Folly Beach Part 39

"Well, in most cases, that would be in a few hours."

"After they bring the baby home then."

"That could be as soon as tomorrow."

"After the baptism then."

"Do I detect a little reluctance on the part of America's newest playwright sensation to get back to business? Do you want to be known as a one-hit wonder?"

"No!" But what was I going to write about?

Russ reappeared. He looked haggard.

"We're going upstairs."

"Did she get her epidural?"

"No, the doctor said it was too late. She's nine and a half centimeters. But she's gonna be in room 516."

"What? You'd better get upstairs on the double, boy, or you're gonna miss the whole thing!"

Russ spun around and was gone. We took the elevator up to the fifth floor and waited. About an hour later Russ came and found us. He was smiling so proudly, just beaming really.

"She's a girl. You have a granddaughter, Mom. Her name is Daisy Ella and she's the most beautiful little girl in the whole entire world."

"Oh, Russ!" I threw my arms around him and hugged him with all my might. "Oh! I can't wait to meet her!"

"Congratulations, Russ!" John said and shook his hand soundly.

"Thanks!"

All summer long, Aunt Daisy and Ella had been planning nurseries for the baby. Ella was crocheting blankets and Aunt Daisy was shopping. They decorated an elaborate baby's room for Russ and Alice at their house but they made another even more elaborate one at their own house on Folly Beach. We could already see there was going to be a lot of bickering about to whom that baby really belonged.

"How's Alice?"

"Alice? She's thrilled. Tired but thrilled. Come say h.e.l.lo!"

We went in room 516 and there was Alice, propped up in bed with her hair brushed and wearing a fresh gown, holding beautiful little Daisy Ella Cooper in her arms. I looked at my granddaughter and wept. In fact, we all did.

A month later, as the temperature became bearable and the marsh gra.s.s began to turn brown, we had a lovely christening at the Catholic church on Folly Beach. Once again, Patti and Mark, who were to serve as G.o.dparents, were staying in the Jolly Buddha. Maureen was still staying with Russ and Alice as she had been since she arrived two days after the baby was born, which was driving Russ seriously crazy. And Sara, who was suddenly in demand for a role in this movie or that play could not be with us.

"I still don't understand why she didn't come," Alice said over dinner at Aunt Daisy's.

"Are you serious? Because she's reading for the second time for a leading role in a Julia Roberts film," John said. "As I understand it, she's the most likely candidate."

Alice's face turned beet-red. The corners of Patti's mouth turned up.

"You always said she had what it took, Cate. I'm just so happy for her," Patti said.

"You never stop believing in your kids, Patti. That's just what a parent does."

Well, later on we were to learn that Sara did indeed win the part.

"Mom? Julia Roberts is so cool."

"Do you call her Julia?"

"Yeah! She's like totally grounded and normal and I love her, but so does everybody . . ."

Sara gushed. I listened, happy to know she was at last getting that chance she wanted, to act in a grand arena. Movies. What could be more exciting for her? I still preferred theater, but I was so happy for my Sara.

Maybe it was a week later, or maybe it was two weeks, but I know it was sweater weather on the beach. I found one of Dorothy's recipes for something called Widow's Punch and thought, what the heck? John and I both qualified for that one. So I mixed up a batch, chilled it, and poured it into a thermos. We had plans to take a walk down to the far end of the beach that overlooks the Morris Island Lighthouse. He was bringing sandwiches and I had beverage duty. I put the thermos in a canvas tote bag and when he arrived I got in his car and off we went. We pa.s.sed locals, surfers, and tourists and finally came to the place where we parked and walked the distance to the part of the beach we wanted to see. Once there, I spread a blanket on the soft sand and John sat down beside me.

"Want a gla.s.s of Widow's Punch?"

"What? You want turkey or ham?"

"Let's share half and half," I said. "Yeah, it's Dorothy's recipe."

"Hmmm. Well, I brought something else with me," he said and pulled out a pair of wire-cutters. He was going to cut my ring off and I was going to cut his.

"Finally!" I said and stuck out my palm. In one snip and a twist, the shackles of Addison Cooper were off. "Let me do yours."

And I did.

