Maggody And The Moonbeams

10

Corporal Robarts and I sat in the waiting room while Doc Schmidt took care of Bonita. All the magazines involved blood sports and were dated from the previous decade. The weapons used to kill fish, fowl, and mammals were bigger and badder these days, but nothing else had changed: hook 'em, cook 'em, or mount 'em on the wall. The last of these was my least favorite. I was grateful that Doc Schmidt had not seen fit to adorn his walls with glassy-eyed heads of patients who had delayed treatment (or declined payment).

"I spoke to Judith," I said abruptly.

"She tell you anything?"

"Not really. According to her, the women are all victims of remarkably convenient amnesia. Previous identities have been wiped out; supposedly, not one of them could make her way back home, even with a map. I find that hard to swallow."

"I don't understand why they want to live that way," he said, "but it's no skin off my nose." He put on his hat, took it off, and looked at the prints of ducks captured in perpetuity as they winged their way across the walls. "How long you think it's going to take?"

"Shouldn't be much longer. Do the Beamers ever try to recruit local women?"

"That wouldn't sit real well with the townsfolk. Most everybody here's Baptist. We got a scattering of Seventh Day Adventists, one family that's Lutheran, and some old hippies in a cabin at the far end of Greasy Valley who claim they're Druids. This is a conservative town, but we get along with our neighbors, long as they don't flaunt themselves."

"Do you know anything about Deborah?"

"Only that she's kinda in charge."

"Have you met her?" I persisted.

"Once or twice," he said nervously. "I really don't have much contact with them, except for Rach and Sarah. Sometimes I give one or the other of them a ride home, but they always get out of the car before we get too near the cabins where they're staying. They say they do that to avoid upsetting the children. Same with Ester, who left a week ago or so. But, yeah, I've met Deborah. She looks just like the others. It ain't all that easy to tell them apart, as you might have noticed. I guess their mamas could, but no one else can."

I leaned back and crossed my legs. "Judith told me that Deborah wasn't at their site today. Could she be in Dunkicker?"

"I don't think so. To the best of my recollection, she's never had a job in town."

"But she somehow manages to send potential Beamers to Camp Pearly Gates. Where do you think she finds them?"

"How would I know?" He stood up. "Guess maybe I'll go by the Welcome Y'all and get a burger for the prisoner. After you've seen to Bonita, come to the PD and we'll figure out what we ought to do next. Les and Brother Verber won't be back for at least three, maybe four, hours."

"Okay," I said. "I shouldn't be more than half an hour."

After he'd gone, I stared blankly at the bleached prints and tried to organize what I knew. The four Beamers living in the cabins were Judith, Rachael, Sarah, and Naomi. Ruth had made five. Ester would have made six, but she was gone, as was someone named Leah.

If the body we'd found was indeed that of Norella Buchanon, how and why had she joined the Beamers and subjected herself to the bizarre makeover and less than luxurious lifestyle? If she'd been afraid of Duluth (and it seemed as though she might have had cause, after all), then why hadn't she found a third cousin twice removed to take her and the boys in until she could get a restraining order? Folks in Stump County have more cousins than they do dollars in the bank. Or common sense, for that matter.

It was clearly time for Duluth to crawl out of his hangover and do some explaining, I concluded.

I was beginning to get impatient when Bonita came into the waiting room, with Doc Schmidt holding on to her shoulder. He had shaggy white hair, bushy eyebrows, and shrewd blue eyes, the consummate personification of a country doctor-or a vet, which I hoped he wasn't. All creatures great and small did not include sheriff's department personnel.

"She's a little bit wobbly," he said apologetically. "I wanted to give her a local before I cleaned out the cut and did the stitches, but she wouldn't let me. I put a packet of pain pills in her shirt pocket. She needs to take two now, another in four hours, and get some rest. An ice pack should bring down the swelling in her lip; the black eye's gonna have to run its course. Bring her in tomorrow so that I can make sure there are no symptoms of infection."

"I'm perfectly fine," Bonita protested in a less than convincing squeak.

"Thanks," I said to Doc Schmidt. I took Bonita's uninjured arm and steadied her as her knees buckled like those of a newborn foal. "Send the bill to Chief Panknine and we'll sort it out later."

"No charge. Any chance you can tell me what happened out at Camp Pearly Gates last night?"

"What have you heard?"

"Nothing," he said, flushing. "Ol' Crank Nickle lives by the turnoff to the camp, and he said there was all kind of traffic coming and going in the wee hours, including the hearse from Tattersol's funeral home."

