Madness In Maggody

15

The boys in the cab of the truck tumbled out like circus clowns, slapping each other on the back and whooping at the stunned crowd. With all the animation of zombies, those in the bleachers came out to the field and encircled the truck to get a better look at the very unhappy Lamont Petrel.

He was clad only in boxer shorts. The tar had been slathered on by a generous hand, as had the curly white chicken feathers.

I presumed the tar had been warmed only to the point of spreadability, in that it was lumpy and Lamont was not only alive but also not screaming about second- and third-degree burns. All in all, it was a rather impressive piece of work.

He spotted me. "I demand to file charges. This is quite intolerable and painful, not to mention humiliating. I want all of these vicious animals arrested at once."

"He's the one oughta be arrested," one of the boys jeered. "Rapist skunks deserve what they get."

"Yeah, that'll teach him to leave our women alone," said another.

I recognized the group from the Dairee Dee-Lishus-short the mutant Buchanon, who was suited up for the game and keeping a wary distance from me. "Glad to see you found Mr. Petrel at the Airport Arms Apartments," I said pleasantly. I know Hizzoner told you where to find the crazed rapist. I'm curious to know if he suggested the…costume, too."

"Hell, no," Jim Bob said, shaking his head in disbelief as he shoved through the crowd. "I didn't tell the shitheads to do this. All of you shitheads are fired! Don't even bother to come by for your paychecks. What'll they say at the closing in an hour? Jesus H. Christ, Lamont, you look about as stupid as a pig in a pinafore."

"Then get me out of here," Lamont said through clenched teeth. He scraped a lump of black goo off his cheek and flipped it off his finger. The stripe of white feathers down his back fluttered each time he moved; it fascinated the crowd, all of whom were rumbling and grumbling at each other.

"Not until we've cleared up a few things," I said. "As chief of police, I have an obligation to find out exactly what happened to our guest-and why." I looked at the boys and said, "The gentleman has been at the apartment since the grand opening almost a week ago. Precisely whom did he rape and when did he do it?"

"Heather Riley," the boys chimed in in unison, although not in the melodious style of the Vienna Boys Choir.

"Did he?" I said smoothly. "Why, look, here's Heather hiding behind Darla Jean McIlhaney. Why don't you come confront your attacker and give me enough information to arrest him? Come on, don't be shy, Heather. There's no point in not repeating what every last person in town already knows." Lamont watched as the blond girl came forward. "I've never seen her in my life! I sure as hell didn't attack her. How can I have raped her if I've never even seen her?"

Heather approached me with a pleading look. "Maybe I was confused," she whispered. "Maybe I was so traumatized that I didn't remember exactly what all happened."

"But, Heather," Darla Jean said, running up to put her arm around her friend's trembling shoulder, "you did remember his name and face. You told me all about it in your bedroom. You told me how he held you down and ripped your clothes off and hurt you real bad, and then how you ran screaming into the street and barely escaped being run down by a truck. It couldn't have been more than a couple of days ago when you told me how you cried out for Beau to save you from this here monster."

"What the hell is she talking about?" Lamont demanded, the whites of his eyes in sharp contrast with the smeary blackness of his face.

The most verbal of the boys hitched up his jeans and gave the crowd a self-satisfied grin. "When I heard it, I decided to teach this no-good sumbitch not to mess with my woman. Us boys dragged him out of the whore's apartment and kept him busy all night long, dint we? He ain't gonna bother anyone for a long while."

"They're maniacs," the purported sumbitch howled. "Arrest them."

"If'n he raped the girl, he oughta be shot," someone from the crowd muttered. This proved to be a popular sentiment, and I had to shout to make myself heard.

"Shut up! This is a farce. If all of you weren't so ready not only to believe what you hear but also to expand upon it for your own amusement, this sort of thing wouldn't get out of hand. Heather, what happened when you interviewed to be a SuperSaver cheerleader?"

"Jim Bob put his hand on my knee."

"Anything else?" I said, turning on all my wattage.

She looked at her feet. "No, nothing else. It just bothered me, so I told Miss Estes. The next thing I hear is this big story of how I was raped. I…I, uh, got confused."

We all turned to Jim Bob, who was as miserable as the girl and kicking up a decent-sized cloud of dust. "I was showing her how long the miniskirt was. I distinctly remember saying that the skirt would come to her knee."

