Part 16 (1/2)

Miss Crate giggled. ”Oh, come on, Lynne, he'd drag you off to the bedroom for a night of pa.s.sionate love. And just how does this pa.s.sionate lover come dressed on Christmas Eve? In an unders.h.i.+rt? In worn flannel pajamas? h.e.l.l no! He comes in the s.e.xiest, skimpiest briefs so you can both see what he's got in mind. Right, darling?” Into the doorway stepped a gangly young man, and indeed he was dressed in the ... well, skimpiest briefs Miss Vetchling had ever seen. They appeared to be dotted with tiny reindeer, but there were very few of them, certainly not the standard allotment for a sleigh. On his head was a red cap trimmed with white felt. On his face was an embarra.s.sed smile.

Miss Crate stroked his arm. ”Why, here's Santa.”

”No,” said Miss Vetchling, ”actually it's ...”

”Kevvie!” screamed a figure pressed against the living room window. ”Kevvie!”

Chapter Eighteen.

”So why'd you let them go ahead with the concert?” asked Harve, who as usual was safe at his desk in Farberville where MagG.o.dy was nothing but a bad memory, at least for the moment.

It was Monday afternoon, and I'd finally had time to sit down in the PD (where MagG.o.dy is an omnipresent menace day and night), lean back at the preferred angle in my chair, get my feet settled just right on the corner of the desk, and call him to exchange information.

”I wasn't going to,” I admitted, ”but Ripley and Lillian came by yesterday morning and told me how the cow ate the cabbage, as Dahlia would say. It wasn't exactly blackmail, but there were some overtones. We d.i.c.kered back and forth and finally agreed. It's not like any of them shoved Pierce Keswick out the window, Harve. I'm satisfied that he was there when Marjorie came charging at him and I can tell you it's not the time to consider the safest place to retreat.”

”I grew up on a farm,” Harve said. ”I know how dangerous those old sows can be. Got a five-inch scar on my leg to prove it. But they did drag the body to the souvenir shoppe and dress it up like that. I dunno what the charge should have been, but we might could have come up with something to entertain ourselves.”

”Sure we could have, and I could have called a press conference conference and told everyone that Matt Montana lied about his original lyrics and that Hizzoner is in line for a Country Sound Award for sleaziest songwriter of all time. The story might not have made the front page of the New York Times, but it would have been hot stuff in the tabloids and country music publications. The tour would have collapsed. The label company wouldn't be worth the price of a CD--or even a ca.s.sette. I could have done all that, Harve, but I didn't.”

Harve grumbled as he lit a cigar and told LaBelle to bring him some coffee. He wasn't a dedicated chauvinist, but he wasn't averse to letting someone else fetch and carry. ”So why didn't ya?”

”What Ripley and Lillian told me is that this little town of MagG.o.dy broke a zillion copyright and trademark laws. We are talking more infringements than on Dahlia's uniform. They put Matt's name and face on ashtrays, coffee cups, T-s.h.i.+rts, caps, place mats, maps, pencils, pens, duck callers, and so forth, and every one of them is a violation. They printed songbooks of copyrighted lyrics and reproduced photographs from magazines. They used his name, which is registered. Katie Hawk's, too.”

”I didn't see her name.”

”On the menu at Matt Montana's Hometown Bar and Grill. Country Connections has an entire legal department to deal with this, to see that the miscreants are dragged into court and fined into oblivion. They don't mess around because it's a very lucrative source for the company. They come down like a block of granite. And I can't think of a single business in town that didn't use Matt's name, from the obvious ones on the main road all the way to the Satterlings' produce stand out toward Emmet. They were selling Matt's Homegrown Pecans. What was I supposed to do? Tell 'em to sue everybody in town?”

”Reckon that might cause a problem,” Harve acknowledged with a sigh. ”What did ya do?”

”There were still some tourists in town, and I didn't much want a repeat of the earlier riot. I told 'em to have the concert and then go back to Nashville and do whatever they could for a week. It's going to leak out by then, anyway. Jim Bob was swaggering around at the concert, talking about his songs, and a couple of folks at the launderette overheard Katie's so-called private conversation and yelled some crude remarks at Matt while he was on stage. Only about a hundred people showed up, which makes me think the grapevine is back in business, even if certain establishments are closed real tight. Once I explained the problem, you've never seen signs come down so quickly. The town limit sign is back in its original spot, and the only signs on the highway claim there are seven hundred fifty-five of us and that we've got a Kiwanis Club somewhere.”

”Out behind the Methodist church, maybe.”

”Hammet was so disillusioned that he turned in his cowboy suit and refused to attend the concert. He hung around the apartment all day yesterday, then went off earlier this afternoon. Brother Verber is supposed to drive him back to the foster home in the morning.”

”Then everything'll be back to normal, heh?” Harve said, chuckling. ”As normal as it ever gets over there, anyway.”

