Heartbalm

by Malachi Stone

  It was the unmistakable smell of old semen. Washday was long overdue.

  I slammed the lid. Illicit fantasies of Ruth flew away from me like the Valkyries, replaced by something akin to dull rage. When Ruth had told me her house was free from the stink of any man, she had left out one. With a shock I suddenly understood the true reason for Beattie’s concern.

  Reverend Unc’s twisted lust, like an evil spell, had passed on the curse to another generation. For the rest of her life Little Eve will feel like a leper and won’t know why, a caged animal imprisoned in her own body, warily eyeing her captors with a hate rooted in her soul. Her body will shudder, her mind recoil at the mere thought of a man’s touch.

  I stared at my reflection in the mirror for a long time. An evil clown looked back at me, a sexual predator I couldn’t bear the sight of, my features painted and twisted into a haughty sneer of lust, a demon’s piercing eyes, mouth contorted by my own perverted designs. For a long time I stood thinking of my own daughters and what Father Gerasimos had said about fleeting thrills and future victims. And avoiding all judgment.

  After all, who was I to judge? Me of all people. The damage had already been done. And I had had nothing to do with it. Whatever atrocities Little Eve had suffered were the fault of that ancient serpent Uncle, not myself. Precipitous action on my part was to be avoided at all costs. Any ill-considered ham-handed whistle blowing at this point might disturb the delicate equilibrium of my romps with Heart and Ruth. And there was attorney-client privilege to consider.

  After I had calmed down as much as I could I returned to the solarium. Ruth, now clad in a paint-stained smock, had taken brush in hand and resumed work on her painting.

  “I’ve been thinking how one might best describe a man like you, Ricky. And I have arrived at the inexorable conclusion that you are in essence a true sensualist. Wouldn’t you agree?”

  “Tell me about it.”

  I watched her paint for a minute or two while I decided how best to broach the subject. “Ruth,” I said, “I’m intrigued by your observation that there have been no men in this house for over twenty years. Did you intend that statement literally?”

  “Of course, dear boy. My viduity has remained intact since the Bush administration. Bush the father—the smart one, not that fatuous Texas playboy George W.”

  I knew what viduity meant, but knew equally well she wanted me asking her to define it. So I did.

  “It means perpetual celibacy in widowhood.”

  “But there must have been male visitors from time to time. Social callers.”

  “Not at all. I am hardly what one might call a social butterfly, Ricky. Since my retirement from the teaching profession at the age of fifty-five, I have immersed myself in my painting. And of course there’s Little Eve. And Ernest and Scott.”

  “What about other family?”

  “What about them? I have very little family. Only my brother.”

  “I didn’t know you had a brother.”

  “My elder brother Boaz is formally retired from the ministry but continues in the Lord’s work.”

  “What particular branch of the Lord’s work is he continuing in now?”

  “Boaz is quite active as children’s pastor at our local church. He calls himself Pastor Bobo the Christian clown. A silly wig, some white greasepaint, a putty nose and the transformation is complete. The Sunday school children all find him delightful and charming.”

  “You don’t say.” Heart’s B-movie lingo was beginning to infect my speech involuntarily.

  “I do say. Don’t tell me my daughter has you speaking that awful nineteen-forties movie idiom. She’s thoroughly obsessed with it, you know. She might carry on for weeks at a time, never once communicating like a normal person. The habit positively makes my flesh crawl like a case of the shingles.”

  “Does Pastor Bobo visit often?”

  “Boaz has been a godsend where my grandchildren are concerned. I must confess that I enlist his aid so frequently in their care that a less patient man might long since have refused. But Boaz, bless his heart, has always been eager to provide child care wherever and whenever needed. The man is a true saint.”

  “When was he here last?”

  Ruth turned away from her painting and regarded me suspiciously. “Why all the sudden curiosity about my brother?”

  “No particular reason. I’d like to meet him sometime. As a child advocate, I figure he and I probably share some common interests. He’d be a fascinating man to talk to.”

