Almost Heaven (29 page)

“I appreciate it,” I said. “If you don't mind, I'm going to the gas station down the road and get a PowerBar.”

“See you in a few.”

He patted the front of the truck like you would the head of a dog you wanted to catch a rabbit. When he disappeared inside, I drove to the gas station. I needed to get a read on my levels so I could dose, but at least I wouldn't be going low soon. When I got back to the Dew Drop, the gray-haired man was sitting on the step outside. He came to my open window and ran his tongue around his bottom teeth.

“I might have something for you. It wasn't easy, but I got Larry to tell me he saw your friend last Saturday. Said they got a bite to eat and talked. It was all innocent.”

“Uh-huh. And did Callie know he was married?”

“We didn't get into that. But he did say toward the end of the talk, after they'd had a little to drink, they met up with another friend of his, and when Larry took off, those two were still together.”

I grabbed a yellow pad of paper I keep on the dashboard. That Callie would be drinking at all alarmed me, but I wasn't in judgment-passing mode. I wanted information.

“His name is Clay Gilmore.” He gave me the man's number. “Larry wants you to make sure you don't mention him when you talk with him. He doesn't want any of this coming back on him.”

I put the pad back on the seat and turned to him. “Scripture says the deeds done in darkness will one day come into the light.”

“Does it now? You sound like my wife.”

“I don't mean to. I appreciate what you did. I don't know what I'd have done if you hadn't helped.”

“You'd have made it, Billy.”

I started the truck and it fired up like an old friend. “My guess is your wife at home is praying for you.”

“I expect you're right about that.”

“Tell her I said hello. And tell her I'll be praying for you too.”

I put the truck in reverse, and he turned and stepped toward me. “One more thing I didn't mention. Larry said this Clay fellow ain't right in the head. And he carries a gun. You be careful, Billy.”

22

I went home and switched the reels, then checked my levels, which were above 400—not good. I gave myself a correction shot, wondering if what people said about the pump being so much easier was true. I barely had enough money for insulin and I reused my needles.

I got on the computer and did a reverse lookup on the phone number the man had given. MapQuest showed me the way, and it looked like Clay lived in a remote area of Dogwood County. I called the number but there was no answer.

It was dark when my headlights hit Clay's muddy driveway, and I drove all the way up to the Massey Ferguson tractor that had been parked there for a while. Weeds grew all around it. The house was dark and there was no outside light, so I kept my truck running and the lights trained on the front yard. Calling it a yard was being kind.

I made it as far as the tractor before an old hound came running out from under the wooden stairs, barking and growling. The hair on the back of his neck stood straight, and he sniffed at me like he was sizing up a T-bone steak. I held out a hand and knelt down. He darted away. Pretty soon he came around, sniffing at me and finally licking at the back of my hand. When I stood up, he growled again, and it was a good five minutes before I could get him to trust me enough to let me get to the front door.

I knocked hard but nobody answered. That sent the dog to barking again. I went around the back and found some farm equipment the hard way. I cupped my hand against the window. There was a little night-light on near an old telephone and papers on a desk, but no one moved inside.

I tried the door but it was locked. Same for the front door.

“Callie? Are you in there? It's Billy.”

Nothing but crickets and a panting dog behind me.

I thought about kicking the door in, but then I had another idea. I backed up and drove down to the road and went around the bend, then turned my lights off and parked where I could see the house. If there was anybody in there, a light would come on soon. I turned on the radio low, but I couldn't get my station out here.

Sitting there in the dark at the side of the road, I let my mind wander. I kept my eye on the house, waiting for any light to come on, surfing through the dwindling channels on the FM side and listening to the raised ionosphere do its number on the AM band, pulling in stations from Chicago and all over. But what was going through my head was that this whole endeavor had been a failure. I don't mind telling you that I believed the station would be a lot bigger deal than it has become. The fact is, it speaks to me every day. There is something in the music or the teaching that reaches down somewhere and makes my soul sit up and beg for more. But I guess not everybody is the same as me. Sure, I've had some people say that the radio station was important and helped them, but most people had only heard of it or maybe tried it once, and outside of the hollow, like here, you can't even hear it.

Sometimes God has his hand on people in spite of their trials. He walks with them through the fire and they know they are on the right path. At other times, God gives people over to their own desires, and the problems and difficulties they find are of their own accord.

But then there are people like me, who think they are doing exactly what God wants them to do, and they plow through everything that is thrown at them and in the end they're nowhere closer to God than when they started.

That's what I was thinking right then, and I guess the other thing, if I was to be honest about it, was that the love of a good woman had been wasted in the process. I had just spent the past few years digging a lonely hole, and there was nothing at the end of it but four sides of dirt and a long way to climb.

You get to thinking that way and there's not a person in the world who can pull you back. You have to come to your senses yourself through the power of God. His ways are not our ways. The way he guides is not the way we would do it. Look at Job and the senseless things that happened to him. In the end, Job found out that God was the one in control, even though he'd allowed Satan to buffet his servant. And every time I think about Paul chained to a Roman soldier or two, I keep thinking he must have felt like everything he was doing was just spinning his wheels in the sand.

Once I got on that path, things made more sense. I wasn't doing something for nothing, even though at times it felt like it. In the middle of all life had thrown at me, God seemed to be doing something good with my heart. Why was I out here in the middle of nowhere looking for somebody who was just a friend? Was God trying to tell me that Callie meant a lot more to me than I was willing to let on?

