Karen G. Berry - Mayhem 01 - Love and Mayhem (48 page)

Clyde scratched his head and retrieved speech from somewhere in his under-used frontal lobe. “She went to work.”

“She did not. She’s not out there, Clyde.”

“She ain’t?”

“No. She isn’t.” The two men stared at each other. “Do you think I could look around a bit in here, Clyde? Just informally?”

“Why sure.”

Clyde led him to the bedroom with the air of a man who had rarely visited it. Memphis extended a hand to the top drawer of her bureau, pulled it back. It just wasn’t seemly. “Clyde, could you open that for me?”

“Sure, Sheriff.”

He braced himself for the sight of her personal things, the pile of perfumed silk and lace he’d always imagined, but the drawer was empty. One by one, he pulled out the drawers. They were empty.

Back in the car, Memphis took the radio in hand, depressed the button. He sat for a moment while around him, the honey-scented air began to warm. With a sigh, he put down the radio. He turned the key, put the cruiser in gear.

He shook his head and took to the road.

MELVEENA STRANGE HEADED
down the freeway with the top down and the wind in her hair. The enormous trunk of that mauve ’66 Caddy was full to the brim with Louis Vuitton luggage.

Beside her on the seat sat Tender’s boots. She did not want to touch them. It was worst with metal, but it could permeate leather, pearls, paper and even cloth. So she’d let those boots alone for a week. She watched those boots stumbling around the Park on Tender’s feet, sitting on the shoe rack amongst Rhondalee’s wardrobe of bespangled footwear.

She waited for them to cool, like a pie.

After a week, she clipped them from the shoe rack and threw them in her trunk with her luggage. The Gulf of Mexico, she thought. Maybe that’s where she’d put them. Let some Great White scent the blood, gobble them up. Some fisherman would find Tender’s murderous boots when he gutted the monster.

All escapes require a certain amount of combustible fuel, and Melveena was running low. “Cash or credit, Ma’am?” asked the hang-toothed young boy who was there to pump her gas.

“Cash, baby,” she purred. No credit card trail for this trip. None at all. Which was great, considering she’d come into quite a little pile of cash on her way out of town. She’d have to find a nicer shoebox, though. Imagine. Thom McCann.

A knot of migrants was smoking and laughing over by the air pumps. They were decked out in their agreed-upon version of masculine finery, snap shirts and reptile boots and straw hats. These men appraised Melveena as she went to her trunk, opened it, and walked toward them holding the boots at arm’s length. “Anyone want these?”

The boots, she knew, were nicer than any of them wore. But there was such a thing as pride, especially among men who left spacious homes in Mexico to come north and sleep twenty to a room while they harvested hops.

She held out the boots, the pain in them radiating up her wrist. She tried not to wince. “Come on, fellas, do me a favor. These boots are just taking up space in my car. The man who wore them was a no good, sweet-talking cuss of a ladies’ man who ran away so fast, he left them behind. And they’re too nice to throw away. “

The men traded looks, shook their heads, smiled politely. Finally, one stepped forward. “I’ll take them for my brother, okay Lady?”

“Okay.” She turned from the men, leaving them lulled by her voice, her wink, her walk and her generosity.

She’d touched those boots for the very last time.

The gas jockey got sixty dollars and another wink that made him shift and blush. It was time to cruise. Melveena’s skirt blew up over her thighs. Her nails beat a tattoo along with the radio. She wore cat-eye sunglasses, not because she needed to, but because she wanted to.

She was not looking in her rearview mirror.

Kinky Friedman once said about women that “no one knows what goes on between the earrings.” Certainly, whatever thoughts roamed the space between Melveena’s single carat diamond teardrops remained a mystery. No one knew all the answers. No one, that is, but Melveena Strange. And Melveena wasn’t talking. She was smiling.

Perhaps she was smiling because of the changes in the Park. Yes, there would be changes. No one would lead those Thursday night kickboxing classes. No more letters to the newsletter. Claudina, Queen a Hearts would have no more questions from the Lorn in Love. And no one would have any need for high-stepping sartorial advice from the Fashion Filly. How sad, thought Melveena. Things would change for the Park, because things had changed for Melveena.

Last Saturday night, everything had changed.

SHE’D PULLED UP
to the door of the Blue Moon in Tender’s truck. The truck hadn’t been hard to borrow; she’d let herself in to the office after the meeting and helped herself to the set of keys Rhondalee had locked up in there. Rhondalee hadn’t heard the truck start over her talk shows. Melveena had driven to the Blue Moon and waited. She’d seen Raven approaching the Blue Moon, the Reverend leaving, their exchange. Once Raven went inside, she’d pulled into the parking lot, rolled down the window and smiled at him.

The Reverend had doffed his hat in surprise. “Evening, Sister Strange. Where is that fine automobile this evening?”

“Oh, Clyde has it down at the station to detail it, Reverend. I just happen to be ready to talk terms.”

He smiled brightly. “That is fortuitous news, Sister. My truck is beyond resuscitation.” He climbed in, sat down, and flashed his bridgework. “Let’s talk.”

“Why don’t we drive while we talk?”

“That would be mighty fine, Sister.”

She hit the gas as soon as the door slammed shut. No one followed. He cleared his throat as if he was about to orate or emote or proclaim, but all he had to say was, “Did you have a figure in mind, Sister Strange?”

“A figure?” She smiled. “Well, you have to understand, Reverend, that this car was left to me by my Granny Strange. It carries great sentimental value.”

“Of course. And how does that sentimental value translate into dollars?”

“Granny Strange drove me to my first day at the University of Little Rock in that car.”

