Dotty’s Suitcase (6 page)

“You know what? You got on your lying face. You know that was the sheriff good as me, and he wasn't out for any old ride. He was chasing somebody, and I bet you dollars to doughnuts he was after them robbers in that big black car.” Jud's mouth clamped down. He was tired out, unaccustomed to making such a long speech.

“You keep your nose down and keep looking, otherwise go on home.” Dotty made such a fierce face at him he cowered behind a pine tree for a minute.

Dotty retraced her steps, around and around, back and forth, and found nothing. She worked her way to the spot in the highway where the road curved. Whatever they'd tossed out they'd come back for. She was certain of that. Whatever it was, they didn't want anyone to find them carrying it.

“Suppose they come back?” Jud was so close to her she jumped. “Suppose they come back looking for what it was they threw out of the car? Suppose they find us here?” His voice faltered and died.

Dotty kept her head down. “They won't,” she said firmly, not entirely believing it. “They won't. Keep on looking.” If they came back and found me and Jud here, tramping around, searching for something, they'd probably kill us. They'd shoot us dead.

“We could look farther in,” Jud suggested. “In from the road. Maybe that guy threw it way far in.”

It was a thought. “I was just thinking that,” Dotty said. They traveled back in and resumed their search. The light was fading fast.

“We better go home. I'm cold and I'm hungry, and besides,” Jud said, “they might come back, and if they do, I don't want to be here.”

“O.K.” Dotty didn't want to be there, either, if they came back. Even as she spoke, her foot touched something that didn't feel like weeds or grass or an old beer bottle or anything like that. Whatever it was it was solid. Dotty knelt down to see better.

“It looks like a box,” she said. The box lay partly hidden under a scraggly bush.

“Open it,” Jud said softly, his breath tickling her cheek. “Open it quick.”

“All it is is an old box,” Dotty scoffed, her heart beating madly. “I wouldn't give you a nickel for it.” She ran her hand lovingly over the surface.

Jud leaned down to look, his nose almost grazing their find. “Never saw no box with a handle on it,” he observed. “Looks like a suitcase to me. Is anything in it? Is it heavy? Lemme see if it's heavy.” He tried to take the box away from her, and Dotty warned, “Hands off!”

“You're not the boss!” he cried, beginning to jiggle the way he did when he had to go to the bathroom.

“Pick it up. See what's inside,” Jud said, jiggling madly.

“Go on behind that tree over there,” Dotty said. “I won't look.”

Jud scuttled behind the tree. Quick as a fox, Dotty worked the clasps on the box and the lid sprang open.

Even in the dim light she could see what the box held. She heard Jud coming back and slammed the lid shut, fastening it with shaking fingers.

“What do we want with an old box …” he began, then stopped.

“There's a car coming,” he said.

Dotty stumbled to her feet, clutching the box. “Are you sure?”

“Listen yourself.” He put a finger to his lips. “Can't you hear it? It's coming this way and it's coming fast.”

Dotty strained her ears. He was right. There was a car coming. “Come on!” she whispered. Crouching low, she ran. Jud followed. They ran as fast as their legs would go, carrying them away from the highway, away from the approaching car, into the woods.

CHAPTER 10

“Listen here,” Jud panted behind her, about twenty minutes later. “I got to rest. That's all there is to it. I got to rest.” He made heaving noises, and she saw him put his head down between his knees. Nothing came up.

Dotty had a bad stitch in her side. It hurt something fierce. She leaned against a big old elm tree to get her breath. Then she stood taut, listening. In the distance behind her, there was no sound except the sighing of the wind.

“We forgot the hamburger,” Dotty said at last. “Oh, my. Won't Aunt Martha be mad!”

Jud raised his head, and for a moment he looked very old and very wise.

“No, she won't,” he said. “I got it.” He tapped his bulging pocket. “I got it right here, but I couldn't fit the milk. I had to leave the milk.” He smiled, revealing the empty space in his gums that had recently held two teeth.

Dotty felt herself getting calmer. She held the suitcase close to the stitch in her side, as if it were a hot-water bottle and would help to ease the ache.

“Good for you,” she said reluctantly.