I was about to get out of the truck and walk around the perimeter of the house again when two headlights shone behind me, coming around the bend. The car slowed when it got to me. I rolled down the window and could see by his dashboard light that it was an older man, unshaven, a bulge in his jaw.

“Can I help you?” he said with a West Virginia drawl that would have curled a northerner's hair.

“Just looking for Clay Gilmore. He lives here, right?”

The man spat moon-glistened brown juice onto the road. “Been right up there since the day he was born. Crazy Clay.”

“Why do you call him that?” I said.

“Not just me; everybody does. You know him?”

“Not really.”

“Figures. If you knew him, you wouldn't be sitting down here next to his driveway. Boy ain't right in the head, if you know what I mean. Comes and goes at all hours. We usually just stay out of his way when we see him coming.”

“He have family around here?”

He spat again. “Not a one. His mama and daddy died in that house and he buried them in the backyard the next day. Nobody found out about it for a few months when we didn't see them sitting in their lawn chairs.”

I opened my door and stood in the road. “I'm looking for a friend of mine. A woman friend. You haven't seen Clay with a lady, have you?”

He laughed and it rattled around in his throat. “Last time I saw a woman go near Clay's house was when a female police officer came out here to investigate some missing person report. One of his dogs pert nigh took one of her legs off.”

Something inside didn't feel right and I got the worst feeling about Callie. “I don't see his truck up there. You have any idea if he's here?”

“If his truck ain't there, he's not there.”

“Know where he could be?”

The man shook his head. “Your guess is as good as mine. I hear he spends a lot of time down at the Dew Drop. If it was in the fall, I'd say he was at the hunting cabin he has in Kentucky.”

“He has a hunting cabin?”

“Yeah, as if he needed it. We got enough deer and squirrels around here to keep the freezer stocked. That's if you're a good-enough shot. I hear the cabin isn't much, but it's remote.”

“You ever been there?”

He blew air through his lips. “Right. He'd never let anybody get near that place, I don't think. Maybe some of the fellows he goes hunting with.”

“Like who?”

He spat again and rubbed his chin with a hand. “There's an old boy up the hollow who may have been there. Oakley Chambers. He went to school with Clay. Until eighth grade, when he dropped out. He might know something if anybody does.”

He gave me the backwoods directions, including a tree I would notice and the driveway that had a gate at the end of it. I thanked the man and he drove away. Before I left, I thought about getting into Clay's house and making sure Callie wasn't there, but from what I could see, nothing had stirred inside since I'd been sitting there.

* * *

The glow of a television lit the inside of Oakley Chambers's house. He was watching something on ESPN and carried a Coors Light can with him when he came to the door. I mentioned the fellow's name who gave me his address and that I was trying to locate Clay Gilmore.

He tossed the can past me into the yard. “What for? You trying to dig yourself an early grave?”

“Not at all. I'm trying to find a friend of mine. Somebody said Clay might know where she is.”

“She?” he said.

“Yeah, our mail lady, Callie Reynolds. She lives over in Dogwood.”

He pursed his lips. “Can't help you.”

“Please,” I said, putting my hand on the door as he reached to close it. “Callie means a lot to me. The old guy said Clay has a cabin in Kentucky. Can you tell me where it is? give me a phone number?”

“That place doesn't even have electricity. No phone. And even if you could find it, your friend's not going to be there.”

“How do you know that?”

He rolled his eyes. “Because Clay don't take chances like that.”

“What do you mean?”

“Just what I said.” He leveled his gaze at me. “You got a death wish?”

“No, I'm just desperate. Can you tell me how to get there?”

He shook his head and I reached in my back pocket. The man ducked behind the door and I put up my hand to show him I didn't mean any harm.

“I don't have a whole lot of cash, but I could write you a check. I'm willing to pay for directions.”

“Right. And they find your body and trace you back to me.”

“Please,” I said. “I have a bad feeling about this, and any help you could give would be appreciated.”

He went back inside and the kitchen light came on. Someone said something to him as he rummaged through a drawer. “Some crazy guy wanting to know how to get to Clay's cabin.”

Finally he came back with a yellow legal pad and turned on the porch light. He stood in his bare feet and drew a line representing I-64. He gave a primer on how many miles it was across the state line, which exit it was, and then which road to take. “It's been a while since I've been back there. I doubt you're going to find it, even with this.”

I thanked him and stuffed the page in my pocket.

“Don't say I didn't warn you,” he said. “If you don't take something to defend yourself with, you're a fool.”

“All right,” I said.

I went back to the house and changed the reels so I'd have at least four hours before the station went off the air. My body was feeling the effects of going low and I was exhausted, but I felt adrenaline kick in. I contemplated calling Sheriff Preston, but in the end I figured it best to keep pushing. Plus, he probably would tell me to just leave it to him and I wasn't about to do that. I made sure I had enough food to get me up if I went low, and I took off.

A light rain had begun as I started out. Following the directions carefully, I exited I-64 and twisted and turned until I came to a dirt road, then what looked like a logging road or something gas drillers had constructed to get in and out of the Kentucky hollow. Several times I came to an impasse, or it looked like the road had ended, and it made me think I was on a wild goose chase and I would get stuck. Believe me, there wasn't a tow truck on the face of the planet that could find me back in those woods. But there was something urging me onward that to this day I can't explain. It was all so fragile now that I think about it. I could have just stopped because I was tired or because it wasn't worth the effort, since I didn't know what was at the end of that path. But that unseen force kept me going, along with the fact that the two tire tracks I was following led farther back into the woods and seemed fresh. I used them to stay out of the muddy places.