The leader of the pack didn't look much happier, but he managed a cocky voice. "Oh, well, the sumbitch probably raped somebody else. Most likely that whore. That's why the FBI's after him."

"No," I said, "the FBI's not after him, and he and the woman were friends. Cherri Lucinda Crate was nice enough to pick him up outside the supermarket and take him back to unit number twelve of the Airport Arms. Lamont wanted to make Jim Bob sweat, and he was doing a fine job of it until the supermarket reopened Monday afternoon. That was most annoying, because it meant all that wonderful ill will he'd stirred up with the tamale-sauce episode might be assuaged and Jim Bob might be less inclined to sell to an outfit in Texas."

I had everybody's attention except for Mrs. Jim Bob, who looked as if she might attack her husband-but not with amorous intent. She sidled over to Brother Verber and began to hiss at him.

Jim Bob was breathing so loudly we could hear it, and he clenched his fist as he glared at the cartoonish skunk in the bed of the pickup truck. "Then he dumped stuff in the tamale sauce? Is that what I just heard?"

I nodded. "He had a key, so it wasn't much of a challenge to return to the deli Friday night and dump several ounces of ipecac in the quart of sauce. He'd even jotted down the quantity in his notebook so he could calculate how many bottles of ipecac to use. Monday night was more of a challenge, because Buzz Milvin and Kevin were supposed to be there all night and Lamont didn't want to surface quite yet. He was obliged to watch the store from the shadows of the bar and grill until he saw Jim Bob arrive to pick up the receipts. He went into his room at the Flamingo Motel and called Cherri Lucinda, who then called Jim Bob and invited him over for a…visit."

Everybody swung around to see how Mrs. Jim Bob was going to field this one, but she was so intent on her conversation with Brother Verber that it was hard to tell if she'd heard any of it. Disappointed, they looked back at me.

I was tempted to get on the bed of the truck so no one would miss a word. However, I opted for decorum, and merely raised my voice in hopes Mrs. Jim Bob would catch on. "The invitation was so vividly couched that Jim Bob told Buzz to take the deposits to the bank, then hopped in his car and drove to her apartment, not the least bit worried about leaving Kevin in charge of the supermarket."

"It was an interview," Jim Bob croaked. This created so much tittering and snickering that I had to wait a full minute before my audience settled down again.

"Whatever you say," I said graciously. "In any case, when Lamont saw Kevin go to the break room, he slipped into the store, using his key, to place the tampered packages on the display rack in hopes the store would be closed down again. It worked well."

Dahlia rumbled like the onset of an earthquake. "He put that stuff in the sponge cakes that made me sick? Him, the fellow in the tar and feathers? I don't care if he raped some girl or not-he deserves to be tarred and feathered and strung up from a tree."

Again, a popular sentiment. Lamont was crouched down so low that we could barely see him, but we could hear his sputters of protest and piteous avowals of innocence.

"You mean," Jim Bob said, rather sputtery himself, "that Lamont did all this shit to make me sell the Jim Bob's SuperSaver Buy 4 Less? He put me through a week of nightmares and cold sweats so I'd belly-up like a trout in a sewage ditch?"

"And murdered Lillith Smew?" Ruby Bee said from behind me. "Just to make Jim Bob sell his share? Don't that seem kinda going overboard?"

"No, he didn't lace the package with a lethal pesticide," I said. "That, indeed, would have been going overboard. He just wanted to keep the pressure on Jim Bob right up to the time of the loan closing. Jim Bob would have been so frantic by then that he'd have been grateful for whatever offer he received for his share of the supermarket. I would imagine Lamont anticipated a fat finder's fee, along with his share, and-"

With a primitive howl born of generations of inbreeding, Jim Bob leapt onto the truck bed and swung wildly at Lamont. His fist stuck in a glob of tar, and he was frowning at it as Lamont shoved him over backward, jumped out of the truck, and ran with surprising agility through the parked cars and around the corner of the high school.

Jim Bob got to his feet, rubbed his tarred fist on his pants, and took off after Lamont. "What about the goddamn loan, you goddamn sumbitch?"

Heather's boyfriend started to follow, but I grabbed his arm and said, "Let him go. The sheriff's got half a dozen deputies waiting out front for him. He'll be charged with felonious assault on various folks' gastrointestinal systems, and we may be able to work out an interstate conspiracy charge that really will attract the attention of the FBI."

