by Peggy Webb
“I got it. I got it!” Bobbie Joe suddenly yelled. “We’ll sell her.”
o0o
Russ came awake with the unsettling feeling that something was wrong.
He rolled up on his elbows and squinted into the darkness. There was nothing to see except a pale sliver of moonlight coming through a crack in the tent flap. He started to settle back onto his pallet, but that strange feeling of something amiss made the back of his neck prickle.
“Stubborn woman, out there in the pickup.” He got out of his pallet. “If I don’t check on her, I never will go back to sleep.”
Yawning and stretching his stiff muscles, he made his way out of the tent. The night was black, with only a pale excuse of a moon showing behind some clouds. Russ looked across the campfire and saw empty space where his truck used to be.
He rubbed his hands over his eyes and looked again. Nothing was there.
“Dammit. What has that woman done now?”
He strode across the camp and stood looking down the mountain.
“If that’s not just like her to go off and leave me stranded here.”
Anger clouded his reason for a moment; then a bit of sanity returned. It was not like Bea at all. She was anything but impulsive. Stubborn, yes. Maddening, definitely. Self-reliant, for sure. But would she take off in the middle of the night, leaving her clothes behind and her purse, without a word to him?
The same uneasy feeling that had awakened him returned full force. Dropping to his knees, he scanned the ground. It was still muddy from the recent storm, and it was covered with tracks, large tracks made by the heavy kind of shoe a man might wear to plow the fields.
Russ’s heart slammed hard against his ribs, and he had to breathe deeply in order to get air into his lungs. Someone had taken his truck. And where was Bea?
“Bea!” He stood up, cupping his hands around his mouth. “Bea! Bea!” His voice echoed through the mountains and bounced back to him, a faint, lonesome sound.
Fighting panic, he raced to the tent and grabbed his jacket and his flashlight. Then he combed the area around the campsite, looking for Bea, alternately hoping to find her and praying he would not, praying that he was wrong about the tracks, praying that she had gotten into the truck and driven serenely down the mountain.
All sorts of visions came into his mind: Bea, lying unconscious behind a rock, her clothing torn and her face pressed into the mud. Bea, still and white, her eyes staring sightlessly up at the moon. Bea...
“Stop it.”
He forced the visions out of his mind and continued his search, cursing the darkness that hampered him. He turned his flashlight behind every rock and tree around the camp. Bea was nowhere to be found.
Finally he went back to the site where his truck had been and knelt down to study the tracks. He was no tracker, but it appeared to him that they only led up to the truck and not away. Suppose the men in the brogans had taken Bea with them? Horrible thought.
He trained his flashlight onto the ground. Tire tracks clearly marked where the truck had turned and headed back down the mountain.
There was nothing to do but follow the truck. Russ set out on foot.
o0o
It was nearly dawn by the time he found Bea.
First he heard the voices. He followed the sound, easing along quietly through the trees until he came upon two old men sitting on rocks in front of a small campfire, quarreling loudly and drunkenly.
“I say we sell her.”
“And I say where the hell at?”
Russ took cover behind a huge oak tree and surveyed the area. His truck was parked nearby, its bed backed toward the fire. Bea Adams sat in the middle of the truck, bedraggled and dirty, very much alive and as mad as a dozen fighting tomcats.
Thank God, Russ said to himself. He studied her in the pale pinkish light of dawn. She appeared to be unharmed, but her feet and legs were trussed with a rope and a dirty handkerchief was tied around her mouth.
He turned his attention back to the men. One of them was the shape and color of a turnip, his round belly bulging against his overalls and his face blotched purple with too much sun and too much liquor. There was very little hair on his head, or anywhere else, as far as Russ could tell. His hands and the portion of his arms showing below his shirtsleeves were hairless.
His companion looked like all the fat had been siphoned off him, leaving a saggy old skin to cover his bones. His hair stuck out in puffs of gray, with huge shiny bald spots showing here and there, as if somebody had done a poor job of plucking him.
