Toni L.P. Kelner - Laura Fleming 06 - Death of a Damn Yankee

by Toni L. P. Kelner

  Sue frowned, and looked around at the crowd.

  “Do you need help with the kids?” Richard asked.

  “Nothing a good set of leashes wouldn’t take care of,” Sue said, looking at the lemonade table, which was getting sloppy with spills as Jason and Crystal tried to see which of them could fill a cup higher. Then Tiffany pushed both of them aside, while Amber wailed and kicked her feet.

  The baby reminded me of the other baby on the way. “Have you seen Vasti?” I asked with a grin.

  Sue rolled her eyes. “Is she still moaning and groaning about what a trial being pregnant is?”

  “ ‘Great with child, and longing for stewed prunes,’ “ Richard said. “Measure for Measure, Act II, Scene 1.”

  “I don’t know about prunes,” Sue said, “but she’s eating everything else in sight. I sure hope she doesn’t want a second child. She’d never survive.”

  “The rest of us certainly wouldn’t,” I joked.

  Sue’s kids, still spilling as much lemonade as they were drinking, suddenly yelled, “Grandmama!”

  Aunt Edna arrived and was immediately surrounded by sticky-faced children. Even little Amber giggled happily and said, “Gran-ma!” Behind her, Aunt Edna’s beau, Caleb Wilkins, beamed at them indulgently, but when Jason saw him, he turned away, and Aunt Edna winced. Obviously Jason had picked up on his father’s feelings about her dating.

  “Hey, Aunt Edna,” I said, hoping to distract her. “Good to see you, too, Caleb.”

  There was a round of hugs and handshakes. It was funny how Aunt Edna seemed to get younger instead of older. The way she was dressing and fixing her hair helped, of course. She’d let her hair out of its bun and let Aunt Daphine cut it becomingly, and replaced the shapeless housedresses with outfits like the slacks and blazer she was wearing. But the biggest change came from Caleb, the handsome man with salt-and-pepper hair who was holding her hand. Everybody in the family agreed that he deserved the credit. Everybody, that is, except for Linwood.

  Since Caleb and Aunt Edna had also come from the anti-buyout side, I didn’t bother to ask what their feelings were, either. Instead I caught up on what they’d been doing and shared a few more jokes at Vasti’s expense. I probably should have felt guilty about it, but I think we needed an excuse to laugh.

  We were speculating about how Vasti would act in labor when Aunt Edna said, “Do I smell smoke?”

  I inhaled and caught a whiff of something. “Just a cigarette, I think.”

  She kept sniffing, and looked at the horizon as if she expected to see something more threatening. “I guess you’re right,” she finally said.

  Caleb patted her shoulder, and said, “I don’t know if you and Richard have heard, but we’ve had a couple of fires around town the past few months.”

  “I know about the Woolworth’s fire,” I said. Aunt Nora had written me that the old storefront had burned down, but she’d said that nobody was hurt and that the fire brigade caught it before anything else was damaged. Since Aunt Daphine’s beauty shop was in the same strip mall, that was all I’d cared about.

  “Well, it looks as if it was arson,” Caleb said.

  “For insurance?” I guessed.

  “Nope, the owner’s policy just barely took care of boarding it all up. I guess he lowered his coverage after the store closed down.”

  “Have there been other fires?” Richard asked.

  Caleb nodded. “A couple of storage buildings have gone up, too. It may be the owners were storing gasoline or something else inflammable in them, but they said they hadn’t been. Anyway, it’s gotten everybody in town a little on edge.” Certainly Aunt Edna looked nervous, and Sue looked tense, too.

  The music stopped then, and Big Bill, Burt, and the Saunders came onstage. There were boos and hisses from the side of the field we were on, and at first I thought even little Crystal was joining in, but all she wanted was the music to start up again. Sue shushed Crystal, and we all moved closer so we could hear what he had to say—after all, that’s why we were there.

  When I paid attention to Big Bill’s actual words, I realized that his speech contained almost no real information. It was nothing but platitudes about a new day dawning, and passing the torch, and good things for Byerly; but somehow, it was still a darned good speech, not because of what he said but because of the way he said it. I’d never realized how forceful a speaker the man was. If he hadn’t gone into business and politics, he’d have made a fine hellfire-and-damnation preacher. By the time he was done, I was nigh about ready to tell Burt to let his father do whatever he wanted to do with the mill.

