“After a while I just picked you up and washed you,” Scarlett went on, “and carried you around like a real dollbaby. Nobody said anything, I guess they were just glad you stopped crying. I cleaned out the baby bottles and fed you canned milk and corn syrup like they told Mamma to do in the hospital. And I thought you were the best little doll anybody ever had. You were my very own.”
No matter what happened Scarlett would never tell Farrie of that terrible night when Devil Anse and one of her uncles had come to take the baby, without even saying what they were going to do with it. “It won’t live much longer,” her grandpa had said. “You’re just wasting your time with it, girl.”
Farrie said, “You took care of me and you weren’t much older than me.”
“That’s right, I was about nine.” Scarlett had fought like a tiger when her grandpa and her uncle tried to take the baby away, and finally they’d let it be. “Going to die, anyway,” was what Devil Anse had said.
Thinking of it made Scarlett uneasy. “Look, it’s all well and good for the sheriff to put us up like this,” she said, “but don’t forget we gotta get out of here. Devil Anse is going to find us sooner or later.”
If her grandpa did what he said he would, Farrie would be left to fend for herself in Catfish Hollow. And Scarlett knew how long that would last. They would let Farrie get sick and die, as her grandpa had meant for her to do when she was a baby.
“He’s not going to catch us, Scarlett!” Farrie hauled herself up in bed, eyes blazing. “Listen, we don’t have to go anywheres. We just got the best Christmas present anybody ever had in the whole world, only we just didn’t see it!”
Scarlett made a warning cluck against her teeth. “Farrie, for goodness’ sake, you’re gonna be sick if you don’t slide down in that bed and close your eyes. Go to sleep—I don’t want to be up all night with you, I’m tired and need some rest myself.”
But Farrie seized the sleeve of her sweater in both hands. “Scarlett, we could live right here in this house. Right here in Nancyville. We wouldn’t have to go to a far-off place like Atlanta!”
Scarlett pried her hand away. She brushed the sticky pizza crumbs off her front and stood up. “Don’t talk like that, Farrie. We can’t stay here, this house belongs to the sheriff.”
Her sister got to her knees in the middle of the bed. “Don’t you see it, Scarlett?” she shrilled. “The sheriff’s house is the last place Devil Anse will come looking for us. And if he does—why you know that big tough sheriff won’t let him do anything. No sirree! Scarlett, this here place is safer than Atlanta!”
Scarlett leaned over and pushed her sister back down against the pillows. “Farrie, I swear, I’m getting worried. I don’t think you’ve got that much fever, but you’re talking out of your head.”
“No I’m not! We can have this house and the sheriff can live here, too. All you got to do is marry him!”
“What?”
Scarlett straightened up to stare at her.
“Yes!” Farrie jerked her head up and down violently. “Scarlett, he’s good-looking,” she pleaded, “it wouldn’t be so hard to do. Not like the ones that are always pestering you around Grandpa’s place. And he’s the sheriff, you can’t get no safer than that. Besides, I think he likes you—he’s always looking at you when he thinks you don’t know it.”
“Good Lord.” Scarlett sat down abruptly on the edge of the bed. “When did you start thinking like this?”
Farrie looked at her solemnly. “Didn’t you say if we ever wanted to live like other people we had to run away from Catfish Holler? That if we stayed up there with Devil Anse and the rest we’d end up no better than they was—were? Well, I guess it was while I was taking a bath in that bathroom where you can look out into the woods, and thinking about that big room downstairs with the Christmas tree in it that it came to me. And the way I feel now in this big beautiful bed, all warm with the curtains hanging over me, just like a princess. All of a sudden I had this idea that you’n me could live here if you was married to the sheriff, and nobody could put us out in the cold. And Devil Anse would be too scared to come here, too!”
“Farrie.” Scarlett put her hand to her sister’s forehead. The skin was hot to the touch. “You gotta stop it.”
“And I knew just then,” her little sister went on, determined, “that if dreams could come true, I knew what my dream would be. That we could be a family, Scarlett, like other folks. With a beautiful big house.”
