“Billy ain’t gonna just go home like Louis told him to,” Mike continued. “He’ll be back.”
“Well, he better not lay a hand on Tyler!” Paula Anne put her hands on her hips. “I’ll have him arrested so fast he won’t know what happened.”
“What do you think’s gonna happen, Mike?” Tyler decided to appease his nervous friend. “And why don’t you think that was a natural thunder bolt?”
“I seen plenty of lightnin’ strikes,” Mike said and shook his head. “That one came straight down out of nowhere from just above that post. I was lookin’ right at it when it happened. There weren’t no clouds in the sky. And if there was, they wasn’t settin’ right on top of that post. And look at the post now! It still works! Didn’t blow out the lamp nor nuthin’. You’re a lineman, Tyler! You know what lightnin’ does to stuff. That post shoulda been blown to smithereens. And everybody standin’ around the bottom of it would’ve been crispy critters. I seen that feller, Fred Aliger, Perry Aliger’s brother? I seen him look right at the pole before it happened. I was over there. He’s what caused me to look up at in the first place.”
Tyler had to admit that Mike’s paranoia had some basis in fact. He certainly did know a bit about lightning and electricity and what it did to things. Especially people.
“You think Mr. Aliger’s brother caused it?” Tyler looked at him frowning. “How could he have done that? He is Mr. Aliger’s brother. Any fool can see that.”
“You just wait.” Mike crossed his arms across his chest and narrowed his bug eyes sharply. “You’ll see.”
“Hey, Tyler!” Chris Parker called as he stepped over the curb bumper in front of them. Tyler looked up and smiled. It was plain to see things were developing rapidly with Cheryl and Chris. They wore matching western outfits and both had the sort of glow about them that only comes from new-found love. To Tyler’s surprise, Bobby Greene and Joanne Parker also came to join them at the bench.
“Hey, Tyler. Mike. Paula Anne,” Bobby nodded to everyone. Reggie skated up behind them on a pair of roller blades.
“I heard we missed all the excitement,” Chris shook hands with Mike and surveyed his broken nose and splinted thumb. “We went over to Carrollton to look at the RV show. I wanted Bobby to see 'em. We just got back. You didn’t get into it again, did you?”
“No, not this round,” Tyler shook his head. “Mike tried to. They might’ve killed me this time,” Tyler laughed and then covered his lip with his hand. “Good thing you weren’t here, Chris. You’d of got that purty shirt all messed up. There was fists flyin’ and blood and guts and German chocolate cake everywhere.”
Chris stuck his chest out and strutted a bit for them. “I got plenty of shirts, Tyler. I could’ve got in few good punches.”
“I know that’s right,” Mike mumbled at the mention of all the shirts Chris had.
Cheryl slapped at his arm and hooked her arm through his protectively.
“Who started it?” Bobby asked.
“Would you believe Junior Morris?” Mike asked them.
“Junior Morris! Again?” Joanne said in disbelief. “What’s got into him lately? Who’d he hit this time?”
“Mr. Aliger’s brother,” Tyler told her.
“What brother?” Cheryl frowned at him.
“His twin brother,” Mike told her importantly. “I-dentical twin brother.”
“You mean there’s two of them?” Cheryl looked dumbfounded.
“Yep,” Mike nodded.
“Why’d he hit Mr. Aliger’s brother? He get ’em mixed up?” Bobby asked and shooed Reggie away as he got too close to his boots with the skates.
“Don’t know why, but you shoulda seen it!” Mike who loved nothing better than to tell a good story launched into a colorful blow-by-blow description of the entire incident from start to finish. By the time he had come to the part about the lightning bolt and the blue sparks, they were completely mesmerized. Bobby and Chris squatted cowboy-style in front of him while Paula Anne, Cheryl and Joanne sat squished together on the bench with Tyler and Mike. They were all very impressed with Mike’s story. It was the best one he’d ever had the pleasure to tell and they had been the first to hear it from him and furthermore he had not only been an eye witness, he’d been a participant as well. He was beaming with pride by the time he finished up by stating that they hadn’t seen the end of it yet.
