by DC Alexander
Duck cleared his mouth and wheezed loud as he could “Get me out of this fuckin hole! I can’t breathe!”
I said “yeah, this man wanted to take me down to the station, he never did tell me what for though. Do yall know what he wanted? Why’d yall come over here?”
One of them said “Ma’am, I imagine it was just a misunderstanding. We’ll get it all cleared up, let’s get these men out of there.” He turned back to the sunken men.
Henry said “Berry, you keep an eye out on all this while I help ‘em up” and grabbed Duck by the shoulder with one hand and pulled on him, I moved away from them. Another car pulled up with the lights flashing, then another one. Cops were coming out of everywhere. Two more got out and come up in the yard. All the radios were squawking incomprehensible gibberish, Henry said “Some of yall come here and give me a hand, this man is stuck.” He wasn’t having any luck. That struck me as funny but I restrained myself.
I sat down on the steps and put my hands over my mouth to stop me. Everybody but Otis and Duck were getting tickled.
Henry said “This is funny and all, but we need to get these men out of this shit” to the other cops. They hustled up to lend a hand. I cut loose the bindings as they pulled on Otis and Duck. I pulled water into the holes from the surrounding ground to make it nasty and it worked nicely. Duck come out of the ground with a sucking noise, he’d lost a shoe, had mud all over his pants and arms, and he was truly pissed. “You can’t go around making people fall in holes in the damn ground!” he spit a grass stem out, “I’m arrestin you for assault on a police officer and anything else I can think of. I’m an officer of the law, you aint going to get away with this shit, you smart little bitch. See how you like it when the shoe’s on the other foot.” He pulled away from the men holding his arms and surged toward me.
I softened the ground and he sunk to his knees, “damn, that yard is just fulla holes, you be careful! I wondered ‘bout that shoe, you want me to get you a shoe for that other foot or was you offerin’ it to me?”
He was trying to wade at me and it wasn’t working. Two officers caught him by the arms, Henry said “Duck, give it up man, you embarrassing us all. Just let it go.”
Duck looked like he was about to cry. “You seen what she done, you gonna let her get away with that? Did you hear her? It aint nothing but a big fuckin joke, she’s having a good time.”
Henry said “Duck, she aint done anything, you just wasn’t watchin where you was goin. What were yall doin?”
Otis chimed in “They wasn’t no holes there before, the ground just opened up and sucked him down and when I come to help it got me too.” They had him out and he didn’t want no more, he was standing back crouched a little and watching his feet, ready to run if the ground tried to eat him.
Henry replied “If god opened up the ground you ought to pay attention to what you doin and think about it.” Miz Baker said “Amen!” and looked up to the sky with her hands together like she was praying.
The little old lady from the car was up in the middle of them. She said “you men need to take care of this girl’s yard, she might get hurt.” She turned to me “My boy is a lawyer, I saw everything that happened. If you want to sue I’ll be glad to testify. You need to get names from all the witnesses about what happened and write it all down right now while they are all here.”
The word ‘sue’ caused the cops to stop everything they were doing. Henry smacked Duck on the shoulder hard and looked at him mean. Otis turned to me and said “Ma’am, we sorry for any inconvenience you suffered, we stopped here to see if something was wrong with all the people here and the cars parked and all.”
Duck said “Yeah, that’s right” grudgingly and reached up to pick some grass out of his eyebrow. There was a little dirt on his nose.
Henry said “If yall ok we’ll just go on now, sorry to have troubled you“ he turned to the rest of them and said “Yall load up and lets go, aint nothing here, just this lady and some friends visiting and some people fell in some holes.”
He turned to me “Ma’am, I think this was a misunderstanding and people got carried away. We’re just tryin to do a job here and sometimes things go wrong. Can we leave it at that?”
I said “I be fine with that, if somebody don’t get mad and come by here shootin out the winders and burning my house and I get a ticket every time I leave the house. Duck, if they can pull you out again, you stay still and I get you a rag to get that dirt off.”
He looked at me mean, didn’t say anything. Carl went inside to get a wet rag and hide his grin.
Henry said “I give you my personal guarantee aint none of that gonna happen. We’re over this, it’s just part of the job and I’ll make sure everybody understands that.”
“I don’t like dealing with lawyers. If nothin else happens we just let this drop and we forget about it.”
“Thank you very much, and you have a nice day.” Duck was out, Carl handed him a washcloth, he wiped at his face and handed it back. The others were getting in the cars, some of them pulling out, the flashing lights were off. Duck went on to leave, Henry started toward his car, stopped and turned back to me and said “You didn’t make them men sink in the ground did you? I know it’s silly but I gotta ask.”
I said “I think they a higher power that look out for people sometimes and it was lookin out for me today, hallelujah.” Miz Baker said “Hallelujah, Amen!” and raised her hands to the sky.
Henry said “hunh” and left shaking his head.
I was glad I didn’t use any of those traps on the sidewalk. That would’ve been hard to explain.
