by Kate Merrill
Bird’s eyes lit up like they did that day when Leona took him out to see the Indian caves. He broke loose and scampered across the oiled wood floor to an antique glass display case. “I want one of those, Leona!” Nose pressed to the glass, Bird pointed to a fancy red pocketknife with a little white cross on its casing. “It’s a Swiss army knife. My daddy gave me one just like it, but Aunt Nita took it away.”
Leona was tempted, but she couldn’t give such a dangerous thing to a child. “Pick something else, Juan.”
“No, I want the knife!” he screamed.
Again curious faces swiveled in their direction, until Leona wanted to shrink up and disappear. “Ain’t there anything else you can think of?”
A crooked smile crept across Bird’s face. “Yeah, but it’s not in this stupid store…” He pulled her close. “Give me one of those wolf puppies out in the barn.”
Leona’s chest tightened. She already knew Bird wanted a puppy more than anything in the whole wide world. “Sorry, but we ain’t going back to the barn, honey. Not ever.”
His eyes popped with surprise, but before he came up with more questions, she dragged him across the room to a rack of children’s tee shirts. “My Lord, look at these!” Her voice jiggled as she ran the hangers back and forth. “Do you want one with Dan’l Boone, or this one with the Indian Chief?”
Bird shrugged. “The Indian’s okay…”
She yanked the shirt off its hanger, and then chose a pair of green hunting shorts that looked to be Bird’s size. She hauled him into the dressing room.
“Go on, try ’em on…” The painful lump in Leona’s throat swelled as she watched Bird change. She had dressed him in the original clothes he’d worn when they snatched him, so he stank to high heaven. She counted the ribs on his skinny little chest and made a memory of their last moments together.
The fitting room seemed to close in as an image came clear in her head: Once they got to the police station, she’d send Bird in alone, and then she’d take off. She’d never let them lock her in a cage.
“Can I wear these now?” Bird’s face beamed at his reflection in the mirror.
“Don’t see why not. In the meantime, I’ll throw away your filthy old clothes…”
“No!” The child snatched his rags and clung like a baby to a teddy bear.
If she’d had doubts before, Leona then fully understood that the boy desperately wanted to go home to what he’d lost. These nasty old clothes were his only lifelines to the past, and he’d never let go. She couldn’t hold him in her world any longer.
She counted out cash for the clothes, and then led the boy to the adjacent showroom, where a sign said Mast’s Famous Sodas, Sweets, and Sundries. From her own childhood, Leona remembered this was a magical place, where old-timey wooden barrels overflowed with every candy know to man. Shelves of cookies and tins of exotic confections lined the walls, while an old- fashioned soda fountain glittered all along the back.
“Cool!” Even Bird couldn’t deny the allure. “Can I have some candy?”
“Choose whatever you want.” She handed him a white paper bag. He could mix his own selections, then they’d weigh and pay later.
He stood on tiptoe to peek into the barrels, and then ran from one to the next in wild indecision. The room smelled of chocolate and coffee, but the odors didn’t sit well on Leona’s stomach.
She figured she’d tell Bird about the police station once they got settled at the fountain, and then turn him in directly after they’d finish their sodas. If she hesitated, she’d never do it at all, and the Good Lord knew that any old excuse would get her running in the wrong direction at that point.
She wondered if all the people milling around the room, tourists mostly, took her for Bird’s mama. The idea calmed her some, even though it was just pretend. She noticed how the sunshine from the big glass doors opening to the sidewalk played across Bird’s handsome little features, and her heart near to burst with maternal pride.
But then a cloud passed over the sun, and a strange look came over Bird’s face. His big eyes froze in terror as they fixed on the front door. It was like someone ran a hot poker through his stiff little body. His fingers opened and he dropped his bag. All the candy rolled across the floor, as Bird slipped down to hide behind the nearest barrel.
Leona’s gut seized up as she looked towards the door, to where a bald man, maybe some jerk from a motorcycle gang, leaned on the doorjamb talking with some other guy.
“What’s got into you, boy?” She lowered down on her knees next to Bird and began scooping up the candy. He latched onto her arm with fingers cold as pop sickles. His nails dug into her skin so bad she near cried out in pain. “What’s wrong with you, child?”
A little trickle of pee ran out the leg of Bird’s new shorts and pooled on the floor. The boy’s mouth opened and closed, but at fist no sound came out.
“It’s him!” he chirped at last.
Leona lifted her eyes to just above the rim of the barrel and looked again. She saw the same two men. The bald one was trying to buy a dirt bike off the other. The one who owned the bike mentioned a price, and then the bald one hooted loud and mean. That laugh sliced through Leona’s groin like cold steel, and when the stranger turned his face towards the room, his eyes glowed like coals above the tiny scar across his mouth. Leona bit down hard on her tongue, drawing blood, anything to keep from screaming out Floyd’s name.
At the same time, Bird crawled backwards on his hands and knees, then got up and ran towards the back door. Leona did the same, nearly slipping on the hard candies melting in Bird’s urine.