“I understand, Sister Strange. Now, about the price?”

“I’m not sure you
do
understand. In that car, Granny drove me to my first civil-rights demonstration. And she took me with her to the Democratic National Convention. She was one of the delegates who nominated Jimmy Carter.”

“Is that right.” The Reverend swallowed, and his Adam’s apple gave a mighty bounce.

“She always admired Jimmy Carter tremendously. He’s the epitome of a moral man. He brought peace to the Holy Land, if only briefly. And then all his work with Habitat for Humanity.”

The Reverend shifted, restless. “Your grandmother sounds like a wonderful woman. Now, are you ready to talk money, Sister Strange?”

“Well, it’s hard to put a price on a car like that. I just keep wondering what Granny Strange would have thought about my selling it. She was a pistol. She left me a few things, actually. Here, I want to show you something else she gave me.” She pulled the truck into the parking lot of the Bone Pile Store, and started going through her pocketbook.

“Sister, I’d like to get down to business, here.”

Melveena rummaged through the purse with a frown. “Where did I put that?” She smiled. “Oh, here it is. Granny Strange gave me this right before she died.” It was a smooth motion, the way she pulled the .45 from her handbag, cocked it, held it to his nostril. Anyone watching might have thought the woman had practiced. “Put your hands on the dashboard. Don’t move. Or I’ll happily shoot your nose right off your face.”

A braver man certainly would have risked a run for it. But the Reverend was a coward, so he sat there with his hands on the dash. “Sister Strange…”

She poked the gun a little farther up his generous nose. “Stop that ‘sister’ crap right now.”

His Adam’s apple bobbed like a fishing float. She eased the pistol off slightly.

“It appears to me that you might be listening to some rumors, Miz Strange, some unfounded rumors.”

“I see. Rumors. Rumors such as you fathered a child on a barefoot ninth grade drop-out named Bonnie.”

“I married her.”

“You what?”

His voice took on a funeral-director unctuousness. “I took her as my wife in the name of the Lord. The Lord knows I was working His deeds.”

“I think the Lord might see things differently once she talks to Memphis.”

“She won’t talk. Those girls were born silent.”

It took a second for both of them to understand what he’d just said.

She lowered the gun to his crotch. “I was just going to shoot your nose off if you moved. Now I have another target in mind.” The truck’s passenger door opened just in time to keep the Reverend’s private parts from preceding him to Kingdom Come. Angus MacIver pushed his way in and placed his iron fiddler’s hands around the Reverend’s skinny neck. Ever-mindful of the social niceties, Melveena made the proper introductions. “Reverend, you remember Bonnie’s older brother, Angus.” The Reverend made a gargle of strangulation.

Melveena lay her gun on the floor and hit the gas. The three passengers bucked and rocked in that old truck as she navigated the ruts. “Angus,” she said gently, “he’s supposed to be breathing when we get him up there.”

“Yes Ma’am.” He relaxed his grip, but only a bit.

The Reverend choked out, “Sister Strange…”

“I told you, don’t call me sister anymore.”

She needed guidance in the dark. “This way,” Angus muttered as she used her strong arms to manhandle Tender’s old Ford along. Flumes of yellow dust rose red in the taillights behind them. “Turn here. Stop. We’re here.”

They were on one side of the Bone Pile settlement, all the dark backlit by a bonfire.

“Hands on the dash, Reverend.” She trained Granny’s Colt on his temple as Angus let go and climbed out the back. She could smell the Reverend’s fear.

“Sister, if you let me go, I’ll take care of her. There’s a place in Arizona where I can live with her openly as my lawful wedded wife. Gator has promised to help me get her up there.”

“So Gator’s in on this?”

“He has a special interest in this, yes. It speaks to his religious beliefs. You see, we’re from a place where…” He faltered. “We are from a place where such arrangements are not uncommon. I was put out early. Gator stayed. I have been trying to find a way back for thirty years. Gator says if I help him win the talent show, he’ll take me back there, and I’ll take Bonnie and perhaps some of her sisters, the Lord willing.”

Melveena thought about Bonnie MacIver, fourteen going on thirty, now, with this man’s child in her belly. Melveena thought about the twelve unearthly girl children in her classroom. She remembered the rhyme she’d heard them saying on the first day of school. That rhyme that made her start holding hands and asking questions.

“Please let me go, Sister Strange. I am
begging
you…”

“I’d suggest you stop begging for my mercy and start praying for someone else’s.”

Angus opened the passenger door and wrestled the cringing preacher out to the dirt.

“Reverend,” said Melveena, gesturing with the gun. “Stand up and walk. You might not have lived like much of a man, but can you at least
die
like one?”

He stood, then, brushed off his suit and straightened his hat.

Angus retrieved a pair of boots from the bed of the truck and tucked them under his arms. He steered the silent preacher to the flames that waited for him behind the largest of the darkened cars. There had to be a hell of a fire going, Melveena thought. She put the gun away, rummaged in her purse, refreshed her lipstick. She smoothed down her hair, breathed.

Then she crossed herself.

Angus came back to the truck and climbed in beside her. They sat side-by-side, silent.

It rose like the flames, the unearthly wail of the Bone Pile women. It filled the air in a hammering cascade loud enough to force any listener to his knees. If those were words they called out, they were older than English. Syllables ran from one to the next, rhyming and adding and building and twisting and licking and searing. It was structured just like the rhyme of their daughters, thought Melveena, the rhyme that sent her up these dark roads to talk to the mothers. To express her fear that something horrible was happening to their wild, innocent daughters.