by D. Gideon
Jack turned and threw his hands up again. “They can’t call the cops, idiot! And this chicken-shit ain’t gonna shoot me for bein’ in the street. He’d go up for murder.”
“Jack, listen to your friend,” Bill said. “Stop what you’re doing and go home-“
“I told you to shut up, old man!”
Dotty could hear other screen doors banging against their frames. Flashlights were coming on. Looking past Thomas, she saw Cathy and Dan both out on their stoop. Dan was pointing the flashlight towards Jack, and Cathy had her phone in the air. Recording it to send to the news, no doubt.
“Jack! Jack! There’s a Sheriff’s car coming!” One of the other boys called. “Get the hell out of there!”
“Time to go, Jack-ass,” Thomas said.
Jack pointed towards Thomas as the headlights of a car reached him and lit him from the side. “You think that’s funny, huh? You’ll pay for that. I’ll be back, asshole.”
He turned and ran, darting between the houses on the other side of the street and disappearing into the near-dark.
“The next time you come this’ll be loaded with slugs,” Thomas yelled after him.
A dark blue sedan sporting the gold stripe and seal of the Worcester County Sheriff stopped where Jack had been standing moments ago, the big spotlight on the roof pointing in the direction the boy had run.
Sheriff Kane stuck his head out of the window. “Y’all got trouble? Do I need to go chasing that fellow?”
Dotty lowered her flashlight. “It was just some kids, Sheriff Kane. They were getting into the trash. Thomas and one of the boys traded some words. It’s all over now.”
Sheriff Kane turned the spotlight in the direction of her voice, and both she and Bill threw up their hands to protect their eyes.
“Good lord, Simon! You’re blinding us! Turn that thing off!” Bill said.
“Pastor Bill? I was just down at the church—hold on,” Kane said. The light blinked off and he pulled the car to the side of the road, cutting the engine. The door opened and the big man seemed to unfold himself, standing and twisting to stretch his back. He flicked his own flashlight on and waved it down the street, towards the flashlights of the neighbors that had come out to see what was going on.
“It’s okay folks, show’s over,” he called. “Y’all can go back inside now. And be careful with your candles! We don’t need no more fires,” He added. He strode across the blacktop, every step making his gear jingle a bit. As soon as he stepped into the Miller’s yard, Jax started barking.
“Jax. Jax! You hush,” Dotty said.
The Sheriff stopped and held up a hand. “No, no, it’s his yard, and I’m a stranger. He’s just doing his job,” he said. He stepped back onto the sidewalk, and Jax quieted, watching him carefully.
“What’s his name?” Sheriff Kane asked.
“Her name is Jax,” Dotty said. The Sheriff’s flashlight flicked up to illuminate her and then quickly lowered.
“Well hi there, Miss Dotty,” he said. “Sorry, couldn’t tell who you were before. To be honest, that dang spotlight washes out everything.”
He squatted down. “A girl, huh? C’mere Jax. C’mere, girl. Come say hi.”
Jax cocked her head and looked at Dotty. Dotty nodded and made a shooing motion with her hand.
“Go on, Jax. It’s okay,” she said.
Jax bounded down the steps and ran to the Sheriff, stopping a few feet away and sniffing warily.
“That’s it. Don’t I smell good? I smell like a good guy, right? A guy that’s got treats?” The Sheriff asked. He pulled a half-eaten Slim Jim out of his shirt pocket and waved it at her. “You want a treat, Jax?”
Jax stepped closer and sniffed again. Sheriff Kane peeled the plastic down on the Slim Jim and tore a piece off, offering it to her.
“Here you go, Jax. Take it…good girl,” he said as she pulled the greasy meat from him and gulped it down. She sniffed his hand and licked it, trying to get every molecule of flavor off of his fingers. He chuckled, gave her another piece, and then rubbed her head.
“See? I come bearing gifts. Can I come in your yard now? C’mon, let’s go see Miss Dotty.” He scratched Jax behind her ears and then stood, stepping carefully into the yard and watching for Jax’s reaction. Jax rubbed up against his leg and walked with him, her long tongue still trying to clean his fingers.
