Authors: Philip Gulley
R
alph and Sandy Hodge sat in Owen Stout’s law office on a Monday morning in mid-July. Owen was suffering the aftereffects of a weekend of fishing with his brother-in-law during which he’d imbibed his share of the grape. This conversation, however, was starting to clear his head.
“You want what?” he asked them.
“Our daughter Amanda,” Ralph said. “My brother has her and he won’t give her back.”
“How old is she?”
“Sixteen, soon to be seventeen,” Sandy answered.
“Did you give Ellis custody?”
“Not really.”
“What do you mean not really?”
Ralph lowered his head, clearly ashamed.
“It happened when we were drunk,” Sandy explained. “It’s kind of embarrassing.”
Owen paused, chewed for a moment on the end of his pen, then said, “Why don’t you tell me about it.”
“Well, Ellis gave us some money if we promised to let her live with him,” Ralph said.
“How much money?”
“Thirty thousand dollars up front and five thousand a year after that until she turned eighteen.”
“So you sold your daughter and now you want her back?”
“We weren’t in our right minds,” Sandy said. “But that’s all over with. We joined the AA and stopped drinking and found a church and got jobs and things are better now. We just want to be a family again.”
“So what do you want from me?”
“We want to hire you to get her back for us,” Ralph said.
Owen leaned back in his chair, deep in thought. He’d forgotten all about his headache.
“I don’t think I want the job,” he said after a bit. “Amanda seems happy, and Ellis and Miriam have done a good job. Technically, she’s still your child, and you can get the sheriff and go fetch her. But it’ll cause you nothing but trouble, and I’d advise you against it.”
Sandy began to cry. “We know it was wrong, what we did. We just want another chance, that’s all.”
“Well, if you go charging in there with a lawyer, it’ll get nasty real quick. And you’ll risk turning Amanda against you. I don’t think you want that. Tell you what I’ll do. I’ll have a word with Ellis and see if we can’t arrange a visit.”
“We sure would appreciate that,” Ralph said. “We don’t want to cause any trouble, and we don’t want to hurt Ellis and Miriam either, but she is our daughter, after all.”
“Maybe you should have thought about that when you had her,” Owen said.
Ralph looked up, his shoulders sagging forward and his hands clasped between his legs. “Mr. Stout, there’s not one bad thing you can say to me that I haven’t already said to myself a thousand times.”
Owen thought for a moment, staring at Ralph. “Yes, I suppose you’re right,” he said after a while.
“Will you help us?” Sandy asked. “We know we don’t deserve a second chance, but we’d be grateful for your help.”
“All I’ll promise is to go see Ellis and Miriam,” Owen said. “But I’m not going to institute any sort of legal action against them. If you want that, you’ll have to get another lawyer.”
“Thank you,” Ralph said, rising to his feet and extending his hand to shake with Owen. “We appreciate your help.”
“Leave your phone number with my secretary and I’ll give you a call after I’ve spoken with Ellis.”
“We don’t have a phone,” Sandy said. “We’re staying at the tourist cabins. Number five.”
“I’ll knock on your door then. Until then, keep your distance from Amanda. We don’t want Ellis and Miriam getting upset.” Owen ushered them from his office, just as Dolores Hinshaw came through the door for her ten o’clock appointment.
She studied Ralph and Sandy, and then recognition dawned. “Ralph, is that you?”
“Hi, Mrs. Hinshaw. I read about Dale in the paper. Sure am sorry.”
“Thank you.”
“You’re in our prayers,” Sandy said, taking Dolores by the hand.
“Why don’t you go on in the office, Dolores,” Owen said. “I’ll be with you in a moment.”
“Take care, Mrs. Hinshaw,” Ralph said.
“Bye, Ralph.”
They left the office, and Owen followed Dolores into his office. She settled herself in the chair across his desk.
“So how are things going?” Owen asked.
“It’s one day at a time,” she said.
“That’s all you can do.”
“I can’t help but think the Lord has a purpose for all this. There Dale was, deader than a doornail, and Dr. Pierce got his heart going again. Said if they’d have gotten to the hospital even two minutes later, he’d been a goner.”