Jud noticed the way she held the suitcase, the way she kept her eye on it, and he knew there was something worthwhile inside, no matter what it looked like.

“What you got there?” He pointed. “Let's have a look.” He tapped his pocket again. “Don't forget. I remembered the hamburger. Just don't forget that.”

“As if you'd let me,” Dotty said sarcastically. “Wait'll we get home and I'll show you. Let's get home while there's still some light left. Come on.”

They set out again. The tops of the trees stood out against the sky. There were no stars, no moon.

They walked for what seemed like miles, and although they stopped often to rest, the suitcase was getting heavy. She longed to put it down for another rest. Blood drummed in her ears, making a racket like the ocean pounding on the shore.

If only we'd come to a place I knew, Dotty thought, and there would be our house. Just as if we'd never left it. Smoke coming from the chimney, wash hanging on the line, Daddy's old car leaning on itself the way it does. If only.

Jud was beside her. “Up there. It's a light. I seen it.”

“Where?”

“Right up ahead. It's gone now, but I seen it. I know I did.”

“I have never been lost in my life,” Dotty said indignantly.

“Me neither,” Jud replied. “But there's always a first time.”

“You make me sick.” She turned on him. “You make me mighty sick.”

His face assumed a slick, crafty look, full of guile. He was in charge, for a change. Wordlessly he patted his pocket that held the hamburger. Then he ran ahead.

“You know what?” he shouted. “It's the highway, that's what! We're back where we started.”

He was right about the highway. Oh, Lordy, Lordy! Dotty came up behind him. “It's not the same place. There's no curve up ahead,” she said in a scornful tone, glad to contribute something.

They saw headlights of an approaching car. It slowed and stopped alongside them.

“You kids need a lift?” the driver said, rolling down the window, leaning out. It was an old red pickup truck that, at the moment, looked good enough to be a movie star's limousine.

“Sure do.” Dotty didn't recognize the boy, but was sure he must be from around here. Everybody was. “Come on, Jud,” she called. He was right behind her, peeking out. “We got a ride.”

“Toss your stuff in and let's get going,” the boy said. “I got to be in Boonville tonight and I'm late.”

Boonville? “You going to Boonville?” Dotty asked him, astonished.

“Sure am. That's if Bessie keeps going. Never can be sure. Some days she does what I tell her, some days not.” He smiled, and in the light from the dashboard she saw and admired his golden hair curling around his head like tiny bed springs, and his teeth lined up in his mouth like kernels on an ear of white corn. He's pretty, she thought, almost as pretty as Laura or Mary Beth.

“My friend Olive lives in Boonville,” Dotty said, boosting Jud up, then climbing in beside him. “Do you know her? Olive Doherty. Her father works in Boonville. That's why they moved there, so he could find work.”

He shook his head. “Just toss your suitcase in back,” he directed, putting his truck in gear.

“I'll just rest it here in my lap,” Dotty said. Jud had his thumb in his mouth, making little clicking noises. When he sucked his thumb, he always hooked his index finger over his nose and peered over it, looking slightly moronic.

She decided he could keep it there for the time being. It kept him quiet, at least.

“It's not heavy,” she said, cradling the suitcase to her chest. “It's light as anything.”

He shrugged. “Up to you,” he said, and they were off.

“How long will it take to get there?” Dotty asked.

“About an hour and a half—two, maybe. I'm not coming back your way, though. How'll you get back?”

He had nice eyes. He was very handsome, about seventeen or eighteen. Too bad he wasn't going to drive them home. She closed her eyes and imagined herself pulling up in front of her house with this handsome stranger at the wheel. Of course, the girls would be peeking out the window as he helped her out and escorted her up the steps. She'd ask him in for a cup of coffee, and then, if Mary Beth and Laura behaved themselves, she'd introduce them to him.

They'd go crazy, she thought, smiling at the thought. Oh, well, I can't have everything, she told herself, not at all sure this was true.

“There's a bus that goes from Boonville to Earlville,” she told him, as if she'd planned the trip carefully. “Twice a day, I think. Me and Jud'll take the bus.”

“You got money?” the boy asked, his eyes on the road.

