eyebrows when she found herself quoted. She hadn’t said anything like what Tom had blithely invented. He must have felt free to take liberties since he was quoting a fellow reporter.
Oh well, she shrugged. The quotes were undoubtedly better copy than anything she had actually said; and they were truthful in content, if not in source.
She was so absorbed in reading that it was a while before she realized that Jewel’s fingers had stopped moving-an incredible event on a Monday. Catherine looked up to find Jewel facing her, broad hands fixed on her knees.
“I hope I haven’t bothered you,” Catherine said instantly. She didn’t want Jewel to let loose with one of the pithy phrases she used to blast disturbers of her peace. Jewel was aware that she was indeed a gem to Randall and the
The whine of the press, stopping and starting as Salton Sims overhauled it, made Jewel’s cubicle a little corner of isolation.
“I hear you told the police you saw Martin close to where they found that Gaites woman,” Jewel said abruptly.
“Yes,” Catherine admitted cautiously, wondering at Jewel’s interest.
“Now Melba Barnes has got it in her head Martin was out at that shack meeting Leona Gaites for some fun, and found her dead,” Jewel said contemptuously. “As if Martin would have anything to do with a plucked chicken like Leona Gaites! That Melba hasn’t got the brains God gave a goat.” Jewel paused invitingly, but Catherine prudently kept her mouth shut. The light was dawning about Martin Barnes’s presence on that road Saturday morning. He hadn’t been riding his place at all: he had been at Jewel Crenna’s house by the highway.
“Martin’s a little upset about your telling Jimmy Galton you saw him,” Jewel said amiably. “But he knows you had to do it; why the hell wouldn’t you? Course, he was out to my place, not riding his land. Melba still ain’t put two and two together-Martin and Leona, ha!-but she decided there was something fishy about Martin being out that morning. Up in the air she goes, stupid bitch! ‘Martin,’ I says, ‘just ignore her.’ When he comes home from church yesterday, she busts out crying and tells him now everybody’s gonna know that he’s cheatin’ on her, how can she hold her head up, what about the kids (and them all grown), and so on and so forth.”
Jewel’s voice had risen in a whiny and accurate imitation of Melba Barnes. Now she resumed her normal robust tone. “But I told Martin that Catherine Linton, she was smarter than Melba, she might figure it out; though of course,” and Jewel raised an emphatic eyebrow, “she wouldn’t tell no one. ‘She’s a good girl,’ I said, ‘she’s always kept her mouth shut tighter than a clam.’”
Jewel gave Catherine a firm nod of approval and dismissal, and Catherine silently replaced Tom’s story on its spike and sidled out of the cubicle. She walked through the swinging door back into her own domain, knowing she had gotten a direct and forceful order to keep her nose out of Jewel’s business.
Really, I think she overestimated me, Catherine thought with wry amusement as she rolled more paper into her typewriter. I don’t think I ever would have thought of putting that particular “one and one” together. There’s a woman with nerve. She makes me feel like I just graduated from diapers.
Then Catherine frowned and let her fingers rest idle on the keys. Would Martin Barnes have paid blackmail to keep his affair with Jewel a secret? Jewel would have said, in effect, “Publish and be damned,” but Martin Barnes was a different kettle of fish. Based on her limited knowledge of Melba Barnes, Catherine decided that if Melba had good grounds for divorce, she would take Martin for whatever she could get. And that would be a considerable sum.
Maybe Martin had gotten sick of blackmail. The pressure of trying to have a surreptitious affair in little Lowfield, added to a bad relationship with a jealous wife, might have tipped Martin’s scales toward violence; especially with the additional squeeze of having to pay hush money.
Sheriff Galton hadn’t mentioned how much cash he had found in Leona’s house. Had it all been blackmail money? How many people in Lowfield had secrets they would pay to keep hidden?
A week ago Catherine would have said, “Not many.” But yesterday Tom had told her about Jimmy Galton Junior’s drug sales. Today Jewel Crenna had told her she was having an affair with a prominent planter.
How many more people had mud tracking up their homes? And Sheriff Galton had hinted strongly at some other illegal activity the former nurse had engaged in.
It’s a comment on how I felt about Leona, that I can accept the fact that she was a blackmailer, without being awfully surprised, Catherine reflected.
The swinging door rocked back and forth as Salton Sims, the
“I missed seeing you when you was in the back,” he said cheerfully.
Catherine’s heart sank. No escape. Salton was known and dreaded throughout the county for his complete tactlessness and his equally complete determination to have his say.
“Bet that ole Leona Gaites was a sight with her head bashed in,” Salton began. “Bloody, huh?”
Catherine cast around for help, but Tom was still away at the courthouse.
“Yes, Salton, she sure was, and I’d just as soon not discuss it, if you don’t mind,” Catherine said hopefully.
Salton stuck his hands in the pockets of his grease-soaked jump suit and grinned at Catherine.
“Well, you know what I say?” he asked her.
“I’ll bet you’re going to tell me.”
“Damn right! No one can call me two-faced.”
Boy, that’s the truth, she thought.
“I say,” he continued, “that it’s a good thing.”
“Salton!” She shouldn’t have been shocked, but she was. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Leila come into the room and begin filing at the bank of cabinets. Maybe Leila’s presence would inhibit Salton, who thought all females under twenty were sacred. But no such luck.
“No, Catherine, you just think about it. It was a good thing. Leona was a godless woman.”
“Godless?” repeated Catherine weakly. How long has it been since I heard anyone called that? She wondered. Only Salton would use that adjective.
“Sure, sure. I know for a fact, from a lady I won’t name, that she killed babies.”
Catherine finally understood what Leona had used some of Dr. Linton’s equipment for. She glanced at Leila desperately and saw that Leila was shaken to the bone, staring in horror at Salton’s broad face.
“I guess you mean that she performed abortions,” Catherine said slowly.
“That’s what a lady told me,” Salton said with satisfaction.
“But they’re legal,” Catherine protested. “You can get them thirty miles away in Memphis.” Were they legal in Mississippi? She couldn’t remember.
“Too many people from here go to Memphis every day,” Salton rebutted. “Any kid from here who went to Memphis for a thing like that would be caught in a minute. And what teenager could leave here for two days to go to Jackson, without their parents finding out what for and why?”
“True,” Catherine admitted.
“Well, back to that cursed old press,” Salton said happily, and wandered swiftly through the door, by some trick appearing until the last minute to be on a collision course with the wall.
Abortions. Wonderful. Abortion and blackmail payments: what a legacy I’ve inherited! That’s where those medical instruments went: Leona was supplementing her Social Security.
Catherine caught herself bundling all her hair together and holding it on top of her head, a nervous habit she thought she had discarded with college exams. But she remained like that, both elbows out in the air, until she caught sight of Leila, whom she had completely forgotten.
Leila seemed equally oblivious of Catherine. She was still looking at the swinging door through which Salton had passed, her face so miserable that Catherine felt obliged to ask her if she was feeling sick.
“Listen,” said Leila urgently, then stopped to look back through the archway that led into the reception area. There was no one there, but Leila came and sat close to Catherine’s desk. The girl was still clutching a handful of bills she had been filing.
“Listen,” she said again, and hunched over until her face was five inches from Catherine’s. Catherine had to resist an urge to lean back.