“I guess God has a plan for him,” Owen conjectured. Owen Stout had never been a big believer in God, but Dale’s revival would have given pause to even the most callous.
“So what can I do for you today, Dolores?”
“Dale wanted me to look into getting one of those living wills, just in case the transplant doesn’t go well.”
“Have they found a donor yet?”
“Not yet, but we’re hoping.”
“Just think of it,” Owen marveled. “They can take out a man’s heart and put in somebody else’s.”
“He just doesn’t want machines keeping him alive if things don’t work out,” Dolores explained.
“I can certainly understand that,” Owen said, turning around to pluck a piece of paper from his file cabinet, then handing it to Dolores. “You need to have Dale sign this in front of two witnesses and a notary public.”
“Who’s a notary public?”
“Well, my secretary is one,” Owen said. “And my brother, Vernley, down at the bank, and Johnny Mackey at the funeral home.”
Dolores stood to leave. “Thank you, Owen. It’s awful kind of you to help us. You sure there isn’t a charge?”
“You don’t worry about it, Dolores. You just keep a good eye on Dale.”
“Folks have been so…so…” Her voice caught. “They’ve been so kind.”
“Well, that’s what we’re here for, to help one another.”
He walked around his desk, took Dolores by the arm, and walked her past his secretary to the front door. He stood in the doorway, watching as she climbed in her car and backed out of the space with a roar. She’d gotten her driver’s permit three weeks before. Dale had always done the driving, his way of keeping her on a short leash. Now she’d unbuckled her collar and didn’t seem inclined to wear it again. She goosed the gas, squealed her tires, and sped off down the street, narrowly missing Clevis Nagle, on his way to the barbershop for a trim.
Dale Hinshaw’s medical condition has been the talk of the barbershop the past several weeks. Kyle Weathers began a lottery predicting the date of Dale’s demise. Even though half the pot is going to Dolores, people still think it’s tacky. Bob Miles wrote a scathing editorial against it, but not before betting Dale would shuffle off to glory on or around August 21. Kyle doesn’t understand why people are upset. “For crying out loud, we’re givin’ her half the money. Just trying to bring something good out of all this bad.”
“But you don’t bet on people’s deaths,” Sam Gardner tried to explain while getting his hair cut. “It’s unseemly.”
“It’s no different than life insurance. You buy a fifteen-year policy and you’re bettin’ you’ll die and they’re bettin’ you won’t. I don’t see the difference.”
Sam let it drop.
Sam’s car was parked in the Hinshaws’ driveway when Dolores reached home. He’d been stopping by a couple times a week to play checkers with Dale. They were seated at the kitchen table. A stack of reds was piled next to Dale. He had Sam’s last checker trapped in the corner and seemed inordinately pleased with his victory. He’d been winning most of their games. Dolores was beginning to suspect Sam was going easy on him.
It gladdened her to see them together. For the last five years, Dale had railed against Sam and just this past spring had tried to get him fired. But somewhere along the way they’d forged a truce and Sam began stopping by with his checkerboard. At first it had been awkward, but now it was the highlight of Dale’s day. On Mondays, he brought Dale a cassette tape of the Sunday service, which they listened to together, pausing the tape now and then for commentary.
Today was tape day, so after their game of checkers, Sam turned on the tape player. Bea Majors is back on the organ after her three-month strike over Sam’s refusal to crack down on the freethinkers, so Dale and Sam winced their way through her prelude, then listened to Sam’s opening prayer.
“Nice prayer,” Dale said. “I liked that part about God keeping watch over the sparrows.”
“Why, thank you, Dale,” Sam said after a moment, caught off guard by Dale’s charity.
Then they listened to the opening hymn. Sam had brought a hymnal so they could sing along—Dale in his high, reedy voice, Sam filling in the low places. Since Dale came home from the hospital, Sam has been letting him pick the hymns for worship, to help him feel a part of things. He brings Dale a church bulletin and points out his name on the prayer list.
