“Where?”
“I don’t know. He left, said something about missionary work in Zimbabwe.”
Shirley laughed. “Ruth Ann, what are you talking about? You know Lester ain’t in Zimbabwe.”
“We have a time-share in Zimbabwe. I never talk about it because I don’t want people to think we think we’re all that.”
“Oh, yeah?” Shirley said. “Why don’t you sit for a spell? I’ll drive you home. You might have a concussion.”
Ruth Ann, a few feet away from the door, rubbing her hands together, didn’t look as if she could sit if she wanted to.
“Mrs. Hawkins,” Sheriff Bledsoe said, “I want you to call your husband and tell him to get down here. If you don’t, I will.”
Ruth Ann grimaced. “I can’t. I just can’t, Sheriff.”
“Goodness, Ruth Ann,” Shirley said. “No need to get all upset. Sheriff Bledsoe, why you need Lester? What’s going on?”
“You might want to lock me up now, Sheriff,” Eric said. “Please!”
“Everybody just relax, okay!” Sheriff Bledsoe said. “Why don’t we all sit down and sort this thing out.” He pulled up two chairs. “I’m sure we can figure this out without a buncha hysterics. Come on, everybody take a seat.”
Ruth Ann took a step backward.
“Fine with me,” Eric said. “I prefer to sit in a locked cell. You know what I mean, Sheriff?”
Shirley said, “You keep asking to be locked up. Why? The hell wrong with you?”
“Temporary confinement calms my nerves.”
Shirley took a seat. “Will someone tell me what the hell is going on here?”
“Miss Harris,” Sheriff Bledsoe said, “Eric and…” Should he tell her? Eric was staring at him, shaking his head. “I shouldn’t be the one telling you… If your sister and your boyfriend won’t, I will.” He looked over at Ruth Ann; she’d moved closer to the door. “Don’t leave!”
Eric went into the cell and tried to pull the bars closed. “How do you lock this thing, Sheriff?”
“Miss Harris,” Sheriff Bledsoe said, “today, two hours ago, I observed your boyfriend, Eric Barnes, at—”
“Ohhhhhhhh!” Ruth Ann cried, clutching her chest. “Ohhhh!” She swooned side to side. “My heart! Ohhhh!” She swayed forward, almost falling to the floor. “Ohhhhh!” and stumbled across the room holding her chest and fell backward onto a desk.
No such luck in the world, Sheriff Bledsoe thought.
“Oh my God!” Shirley shouted, running over to Ruth Ann. “Ruth Ann’s having a heart attack!”
“No, she is not,” Sheriff Bledsoe said.
Shirley leaned over and put an ear to Ruth Ann’s chest, listened for a second, rose up and—Whop!—both hands clutched together, down on Ruth Ann’s sternum. She listened again, got up and—Whop! Another quick listen… another Whop!
Shirley found her rhythm: Whop! Whop! Whop! Whop! Whop!
“Hey!” Sheriff Bledsoe shouted. “Don’t do that!”
Again Shirley hammered Ruth Ann. Whop! This time Ruth Ann grunted, “Uhhhh!”
Whop! “Uhhhh!” Whop! “Uhhhh!” Whop! “Uhhhh!” Whop! “Uhhhh!”
Shirley stopped and laid her head on Ruth Ann’s chest. “I hear it,” she declared. “It’s pumping too fast now. Gotta slow it down.” Whop! Whop! Whop!
“Sheriff!… Sheriff!” Eric grunted, his body suspended perpendicular against the bars, each limb pushing or pulling. “Would you please lock this damn cell! Please!”
“Call an ambulance,” Shirley said, and whopped Ruth Ann again.
“Stop before you seriously hurt her,” Sheriff Bledsoe said. “She’s not having a heart attack.”
“Call a goddamn ambulance!” Shirley shouted with such intensity and authority that Sheriff Bledsoe quickly reached for the phone.
Chapter 19
“Shane didn’t want to come back with me,” Leonard told his mother. “He said he wanted to stay up there a little while longer.”
“How did he look?”
“He looked great. Just great.”
“He wasn’t hungry, was he?”
“No, Mother.”
“Maybe you should take him more food. A growing boy needs to keep his weight up. I’ll cook something that’ll keep for a long time. You can take it to him.” She let him digest that before adding: “If you don’t mind?”
“No, Mother, I don’t mind at all.” He hoped she wouldn’t go through too much trouble because whatever she cooked was going into the first trash can he saw. He was not going in the woods again.
“Your dinner is in the microwave. A pumpkin pie in the refrigerator.”
“Pumpkin pie,” already tasting it. “Mother, you shouldn’t have.”
“Save a piece for Shane, okay?” Ida said, leaving the kitchen.
Leonard washed his hands in the sink, took a paper towel-wrapped plate out of the microwave and put it on the table. This was his reward for fearlessly confronting jungle boy. And in the process, he thought, I’ve lost the love of my life.
He’d gone to the Greyhound bus stop in town, the regional airport in Lake Village, and then back to the motel. No sign of Victor.
After blessing the food, he removed the paper towel and froze, staring at green beans, mashed potatoes, two dinner rolls and a steaming heap of boiled neck bones. Leonard swallowed hard.
Had he angered his mother? If he did he couldn’t remember doing so. Even if he’d done something to upset her, it couldn’t have been egregious enough for her to spike the neck bones.
He sniffed the neck bone. Arsenic, he remembered reading, didn’t have a smell or taste. If Kenny G were afoot, he would have him… He remembered Kenny G whining and howling as his owner was wheeled into the ambulance. He’d thought the poor dog was expressing grief, but then Kenny G threw up and keeled over, his little legs sticking straight up.
The phone on the wall rang. Leonard ignored it, got up, dumped the food and the plate into the trash can and covered it with newspaper. He was headed for the pumpkin pie when he heard a scream. He ran and almost collided with Ida, also running, in the hallway.
“What’s the matter, Mother?”
“Come on, Leonard, we gotta go! Ruth Ann had a heart attack!”
Shirley, Lester, Eric, and Robert Earl and Estafay were all sitting in the emergency waiting room when Leonard and Ida arrived at the hospital.
“How is she?” Ida asked no one in particular.
“We don’t know yet,” Shirley said. “The doctor hasn’t come out and told us anything. I’m going to give them a few minutes, then I’m going back there to see what’s going on.”
Robert Earl and his wife, her face hidden behind a large Bible, were sitting apart from everyone else. Robert Earl, wearing his usual blue jean overalls, slumped in his chair, clamped hands resting on his large stomach, one finger tapping a knuckle, as if he were waiting for his car in the shop.
One look at Eric and Leonard thought he might be high on drugs. His legs were shaking and he didn’t seem to know where to put his hands as he swiveled his head back and forth from Shirley to the double doors leading into the emergency room. Shirley appeared on the verge of a nervous breakdown, red eyes, uncombed hair poking up like weeds.
