Final Justice

by Patricia Hagan

  * * *

  The day passed with agonizing slowness, and finally she was on her way home, stopping at the pay phone at Billy's store to call Luke. She did not dare use the one at Dewey's house because of his party line.

  Wilma put her straight through to Luke after Sara said it was urgent. As soon as she heard his voice, she blurted, "I've got to see you right away. It can't wait."

  "What's wrong?"

  "I'll tell you when I see you. Name the place, and I'm on my way."

  "I was fixing to take the jail laundry to the laundromat."

  "I'll be there in ten minutes."

  * * *

  Luke set the basket on the floor, relieved nobody else was around. When Emma Jean came out of the storage room, he felt like his mouth was going to crack at the corners from grinning at the sight of her.

  "I've got a good mind to drag you back there and show you just how much I've missed you, woman."

  "I don't think that would be a good idea."

  He saw how her lips were trembling, her eyes brimming with tears. He started toward her. "Baby, what's wrong?"

  "Don't!" She nodded towards the window behind him. "Somebody's coming."

  He turned and saw it was Sara and quickly explained that she had wanted to meet him there. "But it can wait till you tell me what's got you so upset."

  "Snakes," she said with a shiver. "It's the snakes, Luke. They're going to make me handle them tonight."

  He felt like he'd been kicked by a mule. "No, hell, you aren't."

  "I have to. After Rudy made me go to the altar to supposedly get saved, Miss Bertha says I have to be purged to make sure I'm truly cleansed of sin." She gave a little snort. "Oh, yeah. I'll get cleansed all right. Those snakes are going to eat me alive, and we both know it." She ran her hands up and down the goosebumps on her arms. "Miss Bertha says the reason I haven't gotten pregnant again is because I haven't been right with the Lord, so she's insisting on all of this, 'cause she wants a grandbaby so bad."

  "Well, it's not going to happen," he said fiercely, furiously. "It's against the law. I'll raid the place."

  "If you do, it'll make everybody wonder how you found out it was going on."

  He ran his hands through his bristly crew cut. "That's nothing to fret about. I've always known those crazies play with snakes but haven't done anything about it. I figure it's their funeral, and I've got more important things to do. But this is different. Now you just go on like you're supposed to, and I promise me and Matt and Kirby will be there in time to break it up before things get started, okay?" God, he wanted to take her in his arms so bad it hurt, but Sara was out there, sitting in her car, no doubt watching through the window and wondering what was keeping him.

  Emma jean protested, "I need your help, but there has to be another way. Rudy hates you. He's always saying so. If he hears you broke it up, he might start wondering, and God help me if that happens."

  "I can't let you take a chance on getting bit."

  "Maybe I won't," she said, braver than she felt. "Miss Bertha says I just have to be careful and not make the snakes feel threatened."

  "Hell, they're going to be stirred up by all the drums and cymbals and folks screaming before you even pick one up, so it's not going to matter whether you stroke it like a baby or croon it a lullaby."

  "But Miss Bertha says she handles all the time, and so do a lot of other folks, and they don't get bit."

  He rubbed his hands through his hair again, feeling desperate. A dryer buzzer sounded, and they both jumped.

  "You'd better go on out there and see Sara," Emma Jean said, walking toward the dryer. "And you forget about raiding that church."

  "I'll think of something, Emma Jean. I swear."

  She had never seen him look so worried. "I know you will, Luke, and I love you for it."

  Quickly, she turned away, not wanting to see his face, because she had never mentioned love to him, not in any way, and she was afraid of his reaction to her having done so now.

  * * *

  Luke's palms were sweating as he walked out to meet Sara, but not from the weather. The heat was in his heart. She had said she loved him.

  "I love you for it," she had said, which meant she loved him for promising to help.

  But maybe it actually meant something else, something he dreamed about, fantasized about, but wouldn't let himself seriously consider happening. They couldn't fall in love with each other. In lust, okay Even friendship. But love meant problems. Love meant thinking about tomorrow and the next day, forever and always. And they couldn't do that.

  Could they?

  His mind jerked to the present, realizing he was standing by the window of Sara's car, and she was staring up at him.

