Nancy Bartholomew - Stand By Your Man

She handed the phone to Weathers. I heard her speak to him first. "I had to see did she want to talk to you, but being as how you think it's urgent, I guess she will."

His deep voice rumbled in my ear. "Maggie, where are you?"

"Weathers, state your business or move on."

"I need to see you." Beg me , I thought.

I pulled off to the side of the road, across from the King farm, and sat staring at the bass pond.

"I don't see that we have anything to say. I think we've covered it all."

"Sheila called me after you left." And with that one statement, my heart froze and he had my complete attention.

"What did she want?" I kept my tone casual, as if it didn't shock me that she'd call him.

"She knew we'd arrested Vernell. She was upset."

"Well, do you blame her?"

My face flamed up and I could feel my neck flush. Could he have no feeling for what she had to be going through? Did he not know she'd be devastated?

"She said she's coming to talk to me. I just thought you might want to know, maybe even be here with her."

"What? What do you mean, she's coming to see you? She can't come see you!"

Marshall chuckled. "Maggie, since when does anybody stop Sheila from doing anything she wants to do?"

"Do you not get it?" I screamed. "Nosmo King's money is missing. It's Redneck Mafia money, Marshall. They want it back. Don't you see that as a danger to Sheila?"

"Maggie, calm down. She couldn't be safer once she's here. She's probably driving over from school or your house. I'll send a couple of cars out to watch out for her. She'll be fine."

"No, Marshall, she won't be fine. She's with my sister in Virginia. How's she going to get to you? I had her safe. You shouldn't have let her come."

"Maggie, I didn't know. I just wanted to help her out, and that's what I intend to do."

The trees surrounding the back side of the bass pond began to sway gently with a breeze that gusted up. Clouds skittered across the sky, gray and white, signaling an approaching front. What had been a beautiful fall day was beginning to turn into something far more ominous.

"Someone killed Carlucci's dog last night. I was there. I think they were trying to get to me. You can't tell me Sheila's safe. Now I've gotta go. I'm gonna call my sister and tell her to hang on to Sheila."

I hung up on him, dialing Darlene's number as fast as I could.

"Hey." Darlene's husband, Earl, never fooled with social niceties.

"Earl, where's Sheila?"

Earl paused for a second and I nearly went through the tiny phone after him.

"Well," he said slowly, "I reckon she's still at the drugstore, but it has been awhile. Said she was going after some feminine products. Guess that takes some time to figure on what you want and all."

"Earl! Did she go with Darlene?"

I was beating my hand on the steering wheel, trying to keep from screaming and making matters way worse.

"Nah, Darlene's down to the studio. Sheila didn't go with her on account of she didn't feel good and she needed to go to town. She borrowed my pickup."

"Earl, listen to me. I think Sheila's run off."

"Not without her puppy," he said. "Sheila don't go nowhere without that thing. And he's right out here in his…" I heard the trailer door swing open and Earl step out onto the stoop. "Aw shoot! Dadgummit!"

"The dog's gone, isn't he, Earl?"

"Uh-huh."

"All right, listen here, I'm going to call you every hour. Don't you leave that phone. You hear me, Earl?"

Earl sounded miserable. "I'm sorry, honey," he said.

I couldn't help him out. Instead I hung up, jammed the phone in my pocket and sat in the van, thinking. If I was calm enough about it, I could realize that Sheila was in an unfamiliar pickup, headed directly to the Greensboro Police Department and Detective Marshall Weathers. That in itself should keep her safe. I had to focus on removing the source of our danger. I had to find the money.

I put the van in gear, crossed the two-lane, and started up Nosmo King's driveway. As I pulled to a stop, Bess King emerged from the door of the barn, a red bandanna tied around her head, kerchief style, wearing faded jeans and an oversized denim shirt. She was wearing white tap shoes.

As I drew closer, I realized she was sweating, red-faced from the exertion of dancing.

"I tried to call you again a little while ago," she said.

I just stared at her. How could she be dancing with Nosmo dead and Vernell in jail charged with his murder?

"I can't go home," I said. "Someone thinks I might know where Nosmo's missing money is." And I began to wonder if Bess King might be that someone.

Bess wiped her brow with the tail of her shirt, and held the barn door open. "Come on in," she said. "Let's talk." She saw me staring at her and put it together. "I dance because it's the only thing that keeps me going. If I couldn't dance, I'd go crazy with it all." She walked across the room, grabbed a plastic cup left over from Nosmo's funeral, and ran tap water into it. She stood with her back to me, drinking, until the cup was drained dry. When she turned and walked back toward me, she was all business.

"Tony said you went to see Vernell this morning," she said, and for the first time her expression changed, a spasm of pain moving quickly across her features. "I'm going tonight, when they have visiting hours."

She led me over to a round table and sank down in a chair. I sat across from her and put my hands out on the table, palms down.

"I'm just going to lay this straight out," I said. "I'm not much for dancing around a subject when the best way in the house is through the front door." Bess nodded, watching me.

"I won't ask if you killed your husband. I don't reckon you'd tell me if you did, because if you're the killing kind, then you're the lying kind, the kind to let Vernell Spivey take the fall over something he didn't do. So I won't ask you about that. Same way I won't ask you about the money."

Bess's face got redder and her eyes sparkled with anger, but I didn't give a rat's tail about what she was feeling.

"Vernell didn't kill your husband. I'm going to prove that one way or the other. What I need to know from you is how long you've been seeing Vernell and what you know about Nosmo's girlfriend."

Bess blinked, pulled the kerchief off her head and ran her fingers through her curls.

"Just for the record," she said, her voice taut and angry, "I love Vernell Spivey and we intend to spend the rest of our lives together. And if you think I'm just sitting back twiddling my thumbs while Vernell goes to jail, I'm not. Tony Carlucci is working for me, and if he wasn't so busy covering your tail, he might be a lot closer to finding Nosmo's killer."

Well, if she wasn't a little fireball. I raised one eyebrow and cocked my head to the left.

"You haven't answered my questions."

Bess King never looked away, and I had to give her grudging credit for that. "I started seeing Vernell two months ago. He was here talking to Nosmo and I invited him to stay for dinner."

Bess's eyes grew damp and she stared off beyond me. "He was such a kind man," she whispered. "I couldn't see why he was talking to Nosmo, but that was before I knew about Nosmo and the men he worked for."

"What about his girlfriend?"

Bess focused back on me. "Pauline Conrad?" Bess snorted. "She was nothing but a cheap plaything to Nosmo. He likes them young and pretty and stupid. So Pauline was just perfect. He'd had her for about two years, kept her in a little condo on Elm Street. Two years is usually his limit. That's about when they get difficult and he gets rid of them."

She must've seen the look on my face because she jumped in with an explanation. "No, not like that… He doesn't get rid of them like that. He buys them out and cuts them off." She frowned. "You look surprised, like why would I stick around if I knew all that? Well, I'll tell you why. Nosmo wouldn't let me leave. He said he'd find me and kill me if I ever tried to walk away."