Southern Discomfort Part 4

"Miss Big Ears is liable to hear something she don't want to hear, she keeps talking back to me," Herman said darkly.

He still had his work clothes on, as if he'd just come in himself. Hot, tired, dirty and probably hungry, too. There was a pinched look on his face, and I had a feeling this might not be the best time to ask him to lend me a hammer. Or for Annie Sue to goad him into saying things it might be hard to back down from. She always makes a big dramatic deal out of things and since she turned sixteen, she and Herman always seem to be b.u.mping heads.

"Come on, honey," I said. "I bet your daddy could use a big gla.s.s of tea about now I know I sure could."

Annie Sue wanted to stay and urge, but I was already steering Herman to the lawn chairs cl.u.s.tered under their big pecan tree, so she headed for the back door, impatience with adults in every step.

"And bring me that pack of Tums over the sink," he called after her.

The chairs were in deep shade and it was a pleasure to sit for a while though I knew that mosquitoes would chase us once the sun was fully down. I shooed their big lazy tom from my chair, and as soon as I sat down, he jumped back in my lap like a furry rug. A hot furry rug. But I'm always a sucker for a purring cat, and I missed having one around since Aunt Zell's cat disappeared a month or so earlier.

An occasional car pa.s.sed on the side street and from beyond the thick shrubbery, I heard the m.u.f.fled laughter of young children splas.h.i.+ng in their backyard pool. Nadine's gardenia bushes had almost finished blooming, yet a few creamy white blossoms hung on to perfume the air.

Cindy McGee and another teenage girl pulled up in the drive behind my car, hopped out, and called, "Hey, Mr. Herman!" before heading for the back door with the familiarity of best friends who run in and out of one another's houses a dozen times a week. They were inside only a few minutes till they were out again, carrying two summery dresses on padded hangers. Their high light voices called, -Bye, Mr. Herman!"

Herman shook his head. "Girls! How they keep up with which dress is whose is beyond me."

"You still working over at Tinker's Landing?" I asked as car doors slammed and they drove away.

He slouched down wearily in one of the wood-slatted chairs he'd built himself. "Yeah, finished up one house all except we were short two switch plates. I thought they were two-gangs, but turned out they were three and Reese didn't stock the trucks like he was supposed to."

He gave a heavy sigh. "Guess I'll have to get Annie Sue to start doing it again."

All his kids had worked there in the summers, but Annie Sue was the only one who actually liked it, a fact that seemed to be lost on my brother.

"I swear," he said, "Reese should've been the girl and her the boy."

Like me, Annie Sue was an accident of nature after Herman and Nadine thought they'd finished their family. They'd begun with twins, Reese and Denise. No surprise since twins ran in both families. Herman was one of two sets our daddy sired-he and Haywood, the "big twins," are seven and eight brothers up from me-and Nadine's grandmother was a twin, too. Edward came along two years later and that seemed to be all she wrote till he was in the second grade and Nadine got pregnant with Annie Sue.

"I thought I was having the change early," Nadine always said.

By that time, Herman had his electrician's license and his own business. Nadine had started doing the paperwork and answering the phone, so she just set up a playpen beside her desk and let Annie Sue teethe on new rubber insulators. The child was barely toddling before Herman stuck her in his truck and started taking her along to be his gofer on local jobs. Soon she was handing him a pair of wire strippers or a line tester before he even asked for it. "Best little helper I ever had," he said. "Even if she is a girl."

At the age of twelve Annie Sue rewired her bedroom with outlets every three feet and installed stereo speakers under her bed. Once when she was mad at her parents, she fixed it so that every time Nadine adjusted a stove burner, the front doorbell would ring. Nadine's not the brightest woman G.o.d ever made, so it took her two days to realize there was a connection between turning off the peas and running to answer the door when no one was there. Herman thought it was sort of funny till he went to plug in his razor and the bathroom lights went off and on in rhythmical sequence.

He switched her legs good for it, but I heard him bragging about how much apt.i.tude those monkey tricks took and how he wished Reese or Edward showed half as much.

