Chapter 4
Tuesday, November 12th
Brownie Rises Again
and
Oh, Them Gov’ment People
Tom and Laz came back to the trailer a few hours later. Brownie had returned to the little bedroom and was calmly reading a magazine he’d found about latch hooking rugs as if butter wouldn’t melt in his mouth. In the interim, he’d been a busy little bee on a zealous sojourn of discovery. He had found cream cheese in the fridge, food coloring in the pantry, and Anbesol in the bathroom, along with Petroleum Jelly, Poligrip, shaving cream, dental floss, a package of something called Premium Flavored Lubricated Latex Condoms – Organic Banana-Rama. (They looked kind of like balloons, except with yellowish oil on them. He made a mental note to look them up on his smart phone later.) There had been duct tape in one of the closets. (Tayla Berryhill had five different kinds of duct tape. FIVE!!! Tiger striped, pink zebra striped, purple plaid, one with peace signs galore, and Brownie’s favorite, massively shooting flames on a black background.) There had been ten boxes of Jell-O in an upper cabinet. There had also been baking soda, vinegar, chicken bouillon, and ketchup. There were two kinds of Oreos, regular and double-stuffed golden. There was a six pack of Blue Brain Wash Soda and three bottles of Motley Blue. There had been several ice cube trays in the freezer. There were white coffee mugs on a mug tree sitting on the counter, and wowzers, there was an air horn in a lower cabinet, in addition, an assortment of needles, pins, and sewing accoutrements, along with three boxes of dye. (Fuchsia, navy blue, and teal.)
It had been just like hitting oil on a Texas prairie, except without the gushing black stuff. Brownie was tempted to dance around while throwing all the items into the air, but he knew he shouldn’t make a mess so he restrained himself.
Tom and Laz replaced the masks before they came back in the room. Laz was inordinately pleased that Brownie hadn’t attempted to escape. Brownie could hear them long before they even got close to the door of the little room. Honestly, the trailer’s walls were as thin as paper plates. If they had been any thinner, they would have been translucent, and how would a boy pee in privacy?
“I tole you he wouldn’t get away,” Laz, otherwise known as Kidnapper Two, said to Tom, otherwise known as Kidnapper One or T-uh or T. “Boy’s smart. He done built a Taser from stuff he found around the house and used it to shock Matt Lauer on live television. He knows when he’s licked.”
Really? I don’t think so.
“I guess so,” Tom replied. “Ain’t we should call them Snoddys? Let them know ifin they ain’t found the note.”
“Listen,” Laz said, “when I was in the joint, I was in the cell block with Shishkabob McCandless. He was the one who kidnapped three hoity-toity rich kids in the sixties. Said it was the easiest money he ever done made. A right smart crime.”
But even Tom wasn’t that slow. He asked, “Then why was he in the pokey?”
“He trusted his mother not to squeal,” Laz snapped. “That’s why we waited until Ma went to her convention. Women folk get all riled up over children.”
“Your ma almost didn’t go to the convention,” Tom protested.
“Ma ain’t goin’ to turn down a free buffet. They have jumbo shrimp, barbequed chicken wings, and a melon selection that made her heart race. She’ll eat enough so that she don’t have to eat for the rest of the year. And she done already paid for the convention fee. She’s got three latch hook rugs in the best competitions.”
“You mean that one of Elvis dressed as an alien?”
“No, no, the flowers and kittens in a basket at sunset.”
“I favor the one of the crying clowns on unicycles, myself. Okay then, what do we do next?”
“The thing is not to get impatient,” Laz said. “Ma’s gone to the convention. She’ll be there three days and then she’s stopping at Aunt Julup’s for a whole week. They’ll drink whiskey sours and watch repeats of Buffy the Vampire Slayer every night until they pass out.” He paused. “It’s right ugly. Ma drools over Angel.” He made a noise that Brownie took to be extreme disgust.
“So we got ten days thereabouts.”
“That’s right. Them Snoddys won’t be able to get the money right away. So we don’t get impatient. We let them get what they need to get. Then we get them to make the drop.”
“That’s where we have the highest chance of getting caught, right?”
