The Barefoot Summer(68)

There was a float from the church with the preacher and his wife riding on the back and throwing candy out to the crowd. One from the elementary school with all the teachers on it. Next year Jamie would ride on that one, and Waylon was right—Kate would need to be there to watch Gracie.

No, you won’t. Her Mama Rita will always be here to do that job, her conscience said above the loud band music.

Kate didn’t even argue. She’d be there anyway to take pictures of Gracie through the years, recording her growth by the festival pictures.

People dressed in all kinds of fishing costumes dashed between the next several floats, making the onlookers laugh with their antics as they gave out rubber worms and inexpensive lures to the crowd on the sidelines.

The whole thing had a Mardi Gras feel to it. She’d been to New Orleans once on a business trip and watched a parade from her hotel balcony, but it hadn’t been as much fun as this one.

Finally, the stagecoach appeared at the end with Victor driving and Hattie waving a lace hankie from inside with several other folks. Gracie and Lisa hopped up and down and blew kisses at her. When she yelled their names, they hugged each other and beamed.

And then it was over. People picked up their chairs and headed toward the school, where two blocks had been roped off for vendors and the carnival had been set up in the parking lot. Kate tagged along behind the rest of her group for a few minutes, but then she saw a vendor selling cute hair bows and stopped to buy a couple with tiny pictures of Cinderella on the ribbons.

A booth offering an array of brightly colored scarves and shawls caught her eye, too. The one that stood out was a splash of bright colors swirled around on a background of blue. It reminded her of a sunset over the lake, but she had absolutely nothing that it would match.

Amanda has a cute little maternity dress that it would go with, though.

She was about to buy it when someone touched her hand.

“What do you think of our festival?” Victor asked at her elbow. “Seen Hattie around? I had to get the horses unhitched and I lost her.”

Kate hung the scarf back on the display. “I love it! The parade was amazing, and I loved seeing you up there driving that stagecoach. Are you going to be our driver on Monday?”

“Oh, no, honey! Waylon gets to drive that day and Paul will ride shotgun. I’ll be in the stagecoach to protect all the girls.” He winked.

“How many of these festivals have you attended?” Kate asked.

“I haven’t missed a festival since I was born back in Prohibition. Did anyone ever tell you how Bootleg got its name?”

Kate glanced over his shoulder, scanning the crowd for Waylon. “No, sir, they didn’t.”

“Well, let’s me and you go that way.” He pointed toward the left. “I saw the funnel cake vendor over there. We can have a midmorning snack and talk,” he said. “Hattie will find me a lot quicker if I’m sittin’ down. She and I have got to ride the Ferris wheel together. It’s been our tradition since we was six years old. I was scared to death to ride it, but I wanted to so bad she rode with me. Helped me out—I couldn’t be afraid in front of a girl.”

Kate followed him to the funnel cake wagon, where he marched right up to the window, laid his money on the shelf, and said, “Give me the biggest that you got. Me and that good-lookin’ blonde are goin’ to share it.”

The smell of the hot grease and sweet frying bread brought back a memory that she hadn’t thought of in years. Her father had taken her to a medieval fair somewhere close to Dallas, and they’d eaten funnel cakes. It had been a fun day, and she’d fallen asleep on the way home that evening. When she awoke the next morning, her fingers were still sticky. She’d licked the sweet sugar from them and hoped that they could go to the fair again that day. Her mother and father had both gone to work before she went down to the kitchen for breakfast and the nanny fussed about her sleeping in dirty clothing. The memory put a smile on her face and filled her with happiness.

Victor carried the paper plate carefully to the table where Kate had sat down. He placed the plate in the middle of the small table and pulled out a chair across from her.

“You can have the first bite,” he said.

Kate quickly pinched off a bite, popped it into her mouth, and then pulled a couple of napkins from the metal holder in the middle of the table. “You were going to tell me about Bootleg?”

“The lake came about in 1924, back before I was even born. Until then it was just a part of the Wichita River. Down in this area, it was far enough from prying eyes that folks who had a notion to make moonshine could use the banks of the river to do so. Didn’t want to put a still too close to the house. If you got caught, you could lose your property.” Victor told the story between bites.

When they finished the last strip of cake, he pulled a roll of bills from his shirt pocket and peeled off a five. “Go get us another one, but don’t tell Hattie. She’s going to want to share one with me later, and I sure don’t want her to know that I’ve already had two.”

Kate didn’t have to stand in line, so she was only gone a few minutes. “Tell me more about Bootleg and how it got its name.”

Victor pulled off a chunk of cake. “My grandpa was one of those bootleggers. Times got tough those days, and he found a spot on the river and started up a business. It’s what saved our home place here in Bootleg.”