South of Superior (26 page)

Most of the people on the Bensons' side were younger, better off. The old-timers, the old ways of looking at the world, were being pushed out. It was the end of an era, a way of life, a whole culture. But even as Madeline had these thoughts she had to admit that it wasn't just a matter of old versus new, it wasn't that simple. It was a matter of philosophy. Some people had a sense of humor and proportion and some people didn't, and this trait was scattered on both sides of the divide.

McAllaster had never noticed the Great Depression, Arbutus had told her one day, because everyone was dirt poor and half-starved, only they didn't know it. It had always been that way and everyone was the same. But it was different now. Some people had managed to make a little money, just enough for it to go to their heads. Madeline recognized Edith Baxter and Tracy York on the Bensons' side, and the county sheriff, and a few others whose names she'd never learned. And on the old-timers' side were some newcomers besides herself.

The Bensons were sitting in the front. Terry wore a flowered dress with a white lace collar, and Alex was dressed in tan pants and a polo shirt. They looked smug and self-righteous to Madeline. She supposed she looked the same to them. She'd put on her good slacks and a sleeveless white blouse with a shirred front, and had dug out her good leather sandals. Arbutus was wearing her new pink shirt again, with a pale pink skirt and white old-lady loafers. She had put two spots of rouge on her cheeks. Gladys was the most sober of them, in a navy skirt with a white blouse buttoned to the neck, and a small black hat pinned (pinned!) to her head.

She gave a nod of curt acknowledgment to the Bensons and slid into the bench opposite the aisle from theirs. The Bensons leaned together and whispered to each other, but Gladys didn't take any more notice of them. Arbutus plunked down with an
oof
, and Madeline brought Up the rear. Gladys had carried her purse in—square, covered with dull black taffeta, with a silver clasp that wouldn't snap shut any longer—and held it in her lap with both hands. Madeline wished she had something to hold. She fidgeted, and coughed, and coughed again, wondering if she was getting a summer cold. Gladys gave her a quelling look and fished in her purse for something, then handed a cherry lozenge in a waxed-paper wrapper across Arbutus's lap.

There was a murmur in the room when the judge walked in. He was tall and thin with thick white hair and looked like what might have been called a ladies' man in his day. After a moment, the day's hearings began. Madeline hadn't realized there would be others ahead of them.

The first complainant was a landlord who couldn't get any money out of his renter. The man was three months behind and the landlord wanted to evict him, but the man had three kids and so he hadn't been able to do it. The man was dressed in grungy jeans and a faded Budweiser T-shirt. Yeah, he was behind, yeah, he had a job, yeah, he was getting some assistance, yeah, he'd try to do better. Things had been screwed Up lately. The man half hung his head and looked off into space rather than at the judge. The judge told him to catch Up the rent or he'd garnishee his wages. He slammed his gavel and held out his hand to the clerk for the paperwork in the next case.

It was a woman whose ex was behind on child support. She was a tiny person with long brown hair, wearing a dress that looked like it had come from the free box at a thrift store. She tipped her head so that her hair hid her face. The judge was gentler with her. How long since her husband had paid, how regular was he, how many children were there? She gave low, monosyllabic answers. The judge remained patient and Madeline wondered how he did it. He started asking harder questions, and it dawned on Madeline that he thought the guy was beating her Up and he wanted her to bring charges. He did all this in an almost kindly way that surprised her—kindly didn't seem to be his nature, exactly—but the woman refused to say, and finally he swore out a bench warrant for nonpayment and slammed his gavel.

It went on like this. Gladys didn't belong here. Madeline wished more than ever that she'd ignored Gladys's feelings and Used her hoarded money to pay off the bill.

 

 

At last the clerk announced,
“Benson's SuperValu
versus
Gladys Hansen in the matter of nonpayment of accounts.” Gladys took a quick deep breath. The judge read aloud from a sheet of paper he had in front of him, describing the case. In short, one Gladys Hansen had run Up a bill at the grocery store that she now refused to pay. “Mr. and Mrs. Benson, is that accurate?” he asked.

