Joan Hess - Arly Hanks 02 (4 page)

"I'm Rainbow," the woman said. "My friends will be pleased to know you stopped by for a visit. Could I offer you a cup of mint tea and a carob-chip cookie? If you'd prefer something cold, I think there's still some of our homemade apple cider. It's made from organic apples."

"Sounds great," I said, lying through my teeth for the sake of neighborliness. I followed her through a curtain to a cozy little room that seemed to function as office, storage room, and parlor. I was settled on a chintz sofa and given a glass of cider and a cookie.

I was about to chomp down on a carob chip when a second woman came through the doorway. Unlike her co-owner, she was not willowy. She was a short, rosy little thing, and very pregnant. She was Poppy, I was told, and delighted to meet me.

"Do you think we ought to take this check?" she asked Rainbow.

They looked it over and decided to take it. Poppy waddled away, leaving me no choice but to chomp. I put it off by asking, "Are you and Poppy the official owners?"

"Oh, no. Zachery and Nate went into Starley City in the truck to pick up a shipment of bottled spring water. We get it all the way from Colorado, and hope to sell a lot of it. They should be back before too long, and eager to meet you. We haven't met too many people, although we've had a reasonable number of customers since we opened. Once we get settled, we might throw a party for the entire town so we can meet everybody."

I could imagine Ruby Bee with a carob-chip cookie and a cup of mint tea. Not a pretty picture. "A barbecue?" I asked politely.

She gave me a shocked look. "We're strict vegetarians. Zachery won't even eat dairy products. Poppy used to avoid them, but now she'll eat yogurt, if we remind her."

"Is Zachery the prospective father?"

"Possibly, although Poppy changes her mind daily. She's sure it's either Zachery or Nate. Both of them are going to participate in labor and delivery, of course, and we'll all share responsibility for child care and make joint decisions about the future." She gave me a warm, twinkly smile. "We're just like a big, extended family. We've been together for over a year now, ever since we met at a yoga retreat during the summer solstice. Our relationship is very spiritual."

"That's great," I murmured. I couldn't bring myself to ask about the meditation sessions in the backyard, so I stuffed the cookie in my mouth, polished off the cider, and told her I was pleased that the Emporium was back in business. She twinkled at me as we went back into the main part of the store, where I spotted Raz Buchanon studying crystals and several of the high school girls giggling over posters. Maggody might be taken aback at being served soybean hot dogs and bottled water, but I figured that after a time, no one would worry about Rainbow, Poppy, and their male companions. Except for Kevin Buchanon -- unless Earl chopped down the sweet gum tree.

I whiled away the rest of the afternoon with the directions to the beeper, which I kept thinking was like one of those in-house ankle bracelets used when the prisons were sated. The wearer couldn't go more than fifty feet from his home. I could go anywhere I wanted -- and the sheriff's dispatcher could find me so I could call in for a report. Isn't technology wonderful?

I was wondering how much abuse my beeper could take (and how much I could give it without being accused of beeper abuse) when the telephone rang. It was Ruby Bee, and she was blithering worse than a mockingbird.

"Slow down," I said patiently. "Or take a deep breath, two aspirins, and call me in the morning." When I'd lived in Manhattan with my hotshot Madison Avenue husband, I'd made witty repartee about the international trade deficit, Supreme Court decisions, and potent political figures. When I drove past the Maggody city limit sign, my brain atrophied. Bathroom jokes are big around here, along with traveling salesmen, ethnic slurs, and sexual perversions.

"You need to get right down for supper," Ruby Bee gasped. "You really do, Arly. I made a cherry cobbler this afternoon, and there's still a big corner of it left. When can you get here?"

"It's not even five o'clock. I'm not hungry, and I want to file all the reports the deputy left for me. Besides, I've been pigging out on carob chips and other organic stuff; I may swear off carbohydrates and grease and seek transcendental peace through fasting and intense meditation."

"Rather than your own mother's pork chops and fried okra? What has gotten into you, young lady? Have you been over to those hippies' house?" Ruby Bee is not into fasting and meditation.

"Not I. But it's too early to eat. What's the big deal, anyway?"

"You just get your smart-aleck self down here right now."