"We'll release information when the time comes. I need to get Bonita to bed," I said as I urged her into motion.

We drove down the road to the Woantell Motel, where the primary decor consisted of water stains on walls and a crusty shag carpet underfoot. I waited while Bonita put on a nightgown and washed her face, bullied her until she took a couple of pills, and made her swear to stay in bed until I returned to check on her.

She was still squeaking as I turned out the light and left, but I figured she'd be asleep in a matter of minutes. I drove back to the PD and parked beside Corporal Robarts's car. Duluth had been able to resist Brother Verber's pious reproaches and offers of redemption. No matter how daunting a man of the cloth might be, a woman of the badge, especially when deeply frustrated, was a whole 'nother ballgame.

Corporal Robarts met me at the door. "I was just coming to find you," he said. "The prisoner escaped."

"I'm not in the mood for jokes."

"I'm not, either. The cell door's open."

"And on your watch. Imagine that." I stomped down the short hallway, ascertained that Duluth was not cowering under a bunk, and returned to the front room. "So when did this happen?"

"He was here when you and Brother Verber arrived at about nine o'clock. I asked him if he wanted coffee and he spat at me, so I figured he could make do with the pisspot in the corner and the sink if he wanted water. After you and Bonita left to question the Beamers, Les, Brother Verber, and me went over to the café for breakfast. We weren't back five minutes when you got here. I didn't think to check before you and me took Bonita to Doc Schmidt's office. The key to the cell door's on a hook on the opposite wall. Maybe Brother Verber unlocked the cell door so's to pray with the prisoner, then failed to make sure it was locked when he came back out."

"So Duluth could have hightailed it as much as two hours ago? A possible suspect in a brutal murder, who may be hiding in the woods at Camp Pearly Gates, where ten teenagers and a scattering of adults are getting ready for Sunday dinner and planning to spend the afternoon at the softball field or fishing off the dock? Is this who we're talking about?"

"It wasn't my fault," he said in a surly voice.

"Then whose fault was it?"

"Like I said, Brother Verber most likely didn't lock the cell door."

"Did you lock the door of the PD?"

"We was just going across the road for breakfast. Chief Panknine never locks the door, even at night. The only time anyone's ever come in after hours was when Miz Neblett brought in her son and locked him in the cell after she caught him smoking dope. Chief Panknine gave him what for the next morning, and the boy upped and joined the army that very afternoon. Ain't never been back, far as I heard."

"All right," I said with great restraint, "here's what is going to happen. I'll call Sheriff Dorfer and ask him to put out an APB for Duluth, who may be in the area-or heading for Missouri, Oklahoma, Texas, Louisiana, or British Columbia, where he'll stow away on a freighter for Hong Kong."

"Hong Kong?" he echoed. "Isn't that where they make those karate movies?"

"Don't worry about it. We won't get a posse on horseback or bloodhounds, but the state troopers will be looking for him. Then I need to go back to the campgrounds and make sure the group from Maggody is taking precautions. All you're going to do is sit down, shut up, and take telephone messages. Got it?"

"What about the Beamers and their kids? If he knows karate-"

"Shit," I said as I tried to think. Bonita was snoring in the Woantell Motel, out of commission for at least a couple of hours. Les would not return with Brother Verber any time soon. "All right, I can deal with the group from Maggody and be back here in an hour. You go on down to the Beamer compound, tell them what's going on, keep everybody from straying too far, and sit on a picnic table until Les or I show up. If you see Duluth, shoot him in the leg."

"Just like that?"

"Yeah, Corporal Robarts, on the off-chance he does know karate. He may have killed a woman. The Beamers will not appreciate your presence, but we need to do what we can to ensure their safety."

"So I'm just supposed to sit on a picnic table while everybody else searches for this killer."

"That's right-park your butt and keep your eyes open." I waited until he stalked out of the PD, then reluctantly called Harve at home. Odds were good he'd already gone fishing, but it turned out he hadn't yet assembled his gear, which consisted primarily of a cooler and a picnic basket. Sunscreen was mandatory; bait was optional. After I'd finished telling him what had happened, I let him sputter for a moment, then added, "Thing is, we don't even know if the body is that of Norella Buchanon. Duluth may have just sobered up and decided to go home, presuming he had a vehicle parked somewhere. Why he showed up here is a bit of a mystery, though."

"Could he have been looking for you or Ruby Bee?"

This hadn't occurred to me. "I suppose so. He was in charge of all the repairs to Ruby Bee's kitchen. Everybody in Maggody knew where we were going."

