Can’t Never Tell

by Unknown

  “Nope. Least ways, that’s what she said.”

  “You talked to her?”

  “Found her in Alabama. She sells real estate. Wanted nothing to do with ‘the life,’ she called it. I took it that her daddy had sweet-talked her mama into running off with him when the carnival stopped in her little town one summer. He proved to be a better sweet-talker than a long-hauler. I could’a warned her about that.”

  Shamanique, in her very few years, had acquired quite a database from which to study the male of the species. Despite her experiences, she still collects trifling boyfriends.

  “Anyway, she said her daddy had bought a ten-in-one, she called it, from someone back in the late sixties. You wouldn’t believe the stuff she said it had. She called them gaffs. A frog with a chicken’s head, a human head in a jar where the eyes would open and close. She said that was a trick, that it was really just a table with a hole in it and a big glass jar. When she stayed the summer with her dad, she’d sit under the table with her head in the jar and blink and stare at people. Said it was sweaty hot and cramped, and staring at stupid farmers who’d pay money to see something like that made them the real freaks.”

  What would that have been like? Staring at doughy faced kids and farmers or miners and their wives, all gawking at a little girl’s head in a jar?

  “Some of them wanted to be amazed,” Shamanique said. “Some tried to figure out if they’d been taken. If a kid got obnoxious, she’d bug her eyes and stick out her tongue to scare him.”

  “I can see why she didn’t want to stay with the carnival,” I said. Selling real estate was a different sort of act, I was sure, but at least she didn’t have to sit with her head in a jar in an un–air-conditioned tent.

  “Her dad traveled into the early seventies, until he got sick. Came to live with her at the end. Even then, he kept thinking he’d get well, be back on the road. He was even harder to live with, cooped up in her house, than he’d been to put up with in a trailer on the road all the time. He got bad depressed. When he died, his stuff was in storage in Gibtown, which is a ways from her home in Alabama, so it was a couple more years before she sold it off, sight unseen. That’s when the Plinys bought a lot of it.”

  “So when did Mr. Plotnick first get the mummy?”

  “His daughter wasn’t exactly sure. She remembers her dad traveling with his new ten-in-one when she was in the fifth or sixth grade, somewhere in the late sixties.”

  “And he owned it until he got sick?”

  “Yep. Her dad lived with her two years before he passed, then she didn’t get around to selling it off for another two years. That was in 1979.”

  “But she doesn’t know how he first got the mummy?”

  “No, but she gave me a name of a lady who might know something. I tracked down a phone number in Florida and left a message, but haven’t heard back.”

  I studied her gamine face, the Cleopatra slant of her eyes extended with eyeliner. When Edna had hauled her into my office two months earlier, almost by the scruff of the neck, I’d been irritated at having her foisted off on me. I’d quickly learned she could talk information out of a sealed tomb, and I was learning to respect her instincts. I just couldn’t reconcile her talent with her bad taste in boyfriends.

  “Good stuff, Shamanique. Thanks for taking all this time when you’re supposed to be off. Now get on and have a good time.”

  She waved a dismissive, talon-tipped hand. “Can’t bear to think about that guy with the shellacked-on clothes and his family not knowing where he’s been all these years. Besides, Harmon’s always easier to handle when he’s the one wanting you instead of the other way around.”

  She might choose bad ones, but she did seem to know how to handle them.

  We would wait until we had the whole story before we shared it with the Plinys—or with Rudy. Maybe I’d earn some points with him, if we saved him some legwork at a busy time.

  I stretched, stiff after spending all morning on my feet. We ambled toward the midway, moving slowly in the heat. Shamanique turned off toward the miniature Ferris wheel, where she’d told Harmon, her latest conquest, to meet her.

  I decided I’d try to hitch a ride back to Main Street. Surely somebody would be ready to leave the fair and the sweltering heat. Which someone was—a lady from Mom’s book club was herding her brood into a minivan as I reached the parking lot. The kids looked shiny and sticky from a combination of sweat and cotton candy—and irritable from the same combination. She offered me a seat up front—apparently anxious for a taste of adult companionship even if it lasted only a few blocks. Any attempt at conversation was drowned out by a wailing three-year-old.