  "You look funny," she said.

  "Uh, I'm okay. Just busy." He was struggling to abandon thoughts of Emma Jean for the moment and concentrate on Sara, but his mind refused. Prayer meeting started at seven. It was nearly four-thirty. He didn't have long, and the idea he had in mind was going to be taking a chance, anyway, but it was the only one he had. Otherwise, he'd have to go against Emma Jean's wishes and raid the church. Rudy and everybody else could think what they wanted to, and...

  Sara's tone was sharp, "If you still don't have time to listen to me..."

  He leaned so he could fold his arms on the window, face inches from hers. "I've just got a lot on my mind. Now, what's up, doc?" He wiggled his nose like Bugs Bunny to try and cheer her up, only it didn't work, and he said, "Hey, you don't look so good."

  "I'm not good. Nothing's good." She gave her head a wild toss and gripped the steering wheel and felt like butting her head against it. "I've got trouble, Luke. Big trouble. It's Burch Cleghorn."

  She had his attention then, and he listened intently. By the time she finished, she was in tears. "I just don't know what to do, Luke. He's threatening to see Ted finds out about me and Dewey if I don't do what he wants."

  "Have you told Dewey?"

  "Of course not. He'd pitch a fit and try to tear him apart. I can't tell him or anybody else. Just you. And you've got to do something, Luke. Talk to him. Make him leave me alone and warn him about running his mouth and saying anything about me and Dewey. So many people would be hurt. I might lose my kids, and..." She shook her head at such a heartbreaking thought and rubbed her eyes with the back of her hands.

  Luke glanced up as Emma Jean came out of the laundromat, locking the door behind her.

  She waved to Sara, and, in a genial voice only Luke knew was forced, called, "I'm going to prayer meeting tonight, so I'm closing a little early. Did you need anything, Sara?"

  Sara answered, "No, but thanks."

  Time was wasting, and there was only one chance he could find a way to protect her besides raiding the church.

  He had to find the snake man.

  As the story went, Elmer Bruce Cribbes earned the name by virtue of having been stricken as a child with some kind of strange skin disease. His grandmother, not believing in doctors like so many of her generation, concocted a salve that not only destroyed the disease but also Elmer Bruce's skin. It had shed and come off, just like a snake. When it grew back, it was in shiny, scaly patches of gray and black with yellow flesh on the undersides, just like a snake. The other kids had taunted and made fun of him, and, as he grew up, Elmer Bruce retreated into his own world, a world filled with snakes. He collected them, made pets of them, and, when he was old enough, had gone to live with them in a tar paper shanty in Thunder Swamp, which he built himself out of scraps he hauled from the county dump.

  Eventually he got himself saved at the Thunder Swamp Pentecostal Holiness church and went on to become one of its biggest handlers. There wasn't a snake big enough or mean enough to scare Elmer Bruce. He would pick up a rattler or a cottonmouth and coil them all around his face and neck and arms without batting an eye. Rumor said he had been bitten a time or two and nearly died, but nobody would say for sure. Secrecy was very important to snake-handlers, and that was why those
bitten sometimes died. They were afraid to seek medical help for fear of bringing the law down on the church. They were also ashamed to have it get around they had been bitten, for it made them look unannointed and in disfavor with the Holy Spirit. It was only natural that Elmer Bruce would wind up being the snake-keeper for the church, and, accordingly, Luke figured he was the one person who could help him now.

  Suddenly, Sara could not stand Luke's inattention any longer. "Damn it, you're staring off into space like you haven't heard a word I've said, and I don't have anybody else to turn to but you."

  Luke was aware that Sara's problem could ultimately prove to be a way to bring the hammer down on Burch, but he needed time to think about it. "I heard you, all right, and I'm mad as hell, believe me. But I need a few days to figure out the best way to handle it."

  "I may not have that long. He's crazy. There's no telling what he might do. Luke, me and Dewey have been seeing each other for over fifteen years, and nobody has ever suspected a thing."

  "Maybe, but you can't be sure. People might have noticed and not said anything where you would've heard it. You have to remember not much goes on in this town that doesn't eventually get found out. It's the chance you take when you fool around."