No time to worry about her dignity or the curious, gaping eyes. Instead, she saw only Bird, with tears streaming down his face. He held his crotch as he made a beeline for the old station wagon. By the time she caught up, he was curled up in his old position in the back seat, but this time his knees were drawn up under his chin, like a baby in the womb.
Near as she could tell, Floyd hadn’t seen them and nobody was following. She crawled behind the steering wheel and locked all the doors. If she drove through the back alleys to the police station, she figured Floyd wouldn’t spot her when she put Bird out.
“Don’t cry, honey,” she pleaded. “I promised you it’s gonna be all right, and it will.” She drove slowly as she passed Bird’s old shorts to the back. At least they were dry. “Put ’em on, and you’re good as new.”
He made a low, keening sound, like a hurt animal. If memory served, the station house was located in the next block. Leona’s heart knocked inside her ribs as she looked both ways, then turned onto Main Street.
“You best get ready now,” she called over her shoulder. “The police station’s up ahead. When we get there, I’ll open the door, and you will walk inside all by yourself, like a big boy.”
“No!” Bird’s teeth chattered. “I won’t go in without you.”
Leona’s heart stopped beating altogether. She couldn’t carry a hysterical child through the station house without attracting attention. She could almost feel the cold bite of the handcuffs and hear iron bars closing behind her back. She saw the light fading from her life.
Yet she parked in the city lot behind a squad car, and faced the boy. He was clinging to the seat for dear life. “I know you’re scared, Juan, but no one will hurt you here. The policemen will see you get home safe.”
“I won’t go!” The child choked on his tears. “Take me back to the farm. I want to stay with the wolf puppies!”
Leona lifted her eyes to Heaven and blinked back tears. She knew Floyd had scared the child so bad he couldn’t think straight, but she had already warned the Lord not to tempt her---that any old excuse would send her running down the wrong road. So if this wasn’t a sign from the Almighty, she’d never seen one. She’d never done much right, but then she’d never done anything so wrong that He’d ask her to spend the rest of her natural life in jail…had she?
“Don’t cry…” She stroked Bird’s fuzzy head. “I
won’t put you out, child.”
Leona quickly shifted into reverse and headed back towards Highway 321. This time she’d avoid the main road and follow the old, untraveled lanes recalled from her youth. She knew Floyd would come for her and Bird, but at least she wouldn’t meet him on the highway.
Fear pumped through her veins, causing her hands to tremble on the wheel. With Floyd nipping at their heels, she couldn’t stay in her grandmother’s cabin forever without putting the old woman in danger.
But for now, they were going home, her home.
Mother Mattie would know what to do.
FORTY-FIVE
Salt of the earth with a shotgun…
The sun was high above the mountains by the time Diana and Matthew left the trailer. They had never gotten around to eating the breakfast she had prepared. Instead, they abandoned themselves to horseplay when she tried to turn Matthew’s shirt right- side out. One thing led to another, and they barely made it to the bedroom, where they spent several blissful hours losing all sight of purpose.
Guilt didn’t set in until they wandered into the Boone Drug Company for a very late lunch. “Where do we start?” The image of Juan loomed heavily on her conscience.
Matthew guided her to a booth across from an old- fashioned lunch counter. “We start by eating. Right now we’re running on a wing and a prayer.”
He was right. She was existing on emotional steam, but hunger rumbled somewhere in that sweet pit that used to be her stomach. “Look at this place. Do you ever feel like a dinosaur, Matthew?”
She told him about the old Woolworth’sin West Chester, Pennsylvania, where as a child, she had eaten at a counter much like this one. “They tore the Woolworth’sdown in 1994, but the Warner Movie Housewent under the wrecking ball long before that.”
“They call that progress?” Matthew ordered homemade chicken salad. “Soon those memories will be long gone.”
Diana recalled the lipsticks, costume jewelry, and craft kits that once sparked her imagination at the old dime store. This place offered all those plus a complete pharmacy, hardware department, and art supplies upstairs.
“I think I’ll try the hot lunch bar,” she said.
Matthew frowned at the stainless steel tubs filled with roast beef, mashed potatoes, gravy, steamed vegetables, and even hot apple dumplings. “You may want to rethink that, Diana. That food’s been sitting since the lunch hour…it’s past its prime.”
“Who isn’t?” She winked. Real diner food was one her secret vices, so she was not about to pass up this opportunity.
They ate in distracted silence, each occupied with private thoughts. She knew that Matthew was also desperately worried about Juan. That, coupled with a certain shyness with one another, made for a quiet lunch. Finally, Matthew shoved his uneaten food aside.
“I’ll ask around about Flake,” he said. “It’s a small town. Flake has to shop somewhere.”
She had noticed the stores lining Boone’s Main Street--- used bookstores, college boutiques, and local art galleries. They didn’t seem likely haunts for farmer Brown. Suddenly her apple dumpling lost its appeal.
“I need to buy a few things at the pharmacy,” she told him. “Maybe the druggist knows something?”
Matthew left the tip and paid. “I’ll wait for you out front. I saw some old-timers warming the benches along the sidewalk. Likely one of them is willing to jaw a spell.”
