Land of a Hundred Wonders (6 page)

“Fine, but ya best be careful,” I warn. “He looks at you with a lot of lust, ya know.”

“Oh he does, does he?” she says, still snotty sounding.

“Yes, he does. In fact, I bet LeRoy wouldn't mind one bit gob-blin' you up whole,” I say, swinging myself into the saddle. “Just like he does one a Miss Florida's pies.”

Miss Jessie rests her hand on my knee, a mushy look coming into her eyes. “You and I both know that I already have feelin's for somebody, and that somebody is
not
Sheriff Johnson.”

“I perceive that you are hot for Grampa,” I say, gathering up my reins.

She gives Peaches a sharper than normal slap on the rump and says, “Well,
I
perceive this conversation has just drawn to a close. Git.”

“Sometimes he calls out your name in his sleep,” I say, steering out of the coolness of the barn into the muggy heat.

Miss Jessie chases me down. “What'd ya just say?”

“I said you are hot for Grampa.”

“No, after that. Something about your grandfather callin' out my name in his sleep?”

I don't recall saying anything of the sort. “Are ya feelin' all right, Miss Jessie? As you well know, I have been trained in basic Red Cross. Maybe you're havin' a heatstroke. Are ya seein' stars? Do ya . . . well, speak of the devil.” I point over her shoulder at the Grant County Sheriff car that's speeding up her drive. (Considering our previous conversation, him showing up like this doesn't look too good for her. Makes her look
Culpable: Blameworthy
, don'tcha think?)

“What in tarnation does he want?” Miss Jessie says, flushing flamingo.

“He wants to gobble you up—”

“Hush,” she says out of the corner of her mouth as the car comes sliding to a stop next to the barn.

Watching the sheriff walk our way, I think about how he's always reminded me of a past-prime peach. With fuzzy orange hair on top and all over his arms, and while not exactly fat, he
is
real mushy around the middle. “Afternoon, Miss Jessie,” he says to her with so much lust in his eyes it's practically squirting out. “Miss Gibby.”

I say, “Good afternoon,” but what I
want
to say is—it was until you showed up anyway, you rancid bully—and am real proud of my restraint.

“Like they say, two heads are better'n one. Got time to sort out Buster's disappearance with me, Jess?” he asks, offerin' his arm.

“Pardon me, Sheriff,” I butt in, because Almighty God, the memory of finding that dead body this morning has just floated back into my mind! “Would ya know if Mr. Buster Malloy was well known for his swimmin' ability?” I will need this information for my awfully good story, because even though Mr. Buster wasn't drowned, but punctured in the chest and messed up in the neck, it would be an interesting background fact. I wish I had my blue spiral with me. I should be getting this down.

The sheriff, putting up a nice front for Miss Jessie, says to me in the dearest of voices, “And for what purpose would you be wantin' to know that information?”

“For the article I will be writin' about him once he turns up dead, ya big asshole.”

“Gib!” Miss Jessie shouts, givin' me the cut-throat sign. (That's
her
secret code to warn me I'm cursing.)

The sheriff is waitin' on me to, but I won't give him my deepest of apologies, I won't.

“Well, now,” he says, removing his mirrored sunglasses. “Guess ya got ahold of some bad information, Miss Gibby. Mr. Malloy is not dead. He's missin', is all.”

I coulda corrected him, even mentioned that I got pictures of that dead man sitting in the camera that's inside my briefcase that's under those bushes in front of the barn, but I don't. Because at last summer's Cray Ridge Days, where there were running contestsand buffet food, I overheard the sheriff remark to his deputy, “That McGraw girl's gotta be dumber than anthracite coal.”

“Stay on the path,” Miss Jessie calls to me as she and the sheriff head toward a shaded picnic table and a pitcher of sweet tea. I guess to put their two heads together and I hope that's all. “Like always, Gib, turn back when I ring the come-and-get-it bell.”

“Turn back when I hear the bell. Got it,” I say, heeling Peaches in the ribs.

Now, even though I am 100% lovable with mostly Christian thoughts, as I enter the backwoods, I'm gonna have to confess to thinking: Mr. Buster Malloy is too dead. And when I solve that murder and publish that story, by next week Friday, everybody in town will be reading the front page of
Gibby's Gazette
, their admiration piercing through the clouds and landing square in my mama's heart. We'll see then who is dumber than anthracite coal, Sheriff LeRoy Johnson. We'll just see about that. Ya big asshole.