Both of them were very old men, and apparently deep in their cups. A jug lay on its side by the fat one. As far as Russ could tell, neither of them had a weapon of any kind.
He could probably go in and overpower both of them without any trouble, but he decided to wait and watch. When he knew his opponents, then he would make his move.
“Look at her, settin’ over there,” the skinny man said, “meaner’n a rattlesnake.”
“Well, I wasn’t the one who said let’s turn her hands loose and get a little circulation.”
“She danged near scratched my eyes out.”
The skinny old man had long scratches down the side of his face, and the larger one didn’t look as if he had fared any better: two angry red welts rose on his hairless arms and his right ear looked as if somebody had tried to twist it off and nearly succeeded.
Russ grinned. Bea must have put up a heck of a fight.
“I still say we ought to sell her.” The big one was talking again.
“Who’d want her? Ain’t nobody wants a woman skinny as that. She ain’t got hardly no flesh on her bones.”
“Well, what we gonna do with her, Hank? I ain’t fixin’ to set her loose. If she didn’t kill us first, she’d have the law on us quick as you could say scat.”
The law? Russ bent around the tree for another look. They didn’t appear to be hardened criminals, but if he’d learned anything these last few days, he’d learned not to judge by appearances.
“Shoot, I told you them two old chickens wasn’t worth stealin’, but you said, ‘Yeah, we’ll get us a rooster and be in the chicken business.’ That’s what you said, Bobbie Joe, and I listened to you like a fool.”
Hank hunkered over his knobby old knees, looking forlorn, and Bobbie Joe stared into the fire, apparently looking for a way out.
Russ decided to provide it.
“Good evening, gentlemen,” he said as he stepped from behind the tree and stood posing. He wanted to impress upon them that he was big and strong and fully capable of whipping them both and leaving them in a pile. “Don’t bother to get up. I’ll join you.”
Bea had never been so glad to see anybody in her entire life. She called his name, but it came out a muffled sound against her gag. He glanced in her direction and shook his head. The movement was so slight she wasn’t certain if she’d seen it. Then he sat down on a good-sized rock beside her kidnappers.
“Looks like you’ve been having a party.” Russ nodded toward the overturned jug.
“Who the devil are you?” The skinny one was talking, the one called Hank.
“Fool,” Bobbie Joe interrupted. “Don’t you figure he was settin’ in that tent where we took the truck?”
“That’s a clever deduction, gentlemen.” Russ smiled at Bobbie Joe; then he turned and nodded toward Bea. “And I see you’ve been kind enough to take the little woman off my hands.”
“Shoot, we didn’t mean to,” Bobbie Joe said.
“Nobody in his right mind would,” Russ agreed. “She’s a regular rattlesnake... and too skinny, besides.”
“That’s just what I said; I said she’s meaner than a rattlesnake. Ain’t that what I said, Bobbie Joe?”
“I couldn’t agree more, gentlemen. How much would you pay me to take her off your hands?”
Bea figured that when she got over being mad at Russ, she’d admire his cleverness.
Hank and Bobbie Joe scratched their heads and lo
oked at each other. Then both of them began to fumble in the pockets of their overalls.
“I ain’t got nothin’ but a twenty.” Hank held up the wrinkled bill. “How about you, Bobbie Joe?”
“Looks like it comes to exactly seven dollars point ought six.” He spread a five and two ones on the ground, then lined the six pennies up beside the bills.
“I don’t know if that’s enough.” Russ shook his head. “She’s a powerful lot of trouble.”
Bea decided Russ was enjoying himself far too much.
“Then there’s the matter of my truck,” Russ added. “I didn’t expect to have to spend most of the night searching for my truck.”
“We wasn’t gonna go far,” Hank said. “Just over to the next county till the stink died down about the chickens we stole.”
Bobbie Joe nodded his head vigorously.
Russ actually began to feel sorry for them.