  I hopped out at the stoplight on Main Street, two blocks from my mauve Victorian, glad I wasn’t the one responsible for hosing off the grime and tamping down the arguments.

  I’d have my cool, dark, high-ceilinged cave all to myself. I smiled and pushed the damp tendrils from my forehead as I climbed the front steps.

  The sight of lamplight in Melvin’s inner office surprised me.

  “That you?” I called, in part to alert him I was back, in part to alert myself if we had an intruder.

  “Hey,” he called. “You got a minute?”

  “Sure.” The French doors to his outer office were open, the lights off to maintain at least an illusion it was cool. “Why aren’t you off enjoying holiday festivities?”

  “I’ve enjoyed about all the heat, hot dogs, and beer I can stand,” he said. “Why’re you here?”

  “Too much heat, hot dogs, and excitement for me, too. I gotta rest up for the fireworks.”

  “That’s right.” He sounded as though he planned to skip what I considered the best part of the holiday.

  I plopped into the wooden chair in front of his desk. I didn’t want to sweat on any of his elegant upholstery.

  “Have you ever met Joe Pratchett? The president of Ramble College?”

  “Nope, pretty sure I haven’t.”

  “Would you be willing to talk to him? I’m meeting with him tomorrow morning. He’s got questions about some dealings with their endowment. In case he’s got legal questions to go along with his financial ones, it’d be useful to have you along, if you’ve got time.”

  “Sure.” This was the first time Melvin had consulted me professionally—except, of course, when he’d been questioned last November about the death of his wife years earlier. We’d gotten that all straightened out—and I didn’t count it in the same league as asking me to meet with one of his clients. I was flattered.

  “The meeting’s set for nine at Dr. Pratchett’s office.”

  We agreed to allow half an hour to get there, and I bid him adieu.

  I decided on a nap so I wouldn’t sleep through the fireworks finale tonight. First, though, I rooted through my boxes and found a patriotic CD. With the top down and the speakers cranked up, we could sit on the grass and sync Sousa and William Tell with the fireworks. Emma would love that.

  Emma rode with me to the ball field for the fireworks. We went early to claim a good parking spot.

  Rather than hang around the carnival midway, Emma opted to play in a pickup soccer game with some kids who looked a little older than she did. I watched her dodge and weave, her thick plaited ponytail swinging behind her.

  When her parents joined us, we headed off to the church tent for some barbecue and to kill some time as the sun set.

  “Lydia! How are you?” A bosomy brunette with a big smile appeared at our table in the crowded tent. “You must be Lydia’s sister! How nice to meet you. I’m Lovey Pope. I’ve heard so much about you.”

  “Join us, Lovey?” Lydia scooted over to make room at the end of the bench.

  “Just for a second. Where’s Frank and Emma?”

  “At the dessert table, I suspect.”

  Lovey laughed. “Same with mine. Good to have them old enough to entertain themselves, isn’t it? And I mostly mean the husbands.” She laughed again, a deep chime.


  “Avery, I hear you’ve met Spence Munn.”

  “We-ell . . .” I didn’t glance at Lydia. I doubted she was the source of the gossip, but if she was, now wasn’t the time for a sister fight.

  “I’m sure you know, he’s quite the catch. And he can’t do anything but talk about you. Is he here?”

  She looked around as if suddenly aware that the catch himself might be in the vicinity, overhearing her not-faint praise.

  I just shook my head.

  “He and my husband knew each other at App State, you know. Bet he hasn’t bothered telling you that his father’s some admiral or something like that. Very successful. You know how those career military guys are, expecting great things from their sons. Spence has certainly continued the success, in his own way.”

  I nodded, figuring I really didn’t need to speak.

  “Spence has been handling some investments for us. Not that we have much, but let me tell you, he’s incredible. We just think the world of him. Our daughter—you know Moira.” She turned to Lydia. “She announced last year that she was going to marry Spence. Mind you, she’s only four.” More pealing laughter.