  Irritated that he was not being the instant hero she'd hoped he would be, she could not resist the barb, "Like the one you're taking with Emma Jean Veazey?"

  He forced a laugh. "What kind of nonsense is that? What have you heard?"

  "Nothing." She waved her hand, wishing she hadn't said anything. "I'm just being shitty because you aren't helping me."

  He decided if she did suspect, she'd never say anything. He didn't have time to worry about it right then, anyway. "Hey, you just hit me with this, remember? I can't jump off and do something that might make things worse. Besides, you blew up and told him off today, when the other time you just cried. So maybe he'll leave you alone now."

  "Maybe," she agreed, deciding he had a point. She really hadn't stood up to Burch before. "But be thinking about it, okay?"

  "I will. I promise. And meanwhile, if he does anything else, you call me, and I'll get right on it, okay?"

  With a nod, she backed out of the parking lot and drove away.

  Luke looked at his watch again. He only had a little over two hours left to try and keep Emma Jean from getting bit. He jumped in his car and headed for Thunder Swamp and the snake man.

  * * *

  "When are we gonna move on these nuts, Luke?"

  Luke held a finger to his lips, even though it was unlikely they could be heard over all the racket inside: pounding drums, shaking tambourines, dancing, stomping, yelling. Everyone was up and moving around. Except Emma Jean. She was sitting on the front row with her hands clasped beneath her chin. Her face was the color of bread dough, and tears were streaming from her eyes. Luke wished he could just leap through the window, grab her, and run.

  The church, built of pine boards and tar paper, was just one small room with benches and a plywood stage at one end. Surrounded on three sides by dense swampland, it was pretty isolated, which discouraged anyone except members from coming around. Snake-handling churches did not encourage visitors.

  Luke and Matt were watching through a window. Since it was pitch dark, they would not be noticed. He had brought Matt in case something did happen, like Emma Jean getting bit, which would cause him to expose his presence. Matt being with him would make it look like an official surveillance. After all, the state legislature had passed a law against fooling around with poisonous snakes back in 1950. It was a felony, could get somebody one to five years in prison, but the believers didn't let that possibility dissuade them.

  "Hear the word, children," the preacher was shouting. "Hear the holy word of Mark 16: 'They shall take up serpents, and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them...'

  "Have the faith," he cried, pacing rapidly back and forth, "Have the faith, and no harm will come to you. God will prove you are saved and pure in heart..."

  "Oh, man," Matt whispered. "Look at that."

  A man had thrown himself on the floor spread-eagled, and another was leaping over him holding a snake stretched between his hands. The snake looked bewildered, hypnotized, almost, by all the hysteria, which, Luke knew after talking to Elmer Bruce, was the key to a handler not getting bit.

  "Ahi-lai-wanna-gwum-heeny-heeny," the man on the floor cried as he thrust his pelvis up and down like a fifty dollar hooker. "Yeemah! Yeemah! Allywannayamma Yeemah!"

  Someone else pointed and screamed, "He's got it! The Holy Ghost! He's filled with the spirit. Oh, praise God, Wally's got it!"

  As best Luke could tell amidst the delirium, three snakes were being passed around. One was a canebrake rattler, fat and a yellowish gray color. He knew the snake by Elmer Bruce's description, just as he recognized the two copperheads, bronze and gold in the overhead lights. Elmer Bruce said the copperheads were the least likely to bite if they were handled right and had promised not to use the eastern diamondback rattlers, which were the most dangerous. Neither would he bring out the timber rattlers, which were used most often.

  Bertha Veazey, knees jerking up to her big belly as she stomped in cadence to the drums, danced her way to Emma Jean and tugged at her arms. Luke bit the inside of his jaw and tasted blood. It was taking every shred of self-control he could muster to keep from charging in.

  He tried to focus on Elmer Bruce's promise that he would bring only old snakes tonight. He'd also said he'd see to it they were well-fed with barn mice beforehand so they'd be real lazy and not care much what was going on. All this, of course, had been extracted from Elmer Bruce after Luke had matter-of-factly assured him that, if any harm came to Emma Jean, he would kill him without any qualms whatsoever and make it look like an accident.

