A Gracious Plenty (17 page)

“Indeed,” the old man grunts. “He says you violated an agreement.”

“Mr. Livingston,” I say. “I haven’t violated a
thing
.” And I hold his gaze.

“Evidence?” he demands, and flattens his hand out to Phillips, though he continues looking at me.

“I’m sorry, sir,” Phillips replies. “The records office doesn’t open until eight.”

“Open the records office or I’ll have your languorous nuts with my next cup of coffee!” Mr. Livingston says. “Get me the evidence.”

Phillips flushes and leaves the room.

“You have to talk hard to these fellows if you want anything done,” he says, and he looks at me hard, reading my face.

“I can’t believe Leonard called you.”

“Why not? You requested it, didn’t you?” the old man asks. “Except for public niceties, Leonard and I haven’t spoken in months, so I’m certain he wouldn’t have done it otherwise.”

“He’s a fine officer,” I say.

“Leonard? Pshaw. Now, my
other
son, the one taken from me as a child,
he
was leader material, but Leonard … Hell, Leonard’s lucky he’s not a security guard by now.”

Phillips returns with a copy of the paper I signed just as Leonard arrives. The smoky door squeaks almost as fiercely as his shoes. He waves to me tersely and turns to his father.

“Father,” he says, and he straightens his belt.

“Leonard,” Mr. Livingston says, and nods, then turns away.

I can see that a cat’s been sleeping on Leonard’s pants, his backside furry and pale like the wild babies he took from my house. I’m wishing I could tell him before his father sees. On the desk, there’s Scotch tape, and he could lift the fur off with that, if he knew he was furry at all.

“Here you are, sir,” Phillips whispers, slipping the document into Mr. Livingston’s hand.

“Let’s see what we can do for you, Miss Nobles,” Mr. Livingston says. Then he takes the document to Phillips’s desk and sits down. He pulls out his glasses and studies it carefully. From behind my bars, I see Phillips wiping crust from his eyes, and Leonard standing with his shoulders pulled back so far, his bones vee out, in military fashion The door swings open again, and this time Reba Baker strolls in, a clear plastic bonnet pulled over her head and snapped beneath her chin. She’s holding and waving an envelope.

“Whatever her bail is, I’ve got it,” she says. “I’m here to get Finch out of jail.”

“This document’s not even legal,” Mr. Livingston spits. “Not to mention that she signed somebody else’s name—Lucy Armageddon. Who’s that? Maybe you’d better find out and put
her
in jail.”

Phillips flushes and Leonard drops his head.

Mr. Livingston stands up and marches to where Leonard waits. “You’re a
fine
officer, Leonard,” Mr. Livingston says. “A
fine, fine
officer,” and as he speaks, he’s pounding the letter into Leonard’s chest.

Meanwhile, Phillips hurriedly unlocks my cell, and I’m out of there before anybody has a chance to change his mind. I’m all the way over to the water fountain, near the exit.

“I’ve got
bail
!” Reba Baker declares, as though nobody heard her the first time.

I look over at Leonard, who is red-faced and sinking beneath his father’s wrath, and I hate him for being such a wimp about it. But I come to his defense just the same.

“Leonard didn’t draw up that document,” I announce. “Phillips did. And Phillips was the one who witnessed me signing it.”

Mr. Livingston gets all flustered and rubs at his nose, then returns, “But Leonard was the arresting officer.”

“You’re right about that. And he arrested me and handcuffed me and read me my rights just the way he was supposed to. But as soon as we got to the station, he got called away to an accident on Highway Nine,” I insist. “Phillips is the one who fingerprinted me and kept me here all night long, even though I asked to see the evidence. And isn’t he supposed to find me a free lawyer if I tell him I can’t afford one?”

Phillips shrinks off into the corner, and Mr. Livingston’s pale eyes follow him there.

“Boy, we gotta talk,” Mr. Livingston says, and heads his way.

“Excuse me,” Reba Baker says, “I’ve got bail.” She tugs at Mr. Livingston’s sleeve, but he shakes her off without seeming even to notice her.

“Reba,” Leonard tells her finally. “Ain’t no need for bail. We’re no longer holding Finch. There’s been a mistake.”