Terry Benson nodded, her face already red with emotion. “Yes. She hasn't paid a cent since—” The judge made a shushing motion.

“I Understand. Mrs. Hansen, do you feel this is accurate?”

Gladys rose from the bench, still clutching her purse. She stood very straight. “Almost. Not quite. May I say something?”

The judge motioned her forward. She felt very small standing on the floor below him, and he had to lean over to see her. “Come Up here,” he said. She climbed into the witness box. “You can sit down.”

“No thank you. If it's all the same to you, I'd prefer to stand.”

The judge made a face and shrugged. Gladys cleared her throat and began. “According to my figures, I owe the Bensons five hundred and thirteen dollars and seventy-two cents. They claim I owe seventy-five thirteen more than that, but I returned that last batch of groceries within two hours of getting them, and I will not agree to pay for those. There wasn't one thing missing from that bag, and not one thing opened, and not one thing harmed, I'll swear to that.”

“Returned them.”

“Yes.”

“And why did you return them?”

“Well. I stopped at Mabel Brink's on my way home and she told me that the Bensons had cut off people's credit. They cut them off without so much as a how-do-you-do or a five-minute warning, and there was no call for it. They were brand-new to town, they hadn't even been there a year yet, and they cut off people who—” Gladys was as angry now as she'd been that afternoon, and she had to stop talking. She pressed her lips hard together and shook her head. The judge leaned toward her.

“They cut off people who have had credit at that store for as long as they've been alive,” she finally went on. “And it wasn't right. I meant to let them know it wasn't. They can't just move in from away and change everything. There was just no call to cut off Randi Hopkins, with that child to take care of and she's just a child herself—”

“Randi Hopkins has got money to eat out any time she pleases,” Terry Benson burst out, “but never a dime to put down on her grocery bill! I have had to hound every payment I ever got out of her, and I'm tired of it. She can drink and party and go out, but she can't pay for her milk and cereal? I do
not
feel sorry for Randi Hopkins.”

Gladys saw Randi's cheeks turn red. Well, she'd made her bed, she'd have to lie in it. She would. Despite all her poor choices and flaws, Randi was one of them, a true native with that stone core that would withstand everything. She would grow Up one day.

“And you're just as bad,” Terry went on. “You've got assets, why should I have to carry your bill?”

Assets! Two decrepit old houses and one family heirloom hotel that they'd been pressuring her to sell. Assets. “Be that as it may. Randi is a child and she
has
a child. She was born and raised here and so were her parents and grandparents, she's not some fly-by-night passing through.”
Like you
, she meant, and Terry saw that she meant it, and Gladys was glad. “We have a responsibility. I guess that makes me old-fashioned but that's what I think.”

Terry snorted. “That's a bunch of—”

“Ladies.”

Gladys looked over at the judge and nodded, to agree with him that things were getting out of hand. “Mabel told me they'd cut off Emil Sainio too—”

Alex Benson said, “He's an old drunk.”

Gladys gazed at them with contempt and severity. “Emil Sainio's personal life is not your business.”

“He buys enough liquor to pickle a horse every week!” Terry cried.

Gladys lifted her chin. “Emil is Emil. He is what he is, it's no business of yours.”

“Well I don't have to pay for his habit, and I won't!”

“How much does Emil owe right now?” Gladys asked, narrowing her eyes.

“That's not the point—”

“How much?” the judge asked.

“Nothing.” Terry flashed a sour look at Gladys.

“Nothing?” the judge asked with lifted brows.

“Someone sent in a payment, cleared out his bill the other day.”

“And how often does that happen?” Gladys asked, forgetting for a moment that she was not in charge of these proceedings.

Terry didn't answer.

“How often?” the judge said.

“Every few months, if he hasn't paid it himself,” Terry admitted, as sullen as a teenager. Which is all she was, really. An overgrown, spoiled child who never put herself in someone else's shoes, not even for a moment.

