"I have to confess," he began, "I put a flag on your statement so Britta would call me when you came in."
"Why?" Tolliver asked. I sat up and tried not to yawn.
"Because I thought you might bolt without coming to the meeting tonight if I didn't catch you here and remind you to come," Simpson said with every appearance of frankness. "Britta told me the computers had been down when you were checking out this morning, so I decided to take advantage of the opportunity."
"You belong to the same church? Doak Garland's church?"
"Oh, I make an appearance every few Sundays," he said, not a bit abashed by something most southerners would be ashamed to admit. "I have to confess that I don't have a great attendance record. I like to sleep in on Sundays, I'm afraid."
He seemed to expect me to supply him with a comforting reassurance along the lines of "Don't we all?" or "We miss a lot of Sundays, too." But I didn't say anything. This may have been childish on my part. Tolliver and I don't ever go to church. I don't know what Tolliver believes, at least not in detail. I believe in God; I don't believe in church. Churches give me the cold chills. The only reason I'd been in a church in the past five years was to go to a funeral. Having the body that close was very distracting. It buzzed at me during the whole service. If this had been Jeff McGraw's funeral, rather than a kind of memorial service for all the lost boys, I would never have agreed to come to it.
"Abe Madden is due to speak," Barney Simpson said. "That should be interesting. Sandra hasn't said much, but it's common knowledge that Abe wouldn't pursue the boys' disappearances with anything like the purpose Sandra wanted when she was a deputy. And it's also no secret that's one reason she was elected sheriff."
Barney Simpson gave us a serious nod, his big black glasses reflecting the overhead fluorescents.
"Then I guess it should have a little more controversy than the usual memorial service," Tolliver said. "Our bill is ready, you said? Your computers are back up and running?"
"Yes. We're backing up everything this evening so we won't lose anything in the upcoming ice storm. I guess you've been listening to the weather, like everyone else around here. Did you-all find a place to stay?"
"Yes, we did," I said.
"Back in the motel, I guess. You-all were lucky to find somewhere."
"No," Tolliver said. "They were all out of rooms."
He went over to the window to check on the bill while Barney looked at me expectantly, waiting for me to tell him where we'd found a place to stay—but I didn't. I wasn't sure why I was being so ornery. A bop on the head will only excuse so much. I forced myself to be polite.
"Is there a Mrs. Simpson?" I asked, though I simply could not have cared less.
"There was," he said, regret tingeing his voice with gray. "We came to a parting of the ways a few years ago, and she and my daughter moved to Greenville."
"So you get to see your daughter sometimes."
"Yes, she comes back to stay with me and visit her junior high buddies every so often. Hard to believe she's in college now. Any children for you?"
"No," I said, shaking my head.
"Well, they're a mixed blessing," the administrator said in a consoling voice, as if to assure me I didn't have to grieve at not having any.
I stood and moved over to Tolliver, who was getting a receipt from Britta.
"Could I take you two to supper?" Barney Simpson asked, and we tried not to look too astonished.
Tolliver glanced at me quickly to get my reaction to this very unexpected invitation, and he said, "Thanks, but we already have plans. We appreciate your offer, though."
"Sure, sure."
Britta had closed her window and I could see her silhouette behind the glass as she rose and began putting on her coat.
The hospital was as closed as a hospital gets.
We left then, heading out the front door with the receipt and Simpson's goodbyes. "What a lonely guy," I said.
"He has a thing for you," Tolliver said gloomily.
"He does not." I dismissed the idea without a second glance at it. "He didn't care about me at all. I didn't represent a woman to him, one little bit."
"Then why'd he want to be our best friend?"
"I guess it was the newness of us," I said. "He may not have the chance to meet that many people. I bet his job pretty much holds him down. We're variety."
Tolliver shrugged. "Whatever. Where you want to eat?"
"This is Doraville. What are our choices?"
"It's too cold for Sonic. There's a McDonald's and there's a Satellite Steaks."
"That'll do."
Satellite Steaks was very much like Golden Corral or Western Sizzlin'. On this cold night, with the prospect of a memorial service and bad weather to anticipate, everyone in Doraville had had the same idea. There were some easily identifiable strangers who had to be with the news crews, and there were a lot of locals (who probably didn't come in during the summer tourist season), and there were travelers from the interstate. The place was jammed. Manfred and Xylda were at a table for four. Without consulting Tolliver, I went right over to their table and asked if we could share.
"Oh, please," Xylda said. She had maybe a ton of makeup on. Her encounter with the media at the barn seemed to have galvanized her into going the extra mile. Her eyes were positively Cleopatran, and she'd actually tied a scarf around her head à la a gypsy, with her brilliant red ringlets flying out from under it to form a shocking contrast with her pale, plump, wrinkled face. I sat beside her and got a big whiff of stale perfume. Tolliver had to sit by Manfred, which wouldn't hurt him. And Manfred had to smell better than his grandmother.
"How are you feeling?" Manfred asked. He really looked anxious.
"I'm doing good," I said. "My head feels better. The arm is a pain."
"I heard you two checked out of the motel. I figured you'd be long gone."
"Tomorrow or the next day," Tolliver said. "We're just waiting to see if the state guys have anything else to ask us. Then we'll be on our way. You two?"
"I need to stay until tomorrow afternoon, at least," Xylda said in a whisper. "There are more dead people to come. And the time of ice is near."
Now, that I understood. "That's what the weather says. There's going to be an ice storm."
"We're hoping to get out of town ahead of it," Manfred said quietly. "Grandma don't need to be away from a big hospital any longer than we can help it. I'll be taking her back home as soon as I can." I looked at him sideways and read clearly the grief written on his face. It made me want to give him a big hug.
Xylda looked like she was listening to a faraway voice. I was seriously concerned about her. Before, she'd been in the likeable fake category, though she'd always had her moments of true brilliance. They'd just been too few and far between for her to make her living off of them. Now she appeared to be "on" all the time. The stretches of shrewd reality that had helped her earn a living (if fraudulent) wage seemed to be fewer and farther between.
I wondered what Manfred would do when she was gone. He was very young and he still had all his options open. He could go to college and get a regular job. He could apprentice in a circus. He could assume the hand-to-mouth existence of petty fraud and chicanery that Xylda had led. This wasn't the time or place to quiz him about his future plans, when the big stumbling block to any of them sat beside me spilling salad dressing down her blouse.