“Putty in my hands,” the Sheriff said, climbing up the porch steps. “I’d offer to shake, Pastor, but my hand’s covered in Slim Jim and dog slobber.”
“Don’t bother me none,” Bill said, offering his hand. The two shook in greeting.
Along the street, flashlights were turning off and people were going back inside. Thomas dragged a chair to the edge of the porch.
“Thomas, put that thing away,” Dotty called.
“I’m just gonna sit out here for a while, make sure they don’t come back,” Thomas said.
“Thomas Winters, I still ain’t seen your application come across my desk,” the Sheriff said. “You still playin’ footsie with those State boys?” He leaned back against the railing, one hand absently scratching Jax’s head.
They heard Thomas laugh. “I start the Trooper Academy in January,” he said.
“Waste of talent, I tell ya,” the Sheriff said, shaking his head. “You’re gonna be out on Route 50 writing speeding tickets, when you could be here with me doing cutting-edge police work. Exciting stuff, like tracking down kids that take baseball bats to mailboxes. Chasing escaped goats back into their pasture. Real adrenaline junky stuff.”
“I’m not sure I could handle that much excitement, Sheriff,” Thomas said.
“Well you let me know when you decide it’s time to join the big league,” the Sheriff said with a chuckle.
“Pull up a chair, Simon,” Dotty said, easing herself back down onto the swing.
“I’m fine, Miss Dotty. Been in a chair at the federal prison playing Warden for most of the day, and now sittin’ in that car for the past half hour. My back’s arguing with me,” he said. “I need to stand up and stretch it out.”
“Playing Warden?” Dotty asked. Beside her, the little timer clicked and started buzzing. “Oh, shoot. Excuse me, gentlemen.” She turned off the timer and tucked it into her apron, then hurried inside with her flashlight.
On the big gas range, all three of her All American pressure canners sat with their weights jiggling merrily. She turned off the flames and lifted the aluminum foil tent covering the roasts that were thawing on the counter. They seemed to have thawed all the way through. Cutting them as close as she could to one-pound chunks so they’d fit into her pint jars, she rubbed a mixture of salt and pepper into them and covered them back up to rest. It would take about twenty minutes for the pressure to drop in the canners, and then she could put this batch in. It would be the last of the evening; she was bone-tired. She might even lay down on the couch before they were finished; she knew her trusty little timer would wake her up.
She turned the handle on the sink faucet and made a little growling noise when nothing came out.
“Nothin’ like a useless habit to make you feel the fool,” she said. The town’s water tower had gone dry sometime during the day while she’d been at the farm. Thomas thought it was probably the fire department’s fault; they hadn’t had time to take the pumper truck to the river and refill it Friday night between racing to house fires, so they’d just hooked up to the hydrants and used city water. He couldn’t even estimate how many thousands of gallons they’d used putting out those fires, but surely it had reduced the levels in the tower significantly.
Scooting to the side, she washed her hands in a large stainless steel bowl she’d filled with water Friday night. The water in it was cloudy with dishwashing soap after all the canning she’d been doing. Squeezing as much of the water off of her hands as she could, she dunked them into a second bowl and rinsed them off. There was a third bowl of clean water for a final rinse when she was washing dishes, but she didn�
��t use it. Toweling her hands dry, she stepped to the back door and looked out through the screen at the garden.
She’d been too busy the past two days to get out there and harvest anything. She’d been able to rush and pick a couple pounds of string beans from her own garden this morning to take to church, but that was all she’d picked in either garden since Friday. Tomorrow would be the same, with her and Thomas at John’s farm from sunup to sundown. Three days in a garden could be the difference between ripe and inedible. It wasn’t right to let food spoil on the vine; her superstitious Mama had told her it was disrespecting the garden and all it had offered you, and to let it go to waste meant the garden would be less productive the following year. Mama would’ve been out there picking beans with a flashlight.
“Sorry Mama, but I am just too worn out tonight,” Dotty whispered. “Tomorrow night, I promise. Even if I have to use a flashlight.”