"So he drove down to show you paint samples, drank too much on the way, and ended up in a ditch on account of the thunder and lightning. Some folks are fearful of things, no matter how tough they pretend to be. I seem to recollect you let out a screech when a field mouse ran across your foot while we was pulling that body out of the reservoir last fall."

"It was a rat," I said stiffly. "You're saying Duluth came all this way to show us paint samples?"

"Or something along those lines. I'm not claiming he's an interior decorator. Like I said, I'll put out the APB, but you got no call to assume he's hiding in the woods with a softball bat."

"Somebody was," I pointed out.

Harve paused to light a cigar. "I can't argue with that. You need help? I'm not sure I can scare up anybody today, it being the weekend, but I can send somebody tomorrow."

Tomorrow was another day, I thought wearily. "I'll call you tonight and let you know. We should have an ID on the body; if it's not Norella, then… I don't know what to do. Maybe I can get some information from these damn Beamers."

"I hear the bass crooning my name," he said, then abruptly hung up, as if I'd been trying to sell him storm windows or his-and-her cemetery plots.

I checked the cell one last time to make sure Duluth wasn't hanging on to the light fixture, then drove back to Camp Pearly Gates. What I had to say would be tricky; I didn't want to alarm them, but I needed to make sure they were reasonably careful until the situation was resolved. And to explain the whereabouts of Brother Verber, which would require more tact than I felt capable of on a few hours of sleep and one forkful of pancakes.

I parked and went inside the lodge. Mrs. Jim Bob sat at one of the tables in the dining room, muttering to herself. Her lipstick had been applied by an unsteady hand, and her hair was unkempt, as though she hadn't bothered to run a comb through it. I would have told her she looked like hell, but I had a feeling my comment would not sit well. I went into the kitchen. Ruby Bee was finishing up the breakfast dishes while Estelle put away food in the oversize refrigerator. The aroma of pot roast and garlicky potatoes perfumed the air, sweeter than wisteria blossoms. I reminded myself that I was going to have to tuck away something unless I wanted my blood sugar and insulin levels to engage in a high-spirited game of Ping Pong.

"Everybody okay?" I asked brightly.

Ruby Bee slammed down the dish towel. "Just where have you been? All you seem to do is come and go, Miss Revolving Door. Don't you think, as your mother, that I'm entitled to an explanation?"

"What's more," said Estelle, "you seem to think you can take my car whenever you want. Did it ever occur to you that I might have preferred to use it to drive Darla Jean to get her ankle seen to? I felt like a dang fool when we drove up in that awful excuse for a bus. Two nurses coming off duty asked me if I cleaned carpets."

"Do you?"

"You're about as funny as a flat tire."

I backed off. "So how's Darla Jean?"

"Nice of you to ask. Her ankle's sprained, and we're supposed to keep ice on it the rest of the day. I'm gonna be so worn out from going up and down those stairs that I won't have the strength to reel in a fish, presuming I get more than a nibble. Which I most likely won't, but that's beside the point."

"Do either of you know Norella Buchanon?" I asked.

Ruby Bee sat down at the kitchen table. "Is that who got herself killed?"

Estelle joined her. "That'd be Duluth's wife, right? I bleached her hair once or twice, but she was trash and we didn't much talk. She had a real mouth on her, though. She carried on so much about how she was forever being snubbed at the supermarket that I finally took to telling her I was booked up."

"Any chance of coffee?" I asked as I pulled up a chair.

Ruby Bee read me as only a mother can, then rose. "I'll put on a fresh pot. How about a sausage biscuit to go along with it?"

"Thanks, that would be nice. Part of the problem is that we don't know who was killed up by the softball field. Duluth showed up yesterday and was arrested for drunk and disorderly, or whatever they call it in Dunkicker. These Moonbeams all look alike. I don't remember ever encountering Norella, but even if I had, I wouldn't have been able to identify her."

"Moonbeams?" said Ruby Bee.

I was explaining when Mrs. Jim Bob came into the kitchen, wiping her nose with a wadded tissue and gurgling in a most disturbing way.

"Why don't you start again?" she said as she sat down. "I do not intend to be kept in the dark about this wicked cult-or, more likely, coven. Larry Joe Lambertino stuttered, stammered, cleared his throat, said virtually nothing, and then hustled the teenagers out the door before we could have a proper Sunday morning service. I am responsible for their well-being, as you know. Their parents entrusted them to my care. You, on the other hand, seem to have no interest in their safety, and now Brother Verber has disappeared. Do you have any idea where he is?"