Mr. Charles Michael Murphy

It's not until after I come in the cottage back door and set the egg basket down on our kitchen table that I realize that me and Keeper have come home without my black leather-like briefcase. I left it in the bushes back at Tanner Farm. “Doggone it,” I shout, indecent mad at myself for forgetting.

“Where you been?” Grampa calls in a persnickety voice from the screened-in porch. He can get like that when he wakes up from a nap. “I just got off the phone with Jessie. She said you left more'n an hour ago.”

“I . . . I . . .” I remember the lousy look Sheriff Johnson gave me when Miss Jessie went to retrieve my egg basket for me. I also recall Keeper yapping at snoring Sneaky Tim Ray when we snuck around him in the woods. But then . . . oh my goodness.

I will not tell Grampa. He'll only get red in the tips of his ears.

Like I mentioned earlier, I usually don't keep secrets from him, but in one of the chapters of
The Importance of Perception in Meticulous Investigation
, Howard Redmond states quite firmly that oftentimes, in the midst of an ongoing investigation, one must endeavor to conceal certain facts, so one might have to
Prevaricate: Stray from the truth
. Even from our loved ones if necessary. (For their own protection, you understand.)

“I went over to Miss Lydia's,” I lie, stepping out to the porch. Grampa's perched on the edge of the flowered wicker sofa. Rumpled up. “Please don't get mad.”

Well, for godssakes, this is so UTTERLY discouraging. Why didn't I tell him I stopped by to see Reverend Jack at the Methodist church? Or bed-ridden-with-lumbago Nellie Wilson? Ya know, someone who'd make me look all saintly. Not someone like Miss Lydia, who's got squirrel skulls hanging off her trees that clang together when a storm's coming and make a much better sound than you can ever imagine. Not someone who Grampa despises.

Straightening up, Grampa shoves out through the screened door, letting it slam hard behind him. “I told ya time and time again to stay away from Lydia,” he shouts back at me. “
And
Hundred Wonders.”

Wish I could admit what I really did was go back to check on Mr. Buster Malloy's dead body on Browntown Beach. (The flies have gotten to him some.)

Not wanting to, because when he gets tempered like this, being around him's 'bout as much fun as batting a hornets' nest, I follow him out to our matching wood chairs on the lawn. I keep a stack of flat rocks under mine to use on perfecting my skimming skills. The lake's green and smooth as a chalkboard. Baby waves making their way through the cattails, always a fine place to catch pollywogs. And the cicadas are calling to one another from the woods, sounding as desperate as I'm feeling. “Those goddamn fish bitin' today?” I ask him.

“You're wanderin' off the subject
and
you're cursin',” he says, yanking his knife out from the leather sheaf that hangs from the tulip tree. Being a well-known whittler, Grampa was once asked by a museum in New York City to bring his figures up there for a show of folks art. I was about crushed flat when he told them, “I'd rather be skinned alive and pulled behind a buck-board of runaway horses.” I'd been hoping to have lunch with Mr. Howard Redmond. I had a few questions for him about:
Surveillance
.

“Why don'tcha want me to spend time with Miss Lydia?” I ask, cocking my wrist and letting loose with a skimmer. “She was Mama's best friend.”

“How many times we gotta go over this?” Grampa says, slicing hard on the donkey figure he's promised me for my birthday.

“Can we go visit Daddy's grave one of these days?” He's not buried alongside Mama and Gramma Kitty. He's Up North with his people. “I'd like to show him a coupla my best articles.”

Grampa quits his stroking. Breathes in the aroma of the sweet-smelling roses that surround the cottage this time of year. “No.”

I have asked Miss Lydia time and time again to have a VISITATION with Daddy like she does Mama, but she gets so agitated when I bring him up. Like Grampa, she harbors horrible feelings toward Daddy. I perceive that's because the both of them hold him responsible for causing the crash since he's the one that was driving. But I don't blame Daddy. I got a memory of him building me a soapbox derby car that he painted #1 on. “I've asked Miss Lydia to check and see if Daddy—”

“Lydia's off her head,” Grampa says, back to hacking at the wood with a lot of vigor.