After the first hymn is the children’s message, which this week was delivered by Jessie Peacock. “What has a bushy tail and gathers nuts?” she asked.
There was silence as the children considered her question. Then Jessie called on Andy Grant, Uly’s youngest son. “I know the answer’s supposed to be Jesus,” he said, “but it sure sounds like a squirrel to me.”
They could hear the laughter of the congregation, and Dale chuckled.
Then it was time for Sam’s sermon, which Dale didn’t critique, though he did flinch at several points. The rest of the tape was mostly silence, it being Quaker worship. With Dale gone, no one else stands to contradict the sermon. They listened to the silence, hearing the slight hiss of the tape moving along the rollers and over the head. Every now and then they could hear Harvey Muldock clear his throat, which was his way of hinting that the silence had gone long enough. Then came the offering with Bea playing “We Give Thee but Thine Own,” which is never very much since most of the members are not tithers. Sam gave the closing prayer, asking God to be with them through the week, guiding their footsteps in paths of righteousness, which Dale amened, and worship was over.
Sam reached over to shut off the tape player. “See you Wednesday, Dale,” he said.
“If I’m still around.” Dale had become increasingly fatalistic in the past few weeks.
Sam said good-bye, then let himself out. He had a Library Board meeting to attend. He was the president of the board, ever since Owen Stout had tricked him into it two years before. Seventeen years of ministry had made him politically wily, but he still couldn’t outfox a lawyer.
He parked in the funeral home parking lot, walked across the street to the library and down the stairs, and began making the coffee. Owen Stout came in minutes later. They exchanged greetings, and then Owen said, “You might want to stop past and visit the Hodges sometime soon.”
“How come? What’s going on?”
“Probably ought not say.”
It irritated Sam to no end when people did this—hint that someone in his congregation might be having a problem without revealing the details. Sam always thought the worst. “Is Miriam’s cancer back?” he asked Owen.
“No, nothing like that.”
“Well, then, what is it?”
“Can’t say. It’s confidential. I just thought you’d want to know.”
“Know what? You haven’t told me anything.”
“Just keep an eye peeled that direction,” Owen advised.
The others soon arrived, and the board meeting began. Miss Rudy was happy to report that the annual book sale had netted $113.26, which they’d used to have Ernie Matthews paint a new sign for the library. He’d delivered it that very morning. “I haven’t even seen it,” Miss Rudy said. “I thought we could all see it together.” It was standing the corner with a blanket draped over it, which Miss Rudy whisked off with a flourish.
Harmony Public Librery
, it read.
They studied the sign. “I wasn’t aware there was an
e
in
library,
” Sam said.
“Why don’t we put it up and see how long it takes someone to notice?” Owen suggested.
Miss Rudy didn’t say a word, though her displeasure was obvious. Ernie Matthews was a dead man walking.
On that high note, the meeting ended. Sam left his car at the funeral home and walked the two blocks to the meetinghouse. As he passed Kyle Weathers’s barbershop, Kyle flagged him down. “Is Dale dead yet?”
Sam glanced at his watch. “As of an hour ago, he was still alive.”
“Sure you don’t want to get in on this?” asked Kyle. “The pot’s up to a hundred and fifty-three.”
“No, thank you, Kyle.”
“Well, would you do me a favor?”
“If I can,” Sam said.
“Tell Frank he lost.”
“Frank? Please tell me our church secretary didn’t bet a dollar when one of our members would die.”
“He didn’t,” Kyle said.
Sam sighed with relief.
“He bet ten dollars. Yep, got to pick ten dates. But today was his last day, so if he wants to stay in the pool, he’ll need to stop past to pay up. Can you tell him that?”
Sam walked on to the meetinghouse, his mind awhirl. His secretary on a gambling binge, trouble brewing at the Hodges, a church member a heartbeat from death, and a misspelled library sign. It was just like his grandma used to tell him—trouble never rode into town alone.