The entire scene lapsed into chaotic babbling, which was okay with me. As much as I enjoyed my fifteen minutes of fame, I still had business to attend to, and I dreaded it worse than anything I'd faced before. "What about the ball game?" Hammet said, tugging on the hem of my gawdy pink Flamingo shirt. "Kin we play now?"

I glanced over his head at Ruby Bee, who hadn't moved and was watching me with an unfathomable expression. "I wish you'd volunteered the gossip when you first heard it," I said to her. "If you had, I could have tried to do something."

"There are some things folk don't like to talk about," she said quietly. "I reckon it was awhile back when I heard something vague, but it was so nasty that I put it out of my mind. No one likes to think that sort of thing goes on next door or down the road. I just figured it wasn't true and that I wasn't going to repeat it, not even to you and Estelle."

"Nobody wanted to talk about it, not even Hammet." I gently shook his shoulder and said, "But sometimes it needs to be talked about, to be brought out like all the other dirty laundry."

"I promised," he said. "I wanted to tell ya, but I promised. Lissie made me swear to keep it a secret. She said she tried to tell her teacher, but the dumb sow didn't believe her and she had to miss recess for lying."

We were on an island in the middle of the noisy crowd. I could hear my heart beating, and I thought I heard Hammet's, too. His eyes filled with tears and he flung his arms around me, his body convulsed with painful sobs. Once he'd calmed down, I told him where I was going and why, then told Ruby Bee that the game was postponed. Indefinitely.

"Guess we showed him," Kevin cackled as he and his honey bun sat on the porch swing, enjoying the breeze. "Did you see how he fell on his knees? He was so red, he looked like a fire hydrant, didn't he? I'm just sorry a dog didn't wander by and lift a hind leg."

"Don't you go talking like that again, Kevin Fitzgerald Buchanon," Dahlia said. She polished off the last crumbs of chocolate cake, put the plate down in the respectable area between them, and gazed at him until he started to squirm, which didn't take long. "Now if'n I agree to rebetroth with you, you got to swear you ain't gonna act all crazy ever again until we're married and have our own cozy little house."

She may have said house, but Kevin would have sworn on his great-granny's urn on the mantel that she said bed. It was unfortunate. Not only had he been deprived of his darling dumpling's soft, warm body all these long months, recently he'd been obliged to listen to all sorts of gossip and look at photographs that had left some real vivid images in his head.

He glanced over his shoulder. In the living room, his pa was watching television and his ma was clipping coupons out of a magazine. He gave the swing a little push, then said, "Do you happen to be wearing something other than your best blue blouse, my sweetness?"

He was astonished when she slapped the living daylights out of him. He was so plum astonished that he couldn't for the life of him think of anything to say, which was probably for the best.

Mrs. Jim Bob made one list after another. Groceries; chores Perkins's eldest had best do next week-if she intended to keep her job, that is. Refreshments at the next missionary society meeting. Pieces of furniture to have re-covered. Bible verses that could be used as weapons. The Ten Commandments, all of which Jim Bob had violated in the last week. Well, maybe not failing to honor his father and mother, since they were buried side by side in the old cemetery down by Boone Creek. She scratched that one out and wrote, "Thou shall not humiliate thy wife in front of everybody in town."

She put the other lists aside. This was the one to work on, she decided with a grim smile. When Jim Bob came back, she intended to sit him down on the newly re-covered divan for a long while and go over each and every commandment as many times as it took. By the time she finished with him, he was going to wish he'd been tarred and feathered like that disgusting Lamont. It would seem a minor inconvenience compared to what she had in store for him.

Then, she told herself, she would have to do her Christian duty and march right down to the trailer next to the Voice of the Almighty, because she had some questions and was going to get some answers. Her lips tightened as she recalled the bright pink doll, and she grabbed for another piece of paper.

The telephone rang, and she was feeling brightened enough to answer with a brisk "What is it?" She listened for a minute, then said, "No, neither of them's coming in to the bank today. Last seen, my husband was chasing a giant skunk toward Cotter's Ridge. The man at the other end seemed to want to discuss it further, but she didn't, so she replaced the receiver and went back to Jim Bob's list. She had him on adultery, taking the Lord's name in vain, coveting, and at least partially on some of the others.

Mrs. Jim Bob fixed herself a nice cup of tea and went to work.

