Who Let That Killer in the House?

by Patricia Sprinkle

  Then our lights went out. I heard a yelp of dismay from the windowless storeroom next door and Bo squawked, “Back off! Give me space!”

  “It’s just Bethany,” I told him. She was working for us full-time that summer and taking inventory in our storeroom that afternoon. I didn’t want her breaking her neck, so I lit my lamp and went out like Florence Nightingale to rescue her.

  The rest of the staff bumbled toward the light like moths, so I took them all back to my office and brought out a tin of cookies from my bottom drawer. Somebody went for Cokes from the machine, and we had a party. We couldn’t talk much, though, the rain was so loud. Bo subsided to a series of low mutters on top of my desk.

  We all jumped when my phone rang. “Little Bit?” Joe Riddley’s voice was accompanied by crackles and spits from the storm.

  I paused for a bright flash of lightning and kettledrums of thunder, then demanded, “Are you sure it’s safe to be calling right now? I don’t want us to end our lives at opposite ends of a telephone wire.”

  “I’m not going to talk long. Lightning took out a transformer, and they won’t get it fixed for hours. Go on and send folks home. You go, too.”

  “How’s the sod?”

  “Sodden. Be careful driving, now. I’ll see you at the house. And leave Bo—I’ll swing by and get him when the rain stops. You know he hates to get wet.”

  Who doesn’t? As the staff gathered up the umbrellas they’d all thought to bring, I remembered mine was in the backseat of my car. “Grab a big plastic garbage bag for each of us,” I ordered Bethany, “and I’ll run you home.”

  We cut holes for our faces and dashed through the downpour at such a pace, I collapsed into my car panting. We sat there dripping all over my upholstery like drowned possums while rain drummed on the roof and the sky flashed bright, dark, bright, dark.

  Bethany looked worried. “Could we swing by the pool to see if Hollis is there? She bikes to work, and she’ll get soaked riding home.”

  “She’s a lifeguard,” I pointed out. “She doesn’t mind getting wet, and she’s got a mother and an uncle to pick her up.” However, since I’m her grandmother and not her mother, I added, “We can swing by, if it will make you feel better.”

  It took a while. A big pine was down in the road, so we had to make a several-block detour. When we arrived, the pool and its building were dark and empty. I edged away from the curb. “I’m sure they closed before the lightning even got close. Hollis is probably a lot drier than you are right now.”

  “Could we drive by her house? She’s real scared of lightning.” Bethany spoke through chattering teeth.

  “I can’t imagine Hollis being scared of anything, and she’s got Garnet and her mother home by now. Besides, you’re soaked.”

  “But—” She must have realized she’d gotten to the edge of her grandmother’s indulgence, because she subsided. “Okay.” She fiddled with her stringy wet ponytail. “I’ll call her later. After Todd calls.”

  “Who’s Todd?” I asked in my “grandmother-doesn’t-know-anything” voice.

  She turned so pink the car temperature went up five degrees. “Oh, just a boy I’ve been seeing. A man, actually. He was at the game Saturday—a real cute blond man?”

  She was obviously waiting for me to say I’d seen him, so I did. And since Martha and Ridd had tried talking sense into Bethany without results, I decided to try another tack. “Pop and I would love to meet him, honey. Why don’t you bring him down for a swim and dessert some evening?”

  “Maybe . . .” The way that doubtful word hung between us, I knew she wasn’t real sure how we’d like Todd.

  “We won’t bother you or anything,” I assured her. “You all can swim and then come in for cake and ice cream. Just let me know when.”

  “Thanks, Me-mama.” She jumped out and ran through the rain.

  To tell this story properly, I need at this point to do something a judge generally doesn’t: I need to rely on hearsay evidence, report what other people did and said when I was not present. However, all of this comes from reliable witnesses, so I can say with integrity that I am certain this is what happened on the afternoon of the storm.

  Tyrone, Smitty, and a few friends hung out at Tyrone’s because his mother was working. Once the power went out and they couldn’t play video games, they passed their time plotting mischief.

  Martha, Cricket, and Bethany decided to finger paint by candlelight. Cricket painted a big red heart and flowers and told his mother, “This is for Garnet.”

