Joan Hess - Arly Hanks 13 (21 page)

"She was useless, when she even showed up. She'd peel one carrot, then start gabbing about some soap opera. Do I look like someone who watched soap operas? I worked in a factory, second or third shift most days. I was a lot more concerned about the deductions on my paycheck than I was about a bunch of actors and actresses with capped teeth, perfect hair, and the morals of alley cats."

"Ruth hadn't been here long, right?"

Sarah began to fill the sink with steamy water. "I don't know why she was allowed to come here in the first place. We were all told what was expected, but she carried on like she'd thought she was coming to a fancy spa. Well, my knuckles are scabbed and my ankles are so puffy they look like bread dough. The masseuse ain't called to make an appointment."

"So Deborah warned you?" I asked.

"I knew what I was getting into. Nobody pressured me." She submerged a roasting pan and began to scour it. "I've got another three weeks here, then I'll start working at the motel. I pity the next Moonbeam that has to deal with those boys and a bunch of snivelers who want peas instead of beans, molded lime salad instead of cole slaw, biscuits instead of cornbread. It wouldn't hurt them to show a little gratitude every now and then, but all they do is bitch."

Somehow, we had moved away from the topic into volatile territory. I waited a moment, then said, "Did Ruth say anything about her background?"

"She didn't have one, any more than I do. It's part of the deal."

"You gave up your past because of your religious convictions?"

"Yeah, that's right. My children are being taught the fundamentals and learning the value of physical labor. They have chores in the garden, not time to waste on television and video games. My daughter is making a scrapbook of pressed wildflowers. My son likes sketching down by the creek. They complained at first, but they've adjusted real well."

"How about Ruth's children?"

Sarah looked over her shoulder at me. "I should know? I get up at dawn, take a cold sponge bath, and walk here to start preparing the meal. I'm usually ready to go back in the middle of the afternoon. If Anthony sees me, he'll give me a ride to the top of the road, but that doesn't happen very often. When I get there, I barely have the energy to deal with my own kids, much less worry about any of the others."

"So why are you doing this?" I asked, having noted a distinct lack of spirituality in her recitation. "You said you knew what you were getting into."

"Yeah, I did."

I waited for a moment, but she seemed more interested in scrubbing cake pans than elaborating. "Where were you recruited?"

"I'm not allowed to talk about that. My children are safe for the time being, and so am I. I ain't gonna say anything else about it."

"No, of course not," I murmured. "How did you and your children get to Dunkicker?"

"In a rusty white Honda Accord with a faulty transmission and a cracked windshield. Now I think you'd better leave. If Deborah finds out I've been talking to you -- well, I need the Daughters of the Moon for my children's sake, and mine, too."

"How would Deborah know we'd been talking?"

"Just go on, please. I've got pots and pans to wash, and the oven needs cleaning. After that, I'll have to wipe down the counters, mop the floor, and put everything away so I can be ready to leave when the delivery boys get back."

I got off the stool, but paused by the door. "I have to ask this, Sarah. What about the father of your children?"

"We're divorced. He never paid child support, but always expected me to produce the children every other Friday evening so he could spend the weekend poisoning their minds. The last time he had them, my daughter came home and asked me if I was really a whore like Daddy said. Helluva guy, huh?"

"So you took your children and left?"

"I already told you that I don't want to talk to you anymore. Either grab the mop or let me work in peace."

I drove to the PD. The door was unlocked, but the adage about barn doors and horses applied. We certainly didn't want to prevent Duluth from returning, should he find the urge to spend more quality time on a urine-stained mattress no thicker than a paperback novel.

It would have been a waste of time to try to call the state medical examiner's office. At best, I would have spent thirty minutes working my way through various option menus before I was left on hold while the kudzu vines slithered over the windowsills and choked the last breath out of me. Harve was on his johnboat, swilling beer, eating his wife's chocolate cake, and defying the fish to disturb him.

I poured myself a cup of coffee, then rooted through Captain Panknine's desk until I found a candy bar. I also found some evidence that he was less than loyal to Mrs. Panknine, who was driving to Little Rock every day to sit by his bedside and relate the latest local gossip.

