Joe sat back. “I figured you would.”
“We’ve now got official protests lodged against you from both Arlen and Hank Scarlett. Think about it. The only thing those two seem to agree on is that you are completely out of control, and that reflects on me. You’re wasting time on a case totally out of our purview while game violations are going on in the middle of town.”
“And you’re only too happy to side with them,” Joe said.
“You’re fired, Joe,” Pope snapped.
He heard the words he had been expecting to hear. Nevertheless, Joe still had trouble believing it was actually happening.
Pope’s voice rose as he continued. “As of today, Joe, you’re history. And don’t try to fight me on this. You’ll lose! I’ve got documentation stretching back six years. Threatening a legislator and Game and Fish commissioner with property destruction and bodily harm? WHAT WERE YOU THINKING?”
“Do you really want to know or is that a rhetorical question?” Joe asked, his mouth dry.
“I won’t miss your cowboy antics,” Pope said. “This is a new era.”
“I’ve heard,” Joe said. He was tired of arguing with Pope. He felt defeated. The rain lashed at the windshield.
Pope transferred Joe to someone in personnel who outlined, in a monotone, what procedural steps were available for him to take if he wanted to contest the decision. Joe half listened, then punched off.
IT WAS THREE hours before Bud Longbrake showed up in his one-ton. The rain had increased in intensity, and it channeled into arroyos and draws, filling dry beds that had been parched for years, even rushing down the game trail in what looked like a river of angry chocolate milk.
Joe watched the one-ton start down the hill, then brake and begin to slide, the wheels not holding. Bud was driving, and he managed to reverse the vehicle and grind back up the hill before he slid to the bottom and got stuck. Bud flashed his headlights on and off.
Joe understood the signal. Bud couldn’t bring the one-ton all the way across the basin to pull the truck out.
“Fine,” Joe said, feeling like the embodiment of the subject of a blues song as he slid out of the truck into the mud carrying his shotgun, briefcase, and lunch and walked through the pouring rain to the one-ton with Maxine slogging along, head down, beside him.
“Fine!”
24
WHEN BUD PULLED INTO THE RANCH YARD, HE splashed through a small lake that had not been there that morning and parked the one-ton in his massive barn.
Joe saw Marybeth’s van in there also. She was home early. As he entered the house through the back door they used to access their new living quarters, Marybeth looked up, saw his face, and sat down quickly as if her legs had given out on her.
“We need to talk,” he said.
“Let’s go into the bedroom and shut the door,” she said.
HE TOLD MARYBETH he’d been fired, and her reaction was worse than he anticipated: stunned silence. He would have preferred that she yelled at him, or cried, or locked herself in their room. Instead, she simply stared at him and whispered, “What are we going to do now, Joe?”
“We’ll figure something out,” he said, lamely.
“I guess we knew this would happen.”
“Yes.”
“When do we tell the girls?” Marybeth asked. “What do we tell them.”
“The truth,” he said. That would be the hardest part. No, it wouldn’t. The hardest part would be that Sheridan and Lucy would expect him to say not to worry, that he would take care of them as he always had. But he couldn’t tell them that and look them in the eye.
DINNER THAT EVENING was one of the worst Joe could remember. They sat at the big dining room table with Missy and Bud. Missy’s cook, a Latina named Maria, had made fried chicken and the pieces steamed in a big bowl in the middle of the table. Bud ate as if he were starved. Missy picked at a breast that had been skinned and was made specially for her. Joe had no appetite, even though it was his favorite meal. When he had been employed, that is. Marybeth was silent. Sheridan spent dinnertime looking from her mom to her dad and back again, trying to figure out what was happening. Lucy was oblivious.
The rain roared against the roof and sang down the downspouts. Bud said a half-dozen times how happy he was that it was raining.
AFTER THE DISHES were cleared, Joe asked Bud if he could borrow a ranch pickup.
“Where are you going?” Missy said. Now that they were under her roof, Missy felt entitled to ask questions like that.
“I’ve got birds to feed,” Joe said.
“Have you looked outside?” Missy said with an expression clearly meant to convey that he was an idiot.
“Why? Is something happening?” Joe said. He really didn’t have the patience to deal with his mother-in-law tonight.
Marybeth shot him a cautionary look. Sheridan stifled a smile.
“I hope Bud doesn’t have to come out and rescue you again if you get stuck,” Missy said, and turned away.
“I don’t mind,” Bud said. “I kind of like driving around in the rain. It makes me feel good.”
“I’ll try not to get stuck again,” Joe said as he headed to the mudroom for his still-damp boots and coat. Marybeth followed him there.
“Sheridan knows something is up.”
“I know,” Joe said, wincing as he pulled on a wet boot.
“Maybe when you get home we can talk to the girls.”
Joe sighed. “I guess.” He’d been putting it off all night.
“Joe, it’s nothing to be ashamed of.”
He looked up. “Yes, honey, it is.”
“My business is doing well.”
“Thank God for that,” Joe said, standing, jamming his foot into a boot to seat it. “Thank God for your business, or we’d be out on the street.”
“Joe . . .”
He looked up at her and his eyes flashed. “I brought it on myself, I know that. I could have played things differently. I could have compromised a little more.”
She shook her head slowly. “No you couldn’t, Joe.”
He clammed up. Anything he said now would make things worse, he knew. His insides ached. How could she possibly know how it felt for a man to lose his job, lose the means of taking care of his family? He kept pushing the crushing reality of it aside so that he was only contemplating the little things: that he would no longer wear the red shirt, that he would no longer carry a badge and a gun, that he would no longer perch on hillsides watching deer and antelope and elk. That he would no longer bring home a monthly paycheck.
“Be careful,” she said, taking his face in her hands and kissing him. “I worry about you when you’re like this.”
He tried to smile but he knew it looked like a pained snarl.
“I’ve got to get out for a while” was all he managed to say. God, he was grateful she was his wife.
Missy swept in behind Marybeth and stood there with her eyes sparkling above a pursed mouth. “This is interesting, isn’t it?”
“What are you referring to?”
She opened her arms toward the window of the mudroom, a gesture designed to take in the whole ranch. “Three years ago, I was camped out on your couch in that horrible little hovel you made my daughter and my grandchildren live in. And you wanted me out.”
Joe didn’t deny it.
“Now look where we are. You’re a guest in my home and your family is comfortable and safe for the first time in their lives.”
He felt his rage build, but was able to stanch it. He didn’t want this argument now, when he felt quite capable of wringing her neck.
“It’s interesting, is all,” she said, raising her eyebrows mockingly, “how situations can change and things that were thought and said can come back to haunt a person?”
SHERIFF MCLANAHAN WASN’T kidding. The rain had transformed everything. It wasn’t like other parts of the country, where rain could fall and soak into the soil and be smoothly channeled away. This was hardpan that received only eleven inches of rain a year, and today had already brought four. The water stood on top of the ground, forming lakes and ponds that hadn’t existed for years. Tiny draws and sloughs had turned into funnels for raging brown water.