Chapter Eight
E arl was a big tough mean looking man. And he was scary with that blank stare and his eyelid crooked and pockmarks on his face from the salt in the shotgun. He had a front tooth missing. He was strong and he didn’t seem to feel pain. I wished I didn’t have him and I’d get rid of him soon as I could, but I could use those muscles. All I had to do to ease any feelings of guilt was to think about picking those kids up off the highway that night.
I had him take a sledgehammer and bust a place out in the floor in the basement. I marked out where I wanted the hole and started him beating on the floor and I left him to it. That was at eight thirty in the morning.
At three twenty that afternoon I went down to see how it was coming along. He was on his knees, covered with sweat and struggling to lift the hammer, his arms shaking and his lips pulled back with the effort. He had about killed himself. He didn’t have enough sense to stop and rest. I took him upstairs and fed him and gave him some milk. I made him wait a day to recover. He had most of the concrete beat loose. I had him carry the mess out and clean it up. I couldn’t set him something to do and not watch, I think he’d kill himself, he just didn’t feel his muscles tearing and breaking or he didn’t care.
Carl spent most days in my house answering the phone and taking me places. We were busy most of the time, it was fun. The business made money. We got respect, the heads behaved and nobody messed with my car.
Carl sat in the living room by the phone and answered it whenever it rang. We had a new couch and two chairs, they pretty much filled the room up but it was easy to find a place to sit. Carl had thrown out a lot of the clutter. It was tough letting him take the junk out, I had to leave the house, I was having spasms that he might throw out something I’d need later or something that had value. I realized I had a problem with that and took me outside and communed with Dirt while he and Wanda sorted and cleaned the living room. It was tough.
One of the calls Carl took, he talked and listened for a little while and told the caller he would let them know.
After he hung up he explained to me that this lady was missing a hundred forty dollars from a place where nobody could have taken it. She wanted to know if I could find out who took it and get it back. The money wasn’t the most important thing; she wanted to know who took it. She and her husband had saved for a long time, there was a lot of money.
It didn’t ring a bell for me. I had no feel for it. Carl took me over to see her. We went in and talked with Eloise, the woman in question. Soon as I saw the place I remembered the money was in a safe in a hole under the house. They had cut out the floor and set the safe under the hole with the door facing up so they could open it. It had angle iron bolted to it to hold it still and secure. I could remember every time the safe opened, I could tell what the combination felt like, money mostly got put in, but a few days before a man reached in and took out a handful, I could see him move the flooring, open the safe, reach in and pull out the money.
She was talking, “They aint no way somebody got into it, I don’t know why they didn’t take it all if they found it. I wouldn’t have knowed it was gone but we put a rubber band around it when they’s enough, it lays loose till then, and I was gonna band it this payday so I knew how much was loose, I can’t imagine anybody taking part and not all of it.”
It didn’t look like she was going to get through telling us about it any time soon so I interrupted her “Eloise, is that your family in that picture?” I pointed at the framed picture hanging over the couch, her, a man and two kids in front of a background of grass and trees. She looked like she wanted to ask me why I wanted to know, Carl said “Just answer what she asks, she got reasons, she can do this if you help.”
The woman said “Yes, that’s me and Gib, his name’s Gilbert but everbody call him Gib, and the kids is Megan and Little Gil.
Gib took the money. I hated to be the one to break them up, I said “I’ll take care of it, you stay out of that safe and don’t mess with it for a couple days, ok? I can’t fix it if you don’t listen, so tell me if you gone do what I ask now and save me the time and trouble.”
She realized I said something about the safe and her mouth fell open, she said “Do everybody in the damn world know about my damn money? They aint nobody supposed to know about that!”
I said “You wanted me to help you cause I can do things you can’t and I know things most people don’t know. I don’t care about your money. I get paid and make my money.” She sat there and worried about it with her lips pressed tight together, then she said “Alright, I gone trust you. God get you if you do me wrong, don’t you let me get robbed now. “I reassured her. “now, what sort of fix would you be good with? If I get your money put back in the safe and guarantee you won’t get robbed by whatever robbed you again, would that suit you?” I had an idea but I didn’t know if she wanted punishment for the thief or safety for the money. It made a lot of difference.
“If we get that money back and don’t get robbed no more, I would be happy, but I would hope whoever took it get their hand burned for that. It just aint right to steal somebody’s money they been saving and leave them wondering if they ever be safe again” she was off and running, I interrupted like I didn’t notice her babbling “Ok, then, I gotta go now and get started, we’ll get this done in the next few days, it’ll cost you three hundred dollars after you satisfied. That good with you? Carl, you ok with that?” Carl agreed, and after a moment Eloise agreed “Yes, that aint much to pay for peace of mind, it won’t actually cost me but one sixty if you get the one forty back, right?”
“Ok, one last thing; I need that picture off the wall so I can meditate on it. I’ll get it back to you in the same condition it’s in now, I aint gonna hurt it, I just need a connection to you to make this work.”
She bought it and handed me the photograph and we left with promises to call her back soon as we could.
