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Authors: Graham Landrum

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Yet Charles Hollonbrook breezed into town with another newcomer and began to sell real estate right and left. Just think of it. He got himself into the country club and on the vestry at the Episcopal church, not to mention that he got to be president of the local Rotary Club and finally Rotary district governor. It seemed to me that he had just about made himself into an insider. But at the same time, that feat cannot be accomplished, no matter how cleverly and diplomatically it is done, without making enemies. Not all of the enemies would murderâI hope, but there must be some, at least, who would not be sorry he was dead.

Well, we have to admire Charles Hollonbrook for his success in what you would call a hostile environment. But there is always that downside to the record, too. You see, he broke up his partnership in just a few years and then very soon his marriage. Whose fault was it? If it was just the one bust-up, I might give the young man the benefit of the doubt. But two things like that?

I was to learn quite a bit more about Charles (Holly) Hollonbrook, as well as Charles J. Hollonbrook.

IN WHICH I RECEIVE MORE THAN A MASSAGE

>>
Harriet Bushrow
<<

“Y
ou'll never guess what I've done for you,” Maud said when I got back to the house.

Of course I had no idea.

“I've made an appointment for you with a masseuse.” What on earth could the woman have been thinking of? I'd never had a massage in my life, and I had no idea of such a thing now.

“Now, Hattie, don't look at me like that. The notion just struck me this morning, and I went right to the phone and made the appointment-ten-thirty tomorrow morning.” Maud laughed, then she began to explain.

They have a very lovely country club at Stedbury, and several years ago the town banker insisted that they install a steam room and hire a masseur. Of course, that's for men and operates only in the afternoons. But in the mornings, the masseur's wife gives massage to the ladies, although the steam bath doesn't go with it. The woman's name is Noralou Passmore. Maud says the girl is well named: She knows more and she passes it on.

“Get her started on the subject of Charles Hollonbrook, and you'll hear enough to make your ears ache.”

And that's how I came to have a massage from Noralou.

The Stedbury Country Club couldn't have been in a more beautiful location. The town is in the Piedmont, and that means that on beautiful clear days, if you are in the right place, you see the Blue Ridge Mountains, hazy and soft to the northwest.

Well the clubhouse is in exactly the right place for that view. It is lovely.

When I first walked into the club, I didn't see a soul. Off to the left, I peeked through a door at the ballroom. It is handsome and freshly done up by a decoratorânot my tasteâbut expensive and impressive.

To the right of the ballroom was the dining room, with a carpet almost as thick as and about the color of the greens outside. I was wondering how I could find out where to go when a young woman with a stack of tablecloths in her arms came through a swinging door. She told me how to go downstairs and follow the hall to the right and then to the left. And when I did all that, sure enough I was in the right place; and there was Noralou. I introduced myself. “I know,” she said. “You're the lady from Tennessee that is staying at Miz Bradfield's.”

“I've never had a massage before,” I said, “and I didn't know what kind of clothes I ought to put on.”

“Well, honey,” she said, “for a massage we just take them all off.”

I judge she meant I took them all off, for she had on one of those warm-up suitsâit very likely had been magenta, but it looked to have been through the wash a good number of times. It made her resemble a pink Mack truck.

“What must I do?” I asked.

“There's a dressin' room right there,” she said. “Just take off your clothes and wrap this sheet around you, and come back here.”

Well, I did; and when I came out, I know I looked like one of the women at the tomb of Jesus in a Sunday-school pageant.

“Now get up on this table and lie on your tummy.”

I have to acknowledge that my “tummy” is not the smallest thing I can lie on. I was glad there was nobody but Noralou to see me trying to get in that position and retain my modesty with that sheet wrapped around me. And no sooner did I get settled than Noralou peeled the sheet back and began working me over, starting with my shoulders and neck.

“Just relax, honey,” she crooned, “Noralou is going to do all the work.”

“Oh, that feels good,” I said. “Have you done this kind of work always?”