  Ronnie dropped by DeWayne’s to tell him about the new job, but only Yasheika was at home, so he left to fetch Clarinda from our place. Clarinda, like Hollis, is nervous of lightning.

  Ridd and DeWayne were on the golf course, and—being men—waited until the bottom fell out before they called off the match. Both were soaked when Ridd dropped DeWayne off. DeWayne invited him in for coffee, but Ridd felt he ought to get home and into dry clothes. DeWayne and Yasheika made coffee on his gas stove and lit candles. With nothing else to do, they talked.

  Sara Meg had few customers that afternoon, so she spent most of it getting ready for a summer sale. She didn’t even notice the storm until water streamed from the gutter outside her plate-glass window. Since she’d left her umbrella at home and had parked nearly a block away, she decided to stay and keep marking down prices as long as her flashlight batteries held out.

  Hollis got off work before the storm arrived, because the pool manager shut down at the first flickers of lightning. She biked the mile home, praying she wouldn’t be struck before she got there. As she rounded the corner near their house, she saw a car she recognized pull out of their drive and head in the other direction. She stared, puzzled. Garnet usually practiced the piano all afternoon.

  When she got inside, she heard the shower running. She ran upstairs and stuck her nose in the bathroom door. “You better get out. It’s lightning.”

  Behind the curtain of the old claw-foot tub, Garnet shrieked in surprise. “When did you get home?”

  “I just did. Get out of the tub. You could get killed.” Hollis had a mental file of stories about people who had been killed by lightning in their cars, on the street, and in bathtubs.

  “Then get out of here. I’m ready to dry.” Garnet was as modest as a Puritan—wore long sleeves, long skirts, and never let anybody, even her sister, see her naked.

  Hollis backed out of the bathroom and went to her room to play music to drown out the storm. When she discovered that Garnet had taken several of her CDs without asking, she stomped down to Garnet’s room to retrieve them. At the door, she stopped, astonished. Garnet’s bed, usually as pristine as a nun’s, was rumpled and bedraggled.

  Hollis didn’t understand. She refused to believe what common sense told her could be true, but ripples of doubt chased fear up her spine. Hollis generally challenged what she did not believe, so she pounded down the hall, flung open the bathroom door, and demanded, “What’s going on here? Your bed’s a mess. And why are you taking a shower at this time of day? You even washed your hair. You just washed it this morning.”

  Garnet clutched the towel around her. Her hair hung down her back like long red tails. “I was taking a nap and it got all messy.” She turned around so Hollis couldn’t see her face, but Hollis got one glimpse in the mirror. It was enough.

  She stared at Garnet’s naked back, as lovely as the rest of her, and shock went through her like an electric jolt. “I saw the car drive away,” she said in a menacing voice.

  Garnet shrugged. “So?” After a little pause, she added, “Maybe somebody rang the bell while the water was running and I didn’t hear. Now get out of here, you hear me?”

  “Garnet?” Hollis grabbed her shoulder. “You aren’t”—she stopped; Hollis had always believed that saying bad things could make them come true—“in some kind of trouble?” she finished lamely.

  Garnet jerked away. “Of course not. So don’t you go worrying Mama.”

  Worrying
their mother was something both girls tried to avoid. Uncle Buddy was like a broken record sometimes, warning them that their mother already had enough on her shoulders, just paying bills.

  Hollis clumped downstairs and headed to the refrigerator for yogurt and carrot sticks. She settled herself at the table and tried not to picture Garnet—the very idea made her shiver. Not Garnet! In many ways Hollis was still young for her age. At that moment, she refused to grow up. Then thunder clattered overhead and lightning flashed outside the window, so close she felt she could reach out and touch it. Hollis cringed, laid her head down on the table, covered it with both arms, and moaned.

  She heard Garnet start drying her hair. The pleasant hum of the dryer drew her back upstairs. She wished Garnet would talk to her. How long had it been since they really talked? She thought wistfully of how they used to sit and sing along with the radio when they were little. Before Daddy died. Before Garnet went so far away.

  Sadly, Hollis returned to her own room. The big old house was always dim. Now it grew steadily gloomier as dark clouds came down around it. She turned on the lights and music and wondered if Bethany could come over. She reached for the phone, then remembered you could get killed talking on a telephone if it were hit by lightning.