I told Carl “the man took it and went to treat his side woman with that money. That Gib needs to come over and talk with me. He’s a butcher at the grocery store.”
Carl looked up the number of the store and eventually got the husband on the phone. Gib got hostile when Carl told him what I wanted. I took the phone from Carl and tell him, “Gib, you took a hundred and forty dollars from the safe in your bedroom floor and you used it to take your side woman out to eat. Eloise found that money missin, you let her think somebody else stole that money, she’s accusing the kids and bout to go crazy over this. You got a pistol you been showin around. This is what you’re gonna do. You take and sell that pistol. You put the money you took back in the safe, and you take your wife out to eat and to a hotel room with the rest. Then you don’t ever do anything like that again and we’ll be ok. I didn’t tell Eloise you took it. I think I can fix your problem without that.”
He come back at me “I don’t know who the fuck you think you is, I aint took no money, I aint sellin nothin and I aint listenin to this shit.” He was shook but he stayed on the phone.
“You aint got to listen to me if you don’t want to. You make a note of this number, I think you gone call me back.”
“You’re just some crazy motha fuckin bitch and you don’t need to be goin round tellin my wife shit. I come see you if you don’t just shut the hell up and stay outta my bidness and you won’t like it, you hear me? Don’t you call me no more and don’t you go talkin to Eloise.” he hung up on me.
I told Carl, “Just let it be, I think he’ll call back later.”
Elizabeth had made some vegetable stew. She was getting to be a cook. I went down and told Earl what to do and he left. We sat down in the kitchen to eat. Elizabeth fried some steak for her and Carl, I remember when I would have fought to get a bite of steak, but it smelled wrong now and I didn’t want any.
We got finished eating and I told Carl “We need to get a speaker on that phone so we can both hear without having to huddle over the phone.” Carl made a note, he didn’t miss anything. We went into the living room and it wasn’t long, the phone rang. Carl reached out for it and I held up my hand for him to wait, he looked at me a little funny but he waited.
I give it a couple rings and nodded to Carl. He answered the phone, “This is Miz Rosalee’s house, what can we do for you?” polite and professional. He listened for a second and said “Let me see if she’s available, hold please” and handed me the phone. I said “how you doin Gib? You like what you got goin on?” I’d heard him talking with Carl.
He said “You gotta get this man off me, I aint doin that,” he kinda grunted high pitched, “please, I do what you say, I’m sorry, oh god please stop him.”
“Are you sure? I don’t want to inconvenience you, and Earl got needs.” I was a little upset with the man. “He can come see you all the time, he likes you.”
Gib was crying “please, please, stop him, I do anything you want, don’t do this, this aint right, I don’t do that” and I gave in.
“Alright, tell Earl I want to talk with him.” I hear some bumps and rattles then Earl said “Yes.” I told Earl “let him go and give him back the phone and come on back here to me.”
Gib said “I leave right now and do that what you said. I’m listenin now, please don’t send him back after me no more.”
“You just wait till this evenin after you get off work. You go sell that pistol and do what I said and maybe we be ok.”
He said “Yes ma’am, I do that, can I go now?” and I hung up the phone.
Carl said “What’d you do to make him change his mind like that?” and I explained how Earl waited in the bathroom for Gib. I’d shown Earl the picture and had him manhandle Gib, strip his pants off, make like he was going to make love with Gib. Carl knew how strong Earl was, he laughed “Damn, that’s evil!” He stopped laughing “do you think Earl actually did somethin to him?”
“I don’t think so but I told Earl keep goin till I told him to stop. If Gib waited too long to call he got a ride. I don’t want to know.”
“Damn, girl, you somethin else. This gets out, nobody gone give you backtalk no more.”
”They aint no details gonna get out, but if he spreads the word and don’t give me no shit I can live with that.” I settled back on the couch. I liked that couch, it was cloth and I didn’t sweat like I used to so it felt good to lie back and relax.
Carl looked at me, trying to be sly when he though
t I wouldn’t see him doing it. It would be tempting to cut loose and have some entertainment with Carl but it would ruin a good business relationship and I got nobody to replace him.
Chapter Nine
A manda Peron called, Carl answered the phone and I could hear her from where I sat on the porch, she was talking loud and fast. One of her kids was missing; she asked if we could find him. Amanda started taking in stray kids a couple years ago, it happened all accidentally. One of the neighbor’s kids had dopers for parents and spent the night with her two kids a few times, then stayed for a few days, then quit going home and the parents just accepted it and never made the kid come back home.
Some other kids did pretty much the same thing and she never made any of them go home. She had a big old run down two story house she owned. People worked on it every now and then, she was like a public service and they contributed. She was a single parent and had two kids of her own. She had probably five bedrooms and three bathrooms, they weren’t big rooms and she had problems with the roof leaking and toilets stopping up; the house had lots of problems, but enough people pitched in to keep it standing up and livable.
Her man left her or she’d run him off after the second kid. She was about forty, disabled with back problems. She was home most of the time. She tried to go it alone so she wouldn’t owe anybody but she accepted help when she had to for the kids.