“Damn!” Bobby said quietly, shaking his head.
“Well, I’m glad we missed it” Cheryl told them. “I’m glad nobody got hurt. Mr. Aliger is a real neat guy. I like him.”
Everyone nodded in agreement except Mike who still had some reservations about the Aligers. Chris stood up and pulled Cheryl up next to him.
“I hate to think I missed all that,” he said as he wrapped his arm around her waist. “There I was over in Carrollton when I could have been here bustin’ heads.”
“I wonder if Mr. Aliger’s brother is married?” Cheryl asked as she looked up at him and he pulled her closer.
“Don’t you be worryin’ about that now.” Chris started off with her. “We’ll be back. I gotta have a drink and a dance after that tale.”
“I’d like to take a look at his brother.” Joanne looked around the lot. “Are they still here?”
“They might come back,” Tyler told her.
“I don’t know about that,” Mike said, raising one eyebrow knowingly. “I seen Mrs. Aliger leading Maureen Fitzgerald off down the street earlier. Maureen looked plum sick like she was goin’ to faint or somethin’. I don’t know what that was all about. Ever’body was lookin’ at 'em.”
“Really?” Paula stood up to crane her neck down the street toward the Gift Shop.
“Do you think it’s true what they say about Maureen and Mr. Aliger?” Joanne asked no one in particular.
“What?” Paula Anne looked down at her suspiciously. “What do they say?”
“Now, Joanne,” Bobby shook his head and laughed. “Do you think Mrs. Aliger would take Maureen home with her if it was true?”
“What?!” Paula Anne seemed to be the only one who didn’t know. Tyler didn’t like to pass gossip along to her. Especially that kind.
“You know the wife’s always the last one to know,” Joanne answered Bobby.
“KNOW WHAT?!” Paula Anne almost jumped up and down in front of them.
“Well,” Mike said and looked up at her and squinted. “Let me tell you...”
He got a chance to tell another story much to Tyler’s chagrin. This one was almost as good as the first in the opinions of Joanne and Paula Anne. They listened to him with rapt attention. Tyler had to interrupt him and cut him off when he began to tell about Louis’ interest in Mrs. Aliger.
“Ahem!” Tyler shot him a warning glance. “Anyhow, ladies, that’s the whole sordid little tale and you heard it first on Mike TV.”
“Yeah, but that don’t explain why Junior would have jumped on the brother,” Bobby told them and looked away down the street. “Hey! Why don’t we just mosey on down there and see if they’re comin’ back?”
“OK!” Joanne agreed and Paula Anne raised both eyebrows. She could certainly understand why Maureen would have done what everyone thought she did, but she didn’t understand why Perry Aliger would have done such a thing. It didn’t make sense. If he intended to run a business in Magnolia Springs, he couldn’t go around taking everybody’s wives and girlfriends away from them. He’d get himself shot.
“Ya’ll go on,” Mike told them. “Me an’ Tyler are just gonna sit here and rest.”
Bobby, Joanne and Paula Anne started off down the street with Reggie zig-zagging along behind them on his roller blades. The band cranked up a lively two-step and Tyler let out a long sigh and figured he would need a lot of treatment when he finally got Paula Anne home.
“Oh, really?” The Primus leaned on the counter and eyed Maureen with interest. “And what insights does Miss Fitzgerald have on the subject?”
Perry went to the refrigerator
to take out a small plastic bottle of glacier water. He unscrewed the top and drank half of it down in one long swallow. This was the last thing he had expected.
“She is quite remarkably well-informed,” Angelica told him. “She has already experienced an NDE and understands the concepts of the universal element of soul and the properties of collective bodies. She says she gained her insight from something called the ‘Borg’, I believe? A fantasy race invented by some imaginative artists, but quite accurate in some respects. She has also discerned from her contact with Peregrin, that he is not what he appears to be, and so, by extension, she categorizes you and me to be the same as he. Unlike the average person, she exhibits a great deal of self-control and is in possession of a high degree of intellectual potential. Though she is an emotional creature, she is exceptional. I believe that her soul may be very old indeed.”
