Muletrain to Maggody Page 8

  “They’re making a movie,” he said, squeezing her hand so hard she winced. “Well, it’s more of a documentary, but there’ll be cameras catching every bit of it, and one of these days we can sit right here on the sofa and see it on television. Just imagine seeing me on television. The next thing you know, they’ll be asking me to be in some Hollywood extravaganza with Kevin Costner and Bruce Willis.”

  Gretchen yanked her hand free. “And that’s what I’m supposed to tell everybody on Saturday night when they ask where you are? This is my twenty-first birthday, Waylon. My parents bought a case of champagne and ordered a two-layer cake from a bakery. My cousins from Kansas City are coming, and my grandmother all the way from Peoria. But you’re going to be playing make-believe soldier in some Arkansas podunk, so you can’t bother to be at my party. It’s going to be the most humiliating moment of my life!”

  “Now, honey,” he said, “I’ve already promised to take you to Sir Sirloin on Sunday night. They have a fine salad bar.”

  “I don’t understand why you do this silly thing, anyway,” she said sulkily. “You’re a grown man, Waylon. You’ve got a full-time job and your own apartment. Why do you want to dress up and run around pretending you’re shooting people? The Civil War ended a long time ago. Why can’t you stop fighting it and let bygones be bygones?”

  Waylon sighed. “It’s a part of history that we shouldn’t forget.”

  “Why not? Abraham Lincoln freed the slaves and some Confederate general surrendered. Everybody went back home and got on with their lives. I’ll bet you ten dollars they didn’t all decide to put on their uniforms the next year and go reenact the battles for fun.”

  “Most likely not,” he conceded. “It’s just that when I join up with a unit to do a reenactment, I’m not just a salesman in a plaid jacket, offering coffee and doughnuts so I can sell mufflers. It’s life and death out there on the battlefield. It’s my chance to be a hero, if only for an afternoon. When the order’s given, I run forward, yelling like I was hell-bent. Maybe the comrade next to me falls, but I keep on charging the enemy line. All I can hear is cannon fire and screams. The smoke gets thicker, but I don’t falter unless I’m supposed to take a hit. When I do, I lie there knowing that I gave my best to defend the Union and everything it stands for.”

  “Do you want me to go with you so I can sing the national anthem while you writhe on the ground like the snake my father killed with a shovel this morning?”

  Waylon most certainly did not want Gretchen to come with him for the reenactment of the Skirmish at Cotter’s Ridge. Some of the guys brought their girlfriends along, but he had an agenda. Several years back, when he’d made deliveries for his uncle’s appliance business, he’d been in all sorts of little towns in northern Arkansas, including Maggody.

  There he’d met a woman that he still dreamed about, especially when the weather turned warm and he could sleep out on the porch and savor the hint of honeysuckle in the breeze. Nothing had happened between them, but he’d seen the gleam in her eyes when she’d tilted her head and smiled at him. Remembering the intensity of the electricity between them still gave him a pleasant tingle.

  Had she been dreaming of him, too?

  5

  The creatures might have been stirring all night on Cotter’s Ridge, but I’d nodded off during a particularly silly movie and slept without disturbing dreams. Long about ten o’clock on Sunday morning, I ate a bowl of cereal, crammed my dirty clothes into a couple of pillowcases, and went over to the Suds of Fun Launderette (a misnomer if ever there was one) so that I could kick off the week with clean underwear in case I ended up in the emergency room.

  Or the morgue, courtesy of a cannonball.

  As usual, I lacked an adequate number of quarters and was obliged to argue with Bateyes Buchanon until she gave me change. Once I had several machines chugging along merrily, I used the last quarter to call the old folks’ home.

  “Is Miss Pimilco there?” I asked.

  “She don’t come in until noon. This is Shirlee.”

  I told her who I was, then said, “Has Petrol shown up?”

  “Not exactly.”

  “What does that mean? Did he stop by for a moment to wave from the parking lot, or did you find a few body parts on the porch and now you’re waiting for the rest of them to turn up before you patch him back together?”