”As normal as it ever gets,” I said as I stared glumly at the ceiling. The water stain did not have ears.

Harve rumbled uneasily, took a few puffs, and finally said, ”About that guy that drowned in Boone Creek ...?”

”That one's still yours. He was a tourist and we had a deal, Harve. He may have been married to one of the Nashville people, and it may have been more than a coincidence that he appeared in town, but there's no proof that any of them went down to the creek and shoved Charlie Tunnato into the water. I'm not saying it wasn't in all of their interests not to let him talk to Matt Montana. None of them want Matt to realize he might be a free agent in both marital and professional matters.”

We chatted a while longer, then I hung up and went to the window to look at the darkening town. The streetlight was on and the one stoplight was keeping everybody from getting too rowdy. The town had survived the onslaught, and if we weren't wiser, I'd like to think we would be a good deal warier in the future.

There were a few things I hadn't told Harve. One was that Adele had called from Padre Island. With Merle Hardc.o.c.k cackling in the background and urging her to hurry on account of the wet T-s.h.i.+rt contest, she'd said she was well and asked how had little Moses Germander's visit turned out. Fine, I'd mumbled. She'd gone on to say how disappointed she was not to have been there to hear little Moses sing the song about the detour to heaven that Mr. Wockermann had written on their tenth wedding anniversary. I'd said it was shame. Her last remark was the clincher. She'd finally recalled the details of the baby's birth all those years ago. Adele, the expectant mother, and Mr. Wockermann had been visiting kin in Ca.s.sville when the baby came a week early.

Seems the manger was in Missouri all along.

”Therefore,” Mrs. Jim Bob said, ”it's clear that the Good Lord wants me to donate all the profits from the shoppe to the Missionary Society. If you'll give me the key to the a.s.sembly Hall, I'll just go get the checkbook, take it home, make sure it's balanced nice and neat, and bring it back. Of course I'm busy these days, but it shouldn't take too long.”

”Praise the Lord,” said Brother Verber. He lifted his face to give her a perplexed look, then let it drop and gave his feet a perplexed look. Lots of things were perplexing, he thought as he took a drink of wine. Even that was perplexing.

”We missed you at the concert,” she continued, ”but it went well enough, considering the sort of characters those Nashville folks turned out to be. Miss Katie Hawk was supposed to go first and sing two songs, but Ripley Keswick came right onto the stage and said she was going to do a full set. It's kinda funny they'd change the schedule like that, just to do her a favor, isn't it?”

Brother Verber knew he had to say something--that much he could tell from the way she was glaring at him. ”Praise the Lord, Brother Barbara.”

”Perhaps I'd better just get the key later,” she said, her mouth real pinched as she stood over him. There was an empty wine bottle on the kitchen cabinet and half a dozen next to his garbage can. Later, she thought, when her own position was ... less vexatious, she'd remind him of his sacred duties as pastor of the flock of the Voice of the Almighty Lord a.s.sembly Hall. She'd remind him at length and in a loud, clear voice that would drive demon rum from his gullet and cleanse his soul.

He fell over on the couch and began to snore, bubbling at the mouth like a spring. It occurred to her that she might just take the key right then and there, fetch the checkbook, and be about her business. The key was likely to be on the dresser, so she picked up her gloves and purse and went down the short hallway to the little bedroom.

She couldn't find the switch, but she could see the dresser over by the bed, and she stepped gingerly through a mess of clothes and dishes on the floor. She was feeling for the key when she realized someone was sitting on the edge of the bed, and she screamed so loudly that if it were Satan himself, he'd have flown straight out the window.

Once she realized it wasn't any sort of manifestation of the devil, but was instead a woman with long dark hair and dressed in a cowgirl outfit, she let out a little selfdeprecatory laugh. ”Excuse me,” she said, ”but you startled me sitting so still like that. Brother Verber didn't mention he had a guest. I suppose you're a relative from out of town, and that's why he's sleeping on the couch and you're in here?” There was no response. Mrs. Jim Bob was miffed, but she didn't have time to do anything more than sniff, find the key, and start back to the door. ”I'll just be on my way . . .” she began, then looked a little harder. There was a chip on the woman's nose and she was missing a foot.

Mrs. Jim Bob began to scream with all her might.

”Aw, Kevvie,” Dahlia said, holding out her hand so her inlaws could see the diamond ring. It wasn't gonna blind anybody, but it was definitely a diamond. ”I cain't believe you got me this for our very first Christmas. Ain't he a sweetie?”

Earl agreed in a grumbly voice. He wanted to watch the basketball game, but decided maybe he'd better not. Eilene had fixed his breakfast for two days running, but she was still acting kind of spooky. Before the kids arrived for supper, he'd been out changing the oil in the truck and turned around to find her standing in the doorway, looking at him like he was a used car out at Hobart Middleton's lot. There hadn't been a '64 Mustang glint in her eye, either.