T
he rest of the month whizzed past in a blur, as summer months have a way of doing. Oscar and Livinia Purdy at the Dairy Queen had a Peanut Buster Parfait sale the last weekend of July, and the floodgates opened. The lines were twenty deep, a mob of boisterous people. Bernie the policeman was pacing back and forth, his right hand twitching on his pistol grip. Large crowds made him nervous. Someone, he just knew it, was going to get shot before the day was over. Probably one of the skateboarders, Bernie thought, who were clustered at the end of the bench that ran the length of the building, every now and then looking up from their Peanut Buster Parfaits to sneer at the crowd.
“Would you look at those kids,” Kyle Weathers grumbled to himself while waiting his turn. “That right there is what’s wrong with this country. You can’t hardly tell the boys from the girls.” Kyle has dreams of tying teenage boys to his barber’s chair and buzzing their scalps with his electric clippers, of long strands of hair falling to the floor and piling high around the base of the barber’s chair. He trembled with joy just thinking of it.
He surveyed the crowd, looking at haircuts. He could tell at a glance the men whose wives cut their hair. No taper on the back side. Their hair was the same thickness, the edges ragged, as if bowls had been set atop their heads and the excess hacked away with hedge clippers, like Moe in
The Three Stooges.
Other men had been to Kathy at the Kut ’n’ Kurl. He’d raised the matter with Kathy numerous times, how no woman ever came to his shop to get her hair cut, and if one did, he wouldn’t cut it, but here Kathy was cutting men’s hair and trying to run him out of business and rejecting the law of God, who’d made half the world men and the other half women so’s a town could have a barbershop and a beauty parlor and both of them would do just fine if they’d only stick with their own kind.
It hadn’t done a bit of good.
To top it off, his best customer, Dale Hinshaw, was near death. Dale was money in the bank. A haircut and neck shave every Saturday morning, plus he bought a jar of pomade each month and had his nose and ear hairs clipped every Wednesday morning. Dale had the best groomed ears in town. There were men in this town with so much hair sprouting from their ears they looked like great horned owls. It drove Kyle to distraction. Say what you would about Dale Hinshaw, he was neatly trimmed.
Ellis and Miriam Hodge were in line behind Kyle. Miriam cut Ellis’s hair, except at Christmas and Easter, when he came to Kyle to get it fixed. Amanda was with them. The skateboarders were ogling her. Homely as a child, with big teeth, she has recently grown into them and is now cute on her way to beautiful. She’d gotten her hair styled too, probably by Kathy, Kyle thought bitterly.
Kyle was studying Vernley Stout’s hair, which didn’t take long as there wasn’t much to study. Vernley began losing his hair at age twelve and is now reduced to a thin halo, which he trims himself.
It just isn’t fair, Kyle thought. Men went bald and didn’t need haircuts but once every couple months, while women’s hair grew like weeds. Plus, women lived longer than men. Two years on the average. That was an extra twenty-four haircuts right there, minimum. And Kathy at the Kut ’n’ Kurl got every dime of it.
A loud screeching noise and a barrage of protests from the skateboarders took his attention away from his sad plight. He glanced over to see Dolores Hinshaw whip her car into an empty space. Skateboarders were scattered in her wake. Though none appeared mangled, they were obviously shaken, their pale faces contrasting sharply with their black T-shirts.
Dolores flung open her car door, leaving a sizable crease in the car parked next to her. She eased out of the car, smoothed her dress, and made her way to the lines, gauging which one might be shorter. She stepped into Kyle’s line, behind the Hodges. Kyle smiled and nodded. Good public relations for the wife of his best customer.
“Hi, Dolores,” Miriam Hodge said, reaching over for a quick hug. “How’s Dale?”
“A little stronger each day,” she reported. “His appetite’s picking up. He’s been pestering me all day for a Peanut Buster Parfait.”
Kyle was delighted. This was good news of the highest order. The pot was at two hundred dollars and climbing. He turned and smiled at Dolores. “You want that I come over and give Dale a haircut and shave? I can be there first thing tomorrow.”
“Oh, don’t bother, Kyle. Kathy came by the day before yesterday to drop off a pie, and she tidied him up. But thanks just the same.”
His best customer a turncoat. Sold his soul for a piece of pie.
