by C. L. Bevill
The prized Stetson hat was still pristine. He placed it on the dresser before something undue could happen to it.
When it was all said and done, the white shirt was unrecoverable, and the jeans were consigned to the suitable-as-cleaning-the-potty pile. Regardless, Bubba changed into a t-shirt that was comparable to Swiss cheese and had the barely legible saying, “Life’s a bitch and sometimes it has puppies.” His mother had presented it to him a few months earlier, and it had only taken three weeks to get it properly softened, worn, and dog-bitten. The shirt was accompanied by his most ragged and tough Levi’s. The jeans could probably go through a tornado, an earthquake, and an infestation of locusts before they would wear out. They would certainly make it through the repair of one Chevy truck nicknamed Ol’ Green.
It had been Bubba’s intention to leave the air cleaner alone because it might be evidence in some long-ago-perpetrated crime. He decided that he would leave the box alone but put it in a trash bag. Then he put the trash bag with the box back into the potato cellar. It was there that he had another idea. He got a flashlight, since the potato cellar was not electrified, and examined all of the parts that he had purchased at First Monday Trade Days.
Bubba was wondering if another note had been left in another box. He did not find another note. He did find mice turds, a pile of desiccated acorns, a long-abandoned wasp nest, and some vintage Chevy parts in primo condition. Some of the boxes were ragged and foxed. One no longer had a lid. One still had the original instructions folded neatly inside it. He gave up the notion and went to work on the truck.
Several hours, one split knuckle, a blood blister, and a litany of swear words later, Bubba started the truck up with a broad grin. Some of the bolts had been bears. One was rusted on, and he’d had to persuade it via the mallet method. The brake connection from the bottom of the pedal to the master brake cylinder was worn and wouldn’t make a solid connection, which explained the lack of brakes. He didn’t have that particular part, so he’d jury-rigged a metal contraption to allow the connection to be completed.
Precious had come out and watched him from a shady spot on the veranda. She had remnants of crab all over her jowls. Idly, he wondered if she had eaten the paper, too. But Precious was a clever dog and knew how to get to the tasty insides of something food-like wrapped up in plain wax paper. By the time Bubba started Ol’ Green, Precious was snoring with her paws in the air. She opened an eye to make certain her master wasn’t driving off without her but closed it again when he shut the engine down immediately.
Bubba went inside and took a shower, changing into his third set of clothes for the day. He ate and fed his dog. Then he went and found the receipt for the Chevy parts. It was a handwritten receipt, grudgingly given by a man calling himself Paddy Sheedy. There wasn’t an address on it nor was there a phone number. There wasn’t even a business name. It was a generic receipt with a list of parts hastily written on it and the dollar total at the bottom. Finally, the man had scrawled “Cash paid in full” under the dollar total. “No returns” was scribbled under that and underlined twice.
Taking a moment to study the handwriting, Bubba noted that it was completely dissimilar to the handwriting of the unknown M. Don’t hurt to check no how. He stuck the receipt in the breast pocket of his shirt, right next to the baggie with the note that beseeched for someone’s help.
He took another five minutes to call directory information and check for a Paddy Sheedy in the state of Texas. There wasn’t a listing for Paddy Sheedy, or so the nice woman on the other end of the line informed him. Bubba hung up and then immediately called back. He didn’t get the nice woman again. Instead he got a chipper young man named Sanjay. Sanjay informed Bubba that there wasn’t a listing for Pat, Patrick, or Pattie Sheedy in Texas either. There was a Pat Sheedy in Wisconsin who was 83 years old. There was a Pat Sheedy, Jr. in Iowa who was 65. There was a Pat Sheedy in California who was 67.
Bubba was sure that his Paddy Sheedy, who may or may not be originally named Pat or Patrick, was in his forties.
Deciding he would run up to Canton the next day, Bubba would see if Paddy was in residence. He stopped to look at the calendar. First Monday Trade Days would have been from the second of August to the fifth, but the facility was open month round with people who had permanent stores there. It was worth a shot, and besides, he needed to test drive Ol’ Green.
