Shred of Evidence

When Mavis Kent married Aaron Latimer, she thought she was marrying up. It made sense in a distorted way. Aaron was drop-dead gorgeous, with dark wavy hair, long lean-muscled limbs, and sun-kissed skin. All the other girls wanted him, but Mavis—plain, bookish schoolmarm that she was—nabbed him.

People whispered, “It will never last”, if Mavis heard she ignored them. To her, marriage was forever.

Mavis came from respectable stock. The Kents were bankers and landowners, hard-working, well thought of people. They were also educated and well-traveled; Aaron for all his looks and charm was not. He had been a star athlete in high school, but was a framer by trade. If Mr. Kent was still alive, Mavis would have been bundled off to Europe at the first hint of an unsuitable romance and returned pregnant and married to a doctor, lawyer or a junior banker. Unfortunately, Mr. Kent was gone and what remained of the clan, Mavis’ mother and two older brothers, were loathe to deny the youngest Kent child anything. If Aaron Latimer was what Mavis wanted it was Aaron Latimer she would have. Any misgivings were firmly put aside.

Aaron’s profession wasn’t indicative of his moral fiber. It was an indication of the standard of living he was accustomed to. Within a few months of the wedding the groom hung up his hammer and took up his bottle. In his mind, a wealthy, well-educated girl should have no problem providing for a household. At first, things worked. They moved into a spacious flat which occupied the top floor of the general store the Kent family owned. They apartment was rent free, groceries were cheap, and Mabel had a small trust fund. In addition, the parents from the exclusive prep school Mabel worked for always sent nice gifts during the holidays; and her mother and brothers were often quite generous. Then there was the sex, the mind-fogging, bed-shaking, holler at the moon kind. In the beginning, it smoother over any worries.

It was the drinking that finally did them in. Bottle after bottle of bourbon added up, as did the gambling habit that eventually came to accompany it. Aaron needed something to pass the time. A day out with the boys was always a good time-filler. It started with cards, which evolved to craps and days at the track. If his bets were higher or more reckless that need be, it was only because Aaron assumed that there would always be more than enough to cover things.

It began with more frequent drafts on the trust, and slid into jewelry that disappeared and antique furniture that walked out the door. Brothers marry and have children. Mothers eventually leave this world. Even the largest of inheritances dwindle. The time for sipping lemonade on the veranda had passed and debutante balls, riding lessons, and Atlanta shopping trips never prepared Mavis to cope with such a situation. Soon, nothing extra was left. As years, then decades passed Mavis’ dresses, coats, hats and shoes got a bit shabbier, and her acquaintances fewer. Hands, once soft, white and delicate, were red and chapped from years of chopping, kneading, wringing and scrubbing. Hair, once a lustrous mass of flowing, coppery tresses, was lackluster and cropped. The rest of the Kent family, if Mavis saw them at all, was polite but aloof. Though they smuggled Mavis money if it seemed needed, they never had much to say. No one wanted to state the obvious.

The years were hard on Aaron as well. Working outdoors had once his body and lent a rich tone to his skin. That time was past. Arms once lean and strong had become flabby and thick; a formerly flat, firm belly flopped prodigiously over his belt; Hair, at one time a mass of thick, lustrous, sable curls, was flecked with silver and thinning; and skin once bronzed and flushed with life was just one step past pasty. Liquor turned him caustic and boorish, and a gambling loss made him by turns violent and evasive.

“I know you think you’re better than me. I bet you wish you were married to Bill Harper,” he’d shout.

Bill Harper was Mavis’ high school boyfriend. Male teachers and fathers from her school—married or not—were suspect. Regular customers from the store were worse, because those men came to their doorstep. The few friends Mavis still had slinked away quietly. She was alone with only the achievements of her third graders to provide relief.

Children are trying even at the best of times. As the years bore down on Mavis she had less patience and became less kind. By mid-career she was stricter than a marine drill-sergeant. The third-graders got harder to control and less polite with each passing year. The threat of expulsion was the only thing that reined them in. Only a combination of respect for the Kent name and outstanding state testing scores kept her job secure.