“I don’t know if you heard or not,” Reba tells me, “but the adult women’s Sunday school class has chosen you as our next project, Finch Nobles. We’re going to see to it that your spiritual needs are met so that you won’t feel the need to harass Lois Armour anymore. And if you
had
needed bail, we were ready to supply it.”

“Take me home,” I say to Leonard, and he grabs my elbow and leads me toward the door.

“Hold
it,”
Mr. Livingston calls, and Leonard jerks to a stop. “Your mother needs to be driven to the doctor this morning,” he says. “And as you can see, I’m busy talking with Phillips here about his career in law enforcement.”

“What time’s her appointment?” Leonard sighs.

“In half an hour,” Mr. Livingston says. “You’d better hurry.”

Leonard looks at me apologetically, and then Reba Baker steps up and volunteers to drive me home. She’s so cheerful, she makes me queasy. Nobody should be that cheerful early in the day—and certainly not at the jailhouse.

“My car’s just out here and ready,” she says.

“I’m sorry,” Leonard tells me. “My mother—she’s not well. You understand?”

“Yeah.”

“Come on, Finch,” Reba repeats, like she’s under a time constraint.

“Just a second,” I tell her.

I run back in to the desk, grab the Scotch tape, and pull off a couple of pieces. I offer them to Leonard, who’s already on the way to his car.

“A cat’s been sleeping on the legs of them pants,” I tell him. “On the back.”

He looks at me funny, and so I slap the tape to his ass and walk on over to Reba’s car. ’Cause I’m in no mood to walk the ten miles.

R
EBA DOESN’T TAKE
the highway. She says it’s too hard on her nerves to deal with more than one lane of cars driving in the same direction. She takes Route 5, which adds some time to our trip.

The beige Plymouth hiccups around curves and over hills, with Reba putting her foot on the gas pedal and then lifting it up, over and over.

Maybe I’m just looking hard for something to criticize. I don’t know how to feel about her sudden warmth toward me.

In the cassette player, there’s a tape of gospel music, blue-grass and whining, and for the first couple of miles, Reba sings along, trilling high with the tenor. I just lean my head back and study the ceiling, the way the thin beige fabric is sagging, the way Reba has secured it with thumbtacks. Then when the tape comes to an end, the cassette player spits it out, and it’s quiet in the car.

“I reckon you’re wondering why we chose
you
,” she says.

“No,” I answer. “I’ve got a pretty good idea.”

“Oh?” she asks.

“Best I can figure, you’re trying to buy your way to Heaven. So now that William Blott’s dead, you gotta find somebody else to win over to Jesus. And I might not be a drunk or a bum, but I’m probably the next-best thing,” I taunt. “Hell, you probably got even worse words for me than
drunk
or
bum
. I can’t think offhand of anybody you’d consider a harder case.”

“You’re not gonna ruin my happy spirit this day, Finch, so you can just quit trying,” she tells me. “
The Lord
has sent us to you.”

“Is that who I should thank?” I say snidely.

“Yes it is,” she replies. The woman doesn’t have an ounce of wit.

We cross over a bridge and drive through a place where the trees grow tall on either side of the road. Their branches form a canopy, and on this morning, with the rain just past ended, huge drops of water fall onto the windshield each time a breeze crosses. Splat, splat, and then the windshield wipers scrape across the glass with their dulled blades.

All I can think about is getting home, getting in the house and feeding the cats, getting out to the graveyard and picking up the limbs the trees lost in the rainstorm. I’ll probably have to rake, too. I’m already running late.

And then Reba gets behind a farm truck, heavy with tobacco and driving slower than I could run. We putter along, with me growing more impatient and Reba smiling at the windshield.

Finally, she begins talking with me again. “The reason we chose you, Finch, is because you are single-handedly driving Lois Armour crazy. Now, Lois has been sick for many years, but she’s grown closer to God and formed close ties with the church. And even though she can’t come worship with us, she’s an honorary member of our Sunday school class, and we visit with her each week, and we’ve come to love her and want the best for her.”

I listen.

“I’ll tell you a fact, too. She’s a marvelous woman who bears her cross without complaint. She lost her daughter and almost immediately lost her husband, who comes and goes, as you know. But now she’s got God in her life, and she’s doing so much better. Even as an invalid, she does volunteer work. She runs our phone tree. She organizes events for us, and I can’t tell you how important she’s been in all our lives. We all love Lois.

