Joan Hess - Arly Hanks 13 (2 page)

"I feel so gosh darn stupid."

"You shouldn't," I said as I helped her to her feet.

"Sure, and Mrs. Jim Bob is gonna admit that she played fast and loose with the ballots for the last election at the Missionary Society. I heard tell Joyce Lambertino had quite a following, due in part to her tasty green tomato relish. She must have given me three quarts, and I ain't even a member." She forced a smile. "Guess I forgot to remind her of that."

"You need a bath and an aspirin." I regarded the damage, sighed, and added, "Don't worry. I'll track down a plumber and an electrician."

"And just what am I supposed to do in the meantime, missy? Do you think running a bar and grill is a pastime for when I get tired of trading stocks on the Internet and burying my profits in mayonnaise jars out in the pasture?"

I gave her a nudge. "Go on, Ruby Bee. I'll come by later."

She took a last look at the damage and went out the back door. I returned to the barroom, switched off all the pink and red neon beer signs, put the money from the cash register in the drawer beneath it, and locked the door on my way out.

"I can't imagine where the blasted fire department is," Estelle said, fuming as much as the fire extinguisher had. "Here Ruby Bee's being burnt to a cinder, and those ol' boys are sitting in a cafe somewheres, eating pie and flirting with the waitresses." Her voice rose several octaves. "There ought to be a law!"

I caught her shoulder and restrained her. "The fire is out and Ruby Bee's gone to her unit to lie down. She's not in the mood for company just now, but you can drop by in an hour. A bottle of sherry might be welcome." I handed her the one I'd filched from behind the bar.

"You sure? What if -- "

"Real sure. I was in there, and the fire's out. It's hard to assess the extent of the damage to the kitchen, but Ruby Bee's unharmed. It's over."

"I tried to make her let me help her, but she wouldn't let me stay. You know I would have done whatever it took. I was filling pitchers with water when she shrieked at me to call the fire department and get everybody out of the barroom. That ain't to say anyone lingered to help."

"It's okay," I repeated.

"So how bad is it?"

"She'll be out of business for at least two weeks."

Estelle gnawed on her lip for a moment. "This is so awful, Arly. She's been real short of cash since she paid taxes, and everybody knows those insurance folks can be tighter'n bark on a tree. When my pipes burst a while back, you'd have thought it was my fault from the way they sniffed around and asked downright insultin' questions." She paused to make sure her towering beehive of red hair was firmly pinned; I saw no reason to point out that one of her false eyelashes was clinging to her chin like a suicidal spider. "I had to explain on more occasions than I care to remember that I wasn't in control of the temperature that particular night. When my power went out and -- "

"We'll deal with it," I said. "Please wait until the volunteer fire department comes, and then send them away. My skin is crawling from the extinguisher residue. I'd really like to take a shower and change clothes."

I offered a few more words of reassurance, elicited her promise to wait in the parking lot, and headed for my socalled efficiency apartment above Roy Stiver's antiques store. Housing's limited in Maggody, and my only other option had been one of the units in the Flamingo Motel. Ruby Bee manages to look the other way, but everybody knows that the majority of customers would rent rooms by the hour if they could. Parchment-thin walls and squeaky beds might have left me counting things other than sheep.

I'd almost made it across the road when a muck-splattered pickup truck cut me off. It was, I regret to say, operated by our local moonshiner and purveyor of fetid stenches, Raz Buchanon. His beard was encrusted with the usual accumulation of crumbs and speckles of chewing tobacco, and his teeth were awaiting their semiannual encounter with a toothbrush. If that.

"Howdy, Arly," he said. "Ruby Bee okay?"

"She's fine, and thanks for asking, Raz. I'm on my way to clean up, so if you -- "

"I could see the smoke all the way from my back porch. I dint know what to make of it at first. Marjorie got to frettin' sumpthin' fierce, so I thought I'd better come see fer myself. Idalupino dun told me what happened."

"An accident," I said with a cursory grimace. "Now I'd like to -- "

"Got sumpthin' to ask you, Arly."