  To Big Bill’s increasingly obvious annoyance, I was in the minority, at least on the side of the field where we were standing. Every time he paused to take a breath, there were catcalls and comments yelled from the crowd, all of them rude and some bordering on vulgar. I could see Big Bill looking around, trying to see who the hecklers were; but they were smart enough to duck. Still, I was pretty sure I recognized Linwood’s voice at least once, his words a little slurred as if he’d been drinking more than lemonade. I wasn’t at all surprised that when Big Bill came to the end of his speech, there was applause from half the field, but mostly boos from the other.

  Next Marshall Saunders took the microphone. I’d expected Grace to do the talking, but maybe they assumed a Southern audience would be more receptive to a man. Whatever the reason, it was a mistake. Marshall was a terrible speaker. He mumbled, and I couldn’t hear enough of what he was saying over the catcalls to figure out what he was getting at. People on the pro-buyout side started yelling for the other side to hush up, which only made things worse. Marshall rushed through his speech to get to the end; but by then, people were so distracted by fussing at one another that there wasn’t even a pretense of applause from anybody other than the folks onstage. Big Bill was furious, but when he reached for the microphone, Burt pulled him away. As the arguing continued, the Walters and the Saunders left the stage.

  I was starting to worry that it was going to turn violent, and was trying to figure out the best way to get out of there, when somebody managed to make himself heard over the crowd. “Fire! FIRE!”

  I turned and saw black smoke rising from the direction of the parking lot, but I was too short to see the actual flames or what it was that was burning. There was mass confusion, with shrieks and yells, but even that was drowned out by a woman screaming, “Crystal! Where’s Crystal!”

  It was Sue.

  Chapter 10

  An authoritative voice came over the loudspeaker and said, “Fire brigade—grab what buckets and water you can and head on over there. Everybody else, stay out of the way and don’t panic. I repeat, do not panic!” I recognized Tavis Montgomery, who ran Byerly’s fire brigade as well as the union chapter, and thanked the Lord that somebody was in charge.

  I was trying hard to follow Tavis’s instructions about not panicking, but all I could think of was Crystal getting trapped in that fire. Sue was staring toward the smoke, her knuckles white from gripping the handle of Amber’s stroller. “I leaned over to change Amber’s diaper,” she said, “and when I looked up, Crystal was gone.”

  “Sweet Jesus!” Aunt Edna breathed.

  Caleb took her hand and paused just long enough to say, “Stay here. We’ll find her,” before pulling Aunt Edna into the throng of people.

  Richard tried to put one arm around Jason, but he twisted away to grab on to Sue’s shirt. I don’t think she knew he was there, any more than she saw Tiffany and Amber crying. The baby seemed to be crying as much from unhappiness at being held so tightly by her sister as from anything else.

  I took a deep breath. Though I didn’t have a clue as to what Sue was feeling, I was going to have to act as if I did. First things first, and that meant Amber. I gently pried the baby away from Tiffany, and started jiggling her the way I’d seen mothers do to fussy children my whole life. Wonder of wonders, it worked, and Amber calmed down. That was one of them, anyway.

  “W
here the hell is Linwood!” Sue said.

  “He’s probably helping with the fire,” I said, trying to make it sound as if putting out a fire were an everyday event. I knew my cousin was with the fire brigade, so it was a reasonable answer. Wherever he was, Linwood probably didn’t even know that his daughter was missing. “Richard, see if you can find him.”

  Richard knew that I also meant for him to tell the rest of the fire brigade that a child might be in danger, but there was no reason to say that. He wove through the crowd, which was starting to get frenzied despite the warning we’d been given.

  Still holding Amber, I leaned toward Tiffany. “Honey, you’ve got to calm down. Your mama needs you.”

  It took a minute, but Tiffany did manage to staunch her tears and went to put her arm around Sue’s waist. From the other side, Jason did the same. Sue finally looked away from the smoke, saw her two oldest looking up at her with fear in their eyes, and pulled them toward her in a fierce embrace.