When Plover and I returned from Farberville, I admitted I couldn't face the PD or the magpies eagerly awaiting a choice morsel to devour. We drove down to Boone Creek and parked under a clump of oak trees. October was nearly a month away, but the relentless heat had turned some of the leaves brown, and we could hear them rustling above us. The water was low, exposing mud bars and expanses of rough yellowish-green rocks.

Plover called the sheriff's dispatcher for an update. Lamont had last been seen scampering into the brush in the direction of Cotter's Ridge, with Jim Bob hot on his heels and bellowing some highly creative threats. The dispatcher conveyed Harve's apology for letting the two get past his deputies, but none of us was terribly perturbed. Cotter's Ridge was a rocky, brambly wasteland. The dispatcher assured us that all the roads were being watched, then told us to have a nice day.

I replayed the last two hours in my mind. The scene at home plate had had a certain charm, but what had happened at the hospital had not. "I'm glad he admitted it," I said, sighing. "The last thing I wanted to do was to confront him with his own daughter. Gawd, I wish I'd caught on sooner, but I was listening so hard to the ludicrous gossip that I missed the subtle messages. Both kids afraid of him, defending him, and denying he did more than raise his voice. Lissie saying she had to be a big girl, worrying about being accused of making up stories. Martin lying about being beaten."

"We all missed the messages."

I let my head fall back against the seat and glanced at him out of the corner of my eye. "Nobody did a thing to keep that poor little girl from being sexually abused. Martin tried to tell his grandmother, but she refused to believe him. He did the only thing he could."

Plover took my hand and squeezed it. "It's a good thing he didn't taste too much of the roach powder before he laced the coconut cakes in his pa's coat pocket."

"Guess he wanted to know if it had a weird taste. We can write off his grandmother's death as accidental, since he was trying to…stop his father."

"She refused to believe him. He may have suspected she might eat one of the cakes."

"No, he didn't. I'm not about to charge a twelve-year-old with homicide, or even manslaughter. Those kids don't deserve to go through any more ordeals. A caseworker from the Department of Human Services will be here tomorrow to take them into protective custody-and she's not going to hear a single word about coconut cakes and roach powder. God, I hope some therapist can help Lissie understand why he did it. All his pitiful excuses about being so lost and frightened after his wife died, being so lonely, being so desperate for love and physical affection"-I slammed my fist on the dashboard-"those aren't excuses. There is no excuse for what he was doing to that child!"

I shoved open the car door and stalked down the side of the road, grinding my fists into my pockets and kicking the clumps of weeds. When I heard Plover's footstep behind me, I wheeled around and said, "No one listened, damn it. That kind of thing's not entertaining-so we've made it unspeakable." My voice rose an octave. "Let's talk about Kevin and Dahlia in the porch swing, or turn Lamont Petrel into a rapist, or anything worthy of a three-part miniseries on television-anything that has no more than a tiny kernel of truth, because the truth's too damn unpleasant. What the hell-let's bury our heads in a travel book, pretending to be on another continent where everything is romantic and carefree!"

"It's okay," he said, putting his hands on my shoulders. "It's not your fault."

I tried to get my voice down, but I couldn't, and I could barely see him through my watery eyes. "It's everybody's fault. Ruby Bee admitted she'd heard something, but she put it out of her mind. After I talked to you this morning, I called Lissie's fourth-grade teacher from last year. She stammered around, and finally said she'd wondered about the possibility but didn't want to get involved in something like that. Something like that!"

I broke free and started down the road again. He let me go for a minute but eventually caught up with me and we sat on a mossy log until long past dusk.

"Georgie McMay, if you don't stop that, I'm going to tan your hide," Estelle said, even though it was an empty threat because he probably outweighed her. "You, too, Ray. We are not going to hit each other with catsup and mustard bottles. Fix your hamburgers and sit down nicely."

When Georgie hesitated, Earl Boy Nookim took the opportunity to curl his foot around Georgie's ankle and bring him facedown on the floor. Enoch leapt on Earl Boy's back and, with the enraged roar of the Hulk (Enoch was a great fan of the green machine), did his best to throttle his victim. Georgie rolled over and grabbed Earl Boy's foot. He regretted it almost immediately when the wrestlers crashed down on him, and he expressed his displeasure both verbally and with an attack on Earl Boy's hair.

Ruby Bee put her hands on her hips and tried the voice that usually broke up barroom brawls. "I am not about to have this sort of thing going on in this bar and grill. Y'all either settle down or I'll settle you down myself."

"Who wants more chips?" Estelle trilled.

