"I did, just like you said," Rick said, gulping. "I got hold of everybody I could think of. The word's out. I dunno what this guy is doing…"
The door opened. "Pizza man!" said the newcomer.
Brother Verber was puffing as he scrambled over a patch of loose rocks in what would be a bubbly, gushy creek in the springtime. He was having a hard time keeping his balance, in that he could barely see over the boxes he was carrying. Every now and then the white ribbon tickled his nose enough to provoke hearty sneezes that sprinkled the slick silver paper like tiny drops of dew.
"I presume we're almost there," said Mrs. Jim Bob. She wasn't as worn out as he was, but the humidity was getting worse by the minute. Heavy gray clouds had massed over the ridge, with occasional flickers of lightning and rumbles that threatened a downpour at any minute. "We haven't got all day," she continued, her beady eyes boring into his back, "and we can't have much of a fire in the rain. What's more, it's getting chilly."
He almost apologized for the weather, but decided he'd better save his breath and concentrate on picking up any stray cosmic suggestions as to the location of Raz's still. It had to be around there somewhere, he told himself as he stumbled and fumbled through the brush.
"How much farther is it?" demanded Mrs. Jim Bob. "Why, not all that much farther," he said with what confidence he could muster. "The problem is with the directions Raz gave to me after he finished repenting. I'm almost certain he said to take the second logging road and keep to the right all the way, but he was such a pathetic wretch that he might have been addled at the time and meant to have said to keep to the left."
"Then we may be on the wrong side of the ridge? Is that what you're saying?"
"Of course not! We're here to do our Christian duty, and the Almighty wouldn't let us stray down the wrong path, much less the wrong side of the ridge. Any time now we'll come around a clump of trees and feast our eyes on that soul-pollutin' moonshine still."
Mrs. Jim Bob glanced up, but there was no Divine Finger pointing the way to go. "We'd better find it right soon and get this nasty business over with before we find ourselves soaked to the skin." She wrapped her sweater more tightly around her shoulders, wishing she'd thought to bring a coat, not to mention an umbrella. Then again, maybe a shower from heaven would cleanse her soul of the gritty residue of guilt lingering from the night she'd lain in her bed and allowed herself to think about things that violated everything she'd learned from rigorous Bible study and services three times a week.
Brother Verber was shivering, too, although the dipping temperature was not the sole cause. What a tangled web he'd woven, he thought with a wheezy sigh, all because he allowed Satan to hand him a glass and force the wicked whiskey down his throat and into his belly, where it'd festered and boiled and done its best to seep into his loins and turn him into nuthin' more than a sinner driven by mindless lust. Luckily, he'd seen fit to fight for his immortal soul and had won fair and square, and now was again pure of heart and free of lust.
He looked benignly over his shoulder. "Sister Barbara, you are such an inspiration to me and to all the members of the congregation." He was planning to add more, but his foot came down on a loose rock. The boxes went flying every which way as he fell to the ground heavily enough to compete with the thunder and startle the birds into silence.
"Are you all right?" said the inspiration.
He kept his eyes closed while he pondered her question. His head was spinning, to be sure, and his backside was screaming so loudly he was a little amazed she couldn't hear it. He continued his assessment. His back didn't feel broken, which isn't to say it felt good or even so-so, but he made sure he could wiggle his toes just the same. He was getting ready to announce his findings when the Almighty, who'd been real quiet up till now, finally decided to put forth a proposal.
Sister Barbara was slapping his cheeks and making agitated noises, but Brother Verber waited for a moment before letting his eyelids flutter open and his mouth curl into a grimace.
"It's my ankle," he said, making it obvious that the only thing stopping him from whimpering was his resolution to be brave. "It feels like it's on fire." Mrs. Jim Bob pulled up his trouser leg. "This one? It looks fine to me. If it were broken, wouldn't the bones be sticking out?"
"It's the other one, and I don't think it's exactly broken. It's more like sprained real badly and afore too long will commence to swell up and turn purple." He sat up and squinted at it. "Yes, I can see some bruises right below the surface of the skin. I'm afraid this puts a damper on our plans, Sister Barbara, and I'm as disappointed as you are that we can't continue forth to do our Christian duty. I just hope I can hobble all the way back to the car."
Mrs. Jim Bob wasn't overly impressed with his speech, but she wasn't ready to accuse him of lying, not just yet. Instead, she left him to rub his head while she gathered up the boxes, which weren't nearly as festive after having been flung hither and yon. She couldn't leave them on the ridge, she told herself as she made a neat stack. Some fool hunter might come across them, and with her luck, there'd be a receipt in one of them with her name written in big, bold letters that might as well spell S-E-X.
Taking them back to Maggody meant driving down the road while folks out and out smirked at her. Brother Verber's barbecue grill was not an option.
"What we'll do," she said, ignoring his moans and facial contortions, "is sit for a spell and see how much your ankle swells up. If it's not too bad, we can continue on our mission and be back at the car before it starts raining. You do want to destroy the still and these perfidious packages, don't you?"
The fact that she was standing over him with her hands on her hips and a real tight look on her face prompted him to say, "Of course I do, Sister Barbara." He realized he was staring at her trim ankles only inches away. "Of course I do," he repeated numbly.
Chapter Fourteen
I stayed in my room the rest of the afternoon, eating pizza (no anchovies) and trying to sort through everything I knew. Or what I thought I knew, anyway, which was a whole 'nother ball game. The Chadwick Hotel had not seen fit to provide its guests with embossed stationery, but I scrambled through drawers until I found a scratch pad, took a pencil from my purse, and sat crosslegged on the bed while I made numerous lists and drew little arrows all over them. The arrows had points; the lists did not.
I was having such a fine time that I was seriously annoyed when the telephone rang. Furthermore, I hadn't had much luck with calls lately. I let it jangle for a long time, but finally I got tired of listening to it and picked up the receiver.
"Oh, Arly!" Eilene shrieked (her standard approach these days). "There's been a breakthrough! They're still being held hostage in Lebanon, but it looks like they'll be released if negotiations are successful. A man's on his way from Washington, D.C., to act as the go-between. Their nightmare may be over after all this time, and they can come home to their families and loved ones."
"That's great news," I said, feeling as though I was linked to CNN. "Why is the guy having to come from Washington?"
"The terrorist demanded to speak to a black FBI agent, if you can imagine. I didn't know there were any, but the policeman said they tracked one down and sent for him. He's more of an office worker than one of those agents who goes around with a gun chasing drug smugglers and folks who want to shoot the president. He has to fly into Frankfort, and they'll fetch him in a car and take him straight to the café."