Beside her, she felt Jud's thumb stop its ticking.

“A little,” she answered. “Enough for the bus. And if we don't have enough,” she added, “my father'll give it to the bus driver when we get home. Besides, we won't need any money once we get to Olive's. They'll be so glad to see us. I can hardly wait.”

“Seems like you two are a mite young to be out on the road at night,” the driver said.

“Well, I'm thirteen.” Dotty lied a little. It was only a white lie. She'd be thirteen next birthday. A white lie was all right to tell as long as it didn't hurt anybody.

“I've done some traveling.” Once you'd told one white lie, the next one came easier. “Being the youngest in my family and all, I'm pretty grown-up for my age.”

She could feel Jud's eyes on her, gazing stonily at her over the hump his finger made on his nose. He said nothing. And if he did, she'd give him her elbow in his ribs.

She shifted her body away from him, turning toward the driver so she couldn't see Jud watching her. He made her nervous. She never could be sure what he might come out with.

“I can call Mr. Evans up when we get to Olive's and tell him to let my father know where we are.” She stretched her mouth into a smile and longed for dimples. “Mr. Evans owns the general store and he has a telephone. He doesn't mind taking messages.”

Jud said, very low, “How would you know? You never give him none.”

Expertly she gave Jud a tiny taste of the elbow. She felt him pull away from her.

“I'll tell him to tell my father we'll be home on the bus. It'll be perfectly all right. Daddy won't mind.

“My name's Dotty Fickett.” Her voice rang in her ears. To her it sounded smooth and sophisticated, as if she did this sort of thing every day. “And this is my friend Jud. Well, actually”—she gave a small laugh—“he's more like my little brother than a friend. He lives nearby and his mother likes for me to look out for him.”

In the darkness Jud made a little gagging sound. She increased the space between them and hoped fervently the noise he made was one of disgust and not carsickness.

“Pleased to meet you,” the boy said. “My name's Gary.”

With a thrill of recognition, Dotty thought, Of course! That's who he looks like. Gary Cooper. Oh, my! Clasping her suitcase firmly, she settled back in her seat as the truck hurtled toward Boonville at thirty-five miles an hour through the black night.

Her heart was working overtime, flipping around inside her like a fish out of water. She took a long, deep breath. Everything up to now had been pretend. This was an adventure. For real. She and Jud were on their way to Boonville with a suitcase. And what a suitcase!

It was almost too good to be true.

CHAPTER 11

Dreams can be disturbing. Lulled by the warmth and motion of the truck, Dotty dozed. Aunt Martha appeared before her, wringing her hands, calling Dotty's name. Then Olive was there. She and Olive were in a strange house, dressed up in old sheets, as if it were Halloween and they were ghosts. Only Olive had painted a wide red mouth over her own mouth. “I'm Joan Crawford,” she said. So Dotty drew a mouth on herself, but the color got all over her face and even her teeth were pink with lipstick. Olive began to cry, and her mascaraed eyelashes ran in black rivulets down her cheeks. She was a mess. When Dotty asked her why she was crying, she shook her head soundlessly and cried harder. It was terrible.

Dotty woke with a start. The truck had pulled up to a gas station in the middle of nowhere. In the single pale light that shone from a dirty window Dotty could see the first faint beginnings of the storm. The snowflakes worked their way down from the sky in a deceptively lazy, uncaring fashion, as if they meant no harm, had no particular destination in mind.

A man slouched toward them, rubbing his eyes, probably angry at having his nap disturbed. Jud lay heavily against her arm, and the suitcase seemed to have gained in width and weight.

Gary's hand rested lightly on the suitcase's handle.

“I was going to put it back where it'd be safe,” he said softly, smiling at her.

Dotty sat up straight, tightening her grip. “It's O.K. How much longer till we get there?”

He opened the door and jumped down. “Forty-five minutes, hour. Depends. Be right back. She'll take five gallons,” she heard him tell the man as he made for the rear of the station.

I should go to the bathroom too, Dotty thought. But the idea of leaving the warm truck and going out into the night didn't appeal to her. She'd have to take the suitcase with her. She'd leave it with Jud, but he was asleep and she didn't want to wake him.