That, however, was none of my business. Chief Panknine's chair was not as comfortably worn as mine, but I rocked back and propped my shoes on the corner of the desk, my preferred posture for thinking.

Sarah was hardly a devout Daughter of the Moon, and I doubted Norella had been, either (if, of course, she had been there, and I still wasn't sure). Both of them had gone through hostile divorces and squabbles over visitation. Duluth had claimed to have paid child support on a regular basis, but I had only his version. Sarah had offered me an abbreviated story; it could have been tainted with the animosity that usually accompanies divorce. My own had been bitter, but in that children had not been an issue, I'd been able to walk away with my dignity and the gawdawful crystal pickle dish Estelle had given me as a wedding present.

These days it serves as a depository for change and a few keys whose purpose eludes me.

The Welcome Ya'll Café was likely to be busy in the middle of the day, so Rachael would not be available for a private conversation. If she were inclined, which she most likely would not be. Sarah had not been frightened when Deborah's name came up in our conversation, but she had been uneasy. Judith had been less than forthcoming. Deputy Robarts had barely stopped short of fidgeting.

The only person I could think of who might be able to offer information was Willetta Robarts, august matriarch of Dunkicker and its environs, which might stretch as far as Greasy Valley. I decided to try to talk to her before I returned to the Beamers' campsite. How to find her was a problem, however. I found a slim telephone directory in Chief Panknine's bottom drawer, but an address on Robarts Road was of little help, since Dunkicker, like Maggody, had yet to find funding for street signs.

I was about to dial the number when I heard scratching from the back of the building.

There are moments when you just want to cast your fate to the wind. This was not one of them.

I was unarmed. I'd been trained in one-on-one combat at the academy. Supposedly, I could take on a Ninja warrior or a psychotic twirling without a baton. If Chief Panknine had a weapon, he'd had enough sense to keep it well out of Deputy Robarts's reach. I wondered how much damage I could do with a bad attitude and half a Snickers bar.

Not much.

I cautiously opened the door that led to the cell. The scratching sound intensified, but I couldn't identify the source. If I'd been back in Maggody, I most certainly would have found my gun and put one of my last three bullets in it. As it was, I was armed with a rolled-up copy of a magazine devoted to lake trout.

"Someone there?" I called.

"I reckon you be wantin' this feller."

I realized there was a door at the end of the short hall. "What feller?"

"The one what ran away this mornin'. You want him, come and take him. I got better things to do."

I opened the door with a certain amount of trepidation. Duluth Buchanon was being held upright by a citizen who looked and smelled worse than Raz Buchanon. His beard dribbled over his gut in strings so drenched in tobacco juice that they might have turned to amber. His pale eyes were entirely too intense.

"Found him hunkered in my barn," he said. "I ain't got time for the likes of him. You don't want him, I'll cart him down to the pond and put a bullet up his nose. The catfish will dispose of him afore too long."

Duluth gave me a panicky look, but had enough sense to keep his mouth shut.

"Are you Crank Nickle?" I asked.

"I ain't the queen of England."

"No, I suppose not," I said. "I would very much like to take this trespasser off your hands. Chief Panknine will appreciate how you did your civic duty."

"Dumbshit scared my cow."

"Perhaps you might enjoy participating in a firing squad later this afternoon," I said as I yanked Duluth inside. "Say about four?"

"And miss the last round of the PGA finals? You jest tell Chief Panknine to keep his prisoners outta my barn." He stomped off before I could respond, assuming I could have.

I took Duluth to the front room, sat him down, and poured him a cup of coffee. He looked like hell, which was to be expected, considering the depth of his hangover. I gave him a moment, then said, "Well?"

"Well -- what?" he growled.

"I'm hoping you have some innocuous reason for being in Dunkicker. Your great-aunt lives here, for instance, and needed you to plant pole beans and cucumbers. There's an orphanage somewhere down the road that has a leaky roof. You were ready to repaint Ruby Bee's kitchen, but you were torn between oyster shell and ivory. You tell me, Duluth."