Reese could pull wire, but he's not really interested in the finer points. Being an electrician is just a paycheck, something that puts beer and barbecue in his belly, new radials on his Corvette, and his half the rent in his trashy girlfriend's hand-none of which meet Herman's approval.

Edward, on the other hand, had no intention of wallowing around under houses, rewiring old fuse boxes. He studied electrical engineering at State and now works with a big outfit headquartered in Charlotte where he designs lighting systems on a grand industrial scale.

Denise worked in the business every summer, too, but she never got out of the office. She still acts like she's not real sure which end of an extension cord plugs into a wall. Not that she'll ever need to know, long as there's a man around to do it for her. And not that Herman ever expected her to. She's a girl, isn't she? True to form-and confirming his second worst fear-right out of high school she married an insurance salesman a bare eight months before the baby came. (Poor Herman's worst fear is that a daughter of his would have a child and no wedding. In Dobbs, "nice" girls still don't.) Denise now lives in Greensboro, a hundred miles away from her parents' judgmental eyes; but her near brush with scandal has made Herman twice as strict with his younger daughter and she's never been allowed off on anything less than a double date.

Annie Sue gripes loudly to anybody who'll listen that Herman doesn't trust her. She's right. He doesn't. We can tell him he's wrong till our tongues get blisters, he just can't believe she won't make dumb decisions about her life.

Annie Sue returned with a tray that held four gla.s.ses of ice and a big plastic pitcher of tea. Nadine followed.

"Hey there, Deborah. I didn't know you were out here till Annie Sue told me." She handed Herman the antacid tablets and smiled at the big cat in my lap. "Goldie ever come back?"

I returned her smile. Nadine's all right. We're not terribly close. She's seventeen years older, practically a whole generation ahead of me. Too, she's one of those Blalocks from Black Creek and more straitlaced than most of the Knotts, but that seems to suit Herman. They don't go in for public shows of affection, but their marriage has never caused much gossip in the family. Although Herman's tighter with a dollar than most of the boys, n.o.body ever hears Nadine complain that she doesn't have everything she needs or wants.

"No," I answered, stroking Mo-Cat (because he purrs like an electric motor all the time). Goldie, short for Goldenrod, was Aunt Zell's big yellow cat that disappeared back in May. "Aunt Zell thinks she must've been hit by a car or something. Miss Sallie's talked her into taking a puppy. Her mama dog strayed off last week, and Miss Sallie was stuck trying to hand-feed four beagle pups around the clock."

We watched Herman take two tablets and wash them down with a big swig of tea.

"Stomach still bothering you, hon?"

"You're not feeling well?" I asked him.

"I'm fine. Just a little stomach virus I can't seem to shake. It comes and goes."

My eyes met Nadine's. "It comes more than it goes," she said. "Awful cramps. He had a real bad spell Monday night after your swearing-in, but will he see a doctor? I think it's a bleeding ulcer, but he won't let me look at his stool and-"

"Oh, hey now, woman!" Herman had an old-fas.h.i.+oned delicacy about some things and he fumed in embarra.s.sment. "Deb'rah sure didn't come over here to listen to us talk about something like that."

Unspoken was the sudden question of why I had come.

"Actually, I guess I'm here for the same thing you and Annie Sue were fussing about before," I told Herman. "I was hoping you'd let me borrow some of your tools Sat.u.r.day morning. Uncle Ash is so picky and I'm supposed to work on that WomenAid house, too. What about you, Nadine?"

"Oh, I'm not doing any building, but I did say I'd help some of the other ladies with the picnic lunch."

"What sort of tools?" asked Herman cautiously.

"Just a hammer," I a.s.sured him. "Maybe a nail ap.r.o.n if you've got an extra."

"I reckon I could do that right now Annie Sue, you want to look in that side bin for your aunt?"

"Or I could just drive the truck over Sat.u.r.day and Deborah could help me string wire."

"Annie Sue-"

Anger was tightening his jaws, but she couldn't let it alone.

"I just don't see why's it such a big deal that I don't have a license. Don't I work for you, too?"

Normally I don't get between my brothers and their children, but I thought Annie Sue was being reasonable.