Lissie, Jackie, and Martin raised their hands. There wasn't any point in saying anything, because the din from the barroom floor would have drowned out a bulldozer.

In the back booth, Saralee gazed pensively across the tabletop at Hammet. "You are mighty mysterious," she said, twirling a yellow braid around her finger.

"I ain't neither."

"Yes, you are."

"Ain't."

"Are too!"

By the time Ruby Bee brought the wedges of pie to the back booth, the occupants were on their feet, pushing, shoving, and yelling at each other. She noted there was no serious damage being done, and returned to the bar at the very moment a man in a khaki jumpsuit and a baseball cap came in.

"Private party," she said wearily.

"I just came by to give you the tournament schedule," he said. He handed her a piece of paper, noticed the brawl still in progress, winced, and said, "The other team was disqualified, naturally. We can't have seventeen-year-olds in the intermediate league, not even ones repeating sixth grade for the fifth time, or fifth for the sixth. Your team has its first game Saturday morning. I…ah, I look forward to seeing you and your players at the ballpark." He left, quickly.

"Lookee here," Ruby Bee said loudly, "the Ruby Bee's Flamingos are the champions of Maggody! Ain't that something? We're gonna play in a real tournament this week."

"And won't Arly be excited when she hears this," Estelle murmured.

Ruby Bee hesitated as a whole lot of things went through her mind. However, she told herself coolly, she could handle Arly. "Let's celebrate with ice cream!"

Lamont finally gave up and stopped, mostly because he was panting so hard that he was afraid he'd have a heart attack in the middle of the woods. Some of the tar had been left on tree trunks and logs submerged in dry leaves. Most of the white feathers on his back were gone, although he was unaware of it and therefore equally unaware of the Hanselish trail he'd left all the way up the side of the ridge.

He sat down on a stump and listened for the sound of someone crashing through the leaves in pursuit. It was hard to think, what with the roar in his head and the black blotches rotating before his eyes, and he finally conceded as much. He attempted to run his fingers through his silver hair, but the result was not good. The sudden crackle of leaves behind a dense clump of scrub firs was not good, either. He wiped his hand on the side of the stump, cursed the barbarians who'd done this to him, and struggled to his feet.

Jim Bob charged into the clearing. "I'm going to cut off your balls and feed them to the squirrels," he said in way of greeting. "One at a time. Then I'm going to cut off your-"

"Hey, Jim Bob, I thought we were partners," Lamont said. He held out his hand but shrewdly began to edge around the stump. "We can work this out. I'll call the loan officer, at home if I have to, and tell him we'll be there bright and early Monday morning to finish the paperwork."

He had the stump between them now. He would have preferred a chain-link fence topped with barbed wire, but he figured the stump was better than nothing, since Jim Bob had the look of a pissed-off pit bull. "What's more," he said magnanimously, "we can work out a deal for you to buy me out. You'll be the sole owner of Jim Bob's SuperSaver Buy 4 Less."

Jim Bob advanced. "You're some fine sumbitch, ain't you?"

"Now listen here, you don't have any reason to carry on like a school-yard bully," Lamont said. Each time Jim Bob sidled around the stump, he followed suit. "We can work it out."

"Some fine sumbitch, using me and sweet Cherri Lucinda like you did. We're gonna work it out right here and right now."

What neither of them noticed was the entrance to the burrow beneath the stump. It was small but cozy and had been excavated for the sole intent of protection. The Mephitis mephitis (Mustelidae), being a nocturnal creature, was frightened by the loud voices and commotion outside its burrow. It twitched its nose and warily turned its tapered snout toward the opening.

"You keep away from me!" Lamont said shrilly.

A foot kicked the stump, sending its occupant into deep-seated panic. In order to protect itself, it scurried out and took a hard look at the two combatants, who were staggering around the stump, swinging wildly at each other, grunting and cursing, and sending up explosions of dusty leaves.

The Mephitis mephitis (also called polecat or zorrino, or sometimes wood pussy) felt no kinship with this distorted version of itself. It turned around, lifted its tail, and spewed out a fine yellow mist that enveloped the two in a noxious haze. It then stalked away to find a few grubs for an early supper. Jim Bob pushed Lamont away, but it was too late to escape. His eyes burned and his throat felt like someone had poured boiling water down it. His lungs threatened to shut down then and there. His words were barely audible, even in the sudden silence. "Aw, shit."