Mrs. Million (25 page)

Toagie clapped her hands over her. daughter’s ears. Art brought his arms across his belly as if he’d been punched. He’d never seen Barbaraannette like this. He’d never seen the vein that popped out on her forehead, or the way her eyes became hard rectangles. Backing toward the door he said, or heard himself say, “Barbaraannette, when this is all over, whatever happens, I’d like to take you out to dinner.”

“Why? So you can order for me? So you can help me eat?”

Art turned and walked out. Just before the door slammed he heard Hilde call out, “Good night, Arthur.”

I am a good person, Barbaraannette thought. It’s just this one little thing I have, this Bobby thing.

Toagie, still gripping Britty’s head between her hands, said, “Jeez Louise. What happened?”

Barbaraannette, still shaking, sat down on the sofa.

Toagie said, “I always thought he was one of the quiet ones.” Britty squirmed free.

Barbaraannette shook her head. “He’s as bad as the rest of them.”

“Arthur’s a good boy,” said Hilde.

“I hate him. Give me a cigarette.”

“Uh-uh.” Toagie released Britty and clamped her hand protectively over her purse. “You’re not gonna start smoking again, not on me.”

Barbaraannette struck her thighs with her fists and began to pace, her shoes making hissing sounds on the carpet. “I’m going to do something. I swear to God, Toag, I’m going to have to do
something.”
She stopped, took her lower lip between her teeth and bit until she tasted blood. “Damn that Dale Gordon. Damn Mary Beth. Why is this happening to me? Why me? This is all that Art Dobbleman’s fault.”

Toagie, Britty, and Hilde were all staring at her as if she’d turned purple.

“What are you looking at?” Barbaraannette snapped.

Hilde whispered something to Toagie, then turned her V-shaped little-old-lady smile on Barbaraannette.

“What did she say,” Barbaraannette demanded to know.

Toagie essayed a nervous laugh. “She wants to know if you’re going to go out with him.”

Barbaraannette turned an incredulous look upon her mother, then felt something give way and began to laugh. Toagie and Hilde both started laughing, too, with Brittany not far behind. When Mary Beth walked in a minute later they were still giggling, wiping their eyes.

“Well?” she asked.

Barbaraannette said, “Nothing M.B. We were just talking about boys.”

Mary Beth said, “I swear, Barbaraannette, winning that lottery has made you soft in the head.”

This sent Toagie and Hilde into a second fit of laughter. Mary Beth pushed her chin forward. She said, “Come along, Mother. I’m taking you back to Crestview.”

Complete thoughts refused to form. Images, snatches of conversation barked at him, pestered him like biting flies. Art walked past his car, knowing it was there but unable to make his legs slow their chopping walk, hearing the sound of his wingtips on the sidewalk wet with melting snow
—thick thick thick—
and wind rasping the rough fabric of his coat. He leaned forward, let his knees flex. Walking melted into running. He should not be doing this now, not with his long wool coat and his dress shoes, not with Barbaraannette hating him and his job in jeopardy.
I don’t even like you,
she had said. Hard composite heels, thin socks. Each step sent a shock wave up his spine, tiny explosions at the base of his skull. Why not just get her the money? Go back and apologize and then get back on the phone and get the cash up here and let her pay off the kidnapper or whatever he was and wait for Bobby to leave her again then move in. But now she hated him and nothing he did would matter, so why should he help? And who was he refusing to help? Barbaraannette or Bobby? Did she really not like him?

He let the thoughts go for a few seconds and sank into the rhythm of the run, coattails flapping. Had he really asked her out to dinner? A wry smile came, lasted for two strides, fell away. Desperate people do strange things. He sped up to what felt like an eight-minute pace. For the next half mile he forced himself to consider the fact that she had not, technically, said no.

“M
Y MOTHER PASSED ON
,” Bobby said. “Died when I was nine.”

“No!” André’s eyes filled with tears. The closer they got to Diamond Bluff, the more emotional he became.

“My old man raised us, mostly. Me and my big brother, Phil. Then he, the old man, up and died a few years back. Fact, it was the year I left Cold Rock. He was a good man. Big as a damn horse. Used to beat the crap out of Phil, man, I loved it.”

“You and your brother did not get along?”

“Phil’s an asshole. He lives in Texas now.”

“I see.” André found this to be disturbing. “I never had a brother,” he said, dragging a sleeve across his eyes. “I hardly remember my father.”