He slept fitfully that night and woke up when he heard his mother roll in after midnight. He spent the rest of the night thinking about ways to figure out who had written the note. After breakfast and a few brief re-repairs to the old truck (Gremlins in the night had undoubtedly been at work), he cleaned up once again. Then he called to his dog, who came on the run, her claws clattering loudly on the hardwood floor. She slid to a stop against his leg and looked up at him inquiringly.
“Who wants to go for a ride?”
Precious did.
•
It was getting late in the afternoon when Bubba arrived in Canton. He found a parking place very close to the Trade Days compound. The complex wasn’t empty, but it was far and gone from being full. There were even a few people milling from one shop to another stand. Two elderly women bartered ferociously with a man who ran a table filled with glass.
Bubba looked around. The place wasn’t dead, but it was a thousand times more desolate than when First Monday Trade Days were in high gear. People came from all over the state to dig through the acres and acres of every possible kind of something they could find. The somethings ranged from antiques to crafts to the bizarre. Once Miz Demetrice had seen a Fiji mermaid for sale. The man said it was one of Barnum and Bailey’s originals, and it had the price to show for it; $5500, although the man was willing to knock off $500 in exchange for Bubba’s silver rodeo buckle. But the man didn’t have any paperwork to go with it, and Miz Demetrice had reluctantly passed. (Bubba thought she intended on hanging it in the kitchen so Miz Adelia would have someone to talk with during the day.) His mother still mourned the loss of that mermaid. He’d offered to get some local taxidermist to do another version, like a squirrel attached to a catfish, but his mother said it just wouldn’t be the same. But there was the example of what oddities First Monday Trade Days could produce.
Without all of the tents, trailers, tables, and whatnot set up, Bubba got a little lost. The lights along the asphalt roads were flickering on when Bubba finally asked a man for directions to the area he wanted. He had forgotten that it was a long walk, and the August temperature was well into the nineties even though the sun was dropping fast. He was sweating like a pig, and even Precious’s ears were drooping.
The caravan was still there, and a man sat in a cane chair propped against the corner of the trailer. His eyes were shut, and his booted feet were resting on a table that was only a quarter filled with rusting auto parts.
“Where’s Paddy?” Bubba asked. Typically he would have been a little more polite, but he wasn’t feeling like himself lately. It had been a long two days, and Bubba’s last nerve was stretched like a skin over a newly constructed drum.
The man started at Bubba’s words and nearly tipped over backwards. Catching himself, he blinked rapidly, and set his feet flat on the ground. The cane chair shuddered. “Who’s asking?”
Bubba glowered. He shouldn’t have driven up here, but he had to know about where the Chevy parts had come from. He was hoping against hope that someone, optimistically Paddy Sheedy himself, would be around and ready to answer a question or two without undue influence.
Knock on wood. Bubba looked around for some wood upon which to knock and couldn’t find any. Too bad.
Of course, it wasn’t an ideal world, and Bubba was left with a young man who glowered right back at him. The young man was in his early twenties. His bright blue eyes perfected their glower upon Bubba’s façade. The young man’s black hair spilled over his ears and tickled the neck of his t-shirt. His t-shirt proclaimed “Bacon makes everything better!”. His arms were covered with tattoos
, of which Bubba could see several Celtic crosses and the name of a girl called “Griselda.”
“I bought some parts from him— ” Bubba started, but the young man cut him off with, “All sales are final.”
“I don’t want my money back,” Bubba said.
“What part of all sales are final do you not understand, boyo?” the young man asked belligerently.
Precious let out a warning grumble.
The young man glanced at the Basset hound. “What’s that then? A gremlin with mutant ears?”
The warning grumble became a low growl. She showed her teeth. Bubba thought his dog had nice teeth. He brushed them a couple times a week, and she was quite inclined to eat her Milk-Bones.
