by Peggy Webb
As soon as the romantic moment ends, everybody starts talking at once. Jack and Charlie take it in stride. This is what being a member of the Valentine clan is all about, family grabbing their shotguns and circling the wagons when one of their own is threatened.
Lovie doesn’t look like a woman in danger of being arrested and accused. She’s got that stubborn chin stuck out and that take-no-prisoners gleam in her eye that means trouble for somebody.
And I’m not long finding out.
“Jack and I have some matters to attend to, so Lovie, why don’t you take all the girls somewhere quiet for a real lunch?”
Though Lovie uses garden-variety language to express her displeasure, she almost never brings out the heavy artillery around her daddy.
“Daddy, my neck’s on the line. I want to catch the lowlife who’s trying to frame me.”
Charlie is unmoved and Jack winks at her. “Give us a couple of hours, Lovie.”
“Jack’s right,” Uncle Charlie says. “We’ll all meet at the Convention Center this evening and discuss everything over dinner.”
“Don’t you worry about anything, Charlie,” Ruby Nell says. “I’m chaperoning this bunch for the rest of the day. The only trouble we’re liable to get into is using our credit cards so much they go up in flames.”
Ruby Nell is the last person on earth you’d trust to be the chaperone, and Charlie knows it. But he just puts his arm around her shoulder and says, “Thanks, dear heart,” then leaves with Jack.
But not before my human daddy scratches behind my ears, just the way I like. “Take care of the girls, Elvis.”
Anybody watching the two men stroll off would never guess that they are the Company’s two most lethal operatives - Charlie, retired, and Jack, code name Black Panther, active.
Everything’s all up to me now, which goes to show how much Jack and Charlie trust me. Still, I don’t imagine they’d have left this bunch of women unsupervised for the rest of the day if anybody had bothered to tell them about the big black car.
It just circled back and is now parking half a block down the street. What’s a smart watch dog to do but get my mojo working?
I follow the women back to the cottage where Fayrene proceeds to vanish so she can get out of that tacky bathrobe. It’s the color of seasickness, and I’m glad to see it go. It’s a reminder of my al fresco breakfast with a corpse.
Then we all pile into Ruby Nell’s pink Cadillac and head to a beachside shack that sells the best hush puppies this dog has ever had the privilege of eating. And that includes my halcyon days at Graceland.
The black car is still tailing us, but none of the women notice, and I’m not about to bust their bubble by pointing it out. They deserve an afternoon off from crime. I just sit on the back seat between Callie and Lovie with my ears blowing.
Callie’s so relaxed since Jack got here that she doesn’t say a word when Ruby Nell runs a red light and then speeds along too close to Jeep Wrangler. She’s about to run up his tailpipe.
“Look, Ruby Nell,” Fayrene shouts. “Everything’s fifty percent off.”
Ruby Nell brakes hard, and the pink caddy shimmies. The driver behind switches lanes then roars past and gives her the finger. Unfazed, she returns his gesture.
“Way to go, Aunt Ruby Nell,” Lovie says.
“Holy Cow! Sometimes I think the stork left me with the wrong family.”
Callie’s mama either doesn’t hear the remark or is so busy she can’t reply. She’s taking Fayrene’s bad driving advice while trying to fit her big car into the little bitty parking space between two live oak trees.
“To the left,” Fayrene yells, and Ruby Nell almost takes out one of the trees. We’re so close I could stand up and spit on the trunk if I aimed just right.
“The other left,” Fayrene says, and miraculously we come to a stop between the trees with just enough room for the women to crawl out of the car.
Callie and Lovie hurry inside, talking a mile a minute, while I saunter among the multiple outdoor displays with Fayrene and Ruby Nell, sniffing for trouble. It’s not long coming.
The creepy black car eases into the gas station just across the street and parks facing this way. I give them my dangerous face, lips back, killing incisors showing, while my hackles rise to new heights. If those two thugs even think about coming over here to cause trouble, they’ll have this lethal dog to deal with.
