by Cameron Judd
“God’s got nothing to do with any of this. Except for creating them pretty little blossoms the Flower Garden deals in. He makes ’em, we gather ’em, and we put ’em out on the market, all around this world. It’s big money, boy, big money and big dealings. But not just anybody can do it. You got to be – ”
“Hard. Tough.” Rawls cut in. “You already told me, over and over. I got what it takes, Lukey!”
“Prove it.”
“How?”
“By you doing what you ain’t done yet. By settling up with that gunslinger who took away your football career. Think of what he stole from you, Rawls! You’d be living the life of an NFL quarterback right now, rich, famous, women all over you! You owe him some big-time payback. I’m telling you, boy, if you want to show you can work with me and the Flower Garden, the time to give him his payback is now.”
Rawls took another just-in-case look around and spoke very softly. “You’re saying I should kill him?”
“Not that. He ain’t worth it. And there’s harder payback you can give a man than killing him. That’s something I’ve learned from the Gardeners: how the big boys, the really big boys, settle their scores. The way you do it is, you go after the family. Got a man who’s cheated you, robbed you? Put a knife through his wife’s spine while she’s putting her groceries in the minivan and leave her flopped on the grocery store parking lot like a dishrag. Or get yourself a bunch of boys together and go spend a little ‘quality time’ with his daughter. That’s how you make a man suffer … by making his family suffer with him knowing it’s because of what he did.”
“I understand, Lukey.”
Lukey raised his beer. “We’re kin, Rawls. And kinfolk help each other. We might be onto something here. To kinfolk.”
Glass clinked glass, beer was gulped, and Rawls’s head wobbled and ended up resting on the tabletop, passed out cold.
MELINDA BUCKINGHAM’S PLAN FOR evading evening services at her family’s church had been pulled off with ease. She’d made a point of coughing and acting sickly through the afternoon, then as her parents readied themselves for evening church, had told them, hoarsely, that her throat was raw and painful. She was going to stay in and rest.
It worked. Her parents drove off. The cough went away and the sore throat magically disappeared. Melinda put on jeans and a button-down cotton shirt and left the house, walking the short distance down to Buckingham Video Services shop, the Super 8 cartridge she’d sneaked out of Eli’s grandparents’ cellar nestled in her hand.
She entered the shop and went to the processing room. She closed the blinds and went to work. When she was done the content of the eight-millimeter film had been copied to videotape, on cassette.
WHEN HER PARENTS RETURNED from evening services, they found Melinda tucked away in her bed, but not asleep. Dot Buckingham went into the dark room and sat on the edge of the mattress, putting her hand on her daughter’s shoulder.
“Honey! You’re trembling!” she said. “Are you feeling worse?”
“I’m … I’ll be okay, Mom. I’m just under the weather.”
“I think you might have flu, sweetheart. You need to visit Dr. Walters tomorrow. I can take you, if you’d like.”
“I … I will, Mom. I’ll take myself. Right now I just need … to get to sleep.”
“Did you take anything? Can I bring you some aspirin?”
“I took some.” She hadn’t, but it made no difference. It wasn’t illness or fever that had her trembling.
“Rest well, Melinda. A good night’s sleep can do wonders.”
“Yes. Good night, Mom.”
“Good night, sweety.”
Melinda stared into the dark a long time, wondering why she was so bothered by what she’d seen on that film, until sleep finally came.
Chapter Thirty-Two
ELI’S CHEAP PLASTIC TELEPHONE trilled early Monday morning, awakening him most impolitely.
“David Brecht, Eli. I just wanted to make sure you didn’t forget to come by the office this morning for staff meeting. Dad wants to speak to the group.”
“I haven’t forgotten. Monday morning means staff meeting unless specifically told otherwise. I’ll be there.”
He secretly was glad for the call because actually he had forgotten. And if Mr. Carl was going to address the staff, he didn’t want to miss whatever he had to say.
Depending, of course, upon what it proved to be.