The young man straightened in the chair. His hand reached for something, and Bubba saw that it was a hunk of hickory that someone might use to carve into a baseball bat. It was propped against the side of the trailer just as the chair had been. “I wouldn’t,” Bubba rumbled.
“Dogs are supposed to be on leashes on the grounds,” the young man quavered.
“I wouldn’t make any sudden moves,” Bubba advised. “Let’s see. The topic of conversation was some parts that I bought from Paddy Sheedy.”
“He ain’t here,” the young man said.
“And your name is…?”
“Rory Donal,” he said reluctantly.
“Okay then. I’m Bubba,” Bubba said, and the boy said sarcastically, “No crap.”
Bubba took a breath and began again, “I’m Bubba Snoddy, and I need to know something about these parts I bought.”
Rory sat very still and stared at Precious.
Precious stared back. Her mouth was open, and her teeth still showed.
Bubba waited for a moment.
“Paddy won’t be back until the end of the month,” Rory said.
“Don’t you have some kind of records about the parts?”
Rory snorted, and Precious jumped just a little.
“I’ll take that as a no,” Bubba said.
“We have a lot of stuff running through here,” Rory said, “from all over the place. My uncle brings a load from New York once a month. He runs around all parts of Texas. All parts, even little po-dunk towns. Antiques sell pretty good here. People pay good prices for ‘em.”
Bubba considered the talkativeness of the young man. Silently he urged Precious to take a step forward. The sudden silence was filled with her deep grumble of anticipation. She hadn’t gotten to chase anyone really good in days. The day before, she hadn’t felt like chasing people in the woods, but hey, here was someone that her master didn’t care for as evidenced by the tone of his voice, and she could really get a grip on those funny marks on the man’s arms.
“What do you think, girl?” Bubba crooned to his dog. “Think a tattoo will taste good?”
“Ah, dude,” Rory whined. “I told you. We don’t do records. We don’t keep anything. We keep stuff, then we have to pay taxes on it.”
“You have to pay state sales taxes, right?” Bubba said, thinking of his receipt. Paddy Sheedy had added the sales tax to the amount.
Rory rolled his eyes. “That’s for chumps.”
Bubba thought about it. “You’ve got to remember the old parts, right?” He didn’t give the young man a chance to answer. “Fifties Chevy parts in original boxes. You cain’t have much of those. There was about ten of them. You sold them for a pretty penny.”
Rory hesitated. Bubba could tell that the young man remembered the parts. Bubba wished he had The Purple Singapore Sling. The PSS could get blood out of an antique turnip. Maybe the Deadeye David the Dreadful could, too.
Future reference.
“I remember the parts,” Rory admitted. “You ain’t the police are you?” He stared at Bubba suspiciously. “Those parts weren’t hot.” He cast a quick glance at Precious. “I’m pretty sure they weren’t hot.”
“You dint buy them?”
“No.”
“Who bought them?”
“Paddy.”
“Where did Paddy get them?”
Rory chewed on his lower lip. Then his face closed up. It occurred to Bubba that perhaps the writer of the letter was closer than he would have thought. It was possible that the mysterious M was part of the Travellers, a person who had been murdered by them. The way the group moved around and didn’t settle down would certainly prevent the police from connecting them to any bodies left in their wake.
“I don’t have to tell you squat,” Rory said, and folded his arms over his chest.
“Where’s Paddy then?” Bubba asked. His voice became cold and distant. He didn’t like affecting the tone. It reminded him of his father. But if the situation warranted it, then it had to be done.
“Go ahead, sic your dog on me,” Rory said defiantly. “This is a free country. We’re entrepreneurs. We can sell what we want. There’s no law against flea market buying and selling.”
“There are laws against not paying taxes,” Bubba said slyly. Oh, it was a threat, but the kid didn’t know that Bubba wouldn’t know who to tell about it. The last IRS agent to come to Snoddy Mansion had been sent away with a flea in his ear and instructions to talk to Lawyer Petrie, who could quote from IRS pamphlets for hours, word for word.