Chapter 7
Bikinis, Necklaces and Missing Persons
“What do you think, Cal?”
Lovie has pranced out of the dressing room wearing a hot pink bikini that barely covers her national treasure.
“I think if you wear that, you’ll get hauled in for indecent exposure.”
“My kind of swim suit.” She twirls in front of the three-way mirror, setting all her obvious charms to jigging. “I bet this will get Rocky’s motor going.”
This is very good news. Lovie hasn’t mentioned Rocky for weeks now, and I feared the best relationship she’s ever had was over.
“When are you seeing him?”
“Soon as he’s all set up in Italy. A few weeks, I think.”
“That’s fabulous news, Lovie. You should tell Mama. She’ll be tickled pink.”
“I will. Where is she?”
“I haven’t seen her come into the store.”
“Look for her while I change.”
My height gives me an advantage as I walk around the store. I can see over clothing racks and the heads of most women and a considerable number of men. Plus, Mama’s easy to spot, all the rainbow colors in the caftans she wears and those rhinestone studded sunglasses. Shoot, for all I know, she’s strolling around smoking a cigarette in that gaudy movie star cigarette holder.
Of course, all I have to do is look for green to find Fayrene. She won’t wear anything unless it’s the color of money.
I make two circuits of the store, just to be sure, and then check the women’s restroom. There’s not a soul here, even in the stalls. No shoes showing, but just to make sure I open all the doors.
I jerk out my cell phone but my call goes to voice mail. “Mama, where are you? Lovie’s trying on swimsuits and has one she wants you to see. Meet us at the dressing rooms.”
I send her a text, too, thinking she’ll be calling before I can get it typed in. No such luck.
Okay, don’t panic.
There’re bound to be outside, still. Probably got sidetracked with some bargain rack – everything for less than ten dollars. I put on my sunglasses and glance around the outdoor displays. Mama is nowhere in sight. Neither are Fayrene and Elvis.
“Elvis,” I call, and everybody turns to stare. “Come here, boy.”
“You’ll have to go up to Graceland to see him, ma’am.” A gray-haired gentleman with a handlebar mustaches approaches me. “And then all you’ll see is his grave.”
“I know. I named dog for Elvis. A little black and tan basset hound with white markings. Have you seen him?”
“I’m afraid not.”
“He was with my mother and her friend.” I describe Mama as a past middle aged woman with movie star looks and manners. She’d be so proud of me. “Have you seen them?”
“No, but I’ve only been here for about twenty minutes.”
Good grief! That’s almost the entire time we’ve been at this store, Precious Polly’s, it’s called. I thank him and then race off toward the pink convertible, hoping Mama’s taking a cigarette break, or Fayrene got an urge to work on the crocheted “African” she’s doing for Jarvetis.
Nobody is in the car, or lounging against the car, or anywhere even close to the car. I try calling Mama again but she’s not answering.
“Mama, call me as soon as you get this message! I mean it!”
I try not to let my panic show in the second voicemail. But I’m barely holding myself together as I race back into Precious Polly’s. Lovie’s at the checkout counter paying for her man-bait bikini.
“Lovie, they’re gone.�
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“What do you mean, gone?”
“There’s not a sign of them, even Elvis. And nobody outside has seen them in the last twenty minutes.”
“Aunt Ruby Nell never stays where you put her. Maybe they walked to the shops next door.”
“Come on.” I grab Lovie’s arm and race off as if there’s a big clock ticking and I have only five minutes to find my mama. Silly, I know. But a woman with big plans for fertilizing her ovaries with her hunky husband who just showed up doesn’t intend to be anywhere but in her very own room this evening.
Precious Polly is in a mini-strip mall, and there are only four other shops within easy walking distance. Lovie and I search every inch of each shop and turn up nothing. Our questions about two women and a dog yield a disheartening big fat zero.
We reconnoiter outside a shop called Big Ernestine’s. Who’d want to name a shop that? Especially if you were Ernestine?