“I’ll tell you what,” he said, scooping up their money. “I’ll consider this a down payment for relieving you of the woman. You can work off the rest.”
“What kind of work?” Hank asked.
“If you’ll come with me, gentlemen, I’ll show you.” Russ led the way to the pickup. “But first I have to deal with the little woman.”
He climbed into the back and untied her. Then he picked her up and held her hard against his heart for a moment.
“This is all your fault,” she said.
“For a woman who is worth only twenty-seven dollars and six cents, you talk too much.” Russ’s eyes twinkled as he smiled down at her.
“I’ll get you, Russ Hammond.”
“I’m sure you will.” Russ climbed down with Bea and turned to the hapless kidnappers. “Hop into the back, gentlemen. We’re going for a ride.”
Inside the cab, Bea sagged against the seat.
“I thought you’d never come.”
“I thought I’d never find you.”
Russ put the truck into gear and started back to camp just as the sun spread its light over the mountain.
“They didn’t hurt you, did they, Bea?” His expression was anxious, and there were dark circles under his eyes from too little sleep.
“No. I’m a little bruised from bumping around in the back end, but I’m unharmed.”
The anxiety that had kept Russ going suddenly drained away, and in its place came anger.
“You should never have been out there in the truck in the first place.”
Her own anger flared to match his.
“I wouldn’t have if it weren’t for you.”
“I wanted you in the tent, as I recall.”
“Under your covers.”
“That was because of the storm.”
“Well, the storm was over when I woke up in your arms.”
“Did you leave the tent because you didn’t like being in my arms... or because you did?”
She didn’t say anything. She wasn’t about to admit that he was right about everything. Besides, she was too tired to argue.
She sank low in her seat and propped her head in her hands.
“It looks as if I’ll never get home.”
Russ’s anger died as quickly as it had sprung to life. He stretched his hand across the seat and placed it on Bea’s shoulder.
“I’m sorry, Bea... for everything.”
At that moment she thought he must be the kindest man in the world.
“So am I,” she whispered. Then she shut her eyes.
By the time they got back to camp, she was sound asleep. Russ tenderly lifted her down. Holding her in his arms, he faced her captors.
“Wait here, gentlemen. I’ll be right back.”
He carried Bea inside the tent and tucked her into his pallet. She sighed softly and burrowed under the covers.
“Stubborn woman,” he whispered, smoothing her hair back from her face. “You’re worth more than twenty-seven dollars—far, far more.”
He kissed the blue-veined skin inside her wrists, then pulled the covers close under her chin and left the tent.
Hank and Bobbie Joe were waiting for him. He led them around the curve in the road to the rockslide. It took the three of them only two hours to clear away the rest of the rocks.
Bea heard them come back to camp. Their voices drifted through her consciousness, weaving in and out of her slumber until she came fully awake. She sat in the tent, listening... and smiling.
“It ain’t right somehow, Russ,” Hank said, “you givin’ us back our money and payin’ us for that work besides. Not after all we done.”
“Naw,” Bobbie Joe added. “It don’t seem fittin’.”
“Take it,” Russ said. Bea could see him through the tent flap, pressing money into their hands. “Go back home, pay your neighbors for those two chickens, and then don’t get into any more trouble.”
“You must be some kind ‘a saint.” Hank stuffed his share of the money into his overalls.
“Yeah, especially livin’ with that she-cat.” Bobbie Joe pulled a snuff box out of his pocket and put his money inside. “You have our sympathies.”
“I’ll accept them, gentlemen. So long.” Russ waved them goodbye, then went inside the tent.
Bea was sitting on his pallet, disheveled and sleepy-looking, her white gown ripped on the sleeve and her eyes smudged with dark circles and a good portion of mountain mud. He’d never seen a more beautiful sight in all his life. Having her alive and smiling brought a lump to his throat.
Hanging half in and half out of the tent, he swallowed discretely.