"Actually, I do. He rode into Dunkicker with me and has gone to Little Rock with a deputy from the sheriff's office. He ought to be safe unless they encounter a chicken truck careening the wrong way down the interstate." When she swayed so violently that Estelle had to clutch her arm, I hastily added, "He's helping with the investigation, and will be back before too long."

Ruby Bee put a mug of coffee in front of me. "She's not gonna admit it, but she's worried," she whispered. "He upped and took off this morning without so much as a word of explanation."

I regretted my tactless joke. "He had breakfast at the café and has gone with the deputy to see if he can help us identify the body that was recovered last night. He's in good hands, Mrs. Jim Bob."

"Why didn't he say something to me? You'd think, after all these years, that he'd feel an obligation not to just disappear like that. He is the lighthouse shining throughout the dark night to save us from crashing against the rocks of iniquity and damnation, you know."

I told her what I knew. Once I'd finished, Ruby Bee set a sausage biscuit on the table and said, "So Duluth could be around here?"

I gulped down half a biscuit and took a swallow of coffee. "If Duluth did come after Norella, he'd have no reason not to head as far away from here as he can get before we find him."

"But if it wasn't Duluth-" said Estelle, then stopped.

Mrs. Jim Bob was beginning to perspire. "The way I see it, we need to load everybody in the bus and head right back for Maggody within the hour. Arly, you go up to the softball field and tell Larry Joe. I'll start packing my things. Ruby Bee, you and Estelle need to get Darla Jean out to the porch, then fetch whatever you brought."

"Wait a minute," I said. "As long as no one decides to go wandering off on his or her own, we should be fine. Whoever did this is apt to be long gone. I'll go up to the field, have Larry Joe and the kids bring down the tools and softball equipment and lock everything in the back of the bus. They can stay in the yard until it's time for Sunday dinner. Maybe you can get them to sing a hymn or two."

"And then what?" Mrs. Jim Bob said shrilly. "If they're not kept busy, who knows what sinful things they'll find to do!"

I resisted the urge to throttle her into silence. "Larry Joe will handle them. After dinner, he can escort the girls to their cabin and wait-outside, of course-while they change into bathing suits. The boys can take care of themselves as long as they stay together. The Sabbath is supposed to be a day of rest, isn't it? The dock is within sight of the porch, so you can make sure there's no hankypanky."

"I still think we should leave."

I crammed the rest of the sausage biscuit into my mouth. "Give me a few hours," I said indistinctly, trying not to spew crumbs with each word. "Everybody's covered. As soon as Brother Verber gets back, I'll send him down here to thump invaders with his Bible. Why don't you take a break and plan a sunset vespers service, Mrs. Jim Bob?"

Her eyes narrowed. "I don't like this. What are Ruby Bee, Estelle, and me supposed to do if some maniac comes screaming into the lodge?"

I pushed back my chair. "The three of you should be able to take on a Mongol horde and win back the Holy Roman Empire. I'm going up to the softball field. I'll stop back by here before I go to Dunkicker."

Ruby Bee gave me a halfhearted hug. "We'll be just fine."

"Of course we will," chimed in Estelle. "There's a whole drawer full of butcher knives and cleavers. No maniac is gonna have his way with us."

"His way with us?" said Mrs. Jim Bob. "You don't think he'd… have his way with us, do you?"

"Not if he has the sense God gave a goose," I said brusquely. "Keep the doors locked until Larry Joe gets here with the kids."

Ruby Bee looked over her shoulder at the back door. "I was thinking I'd hang the dish towels in the garden."

"Do it later," I said as I left the kitchen and went out the front door. Everybody was not covered, I realized. As far as I knew, Jacko was still at his campsite, blithely listening to classical music while he made futile attempts to catch fish. It was possible he might not hear anyone approaching through the thick brush until it was too late.

But first, Larry Joe and his charges. I took the path up to the field, where the boys were sawing planks and bolting them onto the frame of the bleachers, and the girls were sprawled in the grass, reading magazines.

I took Larry Joe aside. "Do you know Duluth and Norella Buchanon?"

"Why are you asking?"

"It's way complicated," I said. "Do you?"

"I reckon so. They used to show up for Sunday morning services at the Assembly Hall, but not on a regular basis." He paused to think. "They probably haven't come in the better part of two years. When Joyce and me had our fifteenth wedding anniversary a few years back, I let her pick out linoleum for the kitchen floor and Duluth installed it."

"Quite the romantic, aren't you?"