  While they huddled, I looked around the crowd, trying to spot anybody who looked as if he knew what was going on. I saw the tall, thin figure of Uncle Buddy pushing his way through, followed by his sons Augustus, Thaddeous, and Willis.

  “Uncle Buddy! Crystal is missing!” I yelled.

  Uncle Buddy doesn’t say much, but he’s not a stupid man, and he could tell what Sue and I were thinking. “We’ll find her,” was all he said, but as I watched, he took one direction and sent his boys in others designed to make sure they covered the entire field. I knew they’d enlist any other Burnettes they found along the way. The feud over the buyout was forgotten.

  From the rumors spreading via the people going past us, I learned that the fire was in a ramshackle wooden building that used to be the field’s snack bar. It had been abandoned years ago when the cooking equipment wore out, and a new snack bar had been built closer to the bleachers. As far as anyone knew, there was nothing stored in it, and the fire brigade had got to it before it could spread to anything more valuable. Still, since the brigade had to wait for the volunteers on call to get the truck and bring their equipment, it was taking a long time to put out. And nobody knew anything about a lost little girl.

  A few minutes later, Aunt Nora found us, having been alerted by Uncle Buddy. She took Amber from me, and cuddled her as much to comfort herself as the child. I couldn’t bear to stand there waiting for news, so I told Sue I was going to search, and dived into the crowd.

  The problem wasn’t finding towheaded little girls—it was finding the right one. I squeezed my way through clusters of people five times in pursuit of tiny blondes, only to find that I was chasing the wrong one. I’d never realized how much children look the same from the back. Then I tried to remember what Crystal had been wearing. Something pink? No, purple. Purple shorts, and a white T-shirt with the latest Disney heroine, that was it! Only after nearly grabbing two little Mulans did I decide that I needed something else to go on.

  The key, I told myself, was to think like a four-year-old. Or was she five? I was embarrassed that I wasn’t sure. However old she was, the last time I’d seen Crystal, she’d been spinning in time to the music. No, she’d stopped spinning while Big Bill gave his speech, and started whining that she wanted to dance. Sue had shushed her so we could listen, but Crystal had kept pouting that she wanted to hear Ilene sing some more. Now if I were four or five, and wanted to hear my cousin sing, wouldn’t I go find her? So wouldn’t the stage be the logical place for me to hunt for Crystal?

  I decided that anything was better than searching randomly, and I headed that way. Nobody was onstage, and I didn’t see Crystal, but the abandoned microphone gave me an idea. After making sure it was still on, I spoke into it as clearly as I could.

  “Attention! A little girl is missing. Crystal Randolph is five years old, has curly blond hair, and is wearing a Mulan T-shirt and purple shorts. If anybody sees her, please bring her to the stage.” I wasn’t sure if anybody heard me over all the uproar, so I waited a couple of minutes and repeated the message, this time calling Crystal a four-year-old, just to cover my bets.

  The only immediate reaction was for Aunt Maggie to appear and gesture for me to pull her up onto the stage. “God bless a milk cow, Laurie Anne, why didn’t you speak up? I think I’m the only one who heard you.” She took the mike herself and yelled, “Listen up, people! We’ve lost a little girl, so y’all calm down before somebody runs her right over.” Nobody reacted. Aunt Maggie took a deep breath, and roared, “I SAID, PAY ATTENTION! WE’VE LOST A LITTLE GIRL!”

  Folks started looking our way, and when Aunt Maggie described Crystal again, I could see them searching for my little cousin. Aunt Maggie and I peered over the heads as best we could, using the extra foot of height the stage provided. A few minutes later, I heard somebody calling, “I’ve found her! I’ve found her.” Out from the crowd came Earl, carrying Crystal on his shoulder. A cheer went up, and as I helped Earl and Crystal onto the stage, Aunt Maggie yelled into the microphone, “Linwood! Sue! Get yourselves over to the stage and pick up your young’un.”

  Crystal seemed to enjoy all the attention at first, but as the crowd made way for Sue, the little girl burst into tears and started calling for her mama. As fast as Sue was already going, she started running faster when she saw that, and she almost flew onto the stage to grab up her daughter.

  “She’d gotten onto the bus,” Earl explained. “Said she wanted Ilene to sing some more, but then she found one of our guitars and was playing to beat the band. That’s how I found her—I heard the noise.”