“You’re not making sense,” Scarlett said. “I don’t care how much you dream about it, I can’t make a man like that—sheriff — marry me. That’s the dumbest thing I ever heard of.”
“It’s not any worse than what Devil Anse was going to make you do,” Farrie cried. “That was why you ran away, remember?”
Scarlett didn’t answer. She stood up, went to the dresser, and gathered up the paper plates.
“That’s what’s so good about my idea, Scarlett.” Farrie hiked her frail body up on the pillows. “This way you can marry the sheriff and get this big house, and we can stay together.”
Scarlett snorted. “Until the sheriff’s mamma comes home. She lives here, too, you know.”
“She can just go live someplace else,” Farrie insisted. “Or I’ll share with her. I don’t mind sharing a room with somebody’s mamma. Oh, Scarlett, when we left Catfish Holler you said you was—were—going to take care of me. You said you was going to give us a whole new life!”
Scarlett stood biting her lip. She’d promised all that. But at the time she hadn’t known what a slim chance they’d have getting it. A better life was a sometime thing. Especially for a Scraggs.
She’d been desperate, though, to get Farrie away from Devil Anse. That was the first step, and the hardest. Now Scarlett could see how a lot of things could go wrong. Missing the bus to Atlanta was one. Landing in jail was another. Inwardly she flinched. She never wanted that to happen again.
On the other hand Scarlett had to admit that she’d never imagined they’d end up at the sheriff’s house. She was still trying to figure it out. Now, with Farrie wanting to live in it, things were growing even more complicated.
“Just lie back down, Farrie.” Scarlett gathered the paper plates to take them downstairs. “And stop having these crazy ideas.”
She started for the door, then heard a quiet sob.
Scarlett stopped short. The problem was, Farrie knew Scarlett would do just about anything for her.
“All right,” Scarlett sighed, giving in. “If you promise to lie down in bed and get some sleep, I’ll try to think of something.”
“That’s what you always say, Scarlett,” Farrie reminded her.
That, too, was true.
The downstairs hallway was quiet, and a blue light shone from an open door. Scarlett heard voices and music from a television set.
Down here the house had the faint scent of flowers, furniture wax, and pine boughs. It was almost too warm. A faint whoosh startled Scarlett until she realized it was the furnace turning on.
The whole house was toasty hot, she thought, relishing it. People didn’t know how lucky they were to be warm all the time. In the muted darkness the crystal hall light shone over her head, and the candlesticks on the hall table glittered.
It was pretty, all right. This house could make you want things you never even knew about.
Scarlett clutched the plates and pizza crusts to her as she passed the open door. Except for the light from the television set the room was dark.
When she peeped inside she saw the sheriff stretched out on the couch, a box with the remains of the pizza on the floor, an open can of beans beside it. His arm, extended, dangled into space over a familiar black shape.
Scarlett stepped into the room.
“There you are,” she whispered. She could hardly see the dog, but she heard the thump of Demon’s tail. “What’re you doing down here?”
Demon made a friendly groaning sound. The tail wagged again, sweeping piz
za crusts over the rug. Scarlett stepped closer.
The sheriff looked more like a regular-type man now, rather than the police. Farrie was right: he was young and sort of good-looking. By the flickering light of the TV set she could tell he’d showered because his hair was dried in little rattails over his forehead. He’d taken off the starchy tan uniform and wore jeans, and a plaid shirt that lay open and unbuttoned, exposing his bare chest. Where he had rolled up his sleeve his dangling forearm was solid, impressive, lightly spangled with hair. His feet, propped at the end of the couch, were bare.
Scarlett stepped over Demon to lean closer.
It wouldn’t be so hard, Farrie had said. Scarlett was remembering the sheriff crouched in the driveway that afternoon with his pistol in both hands. Big and tough, too, her sister had pointed out. You needed that against Devil Anse.
But married?