“That’s what Shishkabob always said. Nowadays you got GPS on the phones and cell phone towers and security cameras up the hooha. A couple of righteous kidnappers like us have to be right careful.”
“Let’s feed the kid and get that over with. Then we can watch CSI on the TiVo.”
They let themselves into the room, and Brownie looked up at their re-masked faces. One of them scratched at the pantyhose as if it was made of poison ivy infused material. “Lunch?” Brownie asked eagerly.
“Shore,” Laz said. It wasn’t hard to identify him. He had the LB tattoo on his forearm. “We got soft and crunchy tacos just like you wanted.”
“And the Fire Sauce?” Brownie asked eagerly.
“Gal put a big handful in,” Tom said. Tom was also not hard to identify. He still had the belt buckle with the big TOM on it. “I like that about Taco Bell. They ain’t afraid to give a fella a big helping of extra packages. Not like them other places. They ask you, ‘How many packages do you want, sir?’” He made his voice go high and airy like a very uptight individual’s voice might be. “I want enough to make sure it’s all covered. Shore I do.”
“We eating at the dining room table?” Brownie asked.
Both Laz and Tom looked at the three paper bags and the three drinks they were holding in a cardboard carrier. It hadn’t occurred to them to serve it at the aluminum table that was located next to the kitchen. Laz nodded, “Shore. M-ah, I don’t want crumbs in the bed. Hard to clean up and sugar ants like to come exploring.”
“How we goin’ eat with these masks on?” Tom asked petulantly.
“Let me help you carry that,” Brownie said. He climbed out of the bed and took the drinks and the bags. Then he led the way into the living room. The large open space had a living area on one side and an open concept kitchen on the other. There was a linoleum-floored square next to the kitchen where Tayla Berryhill had put the red-lined table. There were four matching chairs. The table and chairs would have looked appropriate in a forties-style bullet diner.
Brownie dumped the Fire packets out on the table and smiled broadly. “Ya’ll should wash your hands,” he said.
Tom and Laz weren’t disagreeable. They went to the kitchen sink and got down to business. Tom hummed “Happy Birthday” while he washed his hands.
“Why in tarnation are you doing that?” Laz demanded.
“You got to wash that long to get your hands clean,” Tom said reasonably. “So I wash it to the entire “Happy Birthday” song. and I know my hands are clean. I learned that in…which jail was it? I don’t recollect.”
Brownie got busy. He was grinning in anticipation by the time the two men returned to the table.
Laz looked at Brownie. “You goin’ to wash them hands, boy?”
“Yep,” Brownie said. “You got the root beer for me?”
“That’s right,” Tom said as he pointed out the cup with the plastic lid. One of the little bubbles on top was pushed in. “That one’s root beer.”
“That’s what I thought,” Brownie said as he got up.
Brownie washed his hands, humming the best song from 101 Dalmatians. He heard both Tom and Laz messing with the tacos. They finally compromised by lifting the pantyhose up over their noses as if Brownie couldn’t tell what they looked like anyway. Tom was the taller one at about six feet. His hair was black, and his eyes were blue. He didn’t have much meat on his bones. Specifically, one could see all of his bones just under the skin. Laz was about four inches shorter and a little broader in the shoulder. His hair was brown which matched the brown of his eyes. They really didn’
t look like two raving criminals who had savagely snatched an innocent child from the bosom of his family.
Ain’t that a shame, Brownie thought.
“I got the 7-layer Burrito,” Tom said. “Yours is the steak Cantina Burrito with extra onions.”
“That don’t look like extra onions to me.”
“You want to take it back?”
“No. I reckon not.”
“You kin have my onions. I’ll scrape ‘em off. What if I sprinkle some taco shell on top?”
“Sounds good to me.”
“What about them Volcano Nachos?”
Brownie heard the rattling of bags while he dried his hands off with a pink towel that had a large B on it. “Here they are,” Laz said. “Remind me not to go to the bathroom after you.”
“I reckon you shouldn’t have got those pintos and cheese then.”
“It ain’t the Pintos ‘N Cheese, it’s the Volcano Nachos that will do it. I should just chug Pepto Bismol with them and carry baby wipes around with me for the rest of the day.”
Brownie came back to the table. “I’m so hungry I could et a backend of a skunk.”
