Lesley Kagen - Land of a Hundred Wonders

“Wwwhat do you wwwant?” Billy says, gripping and ungripping his fists. He wants to get at this louse so bad, but he can’t, and it’s causing his stutter to flare up.

“Wwwhat I wwwant is that mmmap,” Holloway mocks.

“Give it to him,” I command to Clever.

“But… but… what about the treasure and the baby and-”

“He’s got Keeper!” I holler.

“A course,” she says, popping open my briefcase and removing the map. “Don’ know what I was thinkin’.”

“Leave it there on the ground,” Sneaky Tim Ray instructs, smug.

Keep hasn’t moved for the longest time.

“Whatcha do to the dog?” Billy is not tripping over his words anymore. I knew it’d be just a matter of time before his torrential temper poured into his head and swept away his fear.

“Back off, Brown,” Sneaky Tim Ray warns, sensing the shift in Billy.

“You ready-set?” I call, hoping Keeper can hear me.

His right ear cocks. Then his left. His tail gives a feeble tock.

All right then.

“What’s gonna happen next is,” Sneaky Tim Ray announces, “y’all are gonna turn around and head down that path. Once I have procured that map, I’ll set the dog free.”

(He’s lying. I know him. He’ll break my dog’s neck just for the fun of it.)

Getting an idea, I tell Holloway in the sweetest voice I got, “Wait a minute.”

As usual, he’s on a slant. Sweatin’ hooch.

“I might have something ya want more than that map.” I step closer and point to his oily patch.

Holloway checks me out from stem to stern, loitering on my double D deck. “Hand it over.”

He’s referring to the “ eye -catching souvenir” Teddy Smith tossed me out the truck window the day he beat the hell out of Holloway. I’ve been carrying it around in my brassiere, anticipating a moment like this. I may be NQR, but I’m no fool. I got him now. The Importance of Perception in Meticulous Investigationthoroughly covers: The Art of Distraction. Slipping my shirt up over my head, I say, “Come and get it.”

When it comes to my yum-yum ripe melons, Holloway’s as helpless as a crayfish to a mealy worm. Add on the promise of getting his precious eyeball back, well, just like I hoped, he loses what little concentration he’s been able to muster. He’s shuffling toward me like he’s in a trance. So when I yell, “Now!” and Keeper chomps down hard with his needle teeth onto Sneaky Tim Ray’s thumb, it takes him time to react and he loses his grip. Seeing his chance, Billy rushes forward with outstretched arms. The two of them are rolling around on the ground, tugging on my dog like he’s a piece of taffy, when from out of the dark comes, “Back off, Brown,” alongside that unmistakable rifle-cocking sound.

When he steps into the candlelight, we can see that Cooter Smith’s the one aiming a shotgun at Billy’s chest. “Ya dumb-ass cracker,” he says, booting Sneaky Tim Ray in the butt. “Quit hollerin’ like a stuck pig and get that map.”

I am stunned! I have never heard a colored talk that way. Not even to a cracker. Cooter better watch his step. The sheriff hears him mouth off like that, he’ll cook his goose well-done.

“Hey, Cooter,” Clever sings out, eyelashes flapping like sheets on a line. Here we are in the depths of despair and… I swear. The girl’s got a fire in her drawers and she doesn’t care one bit whose hose puts it out.

Cooter says, “Carol?”

Sneaky Tim Ray’s one-armed crawling toward the map, sucking on his bleeding thumb. “Ya could show a bit more grateful that I found the goddamn map,” he whines.

“I’ll give ya a gold star later,” Cooter says, pulling his eyes off of Clever to glance down at me.

They’re all watching Sneaky Tim Ray grab for the folded-up treasure paper. Not me. I’m watching Keeper, who’s lying on the ground between us, not moving one bit.

“See what I mean about her titties? Look at ’em,” Sneaky Tim Ray gurgles as he hands the map over to Cooter, who isn’t looking at my titties. He’s giving a jaw-dropping look at Clever’s globe belly.

“Le’s take the girl and the dog with us. We can sack drown the mutt and get some money for her if this other thing don’ work out,” Sneaky Tim Ray tells Cooter as he reaches over and picks Keep up by the scruff. “She got cash from the crash that made her a dummy. Jessie tol’ me.”

Billy’s doing not much of anything but being stone petrified. He gets like that when somebody’s got a gun pointing at him on account of the war.

“Just fer a bit?” Sneaky Tim Ray begs.

Cooter says, “That’s kidnappin’. Ya want the law after us, ya fool?”

Like on cue, from outta the woods comes a shout. “Gibby McGraw? This is the sheriff orderin’ you to show yourself.”

And then Willard chimes in with, “Carol, baby? Please come back to your daddy.”

Dumber than a stick of chew gum, is what he is. Everybody knows that nobody knows who Clever’s daddy is. No matter. She’s not even paying attention to him. Too busy licking her lips for Cooter.

“We got what we came for,” Cooter says, yanking Sneaky Tim Ray up by the shirt collar and dragging him back off into the woods.

“Carol, hoooney?” Willard sings out. “I bought you a diamond riiing.”

I’m trying to pick up Keep but get a good hold of Clever, too. She’s looking like she’d like to chase after Cooter, but then again, she might relent if Willard keeps up this repent.

Billy whisks my dog up into his arms and whispers frantic, “They’re comin’, Gib. They’re comin’.”

“Who’s comin’?” For the life of me, I can’t recall what the hell we’re doing in these woods in the pitch of the night.

“Ain’t you ever tracked before? Shut the hell up,” the sheriff squawks. “You’re lettin’ ’em know our position.”

Billy pulls us back behind the trunk of the sugar maple. “That’s who’s comin’. ’Member?”

No, I don’t. And I don’t care neither. I nuzzle my lips down on Keeper’s chocolate milk stain. Besides being the best dog there ever was, he’ll be all the family I’ve got left if I lose Grampa. “Is he gonna die?” I ask.

Billy peers around the tree bark, trying to get a fix on the exact whereabouts of the sheriff and Willard. “He’s gonna be okay. Smell his breath.”

I lower my nose to his snout.

“Holloway got him drunk, is all,” Billy says. “I need my hands free if we run into the enemy.” He passes me Keep. “Get out your flashlight and keep it aimed to the ground.”

My Eveready is not. “I can’t. It rolled under a bush.”

“Then follow close as ya can,” he says, proceeding with purpose down the skinny lake path.

“Stay close,” I say over my shoulder to Clever, who is looking off to where Cooter disappeared.

Billy is stepping lightly, carefully. (In the Oriental jungle they got wires that can trip you and blow you up so you have to be mighty careful where you place your feet if you wanna hang on to them.) “Remember back in the woods when Clever told me you two were on the lam?” he asks, holding a branch back for me.

“I do,” I say, proud.

“Where were ya headed?”

“Hundred Wonders.”

Keeper’s nose is quivering. He’s not so sloshed that he can’t get enthused about paying a visit to our most favorite place of all. He can smell the miracles.

Billy says, “It’s probably not safe over there right now.”

“Why?” Like Keeper, I’m yearning something bad to see Miss Lydia. I am craving a VISITATION with my mama.

Clever yanks on my shirttail to get my attention. “Billy’s right, ya know. Didn’t occur to me back at the cottage, but anybody with half a brain could figure out that Wonders is the first place we’d head.”