or accept that those killers had done what wild animals, the Alaskan wilderness, and a cheating husband hadn’t been able to do—and that was beat her.
But right now, getting those homes fixed before Christmas was her goal, and she was pushing hard for it to happen.
Cathy called R.L Meiner every other day, asking for a decision but with no response. And then Mavis Webb finally ran her story about the absentee landlord in New York, and Cathy Terry, the Christmas Angel of Blessings. She ran pictures of the families and of the living conditions with the story, calling R.L. Meiner a hard-hearted slumlord, and again the AP picked up on another scandal and ran with it.
* * *
Cathy’s philanthropy had not gone unnoticed by the people in Blessings. When they first found out what she was doing, they reacted with a sense of guilt, acknowledging this should have been done years ago, and then with a sense of purpose that it was never too late to right a wrong.
Ruby Butterman started an angel tree in her salon and picked five families from the Bottoms for her customers to buy Christmas presents for, and when she did, Lovey Cooper put up an angel tree in Granny’s and added the names of five more family members, and so it went until every business on Main Street had every family member in the Bottoms on the trees.
One Sunday, Granny’s Country Kitchen donated the entire day’s proceeds to the families—to be divided up so that they could have their own Christmas dinners and buy presents for their own children, too. And when Broyles Dairy Freeze and the barbecue place all found out Granny’s was doing that, they did it, too. Even the owner of the Blue Ivy Bar donated the entire take from one Saturday night to the project.
And in the midst of this, Cathy Terry finally got her call from R.L Meiner.
* * *
The morning dawned raw and blustery. Cathy had paint samples and tile samples spread out all over her kitchen table when her cell phone rang. Duke was coming into town, and thinking it was likely from him, she didn’t even look at caller ID.
“Hello.”
“May I speak to Cathy Terry?”
It wasn’t Duke.
“This is Cathy.”
“Miss Terry, this is Michael Meiner. I understand you have been trying to reach my father, R.L. Meiner.”
“Yes, about purchasing some property he owns in Blessings, Georgia.”
“We read the story. I must say it gave our whole family a bad name,” he said.
“Well, your father has given his tenants many years of a living hell.”
“My father has been in a nursing home for the past seven years. He has Alzheimer’s.”
“I’m sorry to hear this, but surely someone has been taking care of his business?”
“My brother and I, but we were unaware of any of this. We don’t know how he even came to own property in Georgia, and the messages you’ve been leaving weren’t taken seriously. We thought it was some kind of scam, because we were unaware that the property was even in the family. It wasn’t until the story ran that we realized the calls were valid.”
“Okay, so now you know,” Cathy said. “What are you going to do about it?”
“We have no interest in being long-distance landlords like this. And we had our lawyer check the property taxes and assess the value of the land, because it’s obvious from the story that the houses are of no value.”
“They are to the people living in them,” Cathy snapped.
“Yes, yes, I’m sorry. That didn’t come out right. What I meant was that there was no way to put a fair price on their value that would increase our asking price, and the rent doesn’t even cover the property taxes that have been coming out of our father’s accounts.”
“Well, in the eyes of God, sir…your family owes the tenants a refund for paying rent all these years for something they didn’t have, which was livable housing. So there’s that.”
Cathy heard a sigh, and then a slight chuckle.
“You are a sharp businesswoman.”
“I just want to right a terrible wrong. That’s all,” Cathy said. “So before you throw out an asking price, remember this is all going to be part of a follow-up story regarding your family. So if you want to clear that good name you are worried about, don’t try to pad your pockets on the backs of poor people and my good intentions.”
Obviously, the knowledge that a second story would be forthcoming horrified him.