The receiver clicked in my ear, with a finality that unsettled me. In that I couldn't think of a particularly good reason to stir up trouble with Ruby Bee, I checked my lipstick, stuck the folder in a drawer, hung a Closed sign on the PD door, and walked down the highway to Ruby Bee's Bar and Grill.

The parking lot was thick with pickup trucks and good ole boys slapping each other on the back and kicking each other in the fanny. I joined the jocular group as we shoved our way through the door for that timeless tradition known as Happy Hour (in another life it was known, if I recall correctly, as the cocktail hour -- martinis, hors d'oeuvres, crystal bowls of peanuts, politically correct conversation). Ruby Bee serves dollar draws and free popcorn, which suits everybody just fine.

I struggled through a row of denim backs along the bar, perched on a stool, and waved to Ruby Bee. When she came over, I requested a light beer and a bag of potato chips.

She sucked on her lip for a minute. "I thought you came here for supper, Arly. You don't want to ruin your appetite with junk food, do you? You just go sit in the last booth, and I'll bring you a nice plate of pork chops, okra, beans, and mashed potatoes. The cobbler will go right nice with vanilla ice cream, don't you think?"

"I'll eat after a while. I'm feeling a bit nostalgic for the cocktail hour. I realize I can't have chilled shrimp and paté, but I have hopes potato chips will ease my longings."

"You just go sit where I told you."

"I don't want to just go sit where you told me. I want a light beer and a bag of potato chips. If I have to go buy 'em at the Kwik-Screw and sit on the gravel beside the highway while I eat 'em, I will."

Her eyes narrowed, and she did some more chewing on her lip. Finally, looking about as guileless as a fox in the henhouse door, she said, "If I give you a light beer and a bag of potato chips, then will you go sit where I told you?"

I thought of all sorts of things to say, not to mention questions that deserved being asked. But obedient child that I am, I said I'd take my light beer and bag of potato chips and go sit in the last booth. I'd even consider the pork chops et al in a half hour or so. But when I got halfway across the room, I noticed there was someone already in the last booth. Not thinking much about it, I aimed myself on a tangent and started for another booth.

Estelle grabbed my arm. "Come on, Arly, there's someone I want you to meet." She propelled me to the last booth and shoved me down on the plastic bench across from a man with blond hair and, not unreasonably, a startled expression. "David Allen, I don't believe you've met Arly. She's Ruby Bee's daughter, divorced, and the chief of police. Arly, David Allen just moved to Maggody last month; he's widowed and the guidance counselor up at the high school. David Allen, Arly. Arly, David Allen. If I can't bring you two anything else, I'll just leave you to get acquainted."

She sailed away, leaving both of us to blink across the table at each other. I put down my beer and extended my hand. "Hi, I'm Arly Hanks, and I think I've just been set up by my mother the professional manipulator. My apologies."

"Oh, no apology needed," he murmured, flashing a pair of dimples as he shook my hand. Blue eyes, broad shoulders, about forty. And not bad at all. "And please don't give Ruby Bee a hard time about her manipulations; I'm delighted to meet you." He realized he was still squeezing my hand, and released it with an embarrassed laugh.

"So you're the new guidance counselor," I said cleverly. "How do you like the traumatized teens of Maggody High?"

"They're remarkably like the traumatized teens of anywhere. The halls reek of angst -- along with armpits, hair spray, and dollar-a-gallon eau de cologne. I took the job here so I could be within driving distance of my son, who lives with his grandparents in Farberville. I try to get over every weekend to spend some time with him."

"How old is he?"

"He'll be seven in November. He's already reading and was the star slugger of his T-ball team this summer," David Allen said with a flicker of parental pride. "I wish I could have him with me, but he has a kidney problem and needs dialysis treatments several times a week. His grandparents live a block from the hospital. Anyway, my bachelor existence would make both of us crazy. I'm big on pepperoni pizza and beer. He needs a woman's hand these days -- someone to make him eat spinach and take a bath every night."

"It's fortunate that you found a job not too far away. Were you able to find someplace not too dreadful to live?" We police officers are trained in the delicate art of interrogation.

"I rented a house in that subdivision past the high school. I'm in one of the twenty-five houses jammed together in the middle of a forty-acre cow pasture. In fact," he said, wiggling his eyebrows at me, "I live on an honest-to-God cul de sac. Impressed?"