MELINDA, TOO, WAS THINKING about the newspaper’s standard Monday morning staff meeting as she readied herself for her day. That meeting would keep Eli away from Hodgepodge at least until sometime in the mid-morning.
And that was good. What Melinda had found on the cellar film distressed her, and the odd thing was, she wasn’t sure why.
The main content of the Super 8 film was nothing particularly shocking or even noteworthy … though it did seem an odd thing to have been possessed by Eli’s late grandfather, given what Eli had told her about him. Will Keller had been a Baptist deacon, an attender of every service his church held, including Sunday and Wednesday nights. He’d taught the Sunday School class for men for a quarter-century and his farm had been a frequent site for church picnics, hay rides for the young folk, and so on. The man Eli had described to Melinda had been a typical rural, conservative, Bible-belt, church-going East Tennessean.
So why, she wondered as she dried and styled her hair, would such a man have hidden in his cellar an undeveloped Super 8 movie showing a half-dozen frilled and painted-up dancing girls entertaining a gaggle of obviously drunken men?
She’d not been totally surprised to discover off-color content on the cartridge of film. It had to have been hidden for some reason, after all. It was obviously something Will Keller hadn’t wanted his family to know he possessed, comparatively mild though it was.
The big question for Melinda was whether she should tell Eli about it. He didn’t even know the film existed, or that she had sneaked it out of his grandfather’s cellar. Would he rather not know? What would be gained by possibly disillusioning him, however slightly, about his beloved old family patriarch?
The girls filmed dancing on a platform set up in the middle of a large room clearly had been trying to titillate their clapping male audience. Just not trying very hard. There was a lot of high-kicking, flouncing skirts, hip-wiggling and so on, but no significant display of flesh. It was closer to a saloon can-can dance as presented in an old western movie than to anything actually salacious. A hoochie-coochie show in the corner of a typical rural county fair midway probably had much wilder presentations than the three minutes of rather inept bouncing around done by the women on Will Keller’s old Super 8 film.
Clearly Keller had never watched the piece of film, given that it had been previously undeveloped. Maybe he had been awaiting a chance to smuggle it off to some far city and have it processed on the sneak, and had simply never gotten around to it.
Two more questions plagued Melinda. The first was: had Will Keller shot the film himself? It seemed likely. After all, how else would he have possessed it?
The other question was: why did she feel so disturbed by a mere clip of amateurish, well-covered dancing girls putting on a mildly naughty performance for a bunch of men in a tavern, a club, a lodge …
Lodge. Her mind froze upon that word, and she knew she’d have to take a closer look at her bit of found footage. She wondered if, at a subconscious level, she’d recognized the place the dancers had been.
One of the rooms in Harvestman Lodge, perhaps?
MR. CARL WAS WAITING in the Clarion’s meeting room as the news staff filed in. From the look on his face it seemed likely he had something serious to talk about with them. Keith Brecht was there, too, not a good sign, because Keith was usually mostly uninvolved in news department activities.
Eli sat down beside Jake Lundy with anticipation they were about to hear the newspaper had been sold to some media syndicate who would probably clean out the news staff to bring in fresh blood.
David opened the meeting with his usual attempt at a pep talk, doing his best to stir his staff to excitement over the prospect of another week of covering brain-numbing governmental meetings, routine police activities, court hearings, overheated mayoral pronouncements, and school class projects, all the typical mundane ham-and-eggs of small-town newspaper work. David went a little too long at it until he finally noticed the stern gaze of his father and wrapped it up.
“Wonder if we’re all about to get our asses fired,” Jake Lundy whispered into Eli’s left ear.
“Dad,” said David, “you have the floor.”
Jake Lundy whispered in Eli’s ear again. “Floor, walls, ceiling … it’s all his, actually.”
“Shut up Jake. We need to hear this.”
Mr. Carl cleared his throat and looked directly at Jake and Eli. “Girls, if you two have finished your whispering, I’ll get started.”
“Sorry, Mr. Carl,” Jake said in his loud nephew-of-Bufe-Fellers voice. “I just can’t get Eli to shut up.”
