Part 10 (1/2)
”Does Cindy know?”
”Not unless he told her,” said Annie Sue. ”You think we ought to go over there after supper?”
”Too late. She said he was picking her up after work. And she just laughed when I asked where they were going.”
They stared at each other grimly.
”He's older than we thought, too,” said Annie Sue. ”Twenty-five, didn't you say, Deborah?”
”Or twenty-six. Reid wasn't sure.”
There was an appalled silence. At sixteen, older men were nineteen-year-old college freshmen. Someone ten years older?
”I knew he was no good,” Paige said again, but there was no satisfaction in her tone.
They didn't ask my advice and there was nothing I could say that would make any difference. They might not be grown, but they weren't children either and there was no way to put raging hormones back in the box once they were loose.
By the time Annie Sue was ready to admit that it was getting too dark to see, mosquitoes were about to eat us alive and all the wall boxes had wires to them although nothing was actually hooked to the panel box yet.
As we loaded tools and ladders back into the truck in the gathering dusk, Herman drove up in the company's newest truck. I saw right off that he wasn't in the best of moods, but I couldn't tell whether it was because he'd had a hard day or because he was half sick.
He was determined to inspect Annie Sue's work and snapped at her impatiently when she couldn't put her hands on the big flashlight that was supposed to be in the back of the truck. Annie Sue got tight-jawed and defensive, and Paige went beet red with sympathetic impotence. It didn't help Herman's temper when I spotted the missing flashlight on the seat of his truck-right where he'd left it.
Tension crackled like heat lightning in the starless sky, but I was too hot and tired to play the thankless role of peacemaker. A mosquito whined in my ear, another was gnawing on my ankle, and my deodorant threw in the towel as perspiration trickled down between my b.r.e.a.s.t.s. Suddenly, all I could think of was how nice it'd feel to be floating in Aunt Zell and Uncle Ash's pool, a bourbon and Pepsi floating in an untippable tumbler beside me, far, far away from quarrelsome people.
”See you tomorrow,” I said and left them to it.
When I called that evening to tell Ned O'Donnell that I was reducing Layton Ogburn's bail, he was suspicious. ”Don't you do it on my account.”
”A little ol' district court judge doing favors for a superior court judge? Never in a million years, Your Honor.”
I told Zack Young the same thing when he stuck his head in during the midmorning recess next day and thanked me for my cooperation.
”Raising that much cash would've cost your client more than his profits on a WomenAid house,” I said, pouring another gla.s.s of ice water. ”Better in their pocket than in a mortgage company's.”
”If it came to that,” Zack agreed blandly. ”I had an appointment with a superior judge over in Wake County this afternoon. You just saved me a trip to Raleigh.”
The day continued overcast and heavy, but the rain held off, tormenting us with a promise of relief that wouldn't come. I sweated through morning court in my heavy robe, then drove home at lunch, took off all my underwear and panty hose, and drove back to court wearing only an opaque cotton sundress and sandals under that horse blanket.
On the afternoon docket, a flasher was followed by a thief who'd stolen his next-door neighbor's air conditioner right out of the window. Both pleaded the heat as a mitigating circ.u.mstance. I sent the flasher for a Mental Health evaluation and sent the thief to an air-conditioned jail cell for forty-eight hours.
When I met Annie Sue after work, I warned her that I'd have to leave early for a political meeting over in Makely. She seemed as listless and dispirited as the weather.
”Your dad give you a hard time last night?” I asked.
She shrugged. ”Not really. In fact, at breakfast this morning, he told Mom I was doing good. I don't know why he couldn't just tell me though. Why does he have to be like that?”
”At the risk of sounding s.e.xist, honey, that's just the way some men are.”
Her smile was wan. ”Yeah.”
”Did you talk to Cindy?”
She grimaced. ”For all the good it did. Guess what? He doesn't love his wife. They're going to get a divorce. 'And what about the baby?' Paige asked her.”
”Baby?”
”That's what Cindy said. Yeah, baby. Paige did some asking around. Remember Sat.u.r.day, that tall black-haired woman? She had on that funny Calvin and Hobbes T-s.h.i.+rt you liked?”
I nodded.
”Well, she lives in the same trailer park as them and she's friends with Roch.e.l.le Bannerman. She told Paige that Roch.e.l.le and Carver were going through a rocky time of it 'cause neither of them wanted a baby this quickly-they've only been married about a year-but Roch.e.l.le's never said anything about a divorce. And he's still living with her.”
Annie Sue climbed up on the stepladder and started splicing wires into a ceiling box. ”We told Cindy all that, but she won't listen. She's talking about dropping out of school and marrying that creep.”
Her fingers worked furiously the whole time and as she finished one box and moved her ladder into the dining area to begin on another, thunder rumbled and drops of rain began to fall, tentatively at first, then gathering in volume and tempo till there was a steady drumming on the tar-papered roof over our heads.
We raced out to close the windows on the car and truck and came back damp and cooler as the wind rose and sheets of rain swept down the road in front and even blew vagrant drops onto us as we stood in the doorway and watched. The trees around the house swayed and danced, their leaves turning inside out, and lightning popped somewhere nearby.
After the first rush, the skies lightened somewhat and the winds died down, but rain continued to fall steadily as if it were fixing to set in and go all night. Annie Sue had rigged a droplight so that we had no trouble seeing what we were doing, but it made me lose track of time. Suddenly I realized I only had an hour to shower, change, and get to Makely before the meeting started.
”Want me to help you put this stuff away?” I asked.
”I'll do it. I just need to finish up a couple of more things.”
Even though this was a stable, low-crime neighborhood and even though there was plenty of daylight left, I hesitated. ”I don't know, honey. I don't think you ought to be here alone.”
”It's okay. Besides, Paige's coming. We're going to practice some harmony on a song we're doing at her church next Sunday. She should've already been here.” She smiled down at me from her perch. ”Don't worry. If she doesn't come soon, I'll pack up and go before dark. Promise.”
Just to be on the safe side, I stopped at the convenience store and got Patsy Redd.i.c.k to lend me the phone again. Eleanor Byrd, Perry Byrd's widow answered on the third ring. I didn't identify myself, just asked for Paige.
”Paige? She left a little while ago to go help work on that WomenAid house.” She didn't ask who I was, so I thanked her, hung up, and headed off for a very dull, very routine, but thankfully very short meeting.
It was only a little past eight-thirty when I got back to Dobbs. Had the skies been clear, it wouldn't even be full dark yet. All evening, one storm after another had rolled across the Triangle, misty showers followed by frog-strangling gully washers. At the moment, it was raining fairly hard, but straight down. The temperature hadn't dropped much and I had my window lowered to enjoy the cool wetness on my arm.
My route through town took me only a few blocks from the construction site, and a guilty memory had surfaced on my drive back: I had left Herman's fifty-foot tape measure and brand-new hammer up on one of the cross-braces in the living room. I was sure Annie Sue would overlook them in the twilight; I was equally sure that three little sharp-eyed Norris vandals wouldn't if they disobeyed Lu and came back in the daylight.
There was nothing for it but to go by and pick them up. The convenience store was still open as I turned up Redbud Lane and a light was on in the house diagonally across the way. I pulled into the muddy yard so I could s.h.i.+ne my car lights in through the open door s.p.a.ce.
To my surprise, Annie Sue's van was still parked there. So was Carver Bannerman's red Jeep. At least I a.s.sumed it was his vehicle, only now it was covered by a black vinyl snap-on top.
No one appeared in the doorway and I could see no light. I splashed through the rain and onto the covered porch where I paused to call Annie Sue's name.
No answer.