A stressful job, unhappy home, and nonexistent loved ones drove Mavis out of the house and into the library. People had deserted her, but books were always at her beck and call. Whenever Aaron couldn’t find her, she was tucked away on the top floor. Mavis slowly worked her way through biographies, tomes of history, literary criticism, science texts, cookbooks, gardening manuals, and the great works of fiction—with a little Barbara Cartland just for fun. Never once did a story disappoint her. Careful to do the bulk of her reading in the library, Mavis never checked out more than one book at a time. When she did take something out, it was something practical with recipes or gardening tips. A secret that wonderful was bound to trip her up.

One night, Aaron’s supper wasn’t on the table promptly at six. That might have slipped by, but one night turned into two, then three. Finally, he got so angry he cobbled together his own dinner and waited for Mavis to come home. Aaron decided it was time he and his wife had a “chat”—there was very little conversation involved. A cluster of scraps and bruises and one broken hip later, Mavis was in the hospital. Luckily it was summer. She recuperated without the worry of losing her job.

Weeks later, on crutches, Mavis returned her last book. Though it was incredibly overdue, the librarian waived the fine, saying, “It obviously couldn’t be avoided”. No more comfort was to be found there; Mavis was forbidden to go back. Instead, she turned to her garden. She dug and pulled and watered, nurturing it along until it contained just about everything: roses to daffodils, irises to azaleas, phlox to rosemary, sage to sweet violet, and comfrey to verbena. Most of the plants were edible, some were medicinal, and all were simply beautiful. The garden kept Mavis at home and helped augment a meager pantry.

To preempt Aaron from destroying the last thing that mattered to her, Mavis got him involved in her new hobby from the start. She planted lavender, comfrey, mint and chamomile in order to augment his tea, and carefully cultivated the wild raspberry and blackberry bushes until they provided lush fruit for pies and preserves. The vegetable garden contained all of Aaron’s favorite vegetables. Mavis even coaxed Aaron to take up his tools again long enough to build an arbor for the wisteria cuttings her sister-in-law had given them. Aaron enjoyed the garden’s bounty to leave it and his wife alone.

Mavis and Aaron could have gone on like that indefinitely, but a few key events forced a change. A little black girl visiting her cousins for the summer was abducted and raped. A few weeks later, an old Negro man was found out by the railroad tracks, beaten to a bloody pulp and left to die. Both victims were known to Mavis. As time rolled by, the makeup of her neighborhood had changed. In turn, customers at the store had changed too. Mavis never cared what color the customers where as long as they were polite and their money was green. Aaron felt differently. Before the garden, Mavis had always born the brunt of his ire. Now he and his boys had a new outlet, a grander passion than gambling, that she could not condone.

That same summer, Mavis’ older brother barely survived a head-on car crash. He repeatedly asked to see his sister until his wife relented and called. They had moved to Charlotte when they married. It meant she would be away for several days.

Aaron pitched a fit when he realized he was not welcomed and would have to fend for himself while Mavis was gone. “What am I going to eat?” he wailed.

“The pantry is stocked. I also left a whole roast in the fridge,” Mavis replied.

“Well, what about my tea? Who’s going to make me tea?”

“There are dried herbs in the pantry, too. You can pick your own if you want it fresh. You know which plants,” she said.

For every querulous question, Mavis had the answer; she knew her husband.

By the time Mavis returned home, Aaron was dead. His desire for freshly-brewed iced tea was his undoing. Somehow he picked the wrong leaves and brewed up a batch of toxic tea. After the first glass, his stomach started to feel funny. He assumed it was his inadequate attempt at cooking, so he kept drinking hoping another sip or two would quiet his noisome stomach. Aaron drank until he drained the pitcher. Then the convulsions happened. At least, that was the theory the coroner had devised. Mavis did know the difference between foxglove and comfrey. Although both plants shared the same general form, the Foxglove leaves have finely toothed edges, whereas Comfrey leaves were smooth. It was a simple mistake, unless you were Aaron. Pity the foxglove and comfrey were planted beside each other in the garden.

“Goodbye, Aaron,” Mabel whispered, and with one last pat, the casket was sealed away. When Mavis Latimer buried Aaron Latimer she shed many tears; but in the quiet of her home she was secretly relieved. It was past time to get her hip reset properly and catch up on her reading…