“I commenced when I was nineteen, and I'm thirty-nine now. Bill and me have been at the club ten of those years, and I reckon we'll stay on. The massage business don't have as good a reputation nowadays with all these âmassage parlors.'”

Noralou's voice rose in disgust.

“It's hard on those of us that's professional. Me and Bill are born-again Christian people and wouldn't doâyou knowâsomethin' that wasn't professional. Massage is a âhealing art.'”

Again Noralou's voice rose, but in a tone somewhere in the neighborhood of holy awe. Well, I saw that she could probably go on about the massage business. While a discourse on massage parlors by a born-again Christian might be very interesting, that wasn't what I wanted to hear.

“With all that trashy, immoral massage parlor business,” I saidâand I made it sound right disgusting, which it isâ“you are really fortunate to work in such a lovely club.”

“Well, me and Bill do all right,” Noralou observed with considerable satisfaction.

“I'd imagine you have a very high-class clientele here,” I said.

“You hit it right, there,” she agreed. “The club don't have but only very select members. Of course, some of themâbut I
won't say anything about that. Lots of rich people in this club, and me and Bill do all right.”

“Maybe you knew that poor gentleman that committed suicide in Borderville last month.”

“Mr. Hollonbrook.” Noralou said it as if she had just adjusted her frame of reference and was ready to go.

“Yes,” I said, “I believe that was his name.”

“Mr. Holly Hollonbrook, poor soul. Killed hisself up there in Tennessee. Is that the town you come from?”

“Yes,” I said.

“Well what do you know?” This, of course, was not a question, but a prelude.

“Why, I'll say I knew that poor soulâknow Miz Hollonbrook a lot betterâreal nice ladyâalways gives a real good tip. But I can tell you, she had a lot to put up with about himâpoor soulâtaking his own life that way! But he's paying for it now.” She kneaded away for a moment in silence.

“And such a fine-lookin' man!” she continued. “It seemed like he about had everything. But still everybody has their own private life. And the Good Book says we hadn't ought to judge.”

“Are you saying he wasn't just what he ought to have been?” I suggested.

“Well,” Noralou admitted, “now that you mention it, I have to say he sure wasn't. It's a terrible thing when somebody takes their own life, but let me tell you, there's folks in this town that thinks he done us a favor when he killed hisself.”

“Why do you say that?” I asked. There was no need to urge Noralou, but I did so anyhow. Her pause was only artistic punctuation.

“Honey, it was women.” Noralou made it sound like something out of the garbage can.

“Now I know what men are like,” she continued, “and I guess I'm as forgiving as the next one. But there's a limit. Folks
talk about him and his first wife and how he divorced her to marry the one that's now his widow.

“I don't have a thing against her, mind you. She's a member here and just as nice as you please. Always generous and nice. And the divorce and all that happened before me and Bill came to work here, but they say she was his secretary. Some say she caused the divorce, and some say it was the first wife's fault; and it was only natural with a pretty secretary that she would be the second misses.

“But that don't excuse him.”

By this time, Noralou had peeled the sheet clear down below my hips and was working away at the small of my back. It just felt wonderful, but I was so interested in what the woman was saying that I didn't pay much attention to what she was doing.

“I guess you mean he had affairs,” I said.

“Affairs! I couldn't begin to tell you.”

But she
did
begin, and did a right good job of it, too.

“It was about five years ago,” she said. “We had this new pro here at the club. Now pros are men just like any other men. And working at a golf club, you see pros make passes now and then. But Bucky Patterson had this cute little wife, Desiree, and he was just crazy about her. He spent every penny he had on her, and she was a doll.

“Bucky was good-looking, tooâbrown wavy hair and blue eyes and good buns. She had no call to turn her eyes to another man.

“But that Chuck Hollonbrook! Him with his Lincoln Continental and his Rolex watch. Not much of a golf player, but he'd swagger into the club with his golf bag like he was Arnold Palmer.”

“Noralou,” I said, “I don't think you liked him.”