  Lovey bounced up from the edge of the picnic bench.

  “There’s my crew. I’d better go see what they’ve been into. See you later!”

  Lydia reclaimed her side of the picnic bench, putting a more respectful distance between her and the hulking man in the stained Cat hat sitting next to her.

  “Avery’s got a boyfriend. Avery’s got a boyfriend,” she singsonged.

  My only reaction to her childish falsetto was to roll my eyes. Anything more would’ve just encouraged her.

  Emma, with no idea how grateful I was to see her, appeared at her mother’s elbow.

  “Dad says we can take our dessert with us. We don’t want to miss the fireworks.”

  She carried a spidery mound of blue-green cotton candy twice as big as her head. I knew Frank hadn’t been suggesting she go to his car with that sticky mess. He was pointing her toward my car. I owed him.

  I’d need to find a place to rinse her off after she finished eating—and I was still glad to see her.

  Wednesday Morning

  After the fireworks, I had trouble sleeping, either because I’d slept the afternoon away or because I’d eaten too much junk food. Whatever the reason, when I finally dozed off, snatches of conversations with Spence, with Todd, visions of the parade, the Prune Man, all played in an endless kaleidoscope in my head. I woke up exhausted.

  Hot tea and yogurt with granola did little to revive me. I put on a suit, complete with skirt and heels, for our visit to the college. Somehow visiting the president’s office sounded more impressive than I was sure it would turn out to be.

  I was wrong. It turned out to be quite impressive, in a shabby-elegant way. I’d never been on the campus, set back off a country road as it was, but I’d seen the highway signs, had been faintly aware it existed. I knew Ramble College as a small church-affiliated liberal arts college with an indifferent academic reputation in a neighboring county; that was all I knew. Of course, I’d also recently learned that Spence Munn taught here, but I didn’t expect we’d run into him.

  Melvin turned his Jeep onto the oak-lined circular drive that led to the graceful Georgian brick administration building.

  FOUNDED IN 1906 read the stone sign nestled on the carpet of green grass that stretched out from the highway to the front door of the main building.

  A visitor’s parking slot with a RESERVED FOR MR. BERTRAM sign sat a few yards from the grand stone entry steps. The reception area inside was part Victorian bordello, part rummage cast-offs.

  A young woman in an office just to the right of the main entrance showed no particular interest in us and apparently felt no duty to serve as the college’s official greeter. Her higher calling was to sit at a battered laminate desk in an office with wrinkled beige carpet, where she was sticking labels on stacks of envelopes.

  Melvin was able to draw from her that President Pratchett’s office was upstairs. With a shared glance, we agreed that asking her where the stairs were would take longer than finding them for ourselves.

  The president’s office was, predictably, the largest, taking up the end of a second-floor hall lined with administrative offices identified by plastic nameplates and titles such as DEVELOPMENT, BURSAR, and FACILITIES. The less-important functions, such as the library and classrooms, must be located in less-grand buildings elsewhere on campus, far removed from the president’s view.

  The president’s office had a small plastic sign, similar to all the others along the hall, that read PRESIDENT but offered no more information. Inside the door was a suite of three spacious, high-ceilinged rooms, with fabric cubicle walls turning two of the rooms into subdivided tenements.

  The original architecture included monstrous windows, the old-fashioned double-hung kind that probably rattled in a slight breeze, stuck when someone wanted them open, and leaked heat and cold like sieves. I recognized the problems they presented because I’d had to spend time and money to get similar windows in Melvin’s Victorian house weatherized and functioning.

  The benefit of such outsized windows was the sunlight, though the cubicles and oppressive beige walls swallowed most of the light, creating a strangled, closed-in mustiness.

  A short woman packed tightly into a tweed skirt and ruffled blouse stepped smartly forward when Melvin took it upon himself to knock on what looked like the president’s inner sanctum.

  “May I help you?” she asked, sounding doubtful that she wanted to.

  “Dr. Pratchett is expecting us.” Melvin introduced the two of us. Her gray eyes underneath the iron-gray bangs of a pageboy haircut were unimpressed.