"She was real pleased. I was gonna get her a new lawn mower, but she wanted the linoleum instead. Duluth did a real fine job."

"That's good to hear, Larry Joe." I gave him a terse version of what had happened and told him to declare a day of rest, adding that I didn't want the kids to be out of his sight for even a few seconds.

"About yesterday," he said, scratching his head. "There's something I might ought to mention, although it most likely doesn't mean anything. After you left with Heather, we put everything in the dugout and went down to the cabin. Mrs. Jim Bob would have a hissy fit if she knew, but I figured nobody was gonna do anything while I was with them. Big Mac turned on his radio, and most of them were playing cards when Jarvis told me he'd left his wallet up at the field. He said it was a birthday present from his ma and he was afraid it'd get wet."

"And?" I said.

"It was a good thirty minutes before he came back."

I glanced at Jarvis, who was busy with a cordless drill. "With his wallet?"

"Said he couldn't find it," admitted Larry Joe. "About then the storm hit and we headed for the lodge."

"Did he find it this morning?"

"I asked him. He said he must have left it at home."

Jarvis was by far the most mature boy in the group, at least a head taller than Big Mac, Parwell, and Billy Dick. He'd taken off his shirt, and his muscles were those of a beefy construction worker. He had a few postpubescent pimples on his back, but he undoubtedly shaved more often in a week than the others did in a month. Then again, he'd tried to filch a package of cookies, indicating he was far from wise beyond his years.

"So why did you bring this up?" I asked Larry Joe.

"It shouldn't have taken him more than five minutes to go there from the cabin and get back. I told him to hustle."

"Did he have an explanation?"

"No, and he was real twitchy, like he'd gone through a patch of chiggers. I was trying to pin him down when it started raining and we skedaddled to the lodge. The girls were shrieking about their hair getting ruined and screaming ever' time thunder boomed. It was all I could do to keep them moving. I guess I forgot about Jarvis."

"But he might have known Norella?"

"She was teaching their Sunday school class until Mrs. Jim Bob found out that the topics most weeks were the same Old Testament stories I used to read under my covers with a flashlight. It drove my ma crazy, since I was reading the Bible like she wanted me to do. Once Mrs. Jim Bob caught wind of it, Norella was demoted to the nursery and drummed out of the Missionary Society. Not too long after that, her and Duluth got divorced. Neither of them's been back to church since then."

"Jarvis most likely detoured to smoke a joint," I said. "I want all the tools and softball equipment locked in the back of the bus." I expanded on the scenario for the rest of the afternoon, then added, "Unless we find whoever did this, I'm afraid everybody's going to have to sleep at the lodge again tonight."

"On a concrete floor," he said glumly.

"Mrs. Jim Bob thinks we ought to pack up and go back to Maggody, but I don't think it's that critical yet. If I haven't gotten anywhere by tomorrow afternoon, I suppose we can call it quits and go home. I wouldn't want you to have to take out a second mortgage to pay a chiropractor."

Larry Joe looked at the bleachers, which were progressing. "We take on the job, we finish it. That's my first rule in shop class. Well, the second one, anyway. The first has to do with not thinking you can get away with stealing tools. The shitheels managed to make off with a tablesaw last year. You know how much those things weigh?"

"Gee, not offhand," I said. "Just make sure that every one of the girls is within your eyesight, and that the boys don't go off unless they go together. They don't have to hold hands, but I don't want any of them on his own, not even to go behind a bush to pee."

"So Duluth killed Norella? What was she doing here, dressed in a robe with her head shaved?"

I stiffened. "Did you recognize her?"

"Hell, no. I wouldn't have recognized Joyce if she looked like that. 'Course it was getting dark, but even so."

"We're still trying to get an ID. In the meantime, the kids won't object to an afternoon of sunbathing on the dock and swimming in the lake. I'm trusting you to keep them safe."

I left before he could ask more questions. I hurried by the lodge, ducking behind the bus and station wagon in hopes I wouldn't be spotted, and went on down the road. I stopped at the cabin and allowed myself a moment to regroup, then continued to the place where I'd fought through the brush to Jacko's campsite. Okay, brush is brush, but this time I heard an NPR pundit expounding on the latest setback in civilization.

He was seated on an aluminum folding chair, eating stew out of a can and regarding the fishing boats on the lake. His plaid shirt was of different hues, but his khakis and canvas hat were familiar.

"I was wondering when you'd come back," he said.

I caught my breath. "And why would you be doing that?"

"I thought you might have some questions."

I realized that I most certainly did.