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“I see. Well, next time I’m sure you’ll remember to call. You look tired. Maybe you should take a nap.”
“I don’t need a nap.”
“Like Scripture says, we must always be alert. But as a minister, you already know that. You ran into a nail? How awful.”
“I’m going into my room now.”
“By the way, we’re going to be painting the upstairs. We’ll need to move you into the cubby for a few days.”
“What’s the cubby?”
“It’s in the basement. It’s only temporary. There’s a window and a toilet. You can come upstairs to bathe.”
“That’s not convenient for me.”
“Beg your pardon?” she said.
“I don’t live in basements. I’m not a bat.”
She sniffed the air and made a face. “What’s that smell?” she said.
“I don’t know. I don’t smell anything.”
“It’s very strong. Check the bottom of your shoes.”
He could hear himself breathing, his irritability climbing like a tarantula up his spinal cord. Her mouth made him think of a plumber’s helper, one smeared with lipstick. “Who’s home?” he said.
“Ralph’s splitting wood. The girls went to the movies. Why do you want to know?”
“I thought we’d have a meeting of the minds.”
“You’re acting strangely. I think I should have a look at your cheek. You may already have an infection. Are you running a fever?”
“Don’t touch me.”
“Well, I never.”
“Do you have some baling wire?”
“Ralph probably has some in the shed.”
“Yes, folksy hinterland people would always have some baling wire lying around, wouldn’t they? Ralphie splinters the wood, and then you cord it up for the winter. That’s what folksy salt-of-the-earth people do.”
“What has gotten into you?” she said.
“A little of this, a little of that,” he said, dipping his hand into his overnight bag. “Mostly, I just don’t like the way you look. Or the way you talk. Or your stupid expression.”
He lifted up a .22 auto outfitted with a suppressor and popped a solitary round through the middle of her forehead, the hole no bigger than the circumference of an eraser on a wood pencil. She went straight down on the floor in a heap, like a puppet whose strings had been released by the puppeteer. That was how they always went down when they weren’t expecting it. Not like in the movies, when the shooting victim flew backward through a glass window.
He studied her surprised expression and the pool of blood forming on the floor, then put away the semi-auto and picked up the brass and stepped out on the landing. “Hey, Ralph!” he called down. “Can you bring some baling wire up here? The wife wants you to help hang something.”
The husband snicked his ax into the stump and gazed up at the land
ing, squinting against the sunlight. “Be there in a jiff, Geta. We wondered where you were,” he said. “I told the wife not to worry, you were doing the Lord’s work. Glad you’re back home safe and sound.”
AFTER BERTHA PHELPS drove away, Clete went down to the cabin, and I went back up on the hill, trying to retrace the route Asa Surrette used to get on and off Albert’s property. It was 3:48 P.M. and shady and cool inside the trees, but on the opposite side of the valley, I could see harebells and asters and paintbrush and mock orange and sunflowers and bee balm on the hillsides, where the grass was green and tall and the trees were few because of the thin soil layer. Then I saw Clete laboring up the grade toward me, his porkpie hat on, a bottle of Jack Daniel’s in his right hand, his shoulders as heavy-looking as a bag of rocks.
“I thought you could use some company,” he said, sweating, his breath coming hard. He sat down on a boulder and wiped his brow. “I guess I still haven’t acclimated to the thin air.”