“That's right,” Gladys said. “Every so often somebody pays off Emil's bill, that's just how things are done, that's how things have always been done, and there was nothing wrong with it, no need to bring it all out into the light. You can afford to wait those few months, don't tell me you can't, and if you can't it's your own fault. Overextended, that's what you are. I've seen that new truck you're driving, those fancy bikes you bought your kids, the clothes you wear. You took a vacation over Christmas to Colorado.
Ski-ing
.” The Bensons' faces flushed with outrage. Well, too bad.

“My kids' bikes are none of your business,” Alex said.

“And if Emil has pickled his liver, that's
his
business, not yours. He's got a lot of friends. Somebody always pays.”

“That's not the point,” Terry said.

Gladys ignored this piece of nonsense. “And Mary Feather. Cutting her off, I never heard the like.”

“Old Mary Feather, she's still kicking?” the judge asked with a kind of wondering delight. “She's got to be older than God.”

“Well, not as old as that. She's not so much older than me, really. I guess she must be ninety, maybe a little more, I recall when she moved Up to McAllaster—”

The judge closed his eyes, clearly losing interest, and Gladys hurried on.

“Mary helped me out when times were hard, just like she's helped a lot of people. Lots of people found fish on their doorstep when they needed it. She never made any fuss about it. Fish, berries, syrup, whatever she had she gave it. Maybe that's why she's got almost nothing today.”

“How much did Mary owe?” the judge asked Terry Benson.

“Over a thousand dollars. We let it go and go.”

“It was over the winter!” Gladys cried. “You know she can't make any money in the winter, about everything she has comes in the summer, off the syrup and the berries and the fish she sells, and since you won't buy that now, she's got to try and peddle it herself, and she couldn't half of last summer. She was in the hospital with the bronchitis, you know that! And you know very well she'd have paid as soon as she could. Mary's the proudest woman ever born and she's as good as her word, and you go and make her out to be some kind of
thief
.”

“Mrs. Hansen.”

“It's the truth.”

“This has all been most interesting. But I'm bringing this back to your bill. Am I to Understand you admit to owing the Bensons over five hundred dollars?”

“Five hundred and thirteen dollars and seventy-two cents. They say I owe seventy-five thirteen more but I don't.”

“Because you returned those groceries.”

“That's right. And I don't feel I should have to pay for them and I
won't
pay for them, stick me in jail if you have to.”

“Heh,” the judge said, as if this was funny, but not very. He made a tent of his fingers. After a long pondering moment he said, “I guess I agree with you.”

“Hold on a minute!” Alex Benson shot Up from his pew. The judge fired him a warning look, which he ignored. “We've acted in complete accordance with every law!”

“You've acted like a couple of jackasses. Lay off the old ladies and be happy you're getting your five hundred dollars.” He slammed his gavel down and wiggled his fingers to the clerk, wanting the next file.

“Thank you.” Gladys couldn't help feeling smug. She set her purse Up on the rail in front of her and fished out a large manila envelope. “Since I've said my piece and you've agreed about those returned groceries, I'd like to pay off my bill, right here in the presence of witnesses, because between you and me, I don't trust those people any further than I could throw a sack of cement.”

“You want to pay them now, this minute?”

“If I may.”

He shrugged and made a motion with his hand as if to say,
Knock yourself out
.

Gladys removed a wad of cash from the envelope and set it with care Up on the podium, then dumped the envelope Upside down to catch the change that clattered out: the seventy-two cents. She clutched the change in one hand, gathered the wad of bills in the other, and made her way down from the witness box and across the room to stand in front of the Bensons and pay them in front of God and everyone. She heard John Fitzgerald chuckle and Randi say, “You go, girl.” Mabel Brink clapped her hands together twice and a buzzing murmur of disapproval rose from the Bensons' side of the courtroom. Arbutus and Madeline sat with their faces aglow, grinning like simpletons. Gladys gave them a little wink and then crossed the room to count five hundred and thirteen dollars and some-odd change out to the Bensons in ones and fives and tens.