“Yeah, yeah, right Jake. Right.” Mr. Carl paused and looked around at his news staff. “I’ve got news to deliver today, my friends, that I wish could be happier.” Every heart in the room beat a little faster. “It involves a beloved figure in our Clarion family, a man who particularly means a lot to the Brecht clan. All of you know our dear friend Jimbo Bailey, who has done so much for us all day-to-day, keeping our workplace clean and orderly, giving us barbarians at least the appearance of being slightly civilized.” He paused as it to let his listeners know that he’d just made a joke, and it was time to laugh. They did, in a forced and feeble manner, everyone wondering all the more just what they were about to hear. Eli had the sickening suspicion that Jimbo had died.
“I’ve brought you together to let you know that Jimbo, who has been suffering increasingly from heart trouble that runs in his family, suffered a heart attack Sunday afternoon and was rushed to Parham Memorial Hospital in grave condition. Unfortunately he was alone when he suffered the infarction, and was not found until after he’d laid on his kitchen floor, untended, for nearly an hour. His younger sister, Mrs. Flora Hamilton, came by to check on him, having had a feeling something was wrong. It was her coming along when she did that allowed him to be treated in time to save his life. If he’d gone much longer, I would have to be delivering you worse news than I am. Jimbo is in serious condition, and at this point no promises are being made as to his prospects for recovery, but he is alive. That much we can be thankful for. Jimbo is down, but he’s not yet out.”
Eli asked, “Can he receive visitors?”
“I’m told that general visitation will be allowed this afternoon, though nurses are being encouraged to be militant in making sure poor Jimbo isn’t overwhelmed by visitors and forced to wear himself out talking when he should be resting. Initially visitation was allowed only for immediate family, and for us Brechts, Jimbo having been so much a part of our own family for so many decades now.” He paused. “What I would suggest is giving Jimbo a day or two. Perhaps he will rally some on his own. What appears likely now, though, is he’ll undergo surgery in the next few days … it’s risky at his age, but the doctors believe he is strong enough for it, and it could make a huge difference for him. It could add years to his life. I brought all of you in here so we could all be on the same page about Jimbo. And I want to ask those of you who pray to be sure to include him in your petitions to the Almighty. Jimbo means a lot to me, and to others here, too, and it is my sincere hope that he will pull through this and be back to the Jimbo we’ve known and loved. Does anyone have any questions?”
Lula Ann Jarvis raised her hand and was recognized. “I’ve been assigned the story in the bicentennial magazine about local black history and community. I talked a couple of days ago with Jimbo’s sister, Flora, who is sort of the unofficial historian of the black community here.”
“A fine woman,” Mr. Carl said, Keith nodding solemnly beside him.
“She told me she has heart trouble, too, and that she has been feeling the same kinds of sensations her mother described before she suffered a fatal heart attack. She actually said she expects to die soon. It was pretty morbid.”
Faces all around the conference table glanced at one another. David Brecht said, “Lula Ann, what is the purpose of sharing that rather depressing item just now?”
“Well … it seemed relevant. Her being Jimbo’s sister and all, and her having a bad heart, like he does.”
“Well, you’ve shared it. Let’s move on. Are there any questions about Jimbo’s situation? As opposed to comments about the health of his relatives?”
Lula Ann crossed her arms over her chest like a pouting little girl, and grunted a petulant “Ummp!”
ELI FOUND MELINDA IN her office at Hodgepodge, and when she opened the door to admit him, was sure she’d already heard the news. Her expression was troubled, her manner strangely uncomfortable.
“Who told you?” he asked.
“Told me what?”
“About Jimbo … you look upset, so I assumed somebody told you … ”
“Is something wrong with Jimbo? He’s not dead, is he? Tell me he’s not dead, Eli!”
“He’s not dead. No. But he had a heart attack and is in the hospital. No visitors until later today, and surgery pending in the next day or two. Mr. Carl advised the staff to wait a day or two before visiting, but that won’t fly, not for you and me. We can go see him later today.”
