“OK – I need someone to tell me who I need to call because this isn't working for me and I demand satisfaction! I demand satisfaction!”
Capt. R.E. Ludlow sighed while Mrs. Thalia Ludlow cracked up.
“It's your turn to go get Grandee Leedlow,” she said to him, and he shook his head as he turned himself toward the Lee house.
“I mean, we understood Hilda 'Grandee' Lee – when you brought her some foolishness you might well fear for your life, but as an eight-year-old? I'm going to need you to order some chill pills, Thalia – not for Edwina, because there is no chilling out a great-grandchild of Hilda Lee who is, in essence, the heir of Hilda Lee – but for me.”
Mrs. Ludlow was thus left laughing while Capt. Ludlow headed for the Lee back porch to find out that eight-year-old Gracie Trent was already on the job with eight-year-old Edwina Ludlow.
“No, you really don't want to do that,” Gracie was saying, “because I have a Stepforth cousin that runs one of those stores, and you don't want those mannequins to give you bad ideas about feminine style.”
“And why not – why do you think I had my grandparents order me all this stuff for if I didn't want to look like the picture!”
Capt. Ludlow put his head in his hands, and then had to go laughing into tactical retreat for a few moments as Col. H.F. Lee, the also-observing great-nephew to that same Hilda Lee, said, “It is always a cold day when you find out what your kids really think you exist for, especially if that child is Grandee Leedlow.”
Meanwhile, Gracie kept going.
“So, I know someone who puts together store displays and stuff,” she said, “and, first of all, you wouldn't look good as pale as a mannequin.”
“Well, yeah, there is that,” Edwina said. “They don't look like they get enough to eat, either.”
“And the way people cook around here, that would be a shame,” Gracie said. “But that's not the main bad part. If you were a mannequin, you would also get cold – people cut the clothes in different places to get stuff to hang right.”
“Wait, what – destroying whole fashion sets?” Edwina said.
“And that's the other thing,” Gracie said. “The thread count of what's on the mannequin and what goes on you doesn't even match half the time.”
“So, it's an even bigger scam then I thought – I need some politicians' numbers because there oughta be a law and I'mma make that happen!” Edwina said.
“But you really don't have to do all that,” Gracie said. “Just wear the real clothes, be the real you, and stay cute.”
“Well, yeah, I could do that, though,” Edwina said. “I'm not saying I'm not going to eventually go find some people, but it's a really nice day to look cute on.”
“Ain't it the truth, Eddie, ain't it the truth.”
Capt. Ludlow had just walked back when his cousin sent him off in defeat again, laughing even harder this time.
“The story is told on the bluest of ridges that Mahogany Mae Jubilee by her wisdom saved many a life … and we see through Gracie Jubilee Trent, interceding with Grandee Leedlow, that the legend continues...”