"What should we do with them?" he said, holding the broken rings in his hand.

I stood up and offered him my hand. We walked to the water's edge.

"I'll bet you ten bucks you can't throw them to the lighthouse," I said.

"Really?"

He did the windup for the pitch and threw them far out into the water, but not far enough. The same thing happened with the second one.

"Too bad," I said. "Ten dollars is a lot of money."

"Too bad," he said, "what a waste of two good rings."

"Why's that?"

"Because I'm thinking pretty soon we'll just have to buy two more."

"John Risley! Are you asking me to marry you?"

"I don't know. I was just thinking of making an honest woman of you. Really. That's all."

"Oh, you want to marry me for the sake of the neighbors? The bohemians out here on Folly Beach? You think they care? You're such a terrible liar."

"Nah, I guess I wanted to ask you to marry me because I really love you, Cate." He reached in his back pocket and pulled out a little satin sack. "Tricia Gustofson at Crogan's said you'd like this. What do you think?" He held up a perfectly gorgeous diamond ring, the center stone surrounded by so many little diamonds it was almost blinding in the afternoon sun.

"You're asking me to marry you?" I said, as he slipped the ring over my knuckle.

"What would you say if I did?"

"Well," I stepped in close to him and kissed one cheek. "I'd say they got married on Folly Beach," I said, and kissed his other cheek. "And then they moved into the Porgy House and lived happily ever after."

"Isn't that a coincidence? That's exactly what I'd say, too."

Author's Note

I became interested in the Charleston Renaissance when SCETV Radio's finest personality, noted historian and friend to authors everywhere, Walter Edgar asked me if I had read Three O'clock Dinner by Josephine Pinckney. I had not and he loaned me a copy, which I read and enjoyed tremendously. It seemed so contemporary but in its day (1945) it must have been controversial, as it touched on some topics that were still taboo in 2011.

I couldn't forget the book or the writer's voice, and as fate would have it, I mentioned that to Faye Jenson, the executive director of the South Carolina Historical Society, where I have served on the board for a few years. She said that she thought I should come down and read the papers of Dorothy and DuBose Heyward and others. So last summer, the summer of 2010, I did, beginning with the Heywards. My first discovery was that DuBose was a high school dropout and that Dorothy was very well educated, having studied at Columbia University and Radcliffe College. Then I discovered the huge economic disparities between them. Dorothy was a wealthy woman and DuBose was comfortable at the time they met but he had grown up in poverty. I ran across a copy of her birth certificate, on which her name is "Dorothea"-my name-and letterhead that stated she lived on Fifth and Twelfth in Manhattan-my old address-and that she was a member of the Cosmopolitan Club, and so am I. I began to wonder if Dorothea/Dorothy wasn't trying to tell me something, and if so, what was she trying to say? I then discovered a letter from a friend to her, calling her "Dottie," which my friends and family have called me all of my life. Every time I turned around, it seemed I was b.u.mping into another coincidence or similarity. Okay, I thought, there's a story here and I'm going to try and tell it. Who was Dorothy Heyward?

The most interesting and curious fact of all might be that because she survived DuBose by many years, what is in those boxes at the SCHS is there because it was what Dorothy wanted us to know. Every single letter from her to DuBose is absent. Perhaps he did not save her letters or perhaps she disposed of them. We will never know. But scores of letters from DuBose to her were carefully preserved. It appears that Dorothy wanted us to have a one-sided conversation with DuBose, not her. It is my opinion that Dorothy always wanted DuBose to be the celebrity, the icon, the one who was remembered and revered. She loved him that much.

It is a matter of historic fact that Dorothy herself adapted DuBose's book Porgy for the stage and that she also had a great hand in creating the adaptation of Mamba's Daughters for the stage, the two most successful works with DuBose Heyward's name attached to them. But she shied away from taking credit for herself and, in fact, spent her widowhood making sure that DuBose's name appeared in the credits of all of Gershwin's productions of Porgy and Bess so that his estate would receive the royalties that were due.