Dolores turned back to the Hodges. “I bet you’re glad to have Ralph back home. I saw him at Owen Stout’s office. I didn’t know he’d come home.”
Miriam and Amanda looked up, startled. Ellis appeared uneasy. He opened his mouth to speak, then decided against it. Miriam glanced at Ellis, who smiled weakly.
Dolores went on, oblivious to their reaction. “What’s it been? Five years or more that he’s been away?”
Ellis nodded.
Amanda stared at Dolores, open-mouthed.
Miriam, trying hard not to betray her shock, said, “It’s been nice having them back, but enough about us. What can we do to help you and Dale?”
Dolores thought for a moment. “Sam’s been mowing the yard, but he said he’ll be going on vacation in a few weeks. Maybe we could hire Ellis to mow it.”
“Don’t be silly. Ellis would be happy to do it. He wouldn’t think of taking your money. Would you, honey?”
Ellis was trying to shrink into the sidewalk. Miriam gave him a discreet kick in the ankle and a you’re-in-deep-trouble-Mister smile. “Wouldn’t you be happy to mow the Hinshaws’ yard?”
“Sure, I can mow your yard. You just give me a call.”
Kyle Weathers, who’d been eavesdropping on their every word and was now on the scent of a new customer, turned to Ellis. “You tell your brother that new customers get their first haircut free.”
Ellis thought for a moment. “I think his wife cuts his hair.”
“What is it with this town, anyway?” Kyle grumped. “Griping all the time about having to go to Cartersburg to buy anything, but won’t support their local businesses.”
Five minutes later, the Hodges were climbing in their truck, Peanut Buster Parfaits in hand. Ellis pulled out onto Main Street. “So when were you going to tell me my parents had come home?” Amanda asked.
“Yes,” Miriam asked, “when were you going to tell us?”
“I didn’t think it was all that important,” Ellis said.
Miriam, normally a peacemaker, reached up and smacked Ellis on the back of the head, causing his nostrils to be buried in peanuts, chocolate sauce, and ice cream. “What do you mean, it’s not important? Of course it’s important. Have you spoken with them?”
Ellis wiped his face with a napkin, then decided to make a clean sweep of everything. “Just once. They came out to the house the night of the wedding rehearsal wanting to see Amanda. I asked them to leave, told them that no good could come from it. Then last week Owen Stout called to tell me they were in town and they wanted to see you, but I told him no.”
“Shouldn’t that have been my decision?” Amanda asked angrily. “They’re my parents. Everyone knows my mom and dad are in town except me. You know how that makes me feel? Where are they staying?”
“I’m not sure,” Ellis said, as they neared the tourist cabins on the edge of town. A rusty, white car was parked in the gravel lane that ran between the cabins. Whatever they had done with the money he’d mailed them each year, it was obvious they hadn’t spent it on their car. The rear bumper was crumpled and the rust holes so large and numerous Ellis was surprised the vehicle hadn’t collapsed in a mound of corrosion. He accelerated and passed the tourist cabins as quickly as he could.
They drove on in silence. One mile, then two. They came within sight of the trailer where Ralph and his wife had lived five years before. Theirs was the next driveway, but Ellis wanted to keep on driving, far away, on to Illinois, through Missouri and Kansas, and into Colorado. And never come back. Start all over somewhere else, where Ralph and Sandy would never find them.
He and his father had driven it once, the summer Ellis had graduated from high school. It had been his dad’s idea. The crops were planted, and the summer months stretched before them, an unbroken expanse of time. He’d proposed it on a Monday morning at the breakfast table and by noon they were sixty miles west of their farm, on Highway 36, crossing over into Illinois in their Ford pickup. They camped that night outside Hannibal, Missouri, pitching their tent in a farmer’s field, staying up late into the night, cooking over a fire, watching an occasional stray spark rise from the flames and ascend to the heavens.