“Mama’s flighty, but considering what all we’ve gone through in the last two days, I just don’t think she’d run off and leave us without saying a word.”
“Maybe they went across the street to get a cold drink.”
We race across the street, weaving between cars on the beach road whose drivers honk and wave, mostly in a friendly fashion. But there’s this one, a buxom blond with a bad haircut and too much makeup, who shouts obscenities at us. Somebody needs to tell her that she’s just pegged herself as trashy, which no woman in her right mind wants to do.
Lovie’s the exception, of course. There’s an underlying good humor about everything she says, even her X-rated language.
We push through the doors to the Exxon service station and are hit by a welcome blast of cold air…but no sign of Mama, Fayrene and Elvis. This is a small store, and I can see every bit of when I’m three feet inside. Still, Lovie and I do a systematic search, even asking around and finally asking for the key to their tacky, ill-smelling restroom. Nothing here but bad odors and bad vibes.
“I don’t like this, Lovie.”
“I’m liking it less every minute. Maybe we ought to call Daddy and Jack.”
“Not yet. If you’ll care to remember, they’re up their necks in trying to cover up the fact that Mama and Fayrene pranced around with a murder victim for two days.” Lovie starts laughing and I don’t know if she’s gone around the bend or just nervous. “I’m not about to pull them away from a murder investigation to look for two women who probably climbed in the car with somebody from the cook-off and are now sitting in a cute little ice cream shop on the beach having double fudge sundaes.”
“Are you trying to make me hungry?”
“Good grief, Lovie. Focus!”
“You know, you’ve got a point about them going off somewhere for ice cream. I saw Melinda and Jeff over at Precious Polly’s when we first got there.”
“What were they doing?”
“Shopping. Just like us. She was looking at beach cover-ups that said Biloxi or Bust.”
“Holy cow! There’s no accounting for taste.”
I grab Lovie’s arm and we risk life and limb jaywalking across the beach road again. We take one more look around Precious Polly’s, just in case Mama and my dog have returned. Fayrene, too, of course.
One turn through the store dashes my latest hope. As usual, I start thinking out loud.
“At least she has Elvis with her. Somebody up to no good wouldn’t take along a dog.”
“Who’d be after them, anyhow, Cal?”
“Wait a minute! What about those two pirates she and Fayrene bashed with the candlesticks at the ball?”
“If they were out for revenge, I think they’d come after you. You’re the one who scored the bull’s eye.”
“Oh, holy cow! Those two men who were skulking around the cottage…”
“What about them?”
“What was I thinking, being so dismissive about that? Nobody sneaks around somebody else’s cottage in the dark unless they’re up to no good.”
Lovie gives a monologue standing right there among the cheap tee shirts and skimpy bikinis, and most of it in words you’ve never want your children to hear.
“Come on, Cal.” She races off and I follow her.
“Where are we going?”
“To hot wire Aunt Ruby Nell’s Cadillac.”
Hot wiring cars is just another little specialty of Lovie’s. Like picking locks. I don’t know which boyfriend she learned car stealing skills from, but as I race toward Mama’s car I’m grateful to him.
I’m almost there when something on the ground catches my attention. Silver. Shiny.
I squat down and pick up a necklace. One heart, split apart, the two halves designed to fit perfectly together.
Mama’s necklace. Daddy gave it to her for their first anniversary. She’s told me the story a million time.
You’re my split apart, Ruby Nell. As long as I have you, I’ll always be whole.
My father, Michael Valentine, Uncle Charlie’s brother, was one of the last of the great romantics. Besides Jack, of course. Mama and even Uncle Charlie are full of stories about him.
Mama never takes off this necklace. I inspect the clasp to discover that it’s not broken. Mama took this necklace off. And if she left it lying on the ground in front of Precious Polly’s, it’s a sign that something is terribly wrong.
“Lovie.” I open my palm and when she sees what’s in it, she says a string of words that curl every head of hair in Biloxi.
“Quick. Into the car, Cal.”