  Sue was too caught up to say anything, but Aunt Maggie patted his shoulder, and said, “Good work, Earl.” From Aunt Maggie, that was as good as a twenty-one-gun salute, and Earl beamed.

  Linwood broke out of the crowd just then. “What the hell is going on?”

  “Where were you?” Sue snapped. “Here Crystal gets lost, and you’re nowhere to be found.”

  “Are you telling me you can’t keep up with your own children? I’d have left y’all at home if I’d known that.”

  The two of them glared at one another, then seemed to remember that they were standing on a stage in front of almost everybody in Byerly.

  In a calmer voice, Linwood said, “Is she all right?”

  “She’s fine,” Sue said. “Just scared. She wandered off when I was changing Amber’s diaper, and when I heard there was a fire, I was afraid—” She couldn’t say what she’d been afraid of.

  “I found her on the Ramblers’ bus,” Earl said, obviously proud of himself. “She’d picked up one of our guitars and was playing it as if she knew what she was doing. We might have to let her into the band one of these days.”

  “Over my dead body,” Linwood snapped.

  Earl’s smile melted.

  “The fire’s out,” Linwood said to Sue. “Let’s get the kids out of here.”

  The family feud hadn’t ended after all—it had only been a temporary truce, and the truce was over.

  Chapter 11

  Linwood was right about the fire being out. The fire truck had arrived while we were looking for Crystal. People started drifting toward their cars, but Aunt Maggie suggested that she and I stay where we were so Richard could find us.

  When he did show up, I hugged him nearly as hard as Sue had hugged Crystal. “You knew we found her, didn’t you?” I asked.

  “I think I could have heard Aunt Maggie if we’d still been in Boston.”

  I explained what had happened, and said, “Linwood was just awful to Earl, but I guess we have to cut him some slack under the circumstances. He must have been pretty upset when you told him Crystal was missing.”

  “Actually, I didn’t tell him.”

  “Why not?”

  “I never found him. I got to the fire, but he wasn’t there, and I was drafted for the bucket line until the fire engine arrived. I don’t know where Linwood was, but he wasn’t helping put out the fire.”

  I don’t know how much longer Big Bill had expect
ed the cookout to last, but by that point, most people had already gone, and I saw Clifford and Earl loading equipment onto the bus. I turned to Aunt Maggie. “Are you about ready to go?”

  “Not yet. Tavis Montgomery is going to be meeting with Big Bill and the Saunders later this week, and I want to put a bug in his ear.” Reaching into her voluminous beige vinyl pocketbook, she pulled out her key ring. “Y’all go on out to the van and wait for me.” Then she hopped off the stage.

  While Richard and I were heading for Aunt Maggie’s van, I saw blue lights flashing over by where the fire was still smoking. “Junior must be here. Let’s go say hello.”

  “Are you sure this is a good time?” Richard said.

  “Junior won’t mind,” I said confidently, but as it turned out, I couldn’t have been more wrong.

  Junior Norton, Byerly’s chief of police, is either burdened or gifted with an unusual first name, depending on who you ask. A lot of folks think it was a dirty trick for our old police chief Andy Norton to play on his fifth daughter, just because he’d given up hope on getting a son to follow in his footsteps. Others say that since Junior made it plain right from the start that she was going to be the child Andy wanted her to be, her name made it easier for her to deal with police officers from elsewhere. As for Junior, I don’t think she worried about it one way or the other.

  Junior was a short woman, even in the black cowboy boots she always wore, but her sturdy build and callused hands kept her from looking petite. She was standing next to the smoldering building, holding a blackened piece of something and looking disgusted.

  “Hey, Junior,” I said.

  “Hey,” she said, not sounding at all surprised that Richard and I were in town. I think that I could walk into town at midnight, without warning anybody I was coming, and Junior would still know about it by the time I got up the next morning.

  “What a mess!” I must have seen the old building when we drove into the parking lot, but it had been there so long that I hadn’t really noticed it. They’d boarded it up when they quit using it, but it quickly became a prime target for vandalism and graffiti. After each generation of kids broke in, a new generation of boards was used to repair the damage, making it a patchwork quilt of different colored paint and wood. Now it was all one color: black.