Tom pushed two tacos at Brownie. “Best to eat right up then, boy. Skunks don’t take to their backends bein’ et.”
Laz chuckled and took a drink out of the straw of his cup. He swallowed, and his face turned reddish-purple. He tried to talk but it didn’t exactly work. He slammed the cup down, and his fingers fluttered in the air. The air began to whistle in and out of his nostrils. A stream of spit dripped down the side of his chin.
“You choking, Laz?” Tom said with some concern. He might have been concerned but not enough to get up and slap the other man’s back or to perform the Heimlich maneuver.
Brownie stared.
Tom got up and Laz pointed at his drink. Tom pushed the drink at Laz and he batted it away as he tried to breathe. He sounded like a braying donkey. It was the sort of noise that Tom had made when he was having trouble breathing on account of running away from the hounds at the Snoddy Estate and because he had asthma.
“Hawww. Hawww. Hawwwwww,” Laz went. The palms of his hands slapped the table. One of his knees knocked into the table top, and Brownie protectively guarded his tacos by placing his arms around them. “HAWWW!” He sounded as if he needed Tom’s inhaler.
Tom said, “Something wrong with your drink? I got a cola. Try mine.”
Laz grasped the proffered cup and quickly sucked on the straw. He swallowed convulsively. After about 3.5 seconds, the color of Laz’s lower face got even redder and purpler around the cheeks. His cheeks puffed up, and the whistling from his nose abruptly stopped. Tears from his eyes soaked the pantyhose material in great wet spots that made the nylon glisten. Frantically, he shoved the cola away from him, and it spilled on the floor. Brownie and Tom both saw the packet of Fire Sauce at the same time. One corner of it was opened, and the straw had been inserted into it so that when someone sucked on the straw all they got was sauce instead of their drink. As if he had all the time in the world, Tom leisurely popped the lid off Laz’s cup and pulled out the straw. It was the same. The end had been inserted into the Fire Sauce packet. Laz had two doses of the sauce in rapid measure.
Brownie popped the root beer’s lid and pulled out the straw. There was a third packet of Fire Sauce on the bottom of his straw. “How about that?” he asked.
Laz rushed to the sink and stuck his mouth under the faucet while he turned on the water.
“You know, milk is supposed to be good for spicy stuff,” Brownie said and took a bite of his taco. He had added just the proper amount of sauce. Good stuff, that. He didn’t know why Laz thought it was so spicy. It wasn’t anything as bad as that ghost pepper sauce he’d had at that one restaurant in Dallas. Now that stuff would make an Ironman Triathlon competitor/Navy Seal who laughs at Bear Grylls fall down and bawl like a baby.
* * *
Willodean Gray had called Sheriff John, otherwise known as John Headrick, the elected official law enforcement officer of Pegram County. He had roared out to the Snoddy Estate, not only because he hadn’t given his outdated Bronco a good rip-roaring lately and not only because he had been to the Snoddy Estate many, many times before, but primarily because he couldn’t believe that someone would be stupid enough to kidnap Brownie Snoddy.
In fact, one of the few men who was taller than Bubba in the entire county, repeated the sentiment several times with increasing amounts of dismay. “I cain’t believe someone would be stupid enough to kidnap Brownie Snoddy,” Sheriff John said as soon as he stepped in the front door. He said it a few times as his iron gaze surveyed the immediate area.
Bubba had always admired Sheriff John’s ability to walk a moral line. Sometimes it meant that Bubba’s tushie was on the wrong side of the morality, but usually Sheriff John worked through that. Once Bubba had saved Sheriff John from hanging and certain death and that brought them to a more equal level. It was nice not to be immediately seen as a suspect for a change.
Sheriff John had questioned the Snoddy clan while scanning the mansion for any signs of the errant crumbsnatcher. He had fingered the backpack, eyed the still-dripping athletic shoe, and touched the ransom note with the eraser end of a pencil. “That’s a good sale on kidney beans,” he said, “even with the little s.”
“It’s an old flyer,” Miz Demetrice said.
Sheriff John sighed. “Did the boy do this hisself?”
“We don’t think he did,” Miz Demetrice said.
