“I may have poked the bear when I went to see Briar,” I say. “That might have had a little something to do with it.”
“Poked the bear about what, exactly?” she says. “I thought you just went over there to talk about Leamon’s daughter.”
“I did,” I say, “but before long I was telling him about those boys I caught dealing drugs at the high school and he took it to mean Iwas accusing him of being involved with them, and with drugs, and I let him think that. And he obviously didn’t take kindly to it, in light of what just happened to Bumper and me.”
“Well,” she says, “I need to go get my phone and call Burt Webb this instant, and screw whether I wake him up or not.”
“No, ma’am.”
She stares up at me, hands on hips. “What are you telling me, Silas? That you don’t want to involve the police? What, you plan to take on the Southern Mafia all by yourself?”
“I can takecareof myself.”
“Really?” EJ says. “How did that work out for you tonightandfor your dog?”
“They surprised me tonight, like they came at me from my blind side,” I say. “I won’t let that happen again. You can trust me on that.”
I see her eyes fill up, just like that. When she speaks next, her voice isn’t much above a whisper.
“My husband is gone,” she says. “And my son is gone.” She reaches up and almost angrily brushes a tear off her cheek, like swatting at a fly. “I can’t lose my grandson, too.”
I walk over and pull her close, my grandmother so tiny it’s as if I’m pulling a little girl into my arms, making sure, as I always do, that I don’t hold her too tight. Bumper is already snoring softly from her bed. My head and sides are throbbing and so is the place behind both knees, but right now EJ is more important than any of that.
“You’re not going to lose me,” I say. “If it didn’t happen in the car that night, it’s not going to happen here.”
She pulls back and looks up at me, eyes still red. “But you’re not going to walk away from this, are you?”
“You know me better than that,” I tell her.
“Whatareyou going to do, Silas?”
I smile down at her. “Same thing I’ve always done when I’ve been up against it,” I say. “Call my own number.”
Now she puts her arms around me, pretty much as high as she can get them, and presses her head against me one more time.
“That’s what I was afraid of,” she says.
THIRTY-EIGHT
FIRST THING IN the morning I’m the one who calls Burt Webb and describes to him, as straightforwardly as possible, what had happened, and I ask if I should come in and file some kind of report.
“You sure it was Roof Crockett’s voice?” he asks when I finish.
“Can I swear to that? No, I can’t,” I say. “But am I sure of it? Yeah, Burt, I’m sure it was him.”
“But he’s the one who called them off?” Burt says. “Why?”
“Ask him” is my answer.
There’s a long pause then at his end.
“I’m sorry that this happened to you, Silas, especially after what all you’ve been through,” he says. “And you can come in and file a report with us if you want to. But I have to tell you that the jurisdiction on something like this is going to end up belonging to Nash Hader.”
“But why?”
There’s another lengthy pause before he finally says, “Because it might involve the Crockett family, that’s why.”
“So it’s like that.”