"Norella."

"What about her?"

"Her mother finally got around to mentioning that she'd called a few days back. Said her and the boys was staying at an old church camp, and that she'd be moving on shortly. When folks in Maggody started buzzing about how the teenagers were going to a church camp, I figured it might be the one where Norella had taken the boys. Like I told you, she didn't have much cash, and her car leaks oil bad."

"So you followed the bus?"

"Right till it turned down the road. I decided I'd better wait till it was dark, so I parked my truck behind that old coot's barn. I'd brought a cooler with a couple or three sixpacks, and after I finished those, I remembered I had a bottle of whiskey under the seat."

"And finished that, too, I assume. What were you doing staggering alongside the highway -- looking for a liquor store?"

Duluth gave me a watery look that came from either embarrassment or a doozy of a headache. "I was real nervous about seeing Norella. More likely than not, she'd start screaming at me and trying to claw my face. One time she bit me on the ear so hard you can see the scar to this day. Look right here." He pulled his ear forward and waited until I produced a properly horrified frown. "I was gonna press charges for assault, but then I realized if she was locked up, her family might not be willin' to take care of the boys while I was working."

"Probably not," I said. "Then you never went down the road to the campgrounds?"

"Hell, no, I dun told you what I did. You seen Norella and the boys hanging out down there?"

I shook my head. "How do you think she came to find out about Camp Pearly Gates? Did she go there as a kid?"

"I about had to hogtie her to get her to church on Sundays. She always said everybody was real snooty, looking down their noses at her like they thought she bought her dresses at yard sales. Soon as we got home, she'd send the boys to their room and cuss up a storm. I got to where I dreaded Sunday mornings, knowing what I was in for the rest of the day. I'd just keep turnin' up the volume on the football game, but she didn't care even when the Cowboys was playin' Tampa Bay."

"Must have been tough, Duluth," I said, wondering what his sons had thought during the weekly ordeals. "One more question: How'd you get out of the cell?"

He rubbed his temples so hard I was afraid his head might shatter. "It don't make any sense, but I'll tell you. After Brother Verber left, I took a piss, then crawled back on the bunk. I must have dozed off, 'cause the next thing I saw was this ... uh, this ... "

"Alien?"

"Yeah, this alien unlocking the cell door. I pulled the blanket over my head, and when I finally got up the guts to look, it was gone. Putting up with Brother Verber's one thing, but I wasn't about to find myself being the subject of unnatural medical examinations in a flying saucer. I beat it back to my truck, but the damn thing wouldn't start. I decided to stay in the barn till it got dark, then find a pay phone and call my cousin Leroy to come get me."

"But Crank Nickle found you first."

"Reckon so. Any chance I can call Leroy from here? I'll leave fifty bucks to pay the fine. I mean, all I did was get drunk. That ain't much of a crime these days."

"No, I guess it's not," I said, "but you'll have to remain in custody for the time being."

"On account of being drunk?"

"It's a little bit more complicated than that." I gave him what remained of the candy bar and locked him in the cell. He didn't much like it, naturally, but I assured him that the aliens were on their way back to Alpha Centauri and I'd find him something more substantial to eat.

One of the Beamers had unlocked the cell door, for some reason. Willetta Robarts would have to wait until I could try to talk to them.

Or so I thought.

12

"Please, my dear, tell me what's going on," said Willetta Robarts as she came into the PD. She was dressed in a gray silk dress and the sort of hat more often seen at Ascot than at rural Baptist outposts. "I was chatting with Sister Silvester when I saw you drive behind the church. Everyone here in Dunkicker is aware of the crime, but no one knows what to think. Sister Silvester was literally dribbling with distress, but she hasn't quite been the same since her boy joined up with those heathens in Greasy Valley. You must tell me if you've made any progress."

"Not much," I said. "Would you like a cup of coffee?"

"I have a better idea. Why don't you come to my house for a nice Sunday dinner? Colleen is making fried chicken, mashed potatoes, creamed peas with onions, biscuits, and rhubarb pie for dessert. You do like rhubarb pie, don't you?"