Lesley Kagen - Land of a Hundred Wonders

“Map? What map?” she says in her most innocent-of-all-wrongdoin’s voice. “I have no idea what you’re talkin’ about.”

“Ya weren’t over at Browntown last night, were ya? Spendin’ the night with the Smith boy? Maybe ya even helped him murder Buster. I know how ya favor the coloreds.” He comes in close enough to sniff Clever, maybe for dump smoke. Or barbecue sauce.

Clever hawks and spits to the side, says, “Why, no I wasn’t, and no I didn’t, LeRoy. Ya know, I could swear I already tol’ you that. Seems to me”-she bobs her eyebrows at me-“what we got here is a failure to communicate.”

Oh, my cool-handed Clever!

“But thanks ever so much for worryin’ about my whereabouts, ” she says so realistically, even I believe her.

Shifting his weight toward me, LeRoy asks, “How about you, Miss Gibby? Ya over to Browntown las’ night?” I can tell he’d love to add on, “You who are dumber than anthracite coal.”

“She was with me,” Billy says, trying to maintain a hold of Keeper, whose appetite must be returning ’cause he’s eyeing the sheriff like he’s a chicken-fried steak.

“And just exactly where was you ?” he asks, politing his voice some since Billy’s daddy, Big Bill Brown of High Hopes Farm, is the richest man in Grant County. It’s not likely the sheriff is ready to belly flop into that kind of hot water. Not with an election coming.

Billy says, “I was with Gibby.”

“Sheriff, ya hear anything new about my grampa?” I ask, suddenly remembering. If anybody knows what’s happening over at the hospital, it’d be busybody him.

LeRoy gives us the once-over one more time, and then with a turn of his heel heads back up the lawn.

“Sheriff Johnson?” I call, chasing after him. “Grampa?”

“Gibby?” Billy calls after me, worried.

“I’m fine,” I yell back at him, and then to Clever, “Stay put,” ’cause I can tell she’s just itching to skedaddle.

Hustling, I catch up with LeRoy just as he’s pulling open his cruiser door out back near the road. I’m about to ask him again about Grampa’s condition when he warns, “Keep your trap shut about findin’ Buster on the beach or else.”

OH MY GOODNESS! HE KNOWS I KNOW!

Or is he just warning me about spreading gossip that can’t be proved? Slander: A malicious false statement.

“I’m givin’ you fair warnin’.” He grabs on to a handful of my hair hard enough to wrench my head to my shoulder. “Ya hear?”

“I’ll… I’ll write a story in my newspaper. Everybody in Cray Ridge will know that you’re trying to blame Cooter for something he didn’t do.”

“Be my guest,” LeRoy scoffs. “Who ya think they’re gonna believe? The man who’s been the law of this county for eight years or some… imbecile.”

Seconds after he backs out, siren blaring, Keeper whips past me. He musta been eavesdropping and no longer able to contain himself, ’cause he full-out chases that squad car down Lake Mary Road. “Careful,” I shout after him, even though I know he won’t heed me. That’s the thing with that dog. He’s brave, almost recklessly so, and doesn’t EVER give up. No. Keeper will take it on himself like a sworn duty not to let the sheriff outta his sight. I read the whole book out loud to him, placing special emphasis on chapter 16: Tracking. A good hunting dog can be indispensable. And tenacious. So I’m not worrying about the sheriff’s threats as I turn back to the cottage.

But ya know who should be worried, don’tcha? Cooter Smith, that’s who. Because no matter how rascally he’s been acting lately, we’d all feel real bad if he was found twisting on the end of a rope in Wally’s Woods, the sheriff not bothering to hide a revolting grin when he announces to the town, “He up and escaped. I have no idea who strung the boy up like that. What a goddamn shame.”

Yes, indeed. Cooter Smith should be worryin’ his fool head off.

While Billy and Clever are in the kitchen stirring us up some lunch, I’m picking through Grampa’s dresser drawers. His worn-at-the-seat jeans. The bleached undershirts he wears no matter how hot. I run my finger across the pearl buttons of one of his Texas shirts. The kind you see on rodeo riders. I’ve never been in his room without him. Pressing my face into his pillow, there’s a faint smell of trout twisting out of the lake. My salty tears aren’t helping. They’re only reminding me how the two of us had planned on doing some ocean fishing someday. “The Atlantic spreads out like a Texas prairie,” Grampa told me, thrilled. “Fish the size of calves. Ya’d have to see it to believe it.”

Above his cherrywood bed there’s a portrait of him and Gramma Kitty. They don’t look much older than me and Billy. I’d give up my favorite No. 2 if I could climb into that picture and feel all that love blanketing me and… focus, Gib, focus . What does he always tell me when I get to yearning like this? “What sense does it make cravin’ something ya can never have? That’s like a whippoorwill wishin’ it were a sparrow.”

Oh, Grampa.

What else is he gonna need in the hospital? His deerskin slipper? Yes, he’s awfully fond of that slipper. I check under the bed for it, sending dust bunnies on high. There it is, next to what looks like a wooden hatbox. As I slide them both out and set them on top of his chenille spread, a voice in my head tells me to go ahead and open the box, and it isn’t Grampa’s. He’d raise holy hell if he knew I was going through his personals. I trace the smooth raised-up letters. A M. Addy Murphy. Bet he whittled this box for Mama when she was a little girl. Wonder why he never showed me this before. The top comes right off. There’s a jumble of stuff inside, but what catches my eye right off is the pink ribbon tied around a curl of dusty brown hair. And a letter.

June 2, 1970

Dear Daddy,

Might as well get straight to the point. I caught Joe cheating with the art dealer who owns the shop where I exhibit my paintings. (Calm down. Remember your heart.) After we drop Gib off at your place, the two of us are heading to a cabin in the Cumberlands to try and work things out. Don’t worry.

Love,

Addy girl

Well, goodness. Daddy was cheating an art dealer? So that’s why Miss Lydia can never see him up in heaven when she does one of her ACTUATIONS. This also answers my pestering question as to why he’s not buried with my mama. My grampa despises cheating of any kind.

“Soup’s almost on.” Clever sticks in her head, and seeing what I’m doing, gets herself comfy on his bed. “Whatcha got there?” Boy, she could stand a bath. She smells like giblet stuffing right after you scoop it out of the bird.

I hand over the letter from Mama I found in the box. Clever moves her lips when she reads, so it takes her some time. When she’s done, she shakes her head. “Another man shows his good-for-nuthin’ side,” she says, mimicking her mama to a T, but then adds with some wistfulness, “Do ya think they’re all like that?”

“ My man doesn’t have a good-for-nuthin’ side,” I say. “He wouldn’t cheat an art dealer.” (Billy doesn’t even like art all that much. He’s more the rugged outdoor type.)

“You gonna be all right?” Clever asks, eyeing some coins Grampa left on his bedside table. “ ’Bout your daddy, I mean.”

“A course I am. If he wouldn’ta died in the crash, I’m sure he woulda paid that art dealer back.” I set Grampa’s red-striped pajamas into the packing box next to his whittling knife and records. “Bad timin’ is all.”