"Later, Raz."

He loosed a stream of tobacco juice that splattered on the pavement only a few inches from my foot, knowing damn well that I'd freeze. Seemingly oblivious to my scowl, he said, "A while back Marjorie and me was watchin' this show on the Discovery Channel about how racehorses have what they call companion animals to calm their jitters. They said how these horses are thoroughbreds, but so's Marjorie, ye know. Not ever' sow has a pedigree."

"And a very fine sow she is," I said evenly. "Enter her in the Kentucky Derby next month. Ruby Bee will undoubtedly offer a special on mint juleps, and Mayor Jim Bob can make book in the corner booth. Now, if you so much as look as though you're thinking about spitting on me, I will find a fire extinguisher and shove the nozzle where the sun don't shine. Do you understand?"

"You got no call to say that, Arly," he whined. "I was jest asking for your advice. You're the chief of police, ain't ye?"

"Thirty seconds, starting now."

"So like I said, Marjorie and me watched this show and she took to mopin' around the house, wishin' she had a companion animal like those fancy horses. I could tell right off what was ailing her, so I went into Farberville and bought her a gerbil. You know about gerbils, Arly? They look like -- "

"I know what gerbils look like."

"Well," he said, puffing up his cheek and then wincing when I glowered, "ye might say it dint work out."

"Why not?"

His squinty eyes shifted away from me. "There ain't no reason to go into that. Lately I've been thinkin' about gittin' Marjorie a mule. Perkins owns one that ain't no good for much of anything, but he sez if I so much as drive onto his place, he'll greet me on his porch with a shotgun." He glanced at me, then spat on the floorboard of his truck. "Perkins got hisself a real bad attitude."

Sweat was beginning to dribble down my face, and I suspected it resembled tar. Every inch of my body itched so intensely that I wanted to rip off my clothes and attack myself with a toilet bowl brush.

"Raz," I said, "this is a terrible dilemma. If you'll tell me where your still is, I will personally intervene with Perkins so that Marjorie can have her very own pet mule."

"I ain't got a still, and there's no way of knowin' if Marjorie'll fancy Perkins's mule. They might not be compatible."

"You most certainly do have a still, you devious sumbitch, and one of these days I'll put you not only out of business, but also behind bars at the state pen. When that happens, Marjorie will find herself with a butcher for a companion -- but not for long."

Raz gave me a deeply insulted look, slammed his truck into gear, and took off with a squeal of rubber that almost, but not quite, roused the nappers out in front of the barber shop. Dahlia waved a fist at him and mouthed what most likely were not endearments. Two boys on bicycles went down in the gravel in front of the defunct New Age hardware store, but they undoubtedly were already dotted with scabs and scratches. Growing up in Maggody will do that.

I hurried up the rickety wooden staircase on the side of the antiques store and into my apartment. The cockroaches skedaddled, the hot water heater obliged, and half an hour later, I was feeling much better. I left my hair down until it dried and I could pin it back up into a schoolmarmish bun intended to discourage unwanted attention from good ol' boys named Bubba, Bo, and Jellybelly.

I'd just started a fresh pot of coffee when Duluth Buchanon came into the PD. He was short, thick-necked, and cursed with the infamous Buchanon yellow eyes and simian brow. We'd had a couple of encounters, once when he'd driven his truck off the low-water bridge and I'd been obliged to transport him to the county drunk tank, and another occasion at the supermarket when he'd tried to shoplift a canned ham by stuffing it down his trousers, but he did better than most of his kinfolk. Some members of the clan, including the aforementioned Raz and Mayor Jim Bob, can stare down bobcats and rattlesnakes. Others, such as Dahlia's husband, lose the contest to bullfrogs, chipmunks, and broken glass glinting in the weeds. Buchanons run the gamut -- if and when they can find it.

"Coffee?" I asked Duluth.

"Reckon so," he said as he dropped into the chair across from my desk. "Ruby Bee all right?"