“Yes, we certainly … oh, no. Wait. I’ve got an interview this morning with the city manager about the July 4 town parade coming up. And an interview this afternoon with an old woman at the courthouse who has been the county executive’s assistant all the way back into the days the office was called county judge. She’s worked in the same position under four different men.”
“I … uh, would advise you find a different way to phrase that when you actually present the story.”
Melinda thought through what she’d just said and slapped the heel of her hand to her forehead. “Oh, wow … you’re so right! I’m glad you picked up on that … I might have actually gone on the air and said it that way. ‘Same position under four different men … ’”
“It’s a good thing to have a writer for a boyfriend, maybe, somebody who thinks about words and how they can be construed. Or misconstrued. My favorite journalism professor at UT always told us to read our copy with a dirty mind, because our readers certainly would. He had a whole collection of bad headlines: ‘Seeking to ease pain at the pump, Senate passes gas measure.’ You know, those kinds of things.”
“‘Same position under four different men,’ – I’d never live that one down.”
“No. Your coworkers would make sure of that. It would become part of your legacy.”
“Okay, now forget that. Tell me about Jimbo.”
Eli repeated what Mr. Carl had said, and even mentioned Lula Ann’s sideline commentary about his sister. Melinda, surprisingly, was interested in and saddened by what Lula Ann had said.
“Miss Flora has heart problems, too?” Melinda said. “I do hate to hear that. I’ve known her since I was a little girl. She did some housekeeping for my grandmother on Mom’s side. She still does housekeeping today, though she’s slowed down from age. She’s only two or three years younger than Jimbo.”
“Sounds like an interesting woman.”
“I adored her when I was little, and remember some of the stories she would tell about her own relatives and some of the earlier African-American people in the community. It gave me a better perspective than I would have had otherwise on the whole matter of growing up black in white America. She told me how her mother and even her old grandmother were expected to get off the sidewalk if a white person was coming their way. And about the names they’d be called if the white person didn’t think they’d hustled fast enough to clear the way. And when that kind of thing happened, their husbands and fathers and so on weren’t allowed to say a word in defense of their women.
If they said anything at all, it was expected to be an apology to the white people they’d inconvenienced. Can you imagine it? Can you imagine growing up that way, and how that would make you feel about yourself and your value?”
“I can’t imagine it, no. Not really. All I can do is say how glad I am that things have changed as much as they have, and that I hope the change keeps going until the last of that race garbage is gone.”
“Amen, Eli.” She pointed a thumb back at herself. “This lady’s with you a hundred percent on that. Just don’t say too much along those lines to my father … unless you want to get him started on his rant against Martin Luther King and the Civil Rights movement.”
“I’ll remember that. You sure you can’t fit in a visit to Jimbo’s hospital room with me this afternoon?”
“Not until I’ve finished my interviews. The station has been pressuring me to start getting some pre-bicentennial features in so we can do some build-up to next year’s big celebration … and, I guess, so I can justify my paycheck and my private bureau office.”
Eli said, “How’s this: you do your interview and we meet back here at seven o’clock. We’ll go visit Jimbo together, then run down to the Cup and Saucer and have the blue plate dinner special. Or whatever you want. I’m buying.”
“Well, I’ll not likely to get a better offer than that.” She paused, wistful. “God, I hope Jimbo will be okay. And Miss Flora, too. I hate so much to see good people getting old.”
“It’s simply what happens to folks who refrain long enough from dying, Melinda.”
“Oh, how profound you are! What wisdom! What wit! How did I end up with such a stimulating boyfriend!”
“You’re just lucky, I guess. And if it’s stimulation you’re after, there are some things I can think of – ”
“Shut up! I mean it, Eli. You’re absolutely wearing me out with that stuff!”
“Wearing you out? My hope has been to wear you down, not out! To make you drop your barriers and standards and what the Brits would call your knickers. I’m not doing a very good job of it, though. You just keep holding out on me. But surely you’ll not hold out forever.”