  Just then, the door swung open and a man in pinstriped slacks, starched white shirt, and pink seersucker tie greeted us.

  “Melvin. Good to see you. Come in, come in.”

  Dr. Pratchett was several inches shorter than Melvin, but he made up for that with a booming voice that could address a football stadium full of potential donors. His movements were quick and jerky. He reminded me of crack addicts I’d seen in the detention cells, although his clothes were much more expensive.

  “Melvin, thanks so much for coming. And this is the smart lawyer you told me about?”

  He inclined his silvery head over my hand as he shook it, a facsimile of a courtly kiss on the hand melded into a more businesslike handshake. Was Ramble College stuck in a time warp—or just Pratchett himself?

  “Nice to meet you, Dr. Pratchett.”

  He motioned for us to take seats on the brown, studded leather sofa, crinkled and worn smooth by countless gatherings around the scarred coffee table.

  “Melvin, I know I don’t have to ask, but I need to keep this in the utmost confidence.” His voice lost its street-preacher bluster. Whatever had prompted him to invite us here—and Melvin hadn’t given me any details beforehand—was serious, if the palpable worry in his voice was any indication.

  “Certainly, Dr. Pratchett.”

  Dr. Pratchett didn’t say, “Oh, call me Joe.” Not that I would’ve expected him to. He seemed to like being Dr. Pratchett.

  “I may be overreacting to a situation. I pray I’m overreacting, but I’d rather overreact than have to explain to the Board of Trustees why I overlooked the warning signs. That kind of thing gets college presidents fired.” His nervous chuckle tried to turn that into a joke.

  He leaned forward in his chair, his elbows on his knees, his hands clasping and unclasping in a nervous knot.

  “What kinds of warning signs?” Melvin prompted.

  “I’m sure you know how college endowments operate. Without our endowment, this little gem of a college would’ve been shut and shuttered years ago. The tuition the students pay doesn’t come close to keeping the lights on. Thanks to the generosity of donors and the wisdom of generations of my predecessors, Ramble College survived when scores of other unique little colleges didn’t. Thanks to the int
erest earned every year on the endowed funds, we can hire faculty, buy library books, mow the lawn, and educate our students.”

  Outside, I could hear the drone of a large tractor mower, probably manicuring the massive front lawn while we sat in air-conditioned comfort.

  “There’s a problem with your endowment?” Melvin asked.

  Embezzlement was the first thing that popped into my head, but then I’ve spent much of my life working with large corporations, after which no bad element can surprise.

  “Well.” Dr. Pratchett didn’t want to say it out loud, whatever it was. Because that would make it real?

  He sighed, gathering his words. “We’ve always used a couple of different fund managers, to keep us diversified. The market goes bad, one fund may do better even if the other miscalculates, and one will sometimes hit an upswing in the market that the other doesn’t hit quite as big. Guess that’s obvious to you business types.”

  He waved his hand to include both Melvin and me. “I’m a history professor,” he said. “Don’t like to admit it, especially where those smart-ass economics professors can hear me. If you repeat this, I’ll deny I said it, but I don’t really understand all the details. Frankly, I’m not sure I want to. Too much akin to watching sausage being made. Or placing your faith in alchemy.”

  He took a deep breath. “Two years ago, we decided—by that, I mean the board’s investment committee decided—to move some endowment funds to a local investment firm. We’d been using investment managers at two big banks, but frankly, their fees got steeper and steeper. We’d heard about the returns other investors were earning with this little outfit, which is based right here in South Carolina. And they didn’t gouge their clients with high management fees. So we figured, why not?”

  His nonchalant shrug echoed what had likely been the investment committee’s carefree attitude at the time, but his tone presaged a bad outcome.

  “Things went so well,” he said, “we ended up transferring a third of our endowment holdings. The returns were meeting—and usually beating—the big guys. I knew the fellow, years ago, who started this little company. A straighter stretched string you’ll never meet. Didn’t realize until I called him last week that he’d sold his interest in the company, when he decided to retire, to the fellow running it now.