“Is that so?” The Primus asked and leaned forward to look closely at Maureen. She returned his gaze with open curiosity. She could see that this version of Perry was very, very different from him. She already knew she preferred Perry’s company to his. She refused to be intimidated by his contemptuous stare. “Whatever shall we do with her?”
“Nothing!” Perry said as he came to set his bottle of water on the counter. “We will do nothing with her. You will kindly go on about your business and leave this situation to me... sir!”
“But you have bungled this entire study, Peregrin,” Falco reminded him. “I may be forced to intercede.”
Peregrin glanced at Angelica expecting support, but received nothing more than a cool stare. He could no longer feel her presence nor read her thoughts even if he tried. He had no idea how she could have blocked him without the Primus’ intercession. He shot a glance at Falco and continued. “Consider this, Primus,” he said carefully. “She can ultimately do no harm. Who can she tell? Who would believe her?”
“I have no intention of telling anyone anything,” Maureen came to her own defense. “I feel privileged to have had the opportunity to know Peregrin Caelum,” she said his name correctly. “Maybe someday I will tell my grandchildren some interesting bedtime stories, but that is about all.”
“A charming notion,” Falco said doubtfully and drew back. “Let me think about it.”
“Let you...” Perry began and felt his temper rising before he caught himself. He didn’t want to let the old cat out of the bag just yet. At least not for Angelica’s sake. “Of course.”
“But as she is here,” Falco continued, “perhaps she could give us her views on the merits of your little boxes, Peregrin. Why don’t you explain them to her and we’ll hear what she has to say?”
Perry drew himself up and tried hard to control his anger once more. How dare this idiot play on his disadvantages like that? He would explain nothing. He knew that Falco only wanted to make him explain the boxes so he, himself, would know the why of the practice. He was about to say something he knew he would regret when he sensed the arrival of an approaching change.
“I believe we are about to have company,” he said, glad for the diversion. He took Maureen’s hand to pull her off the stool. “It’s time to go dancing, I think.”
He smiled at her and she flushed from head to toe right in front of Angelica and didn’t seem to care. He escorted her to the door.
Angelica stared after them in surprise. “Come on!” Falco said and got up to take her hand, pulling her along. “We can’t allow him to get away that easily.”
Chapter Twenty-Four:.
Sam Morris sat on his expensive leather sofa pressing an ice pack to his head where he had a growing lump conveyed there by Hannah Lipscomb’s handbag. Mildred Morris sat next to him, alternately lamenting her ruined dress, her torn pantyhose and her scuffed shoes between patting him solicitously on the arm.
“My God!” She pulled the ice pack away from his head to look at the bump. “What did she have in that bag? Brick bats?”
“She’s got bats alright,” he moaned and replaced the ice to his head before picking up a tall glass of straight bourbon to take a swallow. “Bats in her belfry!
“I’ve never been so humiliated in all my life! How dare they lay a hand on my Sammy!” She wailed and looked at her fingernails to check for chips and breaks. “Those horrid people.”
“Oh, so now they’re horrid, are they?” Sam looked at his mother in disbelief. “Just this morning you wanted me to pay a call on him. I shouldn’t have been so foolish. I should have married Maureen a long time ago. This wouldn’t be happening to me now.”
“Oh, there, there, baby boy,” his mother said as she patted him a bit too hard. “You know I would walk through fire to get anything you want, but I will not allow you to blame yourself for this fiasco because of that woman. You have to see the truth of it. Maureen Fitzgerald is just plain rotten. Even if you had married her, she would have probably gone off with Perry Aliger. Oh dear! Just look at my fingernails! They’re ruined!”
“I’ve got to get my life under control, Mother,” he told her and then patted her arm subconsciously. “What would Father say if he could see me now? He would never forgive me. And you! What have I done to you? Look at you! You actually fought for me! I feel so ashamed. Will you forgive me?”
Sam hugged her and she nearly fainted. She burst into tears and clung to him desperately. “Oh, Sammy! Of course I forgive you. You haven’t done anything wrong.”