And, finally, while Dorothy Heyward seems to have gone to great lengths to disappear into history as "just a girl from Ohio who wanted a career on the other side of the footlights," the facts appear to be different to me. True, she was diminutive in the extreme, and the fact that she was from Ohio may have rendered her more easily dismissed by DuBose's crowd, but Dorothy Kuhns Heyward was a powerhouse, who married into one of Charleston's most prestigious families and spent her life doing everything she could for the man she fiercely loved. Theirs may be the most powerful love story of the Charleston Literary Renaissance.

For those who want to learn more about the Charleston Literary Renaissance, I offer the following reading list: Renaissance in Charleston: Art and Life in the Carolina Low Country, 19001940, James M. Hutchisson and Harlan Greene, editors Mr. Skylark: John Bennett and the Charleston Renaissance, by Harlan Greene DuBose Heyward: A Charleston Gentleman and the World of Porgy and Bess, by James M. Hutchisson A DuBose Heyward Reader, James M. Hutchisson, editor Folly Beach: A Brief History, by Gretchen Stringer-Robinson The Morris Island Lighthouse: Charleston's Maritime Beacon, by Douglas W. Bostick A Talent for Living: Josephine Pinckney and the Charleston Literary Tradition, by Barbara L. Bellows The Devil and a Good Woman, Too: The Lives of Julia Peterkin, by Susan Millar Williams For those who want to read the work of the writers of the Charleston Literary Renaissance, I offer the following reading list: Sea-drinking Cities, poems by Josephine Pinckney Three O'clock Dinner, by Josephine Pinckney Mamba's Daughters: A Novel of Charleston, by DuBose Heyward Porgy, by DuBose Heyward Peter Ashley, by DuBose Heyward Carolina Chansons, by Hervey Allen and DuBose Heyward The Doctor to the Dead: Grotesque Legends and Folk Tales of Old Charleston, by John Bennett Scarlet Sister Mary, by Julia Peterkin Green Thursday, by Julia Peterkin

Acknowledgments.

I always say that many hands go into the making of a book, but this time the population is so very important that I want to try and thank each person for their contributions. Where to start? It would have to be with Harlan Greene of Charleston. I was introduced to Harlan by mutual friends and now I hope I can say that he is a friend of mine, too. First, he is the consummate gentleman and a brilliant one at that. And he is a fascinating writer and wonderful historian. I devoured his books, notated them to death, but when we got together and discovered our mutual interest in the Heywards, he opened his generous heart and told me what he knew about Dorothy and DuBose, about the whole literary scene in Charleston and indeed in America during the twenties and the thirties. I think I tortured him with questions, but he was always so gracious and patient with me and he encouraged me to keep digging for new truths. Harlan, I am deeply in your debt and very grateful. Next would be James M. Hutchisson of the Citadel, whose biography of DuBose Heyward kept me up at night as did his work on the Charleston Renaissance that he edited with Harlan Greene. Like Harlan, Jim also answered my countless questions and encouraged me to take literary license with my story, because, after all, I'm writing fiction. So, Professor Hutchisson, I thank you mightily for your time, good humor, and support. Without these two gentlemen, this book simply could not be.

Well, shoot me, but I just put age before beauty. Now I bow and sc.r.a.pe to Faye Jenson, the executive director of the South Carolina Historical Society, and her lovely a.s.sistant, Mary Jo Fairchild. I had such a wonderful time learning about the Heywards within the walls of the Fireproof Building that houses this venerable inst.i.tution and again, this book would be so much less rich without the treasures I found and the ones you led me to within your archives. Many thanks for all your insights and thoughts and most especially for your incredible hospitality.

Also many sincere thanks to Harriet MacDougal Rigney of Charleston for all her remembrances, good ideas, and friendship. Most especially, thank you for the introduction to Kathy Glick of Folly Beach, proud owner of the Porgy House, the lynchpin of this story. And to Kathy Glick, huge thanks for allowing me inside the precious and adorable Porgy House and for telling me your stories. I loved meeting you, and your hand in this book is a very important one indeed. Admittedly, this story evolved into something entirely different from the pitch I gave to you, but that's normal in this crazy business.