"Immensely. I live in a dingy apartment above the antique store."

We continued on in that vein for most of an hour, comparing notes on the citizens of Maggody and the mysterious local rituals. It turned out David Allen was forty (as I guessed), a Vietnam veteran, a graduate of Farber College, and a football fan. His wife had died a couple of years back from cancer; he didn't say much about it, and I didn't ask. His one vice, he admitted, was spending too much money on model rockets, which he launched in the pasture behind his house and usually lost. My one vice, I admitted, was lying in my bed in the dark and thinking up ways to needle my mother. He invited me to watch a launch; I did not invite him to lie in my bed. We had made our way through pork chops and cherry cobbler and were into coffee when he gave me a frown.

"There is something I ought to discuss with you in your professional capacity," he said in a low voice.

Dearly hoping he wasn't going to mention outstanding felony warrants, I put down my cup. "I don't fix traffic tickets, David Allen, but I can put in a good word with the municipal judge when he comes next Tuesday night."

"It's about this psychic woman. One of the girls was in my office all teary about a friend who was upset enough by the psychic to talk about suicide. I don't understand why anyone would take that sort of thing seriously, but I do take suicide threats seriously, especially with adolescent girls. Do you know anything concerning this Madam Celeste?"

"I know she's the talk of the town and the darling of the beauty-parlor crowd. I just got back from a long vacation, and I'm still in culture shock. I haven't had time to do any investigating. What did she tell this girl?"

He related a crazy story about the girl and her boyfriend being incompatible due to their numerological analysis. "I think it's total nonsense," he concluded with a sigh. "I wish the girl did."

I didn't much like the idea of the psychic upsetting the girl, even if it was done in such an absurd way. And David Allen had a point about the suicide threats. "I suppose I ought to check her out," I said without enthusiasm. "I'll also see what the laws are concerning this sort of thing. It may be illegal, although I doubt it. Maggody's local statutes were written in the middle of the last century. Nobody's had any reason to read them since, much less update them. But I'll drop by Madam Celeste's house tomorrow and see what I think."

He reached across the table to squeeze my hand. "I appreciate your taking this as seriously as I do, Arly. If you have some spare time tomorrow evening, could you come by the house and tell me what you've decided about this psychic?"

Me with spare time? It wouldn't have been polite to laugh, so I settled for a nod and a smile. On the way out, I stopped by the bar and gave Ruby Bee a stern look meant to discourage any manipulations in the future. She managed not to see me. Estelle was busy studying the popcorn bowls. I could have climbed onto the bar, ripped off my shirt, and beat my breast while yodeling. Neither one of them would have looked up.

When I got back to the PD, I found Kevin Buchanon in the front room. He gulped, flapped his hands, turned scarlet when the broom, in compliance with the law of gravity, clattered to the floor, ran his hand through his crew cut, gulped some more, and shuffled his feet like an anemic tap dancer. "Uh, Jim Bob told me I was to come on in if you wasn't here," he mumbled. "I mean, I'm glad you're back, Arly. I just didn't want you to think I wasn't supposed to come in unless you was back."

I gazed at the gawky specimen of Buchanon inbreeding. "I'm not back, Kevin -- it just looks like it. I am gone." I took my beeper and went home. Be it ever so humble, it ran rings around Kevin Buchanon.

3

The next morning, after a bowl of stale cornflakes and three cups of instant coffee (with instant cream), I drove over to Estelle's house, which was a quarter of a mile north of the Emporium on a county road that the county had disinherited along about WWI. The psychic and her brother lived a little ways farther up the road, just before a dilapidated chicken house and a rusted Nash set on concrete blocks that was the closest thing to a historical marker we had in Maggody. After that there were stunted pine trees and scrub, a low-water bridge across Boone Creek that provided excitement in the spring months, and ten teeth-rattling miles to Hasty. Hasty makes Maggody look like the Loop in Chicago. Estelle's house was an old but tidy clapboard thing, and she'd done some landscaping with plastic flowers, concrete statues of gnomes and toads, and a genuine imitation marble birdbath. Wishing I had some plastic dandelions to poke into the flower bed, I went up onto the porch and lifted my hand to knock.