The breeze shifted, bringing with it the smell of the tomato vines. She loved that smell. It signified everything a warm summer should be. But it was Labor Day weekend, and that was the official end of summer here on the Eastern Shore. The tourist traffic would disappear, many of the shops would close up until spring, and soon the garden would be spent. Seth and Lily were due back from their seasonal work in Rehoboth Beach on the 15th; she’d need to find time to get out and pull up their garden before then. Even if she could squeeze another few weeks of harvest out of it, she didn’t want the Millers coming home and having to deal with it themselves. They’d let her use the backyard while they were gone; she’d turn it back into a backyard by the time they got home.
“So much to do,” Dotty said. She heard the loud, high-pitched laugh of Cathy Riggs coming from the front porch and sighed. She didn’t think she had the energy to deal with Cathy tonight. Tapping the weight on one of the canners to verify it still had too much pressure for her to take the lid off—pulling jars out would’ve given her a nice excuse to stay inside—she pulled two disposable cups off of the stack on the table, plucked her flashlight from the counter, and headed back to the porch.
CHAPTER 15
Sunday, September 2nd
Snow Hill, Maryland
“Forgive my manners,” Dotty said as she stepped back out onto the porch. She held up the cups. “Pastor Bill brought me a gallon of his homemade southern sweet tea. Would y’all like some?”
“Yes ma’am, thank you,” Sheriff Kane said.
“Oh god no,” Cathy said, straightening from where she’d been leaning on the railing and holding out a hand as if to ward off evil. “That stuff’s got so much sugar in it, I’d gain two pounds just by taking a sip! I don’t know how y’all can drink that stuff.”
“It’s not like two more pounds would break you, Cathy,” Dotty said, putting the gallon jug back onto the little table on Bill’s side of the swing and handing the cup to Simon. “As it is, a good wind would blow you away.”
“Well a girl’s gotta keep her figure, ain’t that right, boys?”
Bill and Simon looked at each other, eyes wide. Neither said a word.
Dotty leaned back against the door frame. “So what did I miss?”
The two men started talking at the same time, eager to fill the silence. They stopped, and Bill motioned to the Sheriff.
“Bill and I walked down and took a look at some of those trash cans. Looks like they were just opening the bins, and cutting open the tops of the bags. Didn’t pull anything out, didn’t throw the trash around, didn’t touch the recyclables…just opened all the bags,” Simon said.
“Simon thinks they were testing reactions,” Bill said. “Seeing if they could get away with stuff on this street.”
Simon nodded. “I’ve seen things like this before. They start small, scope out the houses and cars while they’re at it. See if anyone comes out to chase ‘em off. Come back another night and do some break-ins if no one does.”
Dotty’s brows furrowed. “But why open up the trash? What does that accomplish? They’re tryin’ to get dogs or coons going through? Attract rats?”
“Dunno, but once the trash is on the street, technically it’s public property. Not really much I can do, since they didn’t make a mess. It’ll just be a pain for the trash guys tomorrow morning, picking up those open bags,” Simon said.
“The Sheriff’s gonna go talk to Mayor Wilhelm and tell him he’s got video proof of his son being out here, because of the video I took,” Cathy said, patting the phone in her back pocket.
“How is it that thing’s still running with all the video you keep taking?” Dotty asked. “Ain’t the battery wore down? Or did you go get a new one?”
Cathy snorted. “I tried. We drove down to Pocomoke City yesterday and the T-Mobile was closed. Had a sign on the door saying with no power and no internet, they couldn’t access our accounts.”
“Well that makes sense-” Dotty started, but Cathy interrupted her.
“Then I figured since all the Weight Watchers meals in our freezer thawed out and were bad, we could go to a restaurant and I could charge my phone and power brick in one of their outlets while we ate, right? Nope. Couldn’t find even one that was open. I had to use the car charger.”
“Cathy, I told you yesterday after Farmer John dropped by that there was no power in Pocomoke. Why would you go there?” Dotty said.
“Well haven’t these people heard of generators?” Cathy said. “There’s a generator up at Food Rite. I figured if a little store like Food Rite had one, most of the stores in Pocomoke City would have them.”