Thanks also to Lisa Bowen Hamrick for helping me locate a copy of Dorothy Heyward's obituary and to two very helpful folks from the Charleston Museum for information on the piano used by Gershwin: J. Graham Long, curator of history, and Jenifer Scheetz, archivist. And special thanks once again to Rees Jones for his help with the golf clubs. To Peter McGee of Charleston, for his wonderful story about Oscar Wilde, I say many, many thanks to you, sir! And special thanks to John Zeigler of Charleston for the pleasure of his company and a delightful afternoon of remembering.

I'd like to recognize and thank the following residents of Folly Beach, who opened their doors to me five years ago when this story was in its infancy: Carl Beckman, Mary J. Rhodes, Gretchen Stringer-Robinson, and Marlene Estridge. And many thanks to Randy Robinson, chief building official of the Sullivans Island Building Department, for reminding me which way the sand blows; to Jennet Robinson Alterman for information on Piccolo Spoleto; and to Sue Tynan of Suty Designs for helping me take my notes in style.

To my agent and great friend, Larry Kirshbaum, the most charming and elegant gentleman in the whole darn city of New York, with my undying thanks for his excellent counsel, and to my wonderful editor, Carrie Feron, whose patience seems to know no bounds and for her priceless wisdom-both of you-look out the window toward the Garden State. Yes, that is me curtsying and blowing you so many kisses of grat.i.tude.

And to the entire William Morrow and Avon team: Brian Murray, Michael Morrison, Liate Stehlik, Adrienne Di Pietro, Kristine Macrides, Tessa Woodward, Lynn Grady, Tavia Kowalchuk, Seale Ballenger, Ben Bruton, Greg Shutack, Shawn Nichols, Frank Albanese, Virginia Stanley, Jamie Brickhouse, Rachael Brennan, Josh Marwell, Michael Brennan, Carl Lennertz, Carla Parker, Donna Waikus, Rhonda Rose, Michael Morris, Michael Spradlin, Gabe Barillas, Deb Murphy, and last but most certainly not least, Brian Grogan: Thank you one and all for the miracles you perform and for your amazing, generous support. You still make me want to dance!

To Buzzy Porter, huge thanks for getting me so organized and for your loyal friendship of so many years. Don't know what I'd do with myself without you!

To Debbie Zammit, seems incredible but here we are again! Another year! Another year of tuna salad on Mondays, keeping me on track, catching my goobers, and making me look reasonably intelligent. I know, I owe you so big-time it's ridiculous, but isn't this publishing business more fun than Seventh Avenue? Love ya, girl!

To Ann Del Mastro, George Zur, and my cousin Charles Comar Blanchard: all the Franks love you for too many reasons to enumerate!

To booksellers across the land, and I mean every single one of you, I thank you from the bottom of my heart, especially Patty Morrison and Larry Morey of Barnes and n.o.ble, Tom Warner and Vicky Crafton of Litchfield Books, Sally Brewster of Park Road Books, and once again, can we just hold the phone for Jacquie Lee of Books-A-Million? Jacquie, Jacquie! You are too much, hon! Love ya and love y'all!

And a special thanks to those whose names I grabbed from real life and used for characters. If you recognize yourself acting strangely or being peculiar, it is just me having a little fun with my friends, especially Cathy Mahon and John Risley.

To my family-Peter, William, and Victoria-I love y'all with all I've got. I'm so proud of you and so grateful for your understanding when deadlines and book tours roll around every year. As always, just for being who you are, my heart swells with grat.i.tude and pride when I think of you and you are never far away from the forefront of my mind. Every woman should have my good fortune with their family. You fill my life with joy.

Finally, to my readers, to whom I owe the greatest debt of all. I am sending you the most sincere and profound thanks for reading my stories, for sending along so many nice e-mails, for yakking it up with me on Facebook, and for coming out to book signings. You are why I try to write a book each year. I hope Folly Beach will give you something new to think about and somewhere new to try. There's a lot of magic down here in the Lowcountry. Please, come see us and get some for yourself!

I love you all and thank you once again.

About the Author.

New York Times bestselling author DOROTHEA BENTON FRANK was born and raised on Sullivans Island, South Carolina. She resides in the New York area with her husband.

www.dotfrank.com.

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