt its beige twin, and Franny felt certain one of the colors would make a great deal of difference in how she looked, but which one?
    From out of the pages of the magazine and onto the drive, something fell. A postcard. For Rosamund. Reading other people’s mail was wrong. Of course. However, the handwriting on this postcard was so enormous, Franny could hardly have missed the explosive signature of Rosamund’s friend Turner Haskin, and surely there was nothing wrong with looking at the picture on the front of the card. La Playa, Franny knew, was the name of the beachfront hotel belonging to Turner Haskin’s father, and here was a photo of that hotel and its sandy beach, both of which looked as white and matte as confectioner’s sugar. On the rooftop of the hotel, enormous burgundy letters stood up against the Florida sky to spell out the name: L A P LAYA .
    â€œPeople like Frank Sinatra go there,” Rosamund said when Franny brought the postcard inside, into the kitchen. Martie and Peg and Ginny Weston were in the kitchen, too. A rangy woman in beige glasses and beige slacks and a beige peasant blouse decorated with green rickrack, Ginny Weston sat at the breakfast table, testing the pin curls she would brush out before driving home to serve lunch to her farmer husband. Because of the growing midday heat, no one had bothered to turn on the overhead light, and it was dim in the old kitchen with its dark tongue-and-groove walls and ceiling, and Peg carried Turner Haskin’s postcard to the little fluorescent over the sink in order to take a better look.
    â€œTurner says they’ll have Mafia bosses sitting next to movie stars. People who need privacy and expect the best.” With a butter knife, Rosamund edged a pan of brownies left from the weekend,and ate the fragile slivers, one by one. “Turner says when a celebrity goes by, you pretend you don’t notice.”
    Martie looked up from the eggs she was whipping. “Well, of course. You wouldn’t make an ass of yourself by gawking.”
    â€œMartie!” Peg said in response to “ass,” and Rosamund, with an amused twist of her lips, added, “It’s not like you get a chance to see Frank Sinatra every day, Martie.”
    Ginny Weston gave a laugh as she wound a still-damp coil of hair back into place, and reinserted its bobby pins. “I couldn’t go there, Roz! I’d probably scream if I saw Old Blue Eyes!”
    â€œOh, no doubt you and I would botch it completely, Ginny! A couple