Rory glared. “He’s on a buying jag. Could be Louisiana. Could be Arkansas. He goes to all kinds of places, even little dirt pits in the armpit of hell. I never know when I might hear from him. Hard to say.”
“How about a phone number?”
Rory snapped his fingers. Precious perked right up. “Dang. Think Paddy forgot to bring his phone. I expect he’ll call soon enough.”
Bubba knew when a fella was hiding something. The question was whether Rory was hiding skirting the law on sales or whether Paddy had something to do with auto parts that might be involved in a murder. Logic interfered with Bubba’s reasoning. Travellers probably wouldn’t hold onto parts for decades. It was unlikely that any of these people had anything to do with someone’s long-ago murder. They simply found something they knew they could sell and done exactly that.
Bubba wondered if he could appeal to the kid’s sense of compassion. The cold glare in the young man’s face told Bubba he probably could not. Rory didn’t want to hear about someone leaving a note in a part. He wanted to cover his petunia. He wanted to cover the collective petunias of his relatives. It was all about family, after all.
Bubba could understand that.
“I got a 1954 Chevy,” Bubba said suddenly.
Rory blinked.
“Needs parts all the time,” Bubba added. “Tell your…what…Uncle Paddy? Cousin Paddy? Tell him I want all the old parts he can get. I can pay top dollar.” Bubba had to stop and compose his face into neutrality. He also had to restrain himself from checking to see if his pants had suddenly become engulfed in fire.
Rory stared at Bubba with suspicion. Then he said, “Why didn’t you say so?”
Bubba looked around. Then he looked back at Rory. “Lots of folks want the original parts in the original boxes. You know what I’m saying?”
Rory nodded.
“Cain’t have all them other fellas jumping on your uncle before I can get to them parts.”
Rory nodded again. He understood getting the first foot forward.
“So you won’t tell none of them other vintage truck guys about it, right?” Bubba asked craftily. He winked. Rory straightened his back.
“I’m sure Uncle Paddy can fix you right up,” Rory said. There was still a bit of doubt in his voice.
Bubba leaned over the table and pushed aside a rusting carburetor and a Model T ignition coil. He plucked one of the maps for the grounds and flipped it over. “You got a pen, boy?”
Rory pulled a Bic out of his pocket and handed it to Bubba.
Precious sensed the drama was over and collapsed to the ground to rest. She placed her impressive nose on her paws and woofed softly.
Bubba wrote his name and his phone number. “Ifin you talk to
my ma, you might want to leave out the details,” he said. “She don’t understand a man’s need to have his car all original-like.”
“I can understand that,” Rory said as he took the Bic back. Bubba put the Model T ignition coil over the edge of the paper so the light wind wouldn’t blow it away. Rory didn’t make a move. He didn’t even reach for the paper.
Bubba would have sighed, but he didn’t want to give anything away. Sure the promise to buy similar parts at a higher amount would get Paddy’s attention, but more questions of where the parts had come from, would probably make the man hang up just as quickly. Bubba would have to think of some ploy to get the man to tell what or who his source was.
“Ya’ll have a nice evening,” Bubba said. “Precious, heel.”
Precious sneered at Rory and then she followed Bubba as he walked away.
Bubba heard the young man say to himself, “That was about as pleasant as a turd floating in a swimming pool.”
Chapter Ten
Bubba and the Prodigious Paroxysm
Sunday, August 19th
It was full dark when Bubba arrived at the Snoddy Estate. On his way through Pegramville, traffic had lightened considerably. Apparently a significant proportion of the budding Nancy Drews and would-be Mike Hammers had to go back to regular drudgery during the work week. Bubba assumed that the Pegramville Murder Mystery Festival would be tapered back from Monday through Friday, but he had no idea what his mother and her cronies had planned.