From her perch on the sofa, Mrs. Jim Bob took in the action. She was still in control, she told herself in a level voice. One or two of the bastards might have wandered off, but she was down from the bedroom and clearly held the upper hand. The bastards were orphans; they were at the mercy of her generosity and hospitality, not to mention the fact she could have all of them thrown in jail for what they'd done to her newly carpeted downstairs. If she was kindhearted enough to allow them to work off the damage, they'd be cutting the grass and scrubbing the floors until they were middle-aged. And cleaning those disgusting smears off the plate glass. And gluing together shattered dishes. And polishing the wood until it positively gleamed. And scraping food off the wallpaper, although the flocked swirls would never look all that pretty again.
"You!" she said, snatching Sukie's arm to dislodge the finger. "You are a nasty little orphan girl. If you don't beg my forgiveness, you're going to be right sorry for the rest of your life."
"Let go my hair or I'll kill you!" Sissie shrieked from the kitchen.
"I'm fixin' to rip out every goddamn hair on your head!" Bubba replied in kind. "And kick your butt till you cain't walk no more!"
"Oh, yeah? How about I cut off your dick?"
Mrs. Jim Bob tightened her grip on Sukie's arm. "Did you understand me, young lady? You just get on your knees and start begging."
Sukie lifted her free hand to consider which finger held the most promise. Once she made her selection, she stuck it her mouth. "Fuck you, lady," she said wetly.
Mrs. Jim Bob was formulating a reply when she heard a knock at the front door, although it was a miracle she heard it over the din from the kitchen. She went to the door, smoothing her skirt along the way, flipped on the porch light, and opened the door with a vague smile.
"Why, David Allen, how nice of you to come by for a visit," she said as she stepped onto the porch and closed the door behind her. There was no reason for him to be forced to listen to those vile screeches, she told herself. After all, someone who was unacquainted with the personal sacrifices she'd made by taking in the bastards would be likely to misinterpret what all was going on in her kitchen.
"Good evening," David Allen said, wondering what the holy hell was going on in her kitchen. It sure didn't sound like a meeting of the ladies' missionary society-unless they were role-playing heathen savages.
"I'm afraid I wasn't expecting company just now. Did you drop by unannounced to have a word with Mr. Jim Bob? He's out of town at the moment, but I'd be glad to take a message. Or is there something I can do for you?"
David Allen began to tell her about Robin's death, but she cut him off almost immediately. "I already know about the murder and the booby trap," she said. "I have informed the children, who seem to be taking it well. Of course, they were as aware as the rest of us that the woman was an ignorant, immoral, filthyminded whore and therefore hardly a great loss."
"She were not," Hammet said from behind David Allen.
"There you are, you wicked, wicked child!" Mrs. Jim Bob said. "How dare you sneak away like some slimy snake?"
Before Hammet could point out that snakes wasn't slimy, Sissie opened the front door. "There's some man a-bellowin' for you on this contraption. Sounds like a right ornery peckerwood." Which ruled out Arly and LaBelle, who weren't men, and Brother Verber, who never sounded like an ornery peckerwood. Squaring her shoulders in much the same way the Christians had when ushered into the presence of lions, Mrs. Jim Bob told David Allen that he would simply have to come back in the morning when she could receive him. She went inside and locked the front door, then crossed the living room to the telephone in order to have a word with her husband, who was all the way down in Hot Springs at a municipal league meeting. At least she dearly prayed he was.
David Allen stood on the porch for a while, then finally got into his wagon and drove over to Ruby Bee's Bar and Grill, where over a beer and a cheeseburger he related his news to an interested party.
I woke up the next morning at some absurd hour, heated water for coffee on my camp stove, ate cornflakes from the box, and tidied up the tent. All that got me to seven o'clock. I brushed my teeth, combed my hair, and had another cup of coffee. That got me to seven-fifteen. I doubted my weekend gardeners would show anytime soon, so I went down to the jeep and made sure it was invisible under the scrub pines and branches I'd piled on it. Seven-thirty. I checked for tire marks along the road, just in case my boys were wily enough to notice. Seven-forty. I was back at the tent, preparing another cup of coffee, when my beeper beeped from somewhere inside the sleeping bag. Although it was not my favorite sound, it was pleasant to reaffirm the existence of an outside world. I went back to the wagon (seven-fifty-five) and called in on the radio. "Somebody need me?" I asked optimistically.
"This is LaBelle, honey. The sheriff just wanted me to check on you and see how it's going up there. You caught any criminals as of yet?"
"Not as of yet," I said, watching a squirrel scamper up a tree and fling itself into space like a furry Frisbee. "But tell Harvey that I've set up camp and found a place from which to keep surveillance on the scene. I think odds are good that the perpetrators will show up today or tomorrow. If not, I'll drag myself back tomorrow night and admit defeat."
"I just know as sure as the sun rises that you'll nab them, Arly."
"Thank you, LaBelle."
"Oh, and Harvey says he feels rotten that he couldn't send a man up there for backup, but we're plumb busier than ants at a Sunday-school picnic these days. He also says for you to check in every four hours, so we'll know you're okay, that you haven't been eaten by wild animals or shot in the head by these awful dopers and left to bleed to death all by yourself up on the ridge. So you check with me every four hours, rain or shine. Can you remember all that?"
"Yes, LaBelle, I can. Did Harvey really say all that?"
"Verbatim, honey. Oh, and Ruby Bee called to talk to you. She seemed to think your beeper was like a walkie-talkie and that she could holler into it and you'd hear her, but I had to inform her otherwise." LaBelle licked her lips as she pondered some folks' misconceptions about police technology. "Anyways, she said for you not to worry about her and Estelle interfering in the police investigation, because they're not."
The squirrel had stopped on a nearby branch to glare at me through little red eyes. I glared back so hard, he backed into the leaves. "Just what did Ruby Bee mean by that?" I said grimly.
"I really couldn't say. She just told me to give you the message. Well, I've got to run, Arly. Harvey's bellowing for coffee, and he can be worser than a mangy old grizzly bear if he doesn't get it. You have a nice time up there in the woods."
Her voice faded in a crackle of static. I fetched a blanket, my book, a thermos, and my camera, then went to the spot I'd chosen and made myself as comfortable as possible, considering. I could see the patch and part of the road beyond it. I figured I'd hear a car engine long before it arrived, or even the snap, crackle, and pop of dried leaves if someone tried to approach on foot. Eight-fifteen.
After a while the birds, gnats, mosquitoes, and squirrels decided I was harmless and began to squawk, buzz, bite, and chatter. I leaned back against a tree trunk and considered the case. Robin Buchanon had a ginseng patch (e-i-e-i-o). She'd come to it about a week ago, with her gunnysack and hoe and expectations of digging up the roots to sell to a wholesaler. A nice autumn day, the family patch, an easy hundred dollars or so. Her only source of legal income, although it was hard to imagine that she reported it for income-tax purposes.