Lesley Kagen: Land of a Hundred Wonders

Pulling my black leather-like out from the cubby under the cash register, I follow him out the diner’s back door. The Importance of Perception in Meticulous Investigationis small enough to carry along in my briefcase, which has everything I might need for a long day of reporting. After I break my awfully good story, when I’m QRagain, and Mama’s resting in eternal slumber, I’m planning to become a famous reporter in a city with a population larger than 2,723. I am intending to relocate to Cairo. (The one with the pyramids. Not the one west of here that rhymes with hay row.) I will tread where no other investigative reporter dares to tread. Rooting out tales in that desert sand. My camera and flashlight are also in my briefcase along with the other tools of my trade. My No. 2 pencils. My very important blue spiral notebook. And my pocket dictionary-in case I remember a word, but not its meaning.

Grampa heaves the garbage bag into the rickety Dumpster that sits out back. “I asked how you’re progressin’ on that story.”

Miss Florida musta gotten picked up just a pinch ago ’cause the reclining chair under the pin oak is empty. I’m sitting down to stretch my sore legs straight when my dog scurries over, his tail ticktocking like mad. Miss Florida’s been petting on him. He smells of Palmolive and pie.

“Gib?”

A few weeks after I got home from the hospital, Grampa and me were doing exactly what we’re doing right this minute when we spotted this white wiry-haired pooch waiting on the back steps for us. He’s bigger than a bread box, but not by a lot. With a chocolate-milk-colored stain spilling down his sides. Ears like one of Santa’s helpers. Grampa said back then, “Well, what do we have here?” picked the pup up by the scruff, inspected for tags, and when he found none, said, “Ya need some responsibility, girl. This one’s a Keeper.”

“Gibby!?” Grampa shouts.

“Yeah?”

“The new story?”

I heard, I’m just stalling since I can’t remember which one that is at the moment. My mind’s too busy dwelling on dead Mr. Buster Malloy, the news of which I will keep locked behind my lips for the present time. I usually tell him what I’m up to, but this time, I don’t want Grampa to know just yet. Hovering over me like he does, he’ll try to warn me off in that no-nonsense voice of his. I know exactly what he’ll say. “It’s not safe gettin’ tangled up in a murder investigation. Best you stick to reportin’ about fishin’ contests or birthed babies.” He doesn’t understand how crucial it is that I get Quite Right again. If he did, he wouldn’t be telling me all the time that I shouldn’t set my hopes too high. But believe you me, when I finally do break this murder story, not only will a certain someone’s angelic wings bodaciously beat, but my grampa’s brow will rise in pride as well. I don’t know why, but I do know for certain that Grampa wouldn’ta spit on Mr. Buster Malloy if he was on fire. And Miss Lydia? Mr. Buster’s sister? Grampa is not fond of her either. Fact is, he finds out I been spending most of my spare time with her up at Land of a Hundred Wonders-well, let’s just say he won’t be rushing off to buy me a sack of good times anytime soon.

“Focus yourself, Gib. Ya know the story I’m talkin’ about. Miss Cheryl and Miss DeeDee? The two ladies that drive that red Corvair?”

Miss Cheryl and Miss DeeDee. Miss Cheryl and Miss DeeDee . “Oh, yeaaah.” I took a swell picture of those gals sitting in front of the pumps. “I’m workin’ on it.”

“All right then,” Grampa says, heading for the truck.

After I cozy up next to him on the bench seat, we wait until Keeper scrambles into the bed of the pickup, because second to raw eggs, he appears to enjoy fast air in his mouth. He also knows a couple of good tricks. And for some mysterious reason has got a white bandage running across the top of his head today.

“And awaaay we go,” Grampa sings, turning up the radio and tossing gravel. He’s always in a hurry like this when leaving the diner. Just like the sign on the door says, he’s GONE FISHIN’ every single day of his life, weather permitting. His daddy started him up when he was a boy in an Abilene river that ran clear and cold.

First things first. I can’t bust my gut investigating the Mr. Buster story ’til I get this other one put to bed, else I’d have to listen to Grampa go on and on about the importance of finishing off what I started. I flip open my blue spiral notebook and get back to writing.

Since Miss DeeDee is going blind with cadillacs, I believe Miss Cheryl only lets her drive on the back roads.

Half the time my guts are up around my jaw and my bottom around my ankles when Grampa speeds around in this battered truck of his. Chrome hair smoothed back by the breeze. One hand jaunty on the wheel. “Ya got the egg order?” he asks, coming to a stop at the bottom of Miz Jessie Tanner’s drive-up.

I slide the napkin out of my pedal-pusher pocket and read out loud, “Six doz.” If he’d let me, I’d do nothing all day long but investigate and write my stories or ride through the woods stuffing my mouth with wild berries as I go, but Grampa says chores build character.

“Try to get Jessie to give you a coupla of those brown ones that ole Henrietta squeezes out, all right?” he says, hooking my bangs behind my ear.

“Knock on wood,” I say, giving his fake leg that got stabbed in the war with a dirty bayonet a good whack. The army had to saw it off way back when so now he’s gotta strap this one on every morning. Don’t feel bad for him. The leg’s got an attached black tie shoe and a sock with gray diamonds that he never has to wash, which I’d call a pretty good deal.

“Time’s a wastin’, Gib,” Grampa says, anxious to get out on the water.

Snappin’ shut my leather-like, I get out and wait for Keeper to join me. I don’t go hardly anywhere without my dog.

Grampa shouts out the truck window as he takes off toward the cottage, “See ya at supper.”

“Not if I see you later, you big baboon,” I shout back.

As you can probably tell, I’m already busy working on improving my joking ability. ( All part of the getting Quite Right plan, Mama. )

Tanner Farm is one of the spots in life that make it hard for me to see and breathe at the same time, it’s that gorgeous. Once you get past the plumpy woods that run along the drive, the sky opens up to reveal paddock after paddock full of Thoroughbred horses chewing on the finest of bluegrass. That’s what we call it in Kentucky for some unknown reason. But make no mistake, this grass is dollar green.

Halfway up the drive, I shout out, “Keeper?” ’cause he’s taken off into the woods, probably sniffing for a spot to answer his call to duty, which he takes awfully to heart. “Finish up now, please. Miss Jessie is waitin’ on us and we have bunches to do today.”

“Hey,” Billy calls, his voice wafting out of the treetops.

“Hey, you,” I holler back.

You ever paged through one of those puzzles they put in the Highlights for Children magazine? They have them in all the doctors’ offices. The artists of that magazine conceal foreign objects in a picture, like a candle in a curtain or a key snuggled up in a sofa cushion, and you’re supposed to find it. You know it’s there, but where oh where? Well, ditto with William “Billy” Brown, Junior, previously well known as “Little Billy.” (After he got back home from the war, Billy wouldn’t answer to that name anymore, but that’s what he used to be called on account of his daddy being called Big Bill Brown.)