  Shirlee gasped. “Oh, nothing like that, Chief Hanks. His niece called yesterday evening to say she was taking him to stay with her in Drainard for a few days. She was as sweet as could be, and apologized for not telling us the plan. As far as I’m concerned, she can take him to China on one of those real slow boats.”

  “Did you get her name?” I asked.

  “No, I don’t recollect that she told me. I got to get back to work now. Miz Pimlico will be back afore too long if you want to talk to her. Have a nice day.”

  I replaced the receiver, bought a soda and a bag of chips from Bateyes, who reluctantly tore herself away from a tabloid long enough to slap down change, and then settled in to wait. Which is mostly what I did in Maggody, with a few notable exceptions. I gazed at the washing machines, numbly watching the sudsy water swirl like eddies in Boone Creek.

  I’d thought long and hard about Jack Wallace, but had arrived at no conclusions. For all I knew, he was engaged, re-married, planning to enter the priesthood, or awaiting sentencing on a felony conviction. Then again, available men were hard to find in Maggody, or even in Stump County. I’d had a few romantic entanglements since I’d come home to brood, but none of them had lasted. Ruby Bee and Estelle were convinced that all I needed was a new hairstyle and a positive attitude. Maybe they were right, God forbid.

  I was stuffing sodden jeans into dryers when Joyce Lambertino came into the launderette.

  “I got to tell you something,” she began, then noticed Bateyes’s sharp look and dragged me behind the broken pinball machine. “Larry Joe saw something up on Cotter’s Ridge last night.”

  “Like Raz’s still?”

  Joyce shook her head so vehemently that her ponytail nearly slapped me in the face. “No, Arly, and you got to listen to me. I told him he ought to track you down and tell you hisself, but he’s too embarrassed.”

  I removed her hands from my shoulders. “How did you know I was here?”

  “I called Ruby Bee, looking for you, and she said Eula Lemoy saw you carrying your dirty laundry down the steps from your apartment. We figured out you most likely weren’t going to church, what with you being an atheist and all.”

  “And carrying dirty laundry.”

  “That, too,” Joyce acknowledged with a faint smile.

  “Don’t you want to know what Larry Joe saw last night? I swear, he was shivering like a wet dog when he came stumbling into the house. I couldn’t get a word out of him until he’d gulped down a big ol’ glass of bourbon.”

  “What did he see, Joyce?” I asked patiently, prepared to hear about fornicating bears or albino wildcats.

  She glanced at Bateyes, who apparently found us more interesting than celebrity exposés and singing cows. “A ghost,” she whispered. “He swears he saw a rebel soldier slinking through the trees. He said the figure was all shadowy, but he could make out the gray uniform, gold braid, and squashy hat.” She grabbed my shoulders before I could make a prudent retreat. “Do you think maybe all this business about the lost gold has stirred up the private what stashed it there all those years ago? He could have been resting in his grave, all peaceful like, and then realized he had to come back and retrieve it before the Yankees got it.”

  I pretended to give her theory some consideration as I once again freed myself from her grip. “Let’s think this through, okay? Half the town’s determined to find the gold, and it’s possible that outsiders have heard the legend, too. The ridge could have been a busy place last night, for all we know. Larry Joe might have seen someone in a gray sweat-shirt and a gimme cap, or he might have seen a glint of moonlight on a scrub pine and let his
imagination go wild. You do remember when he claimed to have seen Bigfoot in your backyard, don’t you?”

  “That was unfortunate, but you have to keep in mind that all kinds of folks were seeing aliens and flying saucers. Larry Joe wasn’t the only one that got all het up. I seem to recall that Ruby Bee saw a shiny silver alien walking on water.”

  “Look, Joyce, there’s not much I can do about whatever Larry Joe thinks he saw last night. If it was indeed a ghost, then it vaporized when the sun came up.”

  She gave me a disappointed look. “I just thought you’d want to know.”

  “I’ll write up a report,” I said, wondering if I had a form for spectral trespassing. “As long as Larry Joe stays off the ridge, he should be safe. I gather he didn’t find anything of more substantial value?”