  Trapped with her fears, Hollis jumped at another flash outside her window. She hurried to close the blinds, turned up her music to drown out the thunder, and started polishing her nails.

  With one enormous crash, both lights and music disappeared. Hollis trembled in the darkness, waving her hands to dry her nails and watching in terror the flashes around the edges of the blinds. Sara Meg had bought cheap, precut blinds, and these old windows weren’t standard widths. Which finger of fire would hit the roof, burn down the house, strike her dead?

  When she could stand it no longer, she felt her way down the wide hall toward Garnet. She didn’t see the lightning outside the hall window because her eyes were squeezed shut. Heart pounding, she fumbled for Garnet’s doorknob.

  The door was locked.

  That was so unexpected, she opened her eyes and stood very still. That’s when, behind the door, she heard Garnet sobbing.

  Hollis stood for what seemed a very long time, feeling like she’d stepped to the edge of a bluff and it had slid out from under her.

  Hesitantly, she knocked. “Garnet, are you okay?”

  Garnet’s voice was muffled. “I—I stubbed my toe on the leg of my bed. It really hurts. But I’ll be okay.”

  “Can I come in?” Lightning flashed again in the window at the end of the hall and Hollis panicked. She cried out like she was six, not sixteen, “Please, Garnie! Lemme in!”

  The door clicked and swung open. Garnet held out her arms like she used to when they were small. “Oh, honey, don’t be scared.” She stroked Hollis’s hair and murmured over and over, “I’ll take care of you. It’s gonna be all right. It’s gonna be all right.”

  Hollis felt her sister’s warmth up and down her body. She had no idea how long they stood there, pressed against each another, mingling their tears.

  6

  If I’d had any sense Wednesday, I’d have stayed in bed.

  The day started all right, with breakfast on our screened side porch. My pink climbing roses were mostly finished, but the scent of the few remaining ones made for a mighty pleasant meal. I was picking up my pocketbook to leave for work when Clarinda arrived. She’s worked for us for over forty years, so I can judge her mood by the way she comes through the door. That morning I took one look and asked, “Who ate your candy?”

  Clarinda huffed, to show that working for anybody so insensitive was real hard on her. She thumped her pocketbook on the kitchen closet shelf and tied on her apron before she announced, “You gotta talk some sense into that girl.”

  “What girl?” I checked the mirror on the closet door. I like to look nice when I go out.

  Clarinda propped fists on her sizeable hips. “That Yasheika. Ronnie says he never gets to see DeWayne anymore. They were supposed to go fishing this comin’ Friday night, but now DeWayne says he can’t go because they’re having practice and then he’s takin’ Yasheika to Augusta for dinner to celebrate her birthday. He invited Ronnie, but Ronnie said he won’t eat with that adder—that’s what he calls her because he says she’s so puffed up with herself. Not that he says that to DeWayne, of course.”

  “Of course not.” I fluffed my hair. “Ronnie’s got some sense.”

  Clarinda huffed. “He’s got a lot of sense. But he’s all the time moping around the house these days, on account of that girl interferin’ with his fun.”

  “She’ll be leaving in a little while.”

  Clarinda huffed again. “However long she stays is too long. Ronnie says she is one french fry short of a Happy Meal—all the time talking about getting her daddy out of jail.”

  I turned, surprised. “I didn’t know their daddy was in jail. For what?”

  “I don’t know, but Yasheika swears he’s innocent and she means to prove it.”

  “Everybody in jail is innocent, to hear their family talk.” If I sounded disgusted, I was. “I got hauled out of bed at three this morning to go down to the jail for a bond hearing. Man broke into a dry cleaner’s and stole a whole lot of clothes. Last night, his mama was down there crying and carrying on, claiming he’s a good boy and it’s all his wife’s fault, because she spends too much money. Speaking of money, did Ronnie go see Buddy about a job? I forgot to ask.”

  “I noticed. But yeah, Buddy offered him a job. Ronnie’s supposed to start tomorrow. But that ain’t gonna solve my problem. I got to live with Ronnie, and I hate to see him mopin’ around. You got to do something. Talk to her. Tell her to find herself some girlfriends, that menfolks need some time without women around. You’ll know what to say.”