“Where’d you grow up?”

“Diamond Bluff. We will be there in another hour.” They were headed east on I-694, the Twin Cities bypass.

“Your mother still lives there?”

“Yes.” André’s fingers went white on the steering wheel.

Bobby said, “Do you visit her often?”

“Certainly…actually, it has been a few years. She seems to think I should be married.”

“Oh. You never got married?”

André chuckled. “My dear boy, it was never in the cards.”

“You never came close?”

“Actually, I am gay.”

“Oh!” Bobby went rigid.

André said, “Does that bother you?”

“’Course not.”

André slowed and peered into Bobby’s eyes. “I think it does bother you. There is nothing to be ashamed of, you know. Most straight men are homophobic to some degree. But you need not worry. You are hardly my type.”

“That kid in the basement. He was your type?”

André returned his attention to the road, his eyes once again welling with tears. “Poor Jayjay,” he said.

Now that Bobby realized that André was not simply going to shoot him and dump his body over some bridge, he began to think more clearly. The best way to survive would be to get André to like him, the way he would do with a woman, which was to pretend to be fascinated by him, and by all aspects of his existence. But this gay thing, that might make it difficult, since he didn’t want to look too interested—but at the same time he had to let the guy know he didn’t hold it against him.

“I think that’s really great, you being gay,” he said.

“Oh? And why is that?”

“I mean, different strokes for different folks.”

André frowned, looking puzzled.

“I didn’t mean that the way it sounded,” Bobby said quickly, thinking, Shit, shit, shit! How are you supposed to talk to these guys? It was worse than trying to talk to a black guy, trying all the time not to say something stupid. “I just mean, I like gay guys.” Damn! That definitely wasn’t what he’d meant to say. “I mean, you know, to talk to, like to get a haircut or something.” Shit! He kept digging the hole deeper, and André had that big old gun in his lap. He was going to get dumped over a railing yet. “That’s not what I meant,” he said, staring at the revolver. “None of it is.”

A strange hooting sound filled the car. Bobby lifted his eyes from André’s gun to his face. The man was laughing.

Phlox caught a ride to the Hulke place from a sixteen-year-old kid driving a twenty-year-old Camaro. At ninety-five miles per hour, the trip took only twelve minutes. Phlox gave the kid ten bucks—probably less than he’d burned up in fuel. She got her bag out of her pickup, let herself into Hugh’s pigsty of a house and took a few minutes to spruce up. She changed out of her jeans into a blue suede skirt and a chambray top—the only clean articles of clothing she had left—then got in the pickup and headed back toward Cold Rock at the relatively sedate speed of eighty, still undecided as to her next move.

The first map she bought, at the Amoco on the west side of town, was a cheap fold-out that did not show a Diamond Bluff. Phlox went back into the station, demanded her money back, then drove to the Fleet Farm where she purchased a larger, more detailed map for $14.95. Diamond Bluff turned out to be a small dot on the Wisconsin side of the Mississippi River. It looked like a two- or three-hour drive, a long way to go on a hunch. She set the map on the seat and looked out over the Fleet Farm parking lot. It reminded her of Tucson—mostly pickup trucks. She raised her eyes to the horizon, looking for a mountain, but of course there were no mountains in Minnesota, only a scabby mass of leafless trees and cold buildings and billboards. The highest point in town was occupied by the Taxidermy & Cheese Shoppe. That decided her.

She started the truck and headed east toward the Interstate. She would go to Diamond Bluff and visit Mrs. Gideon or Grubb or whatever she called herself. Maybe this hunch was one of the good ones. In any case, getting the hell out of Cold Rock had to be a good thing.

A few miles south of Prescott, André slowed abruptly, then turned onto a narrow gravel road that led over a set of railroad tracks and down toward the river. He followed the road until they reached a boat ramp, got out, and opened the passenger door. He pointed the revolver at Bobby’s head. “Get out.”

Bobby said, “Is this where your mother lives?” Thinking, Damn, he’s going to kill me after all.

André said, “No. Get out.”

“What for? You don’t have to worry about me. I won’t say anything. What would your mother think?”

“I do not wish to burden my mother with your existence. Get out.”

“You’re not going to shoot me. You can’t shoot me. I can help you. You don’t know Barbaraannette like I do. I can help you get the money.”

“I am not going to shoot you. Get out.”