“You’re awake,” he said, still holding onto the tent flap. “How do you feel?”
“Like a she-cat.”
“You heard?”
“I did. And do you know what I think, Russ Hammond? I think you’re a big, old, softhearted fraud.”
For some reason, he liked that. It pleased him that Bea thought of him as having a heart, particularly a soft heart. He came into the tent, smiling.
“You have mud all over your face, Bea.” Reaching out, he wiped a smudge on her cheek. She felt the way a big-eyed woman ought to feel, like babies and rose petals and warm winter blankets all rolled up in one.
Long after the smudge was gone, his hand lingered on her face.
“Russ?”
“Ummmh?”
Their gazes got tangled up and their breath mingled as they sat side by side, pleased yet watchful.
This will never do, Bea thought.
How can I ever leave her? he wondered.
But he had to, he had to leave her soon, before his heart reached out for her, before it reached out and got such a tight hold he would never want to let her go.
“It’s time to leave.” He became brusque. “I’ll give you five minutes to be ready to hit the road.”
“The road is clear?”
“Yes. I’m taking you home.”
He left the tent quickly and began to dismantle the camp.
Bea made quick work of dressing. She would clean the mud off later. She was going home, home to Glory Ethel and Jedidiah and Samuel and Molly, home to the Victorian house in Florence, Alabama, a house with wide rooms and high ceilings and sweet-smelling sheets, a house with a brass bed instead of a sleeping bag... a house without Russ Hammond.
Her fingers stilled on her buttons. Home without Russ? A sadness weighed down on her, and her steps dragged as she left the tent.
“I’m ready.”
Even her voice reflected her sadness. She hoped he thought she was just tired.
“Good. The sooner we leave the mountain, the better.”
That made her sad, too, that he seemed eager to get rid of her. She remembered how they had sat in the truck, cozy and dry with the rain beating the windows, how they had laughed and joked. She remembered how she had felt, waking up in his arms, warm and contented, at peace with the world.
She felt almost as if she were leaving home instead of going home. How silly.
As he dismantled the tent, she took o
ne last look at the mountain, and then she climbed into the truck.
Russ started the vehicle without much coaxing, and soon they were on the road again, riding side by side, the wind whistling around the ill-fitting windows and Willie Nelson wailing in their ears.
Bea hardly noticed the music. She hardly noticed anything except the set of Russ’s jaw and the intense way he drove, as if he couldn’t wait to be rid of her. She tried to start a conversation, but his reply was so curt she decided to keep silent.
Within two hours they were off the mountain and on the superhighway.
Thank God, Bea finally got an iPhone signal. She pulled up her email.
From: Molly
To: Bea, Catherine, Clemmie, Belinda, Joanna, Janet
Re: Where ARE you?
OMG, everybody’s going crazy here! Where are you Bea? I’ve called you a million times, and it all went to voice mail! Glory Ethel has called every hospital between here and Dallas and Daddy has the highway patrol out looking for your car. OMG, I’m about to DIE!
Molly
From: Janet
To: Bea, Molly, Belinda, Joanna, Clemmie, Catherine
Re: Don’t panic
I’m sure there is a logical explanation. Still, Bea, a woman traveling alone is vulnerable. I hope you carried pepper spray. Knowing you, you’ve probably packed one of those rawhide bullwhips! Wherever you are, I hope you’re kicking ass!
Janet
From: Catherine
To: Bea, Molly, Belinda, Joanna, Clemmie, Janet
Re: Trying to remain positive
As Bea herself would say, everybody just chill. Besides, Bea has some kind of belt in karate. Maybe even a black belt! Don’t you remember that time we were all on that riverboat cruise down here and some drunken old fool tried to grope Molly? Bea had him up against the railing before he knew what hit him. She threatened to throw him in the river, and Janet, I think you threatened to cut out his liver with dull knife. Joanna kicked the shit out of his shins and I thought Belinda was going to pull every hair out of his head. Bea can take care of herself.