“Oh, yes I have,” he said miserably and put his arm around her. “Things are going to be different now. I’m going to get cleaned up and I’m going back down there to find Maureen. If I have to get on my knees in front of God and everybody, I’m going to ask her to marry me. I’ve got to get her to come home. And I would be so happy if you just stay here and wait for us.”
Mrs. Morris sat up straighter and sniffed. She liked that part about his asking her forgiveness and worrying about what his father would have thought of him, but this was not what she wanted to hear. She burst into tears again and he misread her sorrow for happiness for him.
“Now, don’t cry anymore, Mama,” he told her as he got up carefully. “I’ll be home with Maureen before you know it.”
Maureen stood between Perry and the Primus clapping her hands to the rhythm of the dance tune. Angelica stood on the other side of Falco watching the people dancing in front of the library. She still did not understand why they were there and what had happened. Perry watched the dancers disinterestedly and kept one eye on his ‘brother’.
“Do you know this one?” Maureen looked up at him hopefully.
“I’m afraid not,” he apologized.
“How about the Electric Slide?” She asked.
He shook his head.
“The Texas Twister?”
“Not really.”
“The Cowboy Stomp?”
“I’m sorry.”
“Surely you have learned to dance... somewhere?”
“It has been a very long time since I danced and I assure you, it was nothing similar to this.” He frowned. “Things seemed to have changed dramatically in the past several hundred years. Whatever happened to jigs and ditties?” He felt relieved to be able to talk so freely with her and her attentiveness to him was comforting to say the least.
She shook her head.
“How about a nice minuet?”
She laughed.
“Polka?”
“Not around here.”
“The Fandango, then?”
“You’ve got to be kidding!”
“Whatever happened to Strauss?”
“You’re so funny.” She looked up at him.
“Thank you.” He smiled down at her. Yes, she was extremely easy to talk to. Not at all as taxing as Angelica.
“Come on,” she said as she dragged him onto the dance ‘floor’ which was no more than a roped off section of the parking lot. “This one is easy. I’ll show you.”
Perry did not bother to look back at Angelica or her ‘brother-in-law’. Tejas Tom’s deep baritone voic
e filled the air with slow strains of a much older, much slower love song. Perry was very disconcerted, however, when Maureen wrapped her arms around his neck and laid her head on his chest. The sensation was very pleasant, but there were so many people there and most of them seemed to be watching the unlikely couple.
Halfway through the song, someone tapped on Perry’s shoulder. He turned to find Sam Morris behind him. He immediately shoved Maureen out of the way and prepared for yet another onslaught.
“Mind if I cut in?” Sam asked politely and smiled at Perry.
Perry looked down quickly to ascertain that the man held no sharp instrument in his hands.
“Cut in?” Perry repeated and frowned at him.
“Yes. I would like to dance with the lady, if you don’t mind,” Sam told him.
“Oh, yes. I mean, no. I don’t mind.” He turned to Maureen. “Do you mind?”
“Well, I...” Maureen began, but Sam stepped around Perry to take her away across the dance floor. Perry noticed that Maureen took a more formal position with Sam than she had with him putting some space between them. Perry stood watching them until he felt another tap on his shoulder. He turned again to find Louis Parks behind him. Vaguely, he wondered if the man were about to ask him to dance.
Louis mistook Perry’s confusion for anger.
“Don’t do anything you might regret later,” Louis told him in a low voice barely discernible above the music.
“I’m sorry?” Perry shook his head.
“You know what I mean,” Louis tugged on his arm to pull him from the roped area. “Let’s get something to drink.”
Perry followed Louis to the edge of the parking lot where a long table had been set up with refreshments for the dancers. Louis filled two cups from the huge punch bowl and handed one to him.
“Just drop it,” Louis told him gruffly, causing Perry to immediately drop the cup to the pavement, wondering what was wrong. Louis looked down at the mess at their feet, but said nothing. He picked up another cup and filled it for him. “It looks like you need something more than this fruit punch.”
The Pandora Effect Page 43