Bobby swung his legs out of the car. “She’s not gonna pay you, you know. You don’t know her. If she thinks you’re trying to make her do something, she just isn’t gonna do it. Especially if I’m dead.”

“I told you, I am not going to shoot you. I want you in the trunk.”

Bobby shook his head, leaning forward, staring at the ground. “No.” He could not get back into that trunk with its bloodstains, reeking of the dead boy, bouncing and dark. He said, “If you’re not going to shoot me, I won’t get in the trunk.” He cringed and raised his head. “That’s not what I meant.”

André lowered the revolver. “All right,” he said. “Tell me how I can get your wife to pay me the money.”

“Are you going to make me get in the trunk?”

“No.”

For a moment Bobby felt as if he was floating. “Thank you,” he said, gratitude flooding his thoughts. “You won’t be sorry. I’ll help you.”

André said, “All right. Tell me how I should approach your wife.”

Bobby nodded vigorously, trying to shake his mind into action. He did not really know what Barbaraannette would do. He hadn’t seen her in six years, and even when they’d been living together he hadn’t understood her. She was a woman, and he was able to work her like he could work any woman, but at the same time she was working him. It had been a very confusing time for Bobby, never knowing who was in charge, but being pretty sure it wasn’t him. He wished he understood why the hell she wanted him back. He wished he believed that she
did
want him back, and was not instead acting out some peculiar Barbaraannette fantasy that would end badly for him. Hell, it was
already
ending badly.

“Why do you think she called the police?” André asked. “We had an arrangement. I do not understand why she would do that.”

“I don’t know.”

“She offered a reward for your return. Why would she not simply pay me the money as I asked?”

Bobby let images of Barbaraannette flicker through his mind. “She could have lots of reasons. Mostly stubbornness.”

André produced an exasperated sputter. “It was my understanding that you had some special insights into your wife’s behavior. Maybe you would think better in the trunk.”

“Hold on. Let me think.”
Think!
When had Barbaraannette not done something he had wanted her to do? Too many outdated memories. He stared at André’s Hush Puppies, olive suede on wet gravel. “I wanted a pair of boots for my birthday one time. She was gonna buy me a pair of elk hide boots.” How had that gone? Bobby groped for a clear memory. “She said she would buy me the boots and then we had a fight…about something. She wouldn’t buy them. It was like,
bam,
one minute she’s going to buy me these boots and then it was screw you, Bobby, go buy your own damn boots.” He felt his face warming, getting pissed off all over again. “That was when I decided to buy the ranch in Wyoming. When I decided I’d had enough of her.”

“What are you saying?”

“Only things didn’t work out the way they were supposed to with the ranch, because I had to use part of the money to buy my own damn boots. And some other stuff I needed, too, and then to make it up I had to go to the casino.” He had almost done it, had been up a couple thousand dollars at the blackjack table, doubling down after his losers, steadily building his stack of hundred-dollar chips. Then he’d hit a string of bad hands. Dealer blackjack. Double down. Draw to a twelve, bust, redouble. Stick on eighteen, dealer hits for a twenty. Double double. He’d lost, what? Nine, ten hands in a row? He remembered the woozy feeling as the last of his money disappeared when he hit on a seventeen—hell, the dealer had a queen up, what was he supposed to do? Hit it and busted and it turns out the dealer had a seven down. Feeling as he walked out of the casino in his elk hide boots as if he’d swallowed twenty feet of cold, greasy chain.

André said, “Are you all right?”

Bobby swallowed. “I’m fine. I was just thinking about Barbaraannette.” Thinking about driving home and, careful not to wake her up, getting forty dollars and her cash card out of her purse and heading over to the bank and withdrawing her daily maximum of two hundred dollars, then waiting until after midnight and withdrawing another two hundred. Back to the casino, this time starting out conservative, betting twenty-five at a time. He was up to eight hundred when another wave of losses dragged him across the rocks. The second time wasn’t as bad, since he’d been pretty much numb going in.

“The only time I ever got anything from her was when I just took it.”

Home again, not saying a word as he slipped into bed. Did she know he was there? Maybe, maybe not. He’d lain awake for three hours, then finally got up and loaded his Jeep with fishing gear and threw the canoe up top and took off. He had a half gallon of mixed coins from Barbaraannette’s change jar, an Amoco credit card, and his anteater boots. The note he left behind read,
Went fishing. Love, Bobby.