The next day they reached Lebanon, Kansas, the geographic center of the lower forty-eight states, and paid twelve dollars to stay the night in a tourist home a block off Main Street. Ellis still remembered the high mahogany double bed with the crisp, white sheets, the worn, Oriental rugs over the polished hardwood floors, and the clawfoot bathtub. Twelve dollars for a room, supper, and breakfast. After breakfast, they drove north to the marker and stood beside their truck in the center of the United States while a man took their picture. Ellis still had the picture, sitting on his chest of drawers. He saw it every morning when he pulled out a fresh pair of skivvies.
Ellis and his father reached Denver the next day and stayed at the Brown Palace Hotel that night, which reduced them to paupers. The rest of the trip they camped out. They drove home on U.S. 40, the National Road, stopping in Independence, Missouri, to shake hands with Harry Truman, who was shorter than they’d imagined. They pulled in the driveway late Saturday night, in time for church the next morning, which had been Ellis’s mother’s only stipulation. That, and not to get themselves killed.
Ellis has never forgotten the trip. It is the farthest he’s been away from home. Every now and then, while sitting on his front porch of a summer evening, he watches an occasional car speed west on Highway 36 and yearns to follow it, to retrace his steps from years before. Maybe see if the tourist home in Lebanon, Kansas, is still open and what it costs to stay the night in the Brown Palace Hotel.
He was thinking about it again as he pulled into the driveway with Miriam and Amanda. He considered taking Amanda away for a week or two, just the two of them, like he and his dad had done. And when they returned home, Ralph and Sandy would be gone, and their problems with them.
Their dog came running from the porch and trotted alongside the truck until Ellis rolled to a stop underneath the oak tree next to the clothesline. He turned off the engine, and they sat in the truck, quietly, listening to the engine clicking as it cooled.
“I think they’re staying at the old tourist cabins,” Ellis said after a while. He turned to look at Amanda. “Would you like me to go back and tell them you’d like to see them?”
She thought for a moment. “I just don’t want to be kept in the dark, that’s all. I’m old enough to be told these things.”
Miriam reached over and patted her on the knee. “We know you’re old enough, honey. You’re a fine young lady, and we’re very proud of you. This is just new ground for us, and we need to feel our way along. Ellis did what he thought was best.”
“That’s all I was doing,” Ellis echoed.
Their dog was sitting next to the truck, studying them. The sun was setting in the western sky, a swirl of reds and yellows. The bullfrogs and crickets were starting their evening song.
“Maybe we could have them over for supper one night soon,” Amanda said hopefully.
“We surely can,” Miriam said. “How about the day after tomorrow? Ellis will go invite them first thing tomorrow. We’ll have supper. Then we can sit on the porch and visit, and you can tell your mom and dad everything you’ve done. I’m sure they’d want to know. We can do that, can’t we, Ellis?”
“We sure can,” Ellis said, trying to sound sincere.
“It isn’t that I don’t appreciate all you’ve done for me,” Amanda said. “I just want to see my mom and dad, that’s all.”
“I just don’t want you to be hurt again,” Ellis said, reaching over and pulling her to himself.
“Maybe they’ve changed,” Amanda said. “Maybe they’re not drinking anymore.”
“That would be wonderful,” Miriam said, “but you probably shouldn’t get your hopes up.”
They made their way inside. Amanda went straight to her bedroom. Ellis and Miriam came back outside to sit on the porch swing.
“Just what did Ralph say to you?” Miriam asked, when they were alone.
“That he and Sandy were going to AA, had found a church, and straightened out their lives.”
“Don’t you believe him?”
“My brother would lie to the pope to get what he wanted,” Ellis said. “If they want Amanda back, it’s only because they’ve found some advantage in it. I wish you hadn’t told her we could have them for supper.”
“Ellis, you know how teenagers are. If we forbid her to see them, she’d be bound and determined to. This way, it’ll be in our home with us there.”
Ellis thought about that for a moment. “Yes, I suppose you’re right.”
Miriam stood and leaned over to kiss Ellis on the forehead. “I think I’ll go check on Amanda. Are you coming in?”
“Not yet.”
He sat on the swing, reflecting on that day and dreading the next one, wondering how much money it would take this time for Ralph to go away.