“It takes a lot more power to run a full restaurant than it does to keep a few freezers cold, Miss Cathy,” Bill said gently. “And if all of your food is spoiled, why didn’t you stay after the service this morning and get some food from the pantry? We’ve got-”
“I’m not taking handouts from the church like one of those welfare women,” Cathy snapped. “What would the ladies say if they saw me walking out of there with a grocery bag?”
“They’d probably say ‘That’s a good idea. I should do that too’,” Dotty said.
“Cathy, when was the last time you and Dan had something to eat?” Bill asked.
“Oh, we got some canned soup from Food Rite. Do you know they don’t have anything fresh for sale?”
Dotty straightened. “You mean their whole produce section is sold out?”
“No, silly. What would I do with a potato? I can’t bake it in the microwave with no power. I mean their deli department. They didn’t have any prepared foods out at all. There wasn’t even anyone behind the counter!”
“Oh,” Dotty said, waving a hand. “You had me scared for a minute. They were cleaning out all that while I was there yesterday morning. Said Abe needed the power to run the gas pumps at full speed.”
“Abe’s running low on gas,” the Sheriff said. “Truck was supposed to come refuel his tanks today and didn’t show up. He said he’s had a lot of out-of-state cars coming through and filling up.”
“Coming from Ocean City, probably,” Bill said. The Sheriff nodded and snapped his fingers.
“That’s why I was looking for you at the church earlier, Bill. Do you know you’ve got about a dozen cars parked in the church lot with people inside them?” Simon said.
Bill blinked. “I…no. No. When no one showed up for the 7 o’clock service, I closed up and rode my bike up here to bring Dotty some tea. That was right before sunset. There wasn’t any car in the parking lot but mine.”
“Abe closed everything down at sunset so he didn’t have to run the lights. Put up a big sign saying the pumps would be open tomorrow at seven. People started filling up his parking lot to wait,” Simon said. “What you’ve got might be overflow.”
“The church is private property, Sheriff. Why didn’t you kick ‘em out?” Cathy said.
The Sheriff frowned, held up a big hand, and started ticking reasons off on his fingers. “Because without a sign saying ‘No Parking’, Pastor Bill not being there to tell me he doesn’t want
them there, and no evidence of them causing trouble or damaging property, I don’t have cause to make them leave. Private property is out of my jurisdiction unless the owner asks me to get involved.”
“That’s not right,” Cathy said. “What if they start parking in our driveways when we’re not home? With out-of-state tags you know they don’t belong there.”
“And how do I know it’s not your in-laws from out-of-state that came to check on you? I’m supposed to go on your private property and start questioning them? The law doesn’t work that way,” Simon said.
Cathy sniffed. “We didn’t elect you Sheriff to let a bunch of vagabonds take over the town. You’re supposed to protect us from something like this.”
“They’re hardly taking over the town, Cathy, and no one’s parking in our driveways. When Abe opens up tomorrow they’ll get their gas and they’ll leave,” Dotty said, trying to stop Cathy before she really got started.
“I need to get going,” Bill said. “See if there’s anything those people need, or if they want to use the church bathroom. Thank God we’ve got some rainwater on hand to flush the toilet with.” He stood and gave Dotty a hug. “I’ll be at the farm as soon as I can tomorrow morning.”
“Okay, Bill. I’ll let John know,” Dotty said.
“Sheriff, my official word is if you don’t see anyone causing trouble, let them be. They just need a safe place to sleep,” Bill said.
Cathy sniffed. “If they need a safe place to sleep, they should go to a hotel like decent people.”
Simon ignored her. “Got it, Pastor. And thanks again for the heads-up about the prison yesterday,” he said.
Bill trotted down the walkway and swung his bike around, switching on the headlight hanging from the handlebar basket. “You just let me know when I can come in and see them. Troubling situation like this, they probably need someone to talk to.”
“I’ll do that,” the Sheriff called. “You want me to send a Deputy over to the church to sit with you?”
“Your boys are all big men, Sheriff, but I’ve got someone bigger watching over my shoulder,” Bill called back, pointing to the sky. “It’ll be fine.”