“What do you mean by that exactly?” I cannot imagine why he says that. Miss Lydia is one of the most completely right in her mind folks that I know, but I don't say that to Grampa. He'd only get more cantankerous than he already is, or worse, give me his famous silent treatment.

“Lydia was never right again after she lost her boy.” As soon as Grampa says it, I can tell he wishes he could take it back.

“Where'd she lose him?”

“In the lake. He drowned.”

“But you lost a child, too, and you didn't go off your head,” I remind him, in case he's having another leaky memory moment.

“People'r different. Some can stand things. Some can't.” His knife on the pine goes
sha . . . sha . . . sha.
Wood commas are dropping at his feet. “If I lost you . . . ,” he says, so soft I can barely hear him.

“Now you're just bein' plain silly, Charlie. You won't ever lose me.” I inch my lawn chair closer to his. “You're well known for being extremely organized.”

“There is a world of danger out there, Gibby girl. Just like them cicadas, ya might think you got plenty of time to kick up your heels, and in fact, you got nuthin' of the sort.” I know he's remembering about my mama 'cause he's got that particular lilt to his voice that is more soulful sounding than Mr. Otis Reading.

“Just because I am
NQR
does not mean that I cannot take care of myself, ya know.” I fling my skimmer too hard and it sinks straight off.

Grampa shoves back on his cloud hair. His shoulders are wide, but he's lanky at the waist with hands that're full of hot grease scars. And he walks with a limp and a drag because of his fake leg, which must be hurting since he's been rubbing on where it's attached to his knee.

“Achin'?” I ask, setting my hand atop his.

“It's fine,” he says, dropping his mad. “How you been feelin'?”

“Good as g-o-l-d.” Wish I could, but I never bother telling him anymore how I
really
feel. He'd only say what he always says. 'Bout me learning to play the hand I was dealt. Or the other one he's started up with lately: “It's time for ya to accept the fact that you're gonna need to saddle up and ride harder than most.”

First off, I don't really enjoy card playing all that much, 'cept for the cribbage game Miss Lydia and me have every Wednesday morning after we pick flowers. And second off, I don't need to saddle up and ride hard. All I need to do is lope along. A nice easy pace. Giving me plenty of time to take in the scenery, just like Mama and I used to. Riding double, pressed together like one. A wildflower necklace lying warm against my neck. I know he's got my best interests at heart, but if I can be honest with you, my grampa's sort of a Gloomy Gus.

Resheathing his whittling knife that's so sharp I'm not allowed to go near it, he says, “Hungry?”

I listen in on my stomach. “Sounds like it.”

When the weather is warm like it is, at the time of day the crickets and frogs tune up, we eat grilled perch or trout or whatever else has not outsmarted him that afternoon out on the lake. Sometimes with jolly red tomatoes, and just-picked sweet corn that's still got that clumpy dirt smell, and maybe some churned ice cream for dessert.

“Already got the coals heated,” he says, heading toward the grill.

Upon hearing that, Keeper drops his stick at my feet, letting me know he's ready for his evening fetch and go. (This is his favorite hobby next to sucking eggs.) “Ready-set?” I shout, tossing his stick into the lake as far as I can, and when he brings it back, I throw it again, despite feeling awfully bad for loafing like this. What I should be doing is working on finishing up that Miss Cheryl and Miss DeeDee story so I can get busy investigating the murder of Mr. Buster. I cannot tolerate the thought of Mama chewing her fingernails about me.

“Chows up,” Grampa calls after a bit, walking our plates to the picnic table. “Wash your hands.”

After sliding them into the lake and wiping them off on my jeans, I sit down across from him at the table he made from scratch. The cornbread is warm, the catfish crispy. “The sheriff was at Miss Jessie's today,” I say, helping myself.

“Use your fork. What for?” he says, all of a sudden cranky again. Grampa does NOT care for LeRoy Johnson any more than I do. Says the man is a born and bred bully, same as his daddy and his daddy before him. And even though that's true, I also suspect that jealousy, sometimes known as the green-eyed lobster, might be rearing its ugly head tonight.