"She put out the fire in the kitchen, but not before a lot of damage was done. It's a real mess."

"You want I should go by and take a look at it? I can clean up, scrub the walls and ceiling, paint, replace cabinet doors, that kind of thing. I got no control over the cost of materials, but I'll give her a discount on labor."

I brought him a mug of coffee. "That'd be great, Duluth, and I know Ruby Bee will appreciate it. I was told you were upset earlier. Is there something you want to talk about?"

He took a thoughtful slurp. "Well, I suppose there is. My ex-wife, Norella, done run off."

"Norella's not from Maggody, is she?"

"Her family's mostly over in Splaid County. Her pa owned a feed store till he died of some sort of disease of a personal nature. Her and me was living at the Pot O' Gold in a real fine double-wide. Dishwasher, garbage-disposal, miniblinds, shag carpeting, everything I could give her. We had three boys in five years. I was still hoping for a little girl, but Norella went and had some operation after Jakob was born. I wasn't happy, but I sure as hell didn't make an effort to talk her out of it. When I came home from work, the trailer was always stinking of dirty diapers and vomit."

I tried to dredge up gossip that had been of minimal interest. "But you got divorced last year?"

"More like two years ago, come August. In the settlement, she was ordered to let me have the boys every other weekend and half the summer. Last fall she took to keeping them from me, saying they had doctor appointments or sleepovers with their cousins. I finally had to call my lawyer and have him file contempt charges. She countered with charges that I'd been hitting her and got a restraining order." He paused to swallow, and his eyes filled with tears from either the injustice of the accusation or the aftertaste of what I passed off as coffee. "I never laid a hand on her, Arly, not even when I found out she was sneaking around with her sister's husband. I just moved out and filed for divorce."

"This should be resolved in court."

"It would have been if she hadn't disappeared with my boys. Is there anything you can do?"

I opened a notebook and made a few notes. "Any idea what might have caused her to disappear like this?"

"Josie and me got married at Christmas. A month later, someone threw a rock through the living-room window. Two weeks back I found a pile of manure on the front porch. Right after that is when I learned she'd packed up everything and run off."

"Did you ask her family if anyone knows where they might be?"

He shook his head. "Her mother's called everybody she can think of, on account of she's as worried as I am about the boys. If you want to talk to her, she'll tell you same as I did, that I ain't ever done anything bad to Norella. I paid child support on the first of every month like the judge ordered, even when she wouldn't let me see the boys. I might not have been the best husband, but ain't nobody can accuse me of being a bad father."

"I understand, Duluth," I said, "but this is a family court matter. Norella has custody. She may have violated the visitation decree, but technically she hasn't kidnapped the boys."

"I suppose not," he said as he stood up and put the mug on the corner of my desk. "Thanks for hearing me out. Soon as I finish waiting around to talk to my lawyer in Farberville and trying to track down Norella, I'll go by Ruby Bee's and see what all I can do. I'm liable to be tied up for the time being, so you might ought to find somebody else."

I sprinted to the door. "Okay, Duluth, let me see what I can find out. Here's the key to the bar and grill. Assess the damage and get back to me."

"Norella's ma said she didn't think Norella had more than twenty or thirty dollars. None of the rest of the family's seen hide nor hair of her. I called the battered women's shelter in Farberville, but they were real tight-lipped. You might start there."

"I'll do my best," I vowed sincerely, "and talk to you later this afternoon."

His eyes may have been yellowish, but they were also shrewd as he nodded and left.

I was thumbing through the directory for the number of the shelter when yet another Buchanon intruded, confirming my view that there are entirely too many Buchanons in Stump County -- or anywhere else on the planet.

"Arly," said Mrs. Jim Bob (aka Barbara Ann Buchanon Buchanon) as she came inside and sat down, making certain to smooth down her skirt and cross her ankles. Her white blouse was so brittle with starch that it crinkled like aluminum foil when she moved.

I propped my feet on the corner of my desk. "That's my name. Need my rank and serial number?"