“Roll over,” she ordered, giving a little pat to my behind. There hadn't been a pat like that in a long, long time.

“I'll tell you, Bucky Patterson was as nice a fellow as you
would ever want to meet. He just had stars in his eyes whenever that wife of his came around.

“So what happened was that Mr. Hollonbrook began sucking up to Buckyâthe way some men do to professional athletes. It was âBucky' this and âBucky' that and âCome on, have a drink on me.'

“Not that Bucky was the kind that was in the bar all the time, or Mr. Hollonbrook, either. But it started in the bar.

“First there would be just Bucky and Mr. Hollonbrookâfor a cocktail before going home to dinner. Then it was Mr. and Mrs. HollonbrookâAlice, her name isâand Bucky and Desireeâcocktails, of courseâand then dinner here at the club, the four of them.

“I don't know when Mr. Hollonbrook and Desiree began shacking up, but I know when Bucky found out. Bucky had this friend who was going to the Augusta Open, and Bucky went down there with him. Well, the friend got sick and Bucky had to drive him home earlier than he had expected.

“When Bucky got to the house, the papers were laying on the front porch, and the mail hadn't been brought in for three days. No Desiree! Bucky started calling aroundâcoudn't imagine what had happened. Thought maybe her mother had got sickâor maybe a death of some relative.

“And then â¦ .”

Noralou would rate pretty high on my list of storytellers.
And then
âindeed! She wanted me to askâto be her stooge, so as to throw the emphasis on the climax.

“Well, go on,” I said. “Tell the rest.”

“Mr. Hollonbrook drove up in front of the house and let Desiree out. That's what happened. And as she came tripping up the walk with her little overnight bag and her suitcase, who should open the front door but Bucky!

“I'd give a pretty to have been there.

“Poor Bucky! Miz Bushrow, he idolized that girl. And this day
and age, when a man is like that, a woman hadn't ought to play around. No ma'am.

“What made it worse, you see, is that Mr. Hollonbrook was on the board of the club. And Jake Robinson, that was the club manager then, was one of these kind that knows where his bread is buttered. I mean him and Mr. Hollonbrook was like peas in a pod, they was so close.

“Poor Bucky! Next time he got a chance, him and Mr. Hollonbrook got into a fight down by the ninth hole. It must have been a regular knock-down-and-drag-out. Mr. Hollonbrook had a bruise on his cheek bigger'n a biscuit and downright purple. And poor Bucky got his lip cut something awful. Why, they had to take stitches.

“And that Jake Robinsonâhe was the meanest old thing anyway, and a few months later they caught him stealing money from the club, and that was the last of himâbut anyhow, Jake Robinson, being hand in glove with Mr. Hollonbrook, he tried to fire Bucky on the spot.

“And Bucky said he was going to sue the club for breach of contract. And Jake said if he did, Mr. Hollonbrook would have Bucky up for assault and battery. And Bucky said if Mr. Hollonbrook did that, he would name Mr. Hollonbrook in his divorce suit, and there were a good many other things he could tell about Mr. Hollonbrook.

“Maybe you don't think that put the monkey on somebody else's back!

“Well, so Jake said the club would buy Bucky's contract, and Bucky said that wasn't good enough. Then Jake said he could get Bucky a job at a club in Florida. So that sounded pretty good, and Bucky took it.”

“My goodness,” I exclaimed. “Now the pro,” I said. “What did you say his name was?”

“Bucky Patterson.”

“Bucky,” I mused. “Is that his real name?”

“Real nameâBuchannan.”

“Ah,” I said. “And where did you say he went?”

“Playa Grande Club, near Lauderdale.”

Now that's a good long distance from Borderville, and the whole story took place a long while ago. Nevertheless, Mr. Buchannan Patterson was an item of interest.

“And did Bucky and his wife get back together?” I asked.

“Lord, no! He got that divorce, and she and him both left town.”

“And what about Mr. Hollonbrook?”

BOOK: The Rotary Club Murder Mystery

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