  “No, about all he did was twist his ankle and pitch face-first in a patch of poison ivy. He said there’s no way on God’s green earth that anyone’s going find the cave.” She looked at her watch. “Gosh, I’d better get going. Larry Joe said he’d get the kids ready for church, but I can’t trust him. I’ve been waiting six weeks for him to do something about the leak under the kitchen sink. There are days, Arly, when I envy you being single and as free as a butterfly. You can just up and leave whenever you want. Myself, I’ve always wanted to see the Eiffel Tower. The closest thing I’ve seen is the water tower on the hill next to the airport in Farberville. Not exactly the same.”

  She left, leaving me to consider how sorry I ought to feel for myself, having seen the Eiffel Tower on several occasions but never the water tower. I returned to the business of transferring my laundry to dryers. Half an hour later I was folding towels when Hizzoner came storming into the launderette.

  “I thought I told you to find Petrol,” he said.

  “I found out where Petrol is,” I said evenly. “That should be close enough.”

  “Well, it ain’t. I called out to the old folks’ home and they gave me some shit about how he’d gone off with a niece. Petrol may have nieces and nephews from here to Kalamazoo, but not one of them’s likely to invite him for a visit. Why would anyone let him into their house, ferchrissake? If he was to set foot in the SuperSaver, I’d throw his ass off the loading dock and make book on how high he bounced off the gravel.”

  “You’d do that to your beloved kinfolk?”

  Jim Bob’s eyes narrowed. “I don’t need any smartass remarks from you, Chief of Police Hanks. Just find him.”

  “You planning to put him up in your guest room?”

  “No, I ain’t planning to put him up in any fuckin’ guest room!” Jim Bob noticed the rapt expression on Bateyes’s face and lowered his voice to a less-than-endearing snarl. “You get him back to the old folks’ home by five o’clock this afternoon or you’ll find yourself applying for a job at the poultry plant.”

  “Probably not that,” I said as I resumed folding towels. “I might fill out an application to be a chambermaid at the Flamingo Motel, though. Drop by and I’ll tickle your nose with a feather duster.”

  Jim Bob left. I stacked my laundry, nodded to Bateyes, and went back to my apartment. No Yankees attempted to ambush me as I crossed the road, nor did any grayish hazes await me inside. I would have liked a cappuccino, a croissant, and a copy of the Sunday New York Times, but settled for instant coffee and the usual pols and pundits on the morning talk shows.

  I was not pleased when the telephone rang, but, as I may have mentioned, I rarely was.

  “Yes?” I said into the receiver.

  Ruby Bee’s sniff was not hard to recognize. “Well, forgive me for being your mother. I just called to say I’m gonna be closed today so Estelle and I can go into Farberville. She wants to look at handbags at Wal-Mart.”

  I’d been planning to mosey over in an hour or so for meatloaf, mashed potatoes, crowder peas, turnip greens, and biscuits drowned in cream gravy. “Wal-Mart?”

  “You got a problem with that? I don’t reckon we can go shopping on Fifth Avenue, can we?”

  “No, I guess not,” I said, “but it’s not like you to close the bar and grill to search for the perfect handbag.”

  “You don’t think I deserve a break? You ain’t over at the PD, waiting in case there’s an accident or a burglary or something. You don’t have any problem lolling around all day watching TV.”

  “Is something wrong? Is Casper the Friendly Confederate pointing a musket at you and forcing you to make this call?”

  “So Joyce tracked you down. It sounds to me like Larry Joe found a stash of Raz’s hooch, but I told her she might as well tell you what he said. Maybe you should go up on the ridge this afternoon and have a look for yourself. Now that I think about it, that’s a right fine idea.”

  I did my best not to sound exasperated. “No respectable ghost is going to be wafting in and out of caves at this hour. The ridge may be more crowded than Wal-Mart this afternoon, but I have no intention of greeting treasure hunters as they go by with trowels and shovels. I’m sure Raz will do that in his inimitable way if any of them get too close to his still or start poaching Marjorie’s acorns.”

  “I still say you should go up there,” said Ruby Bee. “I’ll fix you up with some ham sandwiches, pickles, chips, and a slice of pie. It’s a nice, sunny day, and Estelle was saying only yesterday that you looked a little pale. Fresh air would do you a world of good. You don’t want to look sickly when that filmmaker shows up again, do you?”