  “I’ll mention it to Boaz. He’s come and gone already this morning, got the children ready and took them on a nature walk.”

  “In November?”

  “Boaz loves teaching children about nature. They’ll no doubt be away for hours.”

  “No doubt. Why didn’t he take Little Eve?”

  “Did he not?”

  “I assume that was her playing on the front porch when I came in.”

  “I had no idea. Perhaps she resisted for some reason and Boaz decided to leave her behind.”

  “She ran outside dressed like it was summer.”

  Ruth sighed absently and turned again to her painting. “She’s probably ensconced in the treehouse as usual. It’s her favorite spot. She won’t come out of there unless I stand at the trunk of the tree and hector her like a fishwife to climb down. It seems that leaves only the two of us, Ricky.” She dabbed away, subtly lengthening a particular bright spot between the horse’s rear legs. “I do hope this painting isn’t too suggestive for public exhibition,” she said.

  “The folks down at Kingdom Hall might raise a couple of big objections.”

  “How clever you are. Bringing the conversation back to my breasts again. Do you know that another word, or phrase actually, flashed into my head this very moment? One of those seldom-encountered phrases associated with the term heartbalm we were discussing earlier. A legal term, I believe it is: criminal conversation. I’m sure as an attorney you’re familiar with it.”

  “So-called unlawful sexual intercourse.”

  “And they say the art of conversation is dead.”

  “Criminal conversation is alive and well.”

  “And here we are, you and I, two talented conversationalists with time on our hands and the whole house to ourselves on a lazy Saturday morning. Imagine that.” Dab, dab.

  “Aren’t you worried about preserving your viduity intact?”

  She stepped down from the footstool and looked me directly in the eye. Her head had stopped bobbling. “Not in the slightest,” she said.

  Later when I told Drey about it in bed, all she said was, “That old bitch has an interior motive.”

  “She cured my E. D. in one session.”

  “Why didn’t you give your fuck buddy a holler if your tallywhacker was givin’ you problems? You lose my number or something?”

  On my way out at Ruth’s I had paused to pick up the drawing little Eve had left face-down in the wicker chair. A tiny stick-figure girl seemed to cower in the lower right-hand corner. In the center, dominating the picture the way Ruth had dominated her own portrait, was an evil clown with red eyes, slavering mouth and fangs. What looked like a dagger jutted from the fly of his clown pants, dripping blood. I folded up the picture and put it in my pocket.

  Thoughts of what to do had tortured me. I knew I should call DCFS and hotline both Ruth Holstein and Pastor Bobo without delay. I could even do so anonymously. But fears of attorney-client conflicts and reveries of ongoing sexual adventures with Ruth gave me pause. Finally I decided to wait until Monday.

  “Your friend Tyranno called me again,” I told Drey.

  “Friend? Hell, Tyranno ain’t no friend a mine, hon. It’s like I always say, ‘With friends like Tyranno, who needs enemas.’ Enemas, get it?”

  “Good one, Drey.”

  “Stick with me, hon, I’ll keep ya laughin’.”

  “Funny, laughing’s the last thing I feel like doing right now.”

  “Hon,
I ain’t one to be handin’ out advice, but since I am your fuck buddy an’ that…”

  “Please.”

  “Seems to me your heart can’t stand the strain, Ricky, not to mention losin’ your mind. I worry about you, messin’ around with some old bag claims to’ve fucked her husband to death. I swear, you’d hump quicksand if it batted its eyelashes at you.”

  “So what’s your advice?”

  “Maybe you oughta just go out and borry the money and pay the man, is what I been thinkin.’”

  “Are you crazy? My credit’s shot. I can’t borrow fifteen cents.”

  “How do you know until you try? It ain’t exactly like you work at the Cracker Barrel now, is it? You’re a professional attorney.”

  “Drey, none of that matters. They look for collateral, they look for co-signers, they look at my credit report. Then they look up from their desk and ask me what I’m still doing in their office.”

  “Ain’t you got no co-signers?”

  “Not unless you want to be one for me.”

