A Fool and His Honey

“You were shaking your head, raising your eyebrows in this kind of amazed look, and got this ew expression on your face.”

I shook my head, feeling silly. I didn’t want to explain my train of thought to Martin. A knock at the front door made me jump again. Martin went to answer it, and a second later a tall young man came with him into the kitchen. I had only to look at his face for a moment to know this was Craig’s brother.

I wiped my hands on a dish towel, and took Dylan’s hand, telling him how sorry I was.

Dylan, who was wearing a John Deere green shirt and some khakis, was dark like his brother, but his build wasn’t reedy like Craig’s had been. Dylan was more bull-like, solid and stolid, a man who saw his way from Point A to Point B and took the most direct route.

“I would sure like to see the baby,” he told me, and seemed surprised when Martin volunteered to take him upstairs to the makeshift nursery.

When they came back, Dylan looked like a man with a puzzle in front of him.

He accepted a seat at the old kitchen table, folded his hands on it, and began to say what he’d come to say.

“I couldn’t set my hands on Rory to bring him with me. Shondra told me you wanted to talk to him.”

Since he said this primarily to Martin, Martin nodded. I kept on pottering around the kitchen, feeling this would make the younger man relax a little more. I opened a can of green beans, put them in a very nice saucepan, and began to cook the rice in the microwave (chipped Corningware casserole, aged small microwave).

“My brother Craig,” Dylan began, and came to a difficult silence. We both kept our eyes down, waiting patiently. “My brother Craig was not always a good man.”

Martin made a gesture that could be interpreted as “Who is?” and I made a little noise that was meant to be commiserating. This seemed to encourage Dylan.

“Craig likes-liked-things to be easy. But being married and earning a living-being an adult-those aren’t easy things.”

I nodded to myself. That was the absolute truth.

“I’m the last person Craig would have told, if he’d had plans to somehow make money off that poor little baby. But I can’t help fearing somehow that.was the case. Whatever Craig’s plans were, Rory knows them. I hate to speak bad about my wife’s brother, just like she didn’t like to speak bad about Craig, but the fact is, Rory and Craig are two of a kind, and they deserved each other, just the way I hope Shondra and I deserve each other. If you had Rory in the car with you all the way here, I guess that was your best chance to find out what he knew. I don’t pretend to understand why you let him go. Why didn’t you turn him over to the police?”

Oooh, good question. I raised my eyebrows inquiringly and transferred my attention to Martin.

“At the time,” Martin answered, thinking as he spoke, “I was sure that bringing him here would make things go easier on Regina if the police picked her up. I think-I know-I was sure Regina had killed Craig, and I didn’t want to see her in jail, see her stand trial. Particularly since I couldn’t understand why. Why she would do that, how she would do that. Regina is the most important thing in my sister’s life, she’s…” My husband seemed to run out of words.

“But letting her get away with murder ain’t doing her a favor,” Dylan said.

Martin and I blinked and looked at him.

There was not a thing to say.

He was absolutely right.

Chapter Seven

We had more company that evening. After a quiet afternoon we’d had a light supper. I’d just washed the supper dishes. Martin, in between trying to get in touch with the midwife and with Rory Brown (we’d found a working phone), had boiled a used batch of bottles and nipples and set them out to drain on a clean towel. I’d put a load of linens and a few clothes through the washing-and-drying cycle. The isolated position of the farmhouse had begun to make me think of us as cut off from the world, a not-unpleasant idea; so the sound of the car and the knock at the front door came as something of a jolt.

Martin walked through the living room to the front door and switched on the outside light. There wasn’t a peephole, and the door was solid wood with no glass window, so he just had to open the door on trust, a habit we’d discarded. Big-city crime was drifting from Atlanta through outlying suburbs like Lawrenceton at an alarming rate.

I don’t think Martin could have looked very welcoming, but the couple on the steps didn’t seem alarmed. They were smiling in a friendly way, and they maintained their smiles even when faced with Martin’s stern expression.

I ventured out into the living room when I heard the man say, “Hi! I’m Luke Granberry, and this is my wife, Margaret. We have the farm to the south of here.”

“Martin Bartell.” My husband held out his hand and Luke shook it exactly the right amount.

“We can just barely see the farm from our house, and we noticed more lights on tonight than there have been, so we felt we ought to check it out,” Margaret said. Luke Granberry seemed to be about thirty or so, and Margaret was within five years of that, more or less, I estimated. The closer I got to her, the stronger I was willing to bet on the “more.”

Hers was the most beautiful skin I’d ever seen, pale and smooth as silk, with fine webbing at the corners of her eyes and mouth. Her hair was red, flaming red, bushy and full. She wore it pulled back from her forehead with a cheap barrette. As she bent to shake my hand, I noticed she wore no jewelry besides her plain wedding ring.

“Please come in,” I said. “I’m Martin’s wife, Aurora.”

Martin stood aside to let the neighbors in. As Luke Granberry edged past Martin, I could see that our visitor was the taller and broader. He had huge shoulders and a mildly handsome face, distinguished mostly by high cheekbones that made his small brown eyes seem perpetually scanning the distance for some adventure. His dark hair and brown eyes made his wife look even paler.

“Regina told us about you,” Margaret said. “The aunt and uncle, right?”

“Yes, I’m Regina’s mother’s brother,” Martin said.

“Barby’s brother,” Luke said. He looked at Martin as if trying to see a trace of Regina in his face. “We heard a rumor that there was some problem…?” Luke spread his big hands in a gesture that seemed to imply that the Granberrys wanted to help, if only they knew how.

“Regina is missing,” I said. Unfortunately, because I didn’t know these people and so couldn’t burden them with our emotions, I sounded like Regina’s disappearance was just a little whim of hers. I was sorry the minute the words left my mouth.

“We’re sure she’ll turn up just any time,” Martin said, to give me some support. We really do care, we just have a positive attitude, his voice implied.

“Where are Craig and Rory?” Margaret asked, looking around the room as if she expected we’d stuck them in a corner.

“Please come in and have a seat,” I said, glancing anxiously at Martin. “I’m afraid we have some bad news about Craig.” I had no idea if these neighbors had known Craig well, and could not gauge how much preparation they needed for the bad news.

Since there was only the couch and one chair in the living room, seating was a pretty cut-and-dried process. The Granberrys took the couch, which I indicated with a hostessy sweep of my hand, and I perched on the edge of the chair so my feet could touch the floor, Martin standing just behind me. I looked back at Martin, but his face gave away nothing.

“Ah… Craig is dead, I’m afraid.” I gave them my most serious expression, which Martin always said looked as though I suspected I was having a heart attack.

“Oh, it’s true, he’s dead!” Margaret said. She turned to her husband, the thick red hair sweeping across her shoulders. Her white hands clutched his. “Luke!”

“I’m so sorry,” Luke Granberry said, in a slow and solemn voice that I thought would be perfect for reading Poe out loud. I hastily put a cap on that thought, since I’d actually opened my mouth to say it, and instead pursed my