When Diana emerged from the store, a big cloud passed over the sun, chilling her with an odd sense of foreboding. She spotted Matthew in earnest conversation with an ancient bearded gentleman hunched over a cane. By the time he joined her, Matthew’s face was flushed with victory.
“I found him, Diana. I know the way to Flake Brown’s.”
***
By the time they located Mr. Brown’s remote little brick rancher, set far back from the highway, it was late afternoon and a storm was brewing. They saw an elderly man on a red tractor driving fast, hoping to finish mowing his yard before the rain started. They parked the truck, and then Matthew led them through a grove of graceful oaks.
At the same time, the tractor buzzed around the corner of the barn at full-tilt, heading straight at them. For a moment, she feared the man intended to run them down, but he shifted into neutral and coasted to a stop just short of Matthew’s boots. He scowled from beneath the bill of his straw hat, and did not turn off the engine.
“Hey, Mister Brown…” Matthew shouted above the din. “How you doing today, sir?”
The old geezer’s suspicion was as thick as the humidity as he cut the engine. “Ain’t buying nothing.”
“Good, ’cause I ain’t selling nothing,” Matthew countered. “We came to ask after your neighbor, Miz Mattie Birdsong.”
Mr. Brown climbed stiffly off his John Deere, but ignored Matthew’s extended hand. “Mother Mattie ain’t buying nothing neither.”
“Then you do know Miss Mattie?” Diana butted in.
“Maybe I do, maybe I don’t.” Flake scowled at her with a look to melt steel. He addressed his attention to Matthew only. “What do you want with her, anyways?”
Diana opened her mouth to speak, but thought better of it. She had experienced this phenomenon before, this male notion that women, like good little children, should be seen, not heard. So she shut up and let Matthew do his thing. Already he had gotten beyond Mattie and was asking about Leona.
Flake sneered. “That little gal ain’t lived up to Mattie’s for years. She wasn’t nothing but trouble from day one, a real heartache to her grandma. Leona run off in disgrace, don’t you know? Girl got herself pregnant. Good riddance, I say.”
Diana suppressed an urge to kick Flake in his self-righteous shins. Both Lucy last night, and now this joker, assumed that Leona had delivered her baby out of wedlock, but Diana knew from Agent Grim that Leona had been legally married, whatever else her sins.
“Sure you haven’t seen Leona lately?” Matthew pressed. “It’s very important that we get in touch with her.”
“I might be getting on in years, but my eyesight’s good as ever. If that girl came sneaking around, I’d have seen her.”
“I understand, sir,” Matthew said. “But do you think we could talk to Miz Birdsong herself?”
Flake’s rheumy eyes narrowed as he sized Matthew up. “I ’spect it couldn’t hurt nothing, long as you don’t go and upset her. But them roads up to her place will shake your truck apart like a tin can, and what with this storm coming, you won’t see the turns until you drive off the edge.”
Matthew’s neck colored. “My truck has four-wheel drive. I’ll take my chances.”
“Suit yourself.” Flake cackled. “Come closer, fella, and I’ll draw you a little map…”
The boys huddled together as Flake scribbled on a matchbook. In the meantime, Diana reeled with anger and impatience. When they finally left, Flake shouted at their backs.
“One more thing, folks, be sure to halloo the house before you go barging in.”
“Come again?” Matthew called.
“Like I told you before, you don’t want to upset Mother Mattie. Old gal has a trigger temper and the shotgun to back it up. If you spook her, she’s like as not to blow your brains out!”
“Thanks for the tip.” Matthew turned
his back on the man and rolled his eyes. “The old coot’s a charmer, isn’t he? Do you still want to go?”
Diana considered. Depending who told it, Mattie Birdsong was a cross between Mother Theresa and Ma Barker, or salt of the earth with a shotgun. Who on earth were these mountain people? It seemed like some of these folks were living in a previous century. Matthew had explained that a few of them had indeed been isolated from modern society for decades and remained quite primitive in their outlook. So not for the first time, Diana wondered what she was getting into.
At the same time, in the past few minutes, an odd premonition had gathered in her subconscious like the thunderheads forming in the sky. She sensed the presence of Juan, saw his face in the clouds and heard his voice in the whistling wind.
“What are we waiting for?” she said.
FORTY-SIX
This dark natural cathedral…
“This can’t be right.” Matthew pulled off the highway and stared at a rutted cow path weaving through an overgrown field.
Diana studied Flake’s scrawl on the matchbook cover. “Must be right. There’s the dead willow he described.”
They eased onto the path, with the shocks of Matthew’s truck squealing in protest as they bumped towards the sky over brutal rocks and fallen branches. Finally, the open fields ended at the edge of a heavy scrub forest.
“Who on earth would choose to live up here in the middle of nowhere?” Her stomach lurched with each bump.
“Some folks prefer the company of nature to living cheek by jowl with their own kind. There have been times in my life when I felt pretty much the same.”
She glanced at him and wondered how long it would be before he tired of her close companionship. In the past twenty-four hours, they had lived and breathed as one, sharing their minds and bodies like a single organism. For two confirmed loners, this intimate time together had been an interlude she never could have imagined one short week ago.