A small town in the American South. Cotton factory, workers houses, peach trees, a church with two stained glass windows and a main street a hundred yards away.

If you walk along the main street on an August afternoon, then little will please the eye in this kingdom of boredom and deserts. In the very center of the city is a large house, which seems to be about to collapse under the onslaught of time. All the windows in it are boarded up, except for one, on the second floor, and only occasionally the shutters open and a strange face peers out.

Once upon a time there was a store in this house, and Miss Amelia Evans, a large, masculine person who showed violent business activity, owned it. In addition to the store, she had a small distillery in the swamps outside the city, and her alcohol was especially popular with the townspeople. Miss Amelia Evans knew how much in this life, and only with people did she feel not quite sure if they were not partners in her financial and trading operations.

In the year when she was thirty years old, an event happened that dramatically changed the course of urban everyday life and the fate of Amelia herself. Once at her store appeared a hunchback dwarf with a suitcase tied with a rope. He said he wants to see Miss Amelia Evans, of whom she allegedly is a relative. Having received a very cold welcome from the hostess, the hunchback sat down on the steps and wept bitterly. Confused by this turn of events, Miss Amelia invited him into the house and treated him to dinner.

The next day, Amelia, as usual, went about her business, but the hunchback as if through the ground failed. Rumors spread around the city. Some did not doubt that she got rid of a relative in some terrible way. The townspeople speculated for two days, and finally, at eight in the evening, the most curious appeared in front of the store. To their surprise, they saw the hunchback safe and sound, in a good mood. He entered into a friendly conversation with the locals. Then Amelia appeared. She looked unusual. On her face is a mixture of embarrassment, joy and suffering - this is how lovers usually look.

On Saturdays, Amelia successfully traded in liquor. She did not change her rule now, but if earlier the trade was exclusively takeaway, then that evening she offered customers not only bottles, but also glasses.

So the first zucchini in the town opened, and from now on every night local residents gathered at Miss Amelia’s store and whiled away time with a glass of whiskey and a friendly conversation.

Four years have passed. The hunchback Laimon Willis — or, as Amelia called him, Brother Laimon — remained in her house. Zucchini was profitable, and the hostess served not only alcohol, but also food. Brother Laimon participated in all of Amelia’s endeavors, and sometimes she started her Ford and drove him to a neighboring city to watch a movie, or at a fair, or at cockfights. Brother Aimon was very afraid of death, in the evenings he felt especially uneasy, and Miss Amelia did her best to distract him from bad thoughts. That's why, in fact, this squash appeared, which greatly brightened the life of the adult population.

The townspeople were sure that Amelia fell in love with the dwarf. This was all the more surprising because the previous experience of Amelia's married life was unsuccessful: her marriage lasted only ten days.

She was only nineteen then, and she had recently buried her father. Marvin Macy was considered the most handsome young man in the area, many women dreamed of hugging him, and he drove some of the young and innocent girls to sin. In addition, his temper was cool, and, according to rumors, he carried in his pocket the dried ear of a man who had once been stabbed with a razor in a fight.

Marvin Macy earned his living by setting up looms, he had money, and in the awkward, shy, closed Amelia, he was not interested in her real estate, but herself.

He proposed to her, and she agreed. Someone claimed that she wanted to get more wedding gifts, someone said that a malicious aunt had just finished on her, but somehow the wedding took place.

True, when the priest announced the young husband and wife, Amelia quickly left the church, and the newly-made husband trotted after her. Marriage night, according to the curious, ended in embarrassment. The young ones, as expected, went up to the bedroom, but an hour later Amelia roared down with a roar, slammed the kitchen door and drove her foot in her hearts. She spent the rest of the night in the kitchen, reading The Farmer's Almanac, drinking coffee and smoking her father’s pipe.

The next day, Marvin Macy drove to a nearby town and returned with presents. The young wife ate chocolate, and put everything else up for sale. Then Marvin Macy brought a lawyer and drew up a paper according to which all his property and money were transferred to its use. Amelia carefully read the document, hid it on the table, but did not relent, and all Macy's attempts to use her conjugal rights led to the fact that she generally forbade him from approaching herself, rewarding him with cuffs.

Ten days later, Marvin Macy could not stand it and left the house of the cruel wife, leaving a letter goodbye, where declarations of love were accompanied by a promise to get even with her for everything. Then he began to rob gas stations, got caught, was convicted and received a sentence. He reappeared in the city six years after the zucchini opened there.

Marvin Macy made an indelible impression on Brother Lymon, and the hunchback began to follow on his heels. He came early in the morning to Macy's house and waited for him to wake up. They appeared together in a zucchini, and Laimon treated him to drink at the expense of the establishment, Amelia resignedly took down this whim of Brother Laimon, although such humility was not easy for her. One day the hunchback announced that Marvin Macy would live in their house. Amelia demolished this, fearing that she would lose Brother Lymon if she put her ex-husband out of the door.

However, it was clear to everyone that the matter was moving towards a denouement, and every evening the zucchini was filled with an increasing number of local residents who were not going to miss such a sight. It became known that Amelia is training with something like a punching bag, and many were inclined to believe that if it comes to hand-to-hand combat, then Marvin Macy will not be knocked down.

Finally, on a February evening, the fight took place. A long exchange of blows did not give an advantage to either side. Then boxing went into the fight. Soon, the position of Marvin Macy became almost hopeless - he was on his back, and Amelia's hands were already closed on his throat. But then Brother Laimon, watching the duel from the table on which he stood, made a fantastic leap and fell upon Amelia from the back ...

Marvin Macy got the better. His ex-wife somehow got up and retired to her office, where she spent time until the morning. In the morning, it turned out that Marvin Macy and Brother Lymon had left the city. But during the night they made a uniform rout in Amelia’s house, and then destroyed her distillery.

Amelia closed the store and went out onto the porch every evening and sat looking at the road. But Brother Limon never showed up. In the fourth year, she ordered the carpenter to hammer all the windows of the house and since then she has not appeared in public.