“So we decided, all of us, we decided to try to show you God’s love, in the hopes that you’ll stop pestering Lois Armour to death about her daughter.”

“Does this mean that you’ll sell my vegetables at the store?”

“No, it does
not
,” Reba answers. “That ain’t how God’s love works.”

“Will I have to be on TV?” I ask her.

“Most people like the idea of being on television,” Reba defends. “And besides that, it’s a good opportunity to give other congregations ideas about helping those in need.”

“I’m not in need,” I tell her.

“Oh, yes you are,” Reba says. “You’ve got a problem, and it’s already gotten you in jail. You’ve got a problem, and it’s natural that you’re denying it, but we want to help you, and God wants to help you.”

“I appreciate the ride,” I say. “And your offer to bail me out, too. But I think you better look elsewhere for your projects. Maybe Lois Armour would be a good project for you. I understand she’s having some trouble admitting that her daughter committed suicide. See, if she’d just admit what everybody else knows, then I could leave her alone.”

And I think for a second I might have finally shut Reba up. But I haven’t. It just takes her a while to reply.

“I’ll tell you a little secret,” Reba mutters nasty. “Lois Armour used to
be
one of our projects. Back when she suffered the loss of her daughter and she was still overwhelmed by the things of this world, the material things that mean nothing in the next life. But God changed Lois, and he can change you. The Lord works miracles every day.”

And I don’t reply to that. My head hurts from a night with too little sleep, and my eyes bag from a morning with too little coffee. And I don’t want to be rude to Reba or nice to Reba, either one. I just want to be done with Reba. But right before we get to my street, I hear this little click.

And then she turns left where she needs to turn right.

“Whoa,” I say. “Where’re you going?”

“I’m taking you out to breakfast,” she tells me, but she’s lying. She’s got that highness in her voice that tells me so.

“Come on, now,” I tell her. “Take me home.”

But she doesn’t. And when I try to open the door at a stop sign, I find that her Plymouth is one of those Venus’s-fly-trap cars where you can’t open the door unless you’ve got the driver’s seat, where all the controls are situated. When I try to roll down the window, nothing happens, either.

And then I get mad, shit-ass-mad, and I start cussing her and threatening her with kidnapping charges. But Reba just smiles and snickers, without giving me the common courtesy of her eyes.

When I finally shut up, she asks, “You like the locks?”

“How’d you get security locks on this ugly junk car?”

“Had them installed just for you,” she says, and I’m almost inclined to believe her.

“Where you taking me?”

“The ladies wanted to talk with you,” she says. “And after we bailed you out of jail, I think talking with us is the least you can do.”

“You didn’t bail me out. I was out already.”

“We’re going to Lois Armour’s house,” Reba says. “We’re going to help you take the first step toward healing the wounds.”

Reba turns into the alley, then drives right into the backyard, where the ladies are all waiting. They’re sitting in lawn chairs beneath two funeral tents—maybe because it’s raining or maybe to make fun of me. They’ve laid out tables like it’s a fancy occasion, and they’ve got a big banner hanging up over some back windows that says
WELCOME FINCH NOBLES
.

“Dear God,” I say.

“That’s right,” Reba answers. “He
is
dear.”

And they’re all wearing pantsuits or neat dresses. They’ve all got their hair teased up and sprayed tight. They’re all smiling to me and waving, like I’d be looking forward to having breakfast with them, like I’d be grateful for all they’ve done.

But when I get out of the car, I’m ready for them. I’ve got too much to do to have a party on a rainy morning with a bunch of old lady hypocrites.

“I thank you for sending the bail,” I announce, “but I didn’t need it. I was already out of jail when Reba arrived, and she’ll be giving you back all your money. Y’all have a good breakfast.” And I head for the gate. I’m not running, but I’m not exactly walking, either. And I’m not looking back.

I half-expect to be tackled by the preacher’s wife or a big bull deacon, but it’s Lois Armour who gets me—and with her words, too. She says, “If you got something to say to me, Finch, please come say it now while I got my friends around. ’Cause it tears me up when you do it and I’ve got no one with me.”

And I’m caught off guard—because she isn’t rude at all; she says “please.” She’s not what I expect, and before I even mean to, I’ve turned around to look at her.