  Luke's pulse quickened as he saw Bertha wave toward a man dancing with a canebrake to bring it over. He didn't want Emma Jean handling that one, damn it. It was too alert, whipping his head from side to side, forked tongue flicking in menace. But then Elmer Bruce suddenly appeared. Like Bertha, he was keeping time with the drums, his worn ankle boots clopping up and down. Without breaking his rhythm, he lifted a copperhead from a man who seemed to be having some kind of a spell, eyes rolled back in his head and spittle running from the corners of his mouth. He didn't seem to notice when the snake was taken away from him.

  Elmer Bruce held the serpent out to Emma Jean, his head bobbing up and down to her in a silent, secret message that it was all right. She had nothing to fear. But she had no way of knowing it was a set-up deal, that Luke had put a deeper fear into Elmer Bruce Cribbes than the Holy Ghost or Satan had ever been able to do, and that before he'd let her be bitten, he'd take the snake's fangs in his own flesh.

  Luke, on the other hand, had no way of knowing that Emma Jean had put all her faith in him for the night instead of God. He had said he would think of something, and she believed him because she loved him and dared to hope he might love her, too.

  The snake was testing the air with his tongue, and Elmer Bruce put his finger in front of his mouth, letting him touch it. Then he pressed his face against the snake's, and the two seemed to be watching each other for a few seconds before the snake finally drew back and flicked at the air again.

  Bertha managed to pull Emma Jean, whose horrified gaze was locked on the snake, to her feet. Elmer Bruce gave her a lopsided smile, trying once more to secretly convey she had nothing to worry about, because he had given his word to the sheriff. Though the sheriff had not said why he wanted her protected, Elmer Bruce could guess. But it was none of his business. All he cared about was keeping his promise because he was firmly convinced the sheriff would surely keep his if he didn't.

  Very slowly, very carefully, he held the snake high above his head, then brought it down to drape over Emma Jean's forearm, the rest of its cold, scaly body stretching around her wrist and hand. Emma Jean gagged as the snake began to move in and around her fingers as bits of his skin fell to the floor
. Luke saw the snake and knew it was shedding. Elmer Bruce had said he thought he had a copperhead that was, which was a good thing, because they were even more docile. It was like they were too busy reinventing themselves, making new out of old, to be concerned with biting anybody.

  Emma Jean made eye contact with the snake, and Luke just knew she was going to faint and hoped to hell she didn't because Bertha would only make her go through it all over again, and he wanted this night to be it.

  "Stay with it," he muttered under his breath, unaware he was evoking a curious look from Matt. "Stay with it, baby. You can do it."

  Elmer Bruce fastened his hands around Emma Jean's wrists and was guiding her paralyzed limbs toward her face. She swayed as the snake's tongue flicked across her nose. For an instant, Luke thought that was it, that she was going down. But, miraculously, she was able to stand there, to get through it, and Elmer Bruce, bless him, was not about to push a good thing and quickly took the snake away.

  Bertha Veazey then bellowed so loud that the drums and tambourines stopped playing and everyone around her froze. "Praise Jesus. Oh, Praise God. The sinner is saved. She's been anointed by the Holy Spirit. And now she's pure in heart, and us Veazeys'll be havin' us a baby in the family a'fore long."

  Those not still lolling on the floor or in the throes of a self-induced seizure began clapping their hands and surged toward Emma Jean to hug and congratulate.

  "All right. Let's go." Luke moved from the window.

  * * *

  Matt had been watching him curiously. He'd had his suspicions about Luke and Emma Jean, even shared them with Kirby and his Aunt Wilma. Now he was sure she had told him she was going to be made to handle a snake tonight, and that's why they were there, to be around in case she got bitten and needed to get to a doctor quickly.

  Okay, Matt allowed. It was Luke's business, just like his screwing Wanda Potts was his, but at least her husband wasn't a hot-tempered nut like Rudy Veazey. If Rudy ever found out, it wouldn't make a hill of beans that Luke was the sheriff. Rudy would do his best to try and kill him.