  “That’s hardly your concern, is it?”

  Ruby Bee sniffed again. “So do you want me to fix you a picnic lunch or not, Miss Snippety Britches? You can look like you live in a root cellar if that’s what you want.”

  Since I wasn’t going to get a proper meal and had no desire to spend the afternoon in my claustrophobic apartment, I said, “That would be very nice, Ruby Bee. Shall I come over in half an hour or so?”

  “Don’t bother. I’ll fix it right now and leave it on your bottom step as soon as Estelle gets here.”

  “Are you trying to get rid of me?”

  “Now why would I want to do something like that?” she said with just a tad too much indignation to be credible. “I’m worried about you, that’s all. A nice afternoon outdoors will put some color in your cheeks. Don’t come back till suppertime.”

  “Okay.” After I hung up, I went into the bathroom and peered at myself in the mirror, almost expecting to see a reflection that suggested anemia—or terminal consumption. A little pale, maybe, and with slight discoloration under my eyes. I did not, however, resemble the result of a botched embalming job. I wasn’t wearing lipstick, but I never did when washing clothes at the launderette. There had been a period in my life when I’d dressed fashionably and spent an hour on my face and hair before heading downtown to the Museum of Modern Art for lunch in the garden, followed by a leisurely exploration of quaint art and antiques galleries. A gin and tonic in a hotel on Park Avenue South, along with genteel yet fiercely competitive chatter.

  I grabbed a couple of magazines and a paperback book that looked intriguing, went downstairs where I found a bulging sack that could sustain me for a week, and drove out to one of my favorite haunts on the banks of Boone Creek. If I was overcome with giddiness, maybe I’d roll up my snippety britches and go wading.

  Lottie, Eula, and Elsie stared at the Headquarters House. The sign posted on the door made it clear that it was open only on Saturdays until Memorial Day, unless private tours were arranged in advance.

  “Well, I never,” Elsie huffed. “This is disgraceful, not admitting folks every day. What if somebody had driven all the way from Des Moines to learn about the Battle of Farberville, and then sees this sign?”

  Eula, who was seated in the back, leaned over Elsie’s shoulder. “Didn’t Harperlee Buchanon move to Des Moines after her husband was convicted of bigamy the third time?”

  Lottie parked in a corner of the small lot and shut off the engine. “I don’t think we need to concern ourselves with Harperlee just now, Eula. Our m
ission is to acquire the journal.”

  “So we can find the gold,” Elsie added cheerfully. “The first thing I’m going to buy is one of those satellite dishes. My second cousin Ramona sez there’s all manner of cooking shows twenty-four hours a day. I might just find myself with a wok.”

  “A what?” said Eula.

  “A wok.”

  “That’s what I just said. You have no occasion to be rude, Elsie McMay.”

  “And you have no business leaving your hearing aid in your bedside table drawer, Eula Lemoy.”

  “What?”

  Lottie was eyeing the house. “I wonder if the doors and windows aren’t a little bit flimsy after a hundred and fifty years. We might just be able to slip inside and fetch the journal.”

  “Slip inside?” echoed Elsie. “Don’t you mean break inside? That’s a crime, and I for one ain’t a criminal. I can just hear myself calling my sister from the jail and asking her to bail me out. What’s more, there are a lot of unsavory folks in jail, like bikers with tattoos and prostitutes with brassy red hair and skin-tight leather shorts. I have no intention of makin’ their acquaintance, thank you very much. I have been teaching Sunday school classes at the Assembly Hall for thirty years. I wouldn’t know what to say to ’em.”

  Lottie continued assessing the window frames. “We’re not going to commit some terrible crime, Elsie. All we’re going to do is borrow the journal long enough to study it for clues. We’ll put it back exactly where we found it, and no one will be the wiser. There’s a big difference between stealing and borrowing.”

  “There’s not a big difference between misdemeanors and felonies,” muttered Elsie, who watched police dramas, including reruns at all hours of the night. “We could end up doing ten years for breaking and entering.”

  Eula’s lips began to quiver. “I think we ought to leave.”