Scarlett frowned. She supposed there were worse things. She wondered how old the sheriff was. If she had to guess she would say not much over thirty.
She bent over him. As he slept the dark fan of his eyelashes were noticeable, unexpectedly long and pretty. They were complemented by a straight sweep of nose, swollen at the tip where he’d fallen on it. His curved mouth, open, snored a little. Even unconscious he looked able to handle anything.
Scarlett felt torn. If she didn’t look after Farrie nobody else would. Worse, they’d taken away her money at the Jackson County jail; they had nothing, now, to get them to Atlanta. She yawned suddenly, convulsively. It was just too much to worry about; she was almost asleep on her feet. She quickly straightened up, feeling a little too warm, strangely dizzy. It was the house. That furnace running like it would never shut off. It had nothing to do with looking at the young sheriff asleep on the couch half naked, in his bare feet.
“Let’s go, Demon.” She reached down to take the dog by the collar but it shifted away, pressing flat on the rug. “What’s the matter with you?” Scarlett whispered. “You’re not supposed to be down here.”
Demon only hunched closer to the couch, lifting a massive head to lick the sheriff’s suspended hand.
Scarlett stood watching. Mostly Demon stuck close to Farrie. On the other hand, she knew that the dog could act strange if someone was in trouble. Once Scarlett had fallen into a gully in the woods and hurt her leg and no one could find her. Demon had hung close as a leech that morning, not letting Scarlett out of her sight. And was sitting there, waiting, when some Scraggs cousins finally took the time to find her.
Before Scarlett could haul on Demon’s collar the body on the couch stirred, and mumbled something. Demon promptly licked the sheriff’s hand.
He seemed to flinch. “Dog ... out,” the sheriff muttered. “Damn ... damn dog ... mmph...”
Scarlett didn’t wait for him to wake up. “Well, just stay there,” she hissed. “I’ll let Farrie take care of you in the morning.”
She tiptoed toward the door. Demon was leaning against the sheriff’s arm, staring at him adoringly. The dog had not even pricked up her ears at the mention of Farrie’s name.
Scarlett made her way back down the hallway toward the foot of the stairs. There was no need to turn on the hall ceiling light, she thought, looking at its prisms winking softly; the sheriff was bound to wake up sooner or later and close up the house. A small noise made her look toward the etched glass panels that flanked the front door. What she saw made her catch her breath.
The porch light was on and the door was locked. But the face that looked at her through the decorated glass was what you would conjure up if you wanted to be scared half out of your wits—a wild, dirty gray beard, white-rimmed, burning eyes. A mouth grimacing now with words she could not hear.
Scarlett saw a grimy hand point downward, toward the lock. Then lift to jab at her.
She stood rooted to the spot, caught by those terrible eyes that bored into hers. Unlock the door. She could not hear Devil Anse’s words, but she could see his lips move.
Never! If it had been a scream it would have burst out of her.
With her hand clamped over her mouth to keep from yelling, Scarlett turned and ran up the stairs.
Six
MADELYNE SMITH, BUCK’S SECRETARY, WAS filing some papers when he walked into his office. She turned from the file cabinet with a surprised flicker of her eyes as she took in the sheriff’s muddy hat, paw prints across the front of his shirt, and coffee stains in a rather indelicate place on the front of his uniform trousers.
“My goodness, Sheriff,” she said, “you sure wouldn’t pass inspection this morning. You better not let your deputies see you.”
At Buck’s ferocious glare, Madelyne decided to leave it at that. Turning, she nearly fell over the Hound of the Baskervilles. She let out a shriek.
“Good grief, what do you call it?” Madelyne hastily retreated behind her desk. “Is it a dog or an animal Frankenstein?”
“I’ve had a bad morning,” Buck growled. “It started early. Can you get somebody back in the communications room to turn down those damned Christmas carols?”
Deputy Moses Holt, hearing the commotion, came out of the hallway that led to the cell block. He stared at the dog. “Sheriff, I thought you decided we didn’t have a budget for no K-Nine corps.”