  “Hon, I love ya, but you’re the one’s got everything to lose if Tyranno goes public with that there sex tape a his. Tell you what, I’ll tag along with you to the bank, hold your hand for moral support and that, but the rest is up to you.”

  “You can give me some immoral support right now, Drey.”

  “You little bastard; I knew you been holdin’ out on me.”

  Monday morning Heart and I played catch-up with all the office paperwork needing attention. From my handwritten notes I dictated GAL reports on at least a half-dozen files and then switched to answering interrogatories, a task that Heart usually performed herself rather than typing my dictated answers from a microcassette. Let’s face it: I was procrastinating over the DCFS thing. Finally I couldn’t stand it any longer.

  “Heart, would you come in here, please?”

  “Ah, ya big lug. Thought you’d never ask.”

  I reluctantly played along. It was easier than fighting her. “Toots, you’re some dish. You look good enough to eat. Let’s see what you got for me underneath that sweater.”

  Instead of a comeback, to my astonishment she flashed me. It must have been secretaries go to work without a bra day.

  “How’d you like to Nipponese, Johnny?”

  Like a man enchanted I rose from behind my desk and approached her. She offered her right breast. I latched on. Too bad we’d forgotten to latch the front door.

  The next thing I remember was hearing a deep voice roar, “What the hell?” from out in the lobby. Snug made it into my private office in three steps. “Get your filthy mouth offa my wife’s bosom,” he growled.

  “Now Snug, calm down,” Heart managed, struggling back into her top. “Remember we’re divorced.”

  “Not in God’s eyes we’re not.”

  “I’m a free woman, Snug. I can do as I please. The sooner you accept that fact—”

  Snug responded with a resounding backhanded slap. I, not Heart, was on the receiving end. “Satisfaction,” he said.

  “What the fuck are you talking about?” I said, nursing my throbbing left cheek, trying to focus on Snug through watering eyes.

  “I demand satisfaction. Wednesday night at sunset. The softball diamond at Laderman Park. Home plate.” He stalked out, slamming the front door. The glass shattered.

  I turned to Heart perplexed. “What the fuck is he talking about?”

  Heart sighed anxiously. She tried to touch my face but I flinched and turned away.

  “Don’t you get it, Boss? Snug’s just challenged you to a duel.”

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN - SHITCANERY

  I tacked a sheet of plywood over the front door while Heart checked the yellow pages. “Do I look under glaziers, or what?”

  “Try glass,” I said, savoring the irony. That was what my erstwhile methamphetamine connection Artie had said to me years ago. It had been three years since I’d snorted glass. If I hadn’t stopped when I did, Emerson Holstein and I would both be polishing stars in heaven.

  “Maybe that nice Mr. Kuhn knows somebody.”

  “Let’s not bother Howard about this; keep looking.”

  “Here we go: Hinkle Glass. ‘Hear a tinkle? Call Hinkle.’ Cute, huh?”

  “Adorable.”

  The guy from Hinkle Glass replaced the broken pane that same afternoon for a mere two hundred eighty-nine dollars. Cash. I didn’t think I’d be sending any bills to Snug for the damages.

  “What are you planning on doing about that duel thing, Boss?” Heart ventured cautiously late in the day.

  “Are you kidding? Nothing, that’s what. Not a goddamned thing. Even I’m not crazy enough to fight a duel in this day and age.”

  “But you can’t ignore the challenge, Boss. That’s the worst thing you can do.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “Because Snug’s whole gang will come after you, that’s why. It’s like an honor thing with the Hades Assassins. If you refuse to duel, they’ll come and abduct you, drag you off to their clubhouse and basically turn you out like a whore.”

  “I don’t know anything about dueling. Strike that; I do know one thing: it’s illegal, not to mention hazardous to my health.”

  “Why are lawyers always saying ‘strike that,’ like they had a court reporter hanging on their every word twenty-four seven?”

  “Beats me.”

  I could see the change in Heart, an impish change in expression, a subtle shift in body carriage.

