“This way, please,” he said mysteriously. “Mrs. Bama, Jeff will park the car.”
The whole unruly, unwashed mob straggled in, through the foyer and into the banquet hall, making odd sounds of confusion and alarm. What on earth?
What they saw astonished them.
The long table had a groaning buffet on it, all the styles of eggs in the world, sausages, pancakes, mounds of fluffy grits, fruits, pastries.
“Golly,” said Nick.
And next to it: Nick blinked. This was the craziest thing his father had ever done. Next to it, a twelve-foot, fully decorated Christmas tree, heaped underneath with presents.
“Is everybody here?” his dad said, stepping out of the kitchen. “Come on, let’s eat. Then we’ll open presents.”
“Uh, hello?” said Amy. “Earth to Daddy: It’s August. I thought Christmas was in December.”
“Oh, we’ll have one then,” Red said. “But I thought we’d have one today too.”
“Red,” said Beth, “when did you start planning this?”
“Believe it or not, less than three hours ago. I called the staff of the club to get them going, I called that Christmas All Year Round place out on Rogers and I called Brad Newton.” Brad Newton was the owner of Newton’s Jewelry, Fort Smith’s most exclusive store, sole Fort Smith importers of Rolexes.
“But I—”
“Honey, you have no idea of the power of cash money. Now come on, y’all, let’s dig in and then open our presents.”
The family, all the kids, the new wife, the old wife, who showed up presently, and all the bodyguards, had themselves a fine old time chowing down, with the exception, of course, of Amy, the Smith freshman, who stood apart and would not participate because she considered such ostentatious displays of wealth and capital …
“Vulgar,” she pronounced.
“I am vulgar,” said her father, twitting her. “I admit it. Gauche, even. What about crude, overbearing, ostentatious, self-indulgent, selfish and boorish? But, honey, you have to admit: vulgar puts the food on the table. Lots of it.”
“Daddy,” she sniffed, “you are so gross.”
Then it was time for presents.
“Each one of you,” Red said, as he took command of the assembly, “each one of you should have a Rolex. Life is much better with a Rolex than without one. So the theme of today’s Christmas-in-August celebration is: Rolexes for everyone. Even those of you who have a Rolex, now you have two Rolexes.”
He walked among his children and wives with an armload of gift boxes.
“Let’s see,” he said, “I think this one is for Timmy. Oh, and what do we have here, we have one for Jason. And, I … think … this … one … is … for … Jake.”
At last he got to Nicholas.
“Now, Nick, isn’t this better than biology?”
“Yes sir, it sure is,” said Nick, gazing up at the loony tune who was his father.
“Go ahead,” his father said, “open it.”
Nick opened the package: yes, it was the Oyster Master Submariner with the day/date and the red and blue bezel.
“You wear that on biology field trips and you’ll never get lost,” Red said.
“Thanks, Dad.”
“I just want everybody to be happy.”
He gave each wife, Miss Third Runner-up and Miss Runner-up, a diamond necklace. They oooohed and ahhhhhhed appreciatively.
“Red, I don’t know what you just survived,” said Susie, his first wife, “but it must have been a honey of a fight.”
“Sweetie, you don’t know the half,” he said.
Then he turned to Amy.
“I know you’ve got one. This one is different.”
“Oh, Lord,” she said.
“Go on, open it.”
She opened it. It was different. It was solid gold.
“How’s that for vulgar?” said Red. “Let me tell you, they don’t git more vulgar than that!”
“What am I supposed to do with this? I can’t possibly wear it.”
“Sure you can, honey. You’re a Bama. You’re the eldest daughter of Red Bama, you can wear anything you like. Or, if you want, since it’s yours, you can do with it what you want: return it to Brad Newton and give the twelve thousand to the homeless.”
“Well,” she said, looking at it, “it is beautiful.” She decided she’d think about it.
As he walked away to join his wives, Red looked back: well, well, well, wasn’t that just a smile on the face of dour Ms. Amy?
Someone touched his arm.
“Mr. Bama?”
“Yes, what is it, Ralph?”
“Telephone.”
“Ralph, I’m with my family now. It can wait.”
“Mr. Bama, it’s Washington. They say it’s urgent.”
44
don’t suppose nobody’s hunting us now,” said Bob. “Let’s get some goddamned breakfast.”
They pulled over at a Denny’s on 271 just south of Fort Smith and went in. It was about eleven now. All the ejected shells had been picked up, the Mini-14 had been dumped in a deep and remote part of the black Arkansas River and they were an hour north of the Ouachitas. The bodies would be found when they would be found: maybe in days, maybe in months, maybe in years.
Russ was going on sheer adrenaline. He was out of the shock and numbness, which had been replaced by a burst of manic energy.
“I feel great!” he proclaimed. “Denny’s! God, I never thought I’d ever be so glad to see a place in my life! I could eat a horse.”
They ordered two big, solid breakfasts and reduced them to crumbs and grease slick. For Russ, life after a night as tense and dramatic as the one he’d just survived seemed especially poignant with meaning and sensation.
He turned to Bob.
“Twice you saved my life. You stopped us from getting sniped; you hit Peck in the head. Unbelievable shooting! My God, I thought my father was a good shot. That was unbelievable!”
“Shhh,” said Bob. “Just relax. You’ve still got a gallon of adrenaline in you. In an hour, it’ll dump and you’ll feel like shit. We got to get you some sleep. And get them abrasions fixed. Russ, just for the hell of it, let me tell you this: you did good. Okay? Lots of people would have lost their heads out there. You did real good. Your old man would be proud of you, okay?”
Russ said nothing.
“Well, anyway,” said Bob. “Next move? Before your adrenaline dumps, and you whack out on me, give me the next move.”
“You’re the genius.”
“Okay,” said Bob, “we beat the man again. We got to find the man now and bring the fight to him.”
“Who’s the man?”
“Hell if I know. I know he’s there. I just don’t know who the hell he is. Any idea?”
“No. The only people who could tell us are turning to fertilizer in the forest. We have nothing.”
“Are you sure?”
“Best bet,” said Russ. “Go back to Fort Smith. We have a few days when he thinks we’re out of it, when he thinks he’s won. We go back to the paper: I can get in and spend a day in the morgue. I can investigate the Fort Smith of 1955, where all this began. Maybe somehow I can—”
But Bob wasn’t really listening.
“What’s going on?” Russ wanted to know.
“We do have a prisoner,” said Bob.
He held up Duane Peck’s flip phone.
“And I think I know how to make him talk,” he added.