At the sound of his voice, Demon raised her black head and snarled softly. Deputy Holt went back inside the cell block and closed and locked the door. “Didn’t mean no offense,” he said through the bars.
“The dog’s not a K-Nine,” Buck explained tersely. He looked around for a good place to put the Scraggs dog but the cell block was already taken by his deputy. “It’s a pet. You don’t bother it, it won’t bother you.”
As Demon followed close on his heels into his office, Buck hoped he was right.
His secretary was not convinced. She stared at the massive animal that settled under Buck’s desk, red tongue lolling out of its fanged mouth.
“That’s the last thing I’d have for a pet,” she observed. “What does it eat—truck bodies?”
Buck didn’t answer. He was going through a stack of telephone messages. He was rarely late, and never had he gotten into the office with so much urgent business piled up and waiting for him. There were four or five calls from the volunteer director of the newly organized Committee for the Real Meaning of Christmas. So far the committee’s nasty attitude on the subject of the cancellation of the Christmas living manger scene had made Buck wonder if they correctly understood the implications of their name. There was also a message in answer to a call Buck had left that morning before he left home: the Methodist minister’s wife, Grace Heamstead, had a houseful of company and couldn’t come herself but would send her daughter Judith over with some clothes from the church’s emergency clothes closet.
Buck put the note aside. He’d hoped Grace would come over with clothes for the Scraggs girls herself. It had seemed to him that a little finesse might be needed to get Scarlett and her sister into better, if nonetheless used clothing. There was something pathetically prideful in the two Scraggses that even Buck could see.
He picked up another memo, this one from his deputy sergeant in charge of state law-enforcement bureau liaison, reporting on the lack of information on thieves who were specializing in hijacking quarter-of-a-million-dollar tractor-trailer rigs in Jackson County.
If the sheriff’s department didn’t get something substantial pretty soon, Buck knew he was going to be inundated with inquiries from the Georgia Department of Criminal Investigation wanting to know details of the problem. Not to mention the considerable unhappiness already being heard from the local packinghouse and truckers.
Two refrigerated tractor-trailer rigs, one of them loaded with beef, had disappeared during December. The way the hijackers were operating, Buck had a feeling they would come back for at least another heist before they moved their operation elsewhere.
Convulsively, Buck yawned. Usually he didn’t feel so bushed in the morning, but he hadn’t slept well. He still didn’
t know what had prevailed upon him to spend the whole night on the couch downstairs with the television going. And early morning, with the knowledge that the two Scraggs females were in the house, had set him on edge. He’d showered in his mother’s room, taking advantage of her private bath, but even so had been surprised by the strange child hobbling down the hallway with the giant dog when he sneaked back wearing only a towel.
That damned dog.
Buck shuffled through the piles of messages listlessly. The thing was called Demon, a fitting name if ever there was one. It had developed a neurotic fixation where he was concerned as it seldom let him out of its sight. He hadn’t been able to get rid of the dog even during breakfast, when it kept licking his hand and leaning on his knees under the table. He’d had to finish his cereal standing up at the refrigerator, and he’d taken his cup of coffee out to the Blazer, intending to finish it on the way to work.
That had been a mistake.
The dog had followed him and when Buck locked the doors it jumped into the Blazer through an open window, knocking Buck’s coffee all over his uniform. When he called the Scraggs females to haul it out, the dog had defied even them, baring its teeth and snarling when they tried to touch it.
“It’s Demon’s way of saying she don’t want to,” the gnomish child had explained blandly. “Sometimes she bites.”
Buck wasn’t going to put it to the test. On the way down to the department he had considered opening the door and shoving the dog out into traffic, but attempted illegal disposal of animals was a punishable offense. He didn’t feel like risking it, anyway; not as the county sheriff.
Now he stared at his telephone messages with a tired, unfocused gaze. He hoped he was never called upon to explain how he had been withstood by a mongrel beast that had refused to be evicted from a county law-enforcement vehicle.
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