  “G’wan, duel the mug, Johnny. Can’t ya see he’s askin’ for it? Don’t let him take you for a piker. Now’s your chance to set the big jerk back on his heels.”

  “Nobody’s ever fought a duel over you before, is that it, Heart? ‘Let’s you and him fight?’”

  The time she took answering got me worried. “There was this once,” she said.

  “And?”

  “And nothing, Johnny. I got a big mouth.”

  “Let’s put it to good use.”

  Half an hour later she sat on my lap and cuddled. I’d say snuggled but the word scared me.

  “I told ya those croakers were full of beans, Johnny,” she said. “Takes more than a few Japs to keep a good man down, I always say.”

  “Where’d you learn to give such good French, Toots?”

  “At my Uncle Bo’s knee,” she said, suddenly bitter.

  “Heart, I’m sorry—”

  “It’s cool, Boss. Some old memories have a way of coming back over and over again like a bad yeast infection.”

  “Wish I could make them go away for good.”

  “Well, you can’t, so you might as well get used to it.” She jumped down off my lap and stood with her back to me.

  “Since we’ve opened that Pandora’s box, there’s something I need to tell you about Uncle Bo.” I proceeded to relate much of what I’d learned at Ruth’s house on Saturday, not bothering to mention the Pastor Bobo masquerade and deliberately leaving out the part about Ruth and me engaging in bedroom gymnastics.

  “That bastard,” she hissed. “Didn’t I tell you? My mother is the queen of denial. No, she’s graduated. Make that the goddess of denial.”

  “I’ve been thinking of hotlining DCFS. Unless you have a better idea. I thought I should talk to you first. After all, she is your mother.”

  “Unfortunately.”

  “I’m kind of worried about your boys, too.”

  “Relax. Uncle Bo may be a pedophile, but he only goes after little girls seven through eleven. Boys don’t hold the same appeal for him.”

  “I hope not.”

  “Do you think we ought to tell Beattie?”

  “I don’t think we have any choice.”

  “She’ll be mad enough to kill him,” Heart said. “And where she’s at, she may have the right kind of contacts to follow through with it.”

  It took me half an hour to find a functioning pay phone in downtown Belleville. Pay phones, unlike parking meters in Belleville, are dinosaurs in this age of cell
phones. Pay phones belonged to Heart’s fantasy world when gay meant happy and blue meant sad, when men wore hats and women wore gloves.

  DCFS kept me on hold for ten minutes. Luckily I had brought along a pocketful of quarters. I went through seven of them before a live person came on the line.

  “I want to hotline a case of criminal sexual abuse of a seven-year-old child.”

  “Name, please,” she said.

  “Let’s keep this anonymous for now.”

  She gave me a code number. I jotted it down, then related all I had discovered and all I suspected, naming names and giving addresses and phone numbers. I told her about Pastor Bobo, the dirty hamper, even Little Eve’s picture.

  “We’ll need that picture for our file.”

  “What if I fax it to you?”

  “That’ll work.” She gave me a fax number.

  I drove to Kinko’s and faxed it within the hour. Back at the office, Heart sat typing at her computer.

  “I’ve been thinking, Heart,” I told her, “maybe you ought to make a police report of that run-in you had with Snug today. He’s violated an order of protection by coming within three hundred feet of you.”

  “Last time I heard, those things won’t stop a bullet,” Heart said. “How does it go? Rock, paper, scissors?”

  “Then I’ll call.”

  “There’s just one problem with that: I let the emergency order drop after two weeks.”

  “You what?”

  “Snug had calmed down. I didn’t want to take all morning off work cooling my heels in courtroom three oh five waiting to testify. The order’s shitcanned. Case closed.”

  “Looks like I fight a duel then.”

  “Unless you have a better idea.”

  As it turns out, I did. I closed the door to my private office and made the call. When Lieutenant Grimm made it to the phone in under ten seconds I said, “You win.”

  “I’ll be right there.”

  “This time I’ll come to you. Impromptu wrestling matches—” The recording device beeped on the police department line.