“Why?”
Miz Demetrice was the only one who was patient to outline their reasoning to Sheriff John. He nodded throughout. When she was finished, he set his shoulders. “We should have a search team go over the area where the backpack was found.”
“Brownie’s dog brought it here. Must have been somewhere between the mansion and the main road,” Bubba said shortly. He couldn’t help the shortness in his tone. Although the whole not-a-suspect-for-a-change was nice, it didn’t feel right just to stand there. Brownie wasn’t his favorite person in the world, but he didn’t deserve to be kidnapped and possibly brutalized. It made Bubba purely sick inside to think of what tortures the young boy could be experiencing.
“Okay,” Sheriff John said, “we’ll start at the house and work our way up to the road. Gray, I want you to canvas the neighbors and see if they saw anything or noticed anyone. I’ll have to—” the big man’s shoulders juddered with the statement and the hesitation was apparent “—call the eff-bee-eye.”
Thus the Federal Bureau of Investigation was called into the infamous kidnapping case of one Rumford Samual Snoddy, Junior, more commonly called Brownie.
Somehow or another, Pegramville’s Chief of Police came wandering into the mansion a few hours later. Joseph Kimple, also known as Big Joe, strolled in and determined that Brownie must be lying in wait with his homemade Taser and that they were all citified fools.
Bubba was forced to restrain Miz Demetrice. “Big Joe could make a preacher kick out a stained-glass window,” she snarled. “He could ruin a two-car funeral! And he’s more uptight than the girdle on a Baptist minister’s wife!”
“Calm down, Ma,” Bubba soothed. “They got to get all the help they can out here.”
Sheriff John was a little more sedate. “Hey, Joe. A little off your turf, ain’t you?”
“Principal called the city about Brownie playing hookie. Turbie ain’t happy that his latest student is staying at home when he could be learning about all the things that make this country great.” Big Joe was another tall man, although not as tall as Bubba’s six-four and certainly not as tall as Sheriff John’s six-five, but his own six-two wasn’t anything to sneeze about. However, Big Joe made up for it in terms of weight. It was said that he tipped the scales at two and a half bills. It wasn’t certain because he had threatened to shoot the last nurse who had weighed him if she shared the information. Big Joe was supposed to be on a dee-eye-eee-tee, but no one with a brain would actually remind him if they liked
their freedom.
“Too late, Joe,” Sheriff John said. “We called the Feds.”
Big Joe looked crestfallen. “Really? You remember the last time we had to do that was when your deputy got herself kidnapped. Cain’t get that Foster Grant stink out of your clothes for months.” He shuddered. “I’ll go hide all the donuts.”
Alas, it was too late. The door slammed open, and one of them entered. Bubba knew they usually came in pairs, and he wasn’t disappointed when the second followed the first. They had come quicker than he had expected as if they had been hanging out on the fringes of Pegramville waiting for a federal offense to occur. After all, Pegram County had become a hot spot for murders and kidnappings.
“Special Agent Langford T. Monday,” the first one said, producing a badge and flashing it at the assorted group of people gathered there. He was a tall man with a trim mustache. He wore a navy blue suit with a matching tie and looked as though he had just ironed it. He smiled grimly, and his eyes looked black in the strong light spilling into the great foyer from the second-floor windows. “We understand there’s been a kidnapping.”
“Only if you can call Brownie a kid,” Big Joe said as if he couldn’t help himself.
The second agent followed closely. She was as short as the first one was tall. Her hair was the color of a movie star’s imagination. Platinum blonde locks spilled over her shoulders. Pale blue eyes in a lovely face surveyed the situation. Her suit was a lighter color blue, one that coordinated well with her eyes and the silk scarf around her neck. She flashed her badge, too, but hers was elegantly displayed in a blue dyed crocodile skin bifold holder. “I’m Special Agent B.J. Hornbuckle,” she said authoritatively. A fella knew she meant it because she got to use just her first two initials.
Big Joe leered first but only because he beat Sheriff John to it. “Of course you are, dear.”
“Well now we’re saved,” Miz Adelia said sarcastically. “I’ll make cinnamon rolls and more coffee.”
Chapter 5
Ransom of Brownie Page 4
