On the other end, Tom Krome smiled. "I'll drive up to Grange this afternoon. Check it out and let you know."
"OK," Sinclair said. "Go check it out. You want my sister's phone number?"
"That's not necessary," said Krome.
Sinclair experienced a small shudder of relief.
Demencio was refilling the fiberglass Madonna when his wife, Trish, hurried outside to say that somebody in town won the lottery.
"I don't suppose it's us," said Demencio.
"Rumor is JoLayne Lucks."
"Figures."
Demencio removed the top of the Madonna's head and reached inside the statue to retrieve a plastic bottle that had once held the wiper fluid in a 1989 Civic hatchback. These days the jug held tap water, lightly scented with perfume.
Trish said, "You're almost out of Charlie."
Demencio nodded irritably. That would be a problem. It was important to use a fragrance the righteous faithful wouldn't recognize; otherwise suspicions would be stirred. Once he'd experimented with Lady Stetson and there was nearly an uprising. The third pilgrim in line, a buzzardly bank teller from Huntsville, had sniffed it out instantly: "Hey, Mother Mary's crying Coty tears!"
The woman was discreetly whisked away from the shrine before trouble started. Demencio had vowed to be more careful. Scenting the Madonna's tears was a fine touch, he thought. The devout souls who waited so long in the hot Florida sun deserved more than a drop of salty water on their fingertips this was supposed to be Jesus' mother, for heaven's sake. Her tears oughtto smell special.
Trish held the plastic bottle while Demencio poured the last of the Charlie perfume. Again she marveled at how small and childlike his brown hands were. And steady. He would've made a wonderful surgeon, her husband, if only he'd had the chance. If only he'd been born in, say, Boston, Massachusetts, instead of Hialeah, Florida.
Demencio replaced the plastic bottle inside the Madonna. Clear thin tubes ran upward from the bottle's cap to the inside of the statue's eyelids, where the clever Demencio had drilled pinprick-sized holes. A thicker black tube ran internally down the length of the statue and emerged from another hole in her right heel. The black air tube connected to a small rubber bulb, which could be operated by hand or by foot. Squeezing the bulb forced the phony tears out of the bottle, up the twin tubes and into the Madonna's eyes.
There was an art to it, and Demencio fancied himself one of the best in the business. He kept the tears small, subtle and paced at intervals. The longer the crowd was made to linger, the more soft drinks, angel food cake, T-shirts, Bibles, holy candles and sunblock they purchased.
From Demencio, of course.
Most everybody in Grange knew what he was up to, but they didn't say much. Some were too busy running their own scams. Besides, tourists were tourists and there wasn't much difference, when you got down to the core morality of it, between Mickey Mouse and a fiberglass Madonna.
Trish liked to say: "All we're really selling is hope."
Demencio liked to say: "I'd rather peddle religion than a phony goddamn rodent."
He made decent money, though he wasn't rich and probably never would be. Not like Miss JoLayne Lucks, whose astounding and undeserved windfall he now contemplated.
"How much she win?" he asked his wife.
"Fourteen million, if it's true."
"She's not sure?"
"She not sayin'."
Demencio snorted. Anybody else, they'd be hooting and hollering all over town. Fourteen million bucks!
Trish said, "All they announced is there's two winning tickets. One was bought down around Homestead, the other was in Grange."
"The Grab N'Go?"
"Yep. The way they figured out who, the store only sold twenty-two Lotto tickets all last week. Twenty-one is accounted for. JoLayne's is the only one left."
Demencio fitted the fiberglass Madonna back together. "So what's she up to?"
Trish reported that, according to neighbors, JoLayne Lucks had not come out of her house all morning and was not answering the telephone.
"Maybe she ain't home," Demencio said. He carried the Madonna into the house. Trish followed. He set the statue in a corner, next to his golf bag.
"Let's go see her," he said.
"Why?" Trish wondered what Demencio was planning. They barely knew the Lucks woman to say hello.
"Bring her some angel food cake," Demencio proposed. "It's a neighborly thing on a Sunday morning. I mean, why the hell not?"
2
JoLayne Lucks didn't expect to see Trish and Demencio on her front porch, and Demencio didn't expect to see so much of JoLayne's legs. She appeared in a peach-colored jogging bra and sky-blue panties.
"I wasn't ready for company," she said in a sleepy voice.
Trish: "We'll drop by another time."
"Whatcha got there?"
Demencio said, "Cake."
He was transfixed by JoLayne's perfectly muscled calves. How'd they get like that? He never saw her running.
"Come on in," she said, and Demencio shaking free of his wife's grip went in.
They stood, each holding one side of the cake plate, while JoLayne Lucks went to put on a pair of jeans. The small tidy house showed no signs of a post-lottery celebration. Trish remarked on the handsome piano in the living room; Demencio eyed an aquarium full of baby turtles there must have been fifty of them, paddling full tilt and goggled-eyed against the glass.
To Trish he said, "I wonder what that'sall about."
"You hush. They're pets is all."
JoLayne returned with her hair under a baseball cap, which Demencio found intriguing and sexy the attitude as much as the style. JoLayne told Trish the cake looked delicious.
"Angel food," Demencio's wife said. "My grandma's recipe. On my mother's side."
"Sit down, please." JoLayne carried the plate to the kitchen counter. Trish and Demencio sat stiffly on an antique cherrywood love seat.
He said, "Those your turtles?"
JoLayne Lucks gave a bright smile. "Would you like one?"
Demencio shook his head. Trish, by way of explanation: "We've got a jealous old tomcat."
JoLayne peeled the plastic wrapping from the cake and broke off a chunk with her fingers. Serenely she popped it in her mouth. "What brings you folks by?"
Trish glanced at Demencio, who shifted in the love seat. "Well," he said, "here's the thing we heard about your good fortune. You know ... "
JoLayne gave him no help. She was savoring the angel food.
Demencio said, "About the Lotto, I mean."
One of her fine brown eyebrows arched. She kept chewing. Demencio fumbled with a strategy. The woman seemed slightly spacey.
Trish came to the rescue. "We stopped over to say congratulations. Nothing like this ever happens in Grange."
"No?" With a lizard flick of her tongue, JoLayne Lucks removed a crumb from one of her sparkling cobalt fingernails. "I thought miracles happen all the time around here. Most every Sunday, right?"
Demencio reddened, perceiving a dig at his Madonna concession. Trish, courageously: "What I meant, JoLayne, was nobody's ever won anything. Nobody I can recall."
"Well, you might be right."
"It's just a shame you've got to split the jackpot with somebody else." Trish spoke with true sympathy. "Not that fourteen million bucks is anything to sneeze at, but it'd be nice if you were the only winner. Nice for Grange, too."
Demencio shot a glare at his wife. "It's still nice for Grange," he said. "It'll put us on the map, for damn sure."
JoLayne Lucks said, "Ya'll want some coffee?"
"So what's next, girl?" Trish asked.
"I thought I'd feed the turtles."
Trish chuckled uneasily. "You know what I mean. Maybe a new car? A place at the beach?"
JoLayne Lucks cocked her head. "You're losing me now."
Demencio had had enough. He stood up, hitching at his trousers. "I won't lie. We came to ask a favor."
JoLayne beamed. "That's more like it." She noticed how Trish's hands had balled with tension.