It takes my cousin less than two minutes to hot wire the car then we roar down the beach road. I don’t even ask where we’re going. Mama and Fayrene’s cottage is the logical first place to look for them.
“Lovie, if they were taken by the two men they caught trying to break and enter, then those men believe there’s something in that cottage they want.”
“What would it be?”
“I don’t know.” Tires squeal as Lovie takes a hard left into the cottage driveway. “But I’m fixing to find out.”
I beat Lovie to the door, and then have to stand there and wait for her to catch up. Mama’s got the key, and Lovie’s the only one who can pick the lock. I’m going to have to get her to teach me how…if I can figure out how to explain it to Jack.
We push open the door and walk into chaos. Everything in this cabin has been tossed and searched. I take deep breaths. Hysterics won’t help anybody.
“They were here, Lovie.”
“And not that long ago.” Lovie picks up Mama’s one-of-a kind cigarette holder, propped against the ashtray on the kitchen counter. “The cigarette butt is still warm. What next, Cal?”
I wish I knew.
“It won’t do Mama any good if we go racing off without a clue where to look. We’ve got to come up with a plan.”
Elvis’ Opinion # 9
Elvis’ Opinion # 9 on Gambling, Riverboats and Kidnapping
Ruby Nell and Fayrene are trussed up like two Thanksgiving turkeys in the bowels of this riverboat while yours truly tries to save the day, as usual.
We wouldn’t be in this pickle except for the gun. There we were, strolling around the tacky tee shirts and thanking our lucky stars – plus Charlie, of course – that we no longer have to dine with a cadaver when the two thugs got out of their black mobster car and headed toward Precious Polly’s. I gave my usual fearless warning bark, but Fayrene was holding forth on a green tee shirt at the time, and Ruby Nell was too busy pulling out that movie star cigarette holder to notice an important dog like me.
Before I could take even a nip out of crime, the tall thug had shoved a gun into the middle of Ruby Nell’s back. She gave a little squeak, but he put a hand over her mouth, all smiles, like he was wiping away cake crumbs from his favorite sweetie.
“Keep your trap shut or you and your friend die. Today.”
Naturally, I sprang into action. When they started toward that big black car, I beat them across the street with some clever hip action as I ma
neuvered among traffic on the beach road. Then I hid out behind the garbage dumpster and waited my chance to show my true talents.
It wasn’t long coming.
The gunman popped the trunk at the same time the one he called Snake Eyes opened the back door of the car.
“Snake Eyes, what’re you doing? The dames go in the trunk.”
“Are you crazy? You’re just gonna put ‘em in there in broad daylight?”
“Nobody’s looking.”
“It’s a public place!”
Snake Eyes said a string of words that even Lovie doesn’t know. “You can see that dame that looks like a flaming peacock for miles. And that one in the watermelon suit stands out like a sore thumb.”
Ruby Nell would have clocked him with her purse if it weren’t for the gun. I know that look. When she gets it, everybody in the Valentine family knows to mind their Ps and Qs.
As for this clever dog, I took advantage of the argument to stow my handsome self in the back seat and hide behind a soft-side cooler and two beach towels. Being a canine who loves PupPeroni, this was harder than you’d think. I didn’t fit. And when I tried to scrunch my sexy hips up under the front seat I nearly lost all religion. I might as well have been trying to climb into the bosom of Abraham. That’s a little song I recorded in Nashville in 1971. I don’t like to brag, but back in the day I had a way with a gospel song.
Bless’a my soul, they put Ruby Nell in the car first, and she immediately slung the tail of that voluminous caftan over yours truly.
And that’s how I stowed away, undiscovered, and ended up on this riverboat, the Crusty Sea Dog. It’s one of those oversized floating casinos that now clog the beach and block the view – all because Mississippi surrendered to brain fog and legalized gambling, but only on the waterfronts. There’s been no peace in the valley since.
Of course, we took a little side trip to the beach cottage first. Here’s how that conversation went.