  “It’s none of my business,” I pointed out. “Yours, either, if we come right down to it.” The look Clarinda gave me was exactly the look I suspect Mary gave Jesus after he told her the empty wine barrels at that Cana wedding weren’t his business. It had the same effect, too. I knew good and well that before the day was out, I’d have called Yasheika on some pretext or other and tried to tactfully suggest that men need some time together without women around.

  First, though, I wanted to arrange some new rosebushes and bedding plants on the sidewalk in front of our store. Hopemore has wide, old-fashioned sidewalks, and colorful plants make our place real pretty.

  I finished, stepped back to admire my work, and ran smack into somebody. I staggered like a drunk and fell against a big, soft chest. Two large arms steadied me. “Sorry,” said a gruff voice above me. Morning breath overpowered the scent of roses.

  I turned and saw I was in the arms of Tyrone Noland. He turned bright red and dropped his arms at once. I stepped away and patted my hair. “Thanks for catching me. I need one of those beeper things for when I’m backing up.”

  “It’s okay.” He looked half-asleep. His teeth were yellow and dirty. His dyed hair hung limp beside his face. His black pants were wrinkled and slung low on his hips, and his black T-shirt and khaki jacket looked like they’d been used for dog bedding.

  “How’ve you been keeping yourself?” I took a step back so I could breathe fresher air.

  “Not real good.” He looked at the ground and shuffled one thick shoe.

  I found the way his socks drooped over the high tops of the shoes a bit endearing. Walker’s socks used to droop just like that. “Looks like you could use some sleep.”

  “Yes, ma’am. I’m headed home to bed. Been playin’ video games with friends all night.” The way he’d said “friends” was boastful, like he wanted to make sure I knew he had some.

  On impulse, I said, “I’m not real crazy about that crowd you’re running with these days.”

  He shrugged. “They’re all right.”

  “They’re trouble, and you know it. Don’t you let them get you into trouble.”

  “No, ma’am. I won’t.” He picked up one f
oot to amble on, then put it down again. “Judge, do you think Hollis—” His voice cracked on her name. He cleared his throat and started over. “Do you think the girls on the team ought to be hugging and kissing Mr. Evans?” His eyes were very blue against his black hair. “You think it means anything, like—you know?”

  I did know, and I didn’t think so. “It was just because they won the game. It’s okay, Tyrone,” I said firmly. Unconvinced, he slouched down the street. I went to the office to justify my existence to Clarinda by calling Yasheika.

  In the way things happen, the phone rang before I dialed. “This is Yasheika Evans. Could I come by and talk to you for a minute?” Her voice was breathy, with a pleasant rasp.

  I couldn’t help picturing an adder speaking with just that voice, but I banished the image and said, “Sure, honey, that would be great. Anytime this morning is all right. I’ll be right here.”

  She got there so fast, I suspected she’d called from her cell phone in our parking lot. She tapped at the plate-glass window in our office door and came in looking dainty and pretty in a yellow sundress and yellow and turquoise sandals. Not adder-ish at all.

  “Have a seat.” I waved her to the wing chair by the window.

  She got right down to business. “I hate to bother you, but I don’t know who else to ask. I need to find some records from a trial that happened in this county twenty years ago. Gerrick Lawton was accused of murder.”

  I sure was glad a deputy interrupted us right then with a warrant to be signed. I didn’t know what to say—not because I didn’t remember, but because I did. Right that minute, Gerrick Lawton was serving a life sentence for killing a ten-year-old girl in the Confederate Memorial Cemetery behind her house.

  The Lawtons were another old family in Hope County, their lives intertwined with that of the Tanners for many generations. The difference between them was that the Tanners’ ancestors came to Georgia with Oglethorpe as convicts, but later generations had managed to erase that from their memories and prosper. The Lawtons came to Georgia as slaves, and even after emancipation, they never rose above being sharecroppers and domestics. Each generation lived in small unpainted shacks with newspaper stuffed in cracks to keep out the cold. Gerrick’s granddaddy farmed Buddy’s granddaddy’s land. Gerrick’s mother was the Tanners’ maid, until Walter died and Sara Meg couldn’t afford to keep her.