Each company has to have at least one licensed electrician on staff, and the others are empowered to work under that. Sometimes though, the person who holds the license never does a lick of field work. In fact there's a company at the other end of the county that occasionally swaps work with Herman. Their holder of record is the owner's wife. He can put electricity anywhere you want it, but he couldn't pa.s.s the written examination. She could. And did.

"So are y'all furnis.h.i.+ng any of the materials?" I asked, hoping to find some ground for compromise.

"They're buying the fixtures and outlets, but we had some extra coils of wire left over from another job," Herman grunted. "I told Lu I'd just donate it. Along with my services," he added heavily.

"But don't you see, Dad?" Annie Sue broke in. She sat with her heels resting on the edge of her chair, her hands clasped around suntanned legs drawn up in front. "It's supposed to be only women that's building the house. To make a statement."

"And just what kind of statement, daughter? That women don't need men for anything?"

"Oh, now, hon," said Nadine as I stirred uncomfortably in my chair. "She didn't mean that."

"Yes, ma'am, she did. Just look at her."

Annie Sue had showered since work and was dressed in a cool blue sundress because she had a date later. White sandals on her feet, pale pink polish on her nails, her s.h.i.+ning chestnut hair clipped up off her neck. A stranger might have seen only a st.u.r.dy young woman who hadn't yet lost all her baby fat, sitting in respectful silence; but there was nothing respectful about the set of her lips or those hot blue eyes.

I waded in with flags flying. "And just what's wrong with women proving they can be self-sufficient?"

His big hand tightened around his gla.s.s of half-melted ice. "Now don't you start on me, Deb'rah."

The exact tone of defensive exasperation, even his choice of words, made me smile. "You sound just like Daddy when he gets cranky."

The anger went out of Herman's jaw. He loves our father. So does Annie Sue. She put fresh ice cubes in Herman's gla.s.s and filled it up again with tea.

"Look," I said. "What I'm hearing is that you're afraid it'll endanger your license if Annie Sue screws up the wiring, right?"

"No, it's because I don't want another Mary Dupree on my conscience." As soon as he'd blurted it out, I could tell he wished he'd kept that thought to himself.

"Why, Herman Knott!" exclaimed Nadine, clearly surprised. "You still worrying about that after all these years when you know good and well that wasn't your fault?"

"Who's Mary Dupree?" Annie Sue and I asked.

"Tink Dupree that owns the Coffee Pot's mother."

The Coffee Pot is next door to Herman and Nadine's office. It's only open for breakfast and lunch, but half the town walks in and out between six and two. Herman stops off there for a cup of coffee every morning and I think Nadine takes her midmorning break there. It's a family business-Tink and his wife, Retha, and their daughter, Ava-but I didn't remember seeing his mother.

"Happened about ten years ago. During that time you lived off," said Herman. (All my brothers walk gingerly around that patch of wild oats I'd sown back then.) "Tink and Retha were working at the Coffee Pot, but they didn't own it then."

"Didn't have two nickels to rub together," Nadine said, stirring more sugar into her tea.

"His daddy used to work on the base at Fort Bragg and one night they were driving back down to Fayetteville and got in a bad wreck. It was raining and he run off the road and got killed. His mama got banged up so bad she had to come up to stay with Tink and Retha while her leg healed, Tink being their only child and all."

Annie Sue was waiting impatiently to hear what Tink Dupree's mother had to do with wiring the WomenAid house, but Mo-Cat rearranged his bulk on my lap so I could stroke his other side for a while.

"Won't enough room in that old house to cuss a cat without getting hair in your mouth," said Herman, "so they give Ava's room to Miss Mary and they made a little attic room for Ava. It was around Thanksgiving, so that worked out okay as far as it being warm enough up there. Heat rises. She'd've burned up if it'd been summer. But they figured either Miss Mary'd be back in her own house by then or that they'd just build 'em on another room if they needed to. Ava won't happy about having to move, of course, and she pitched a fit to have her hair dryer and her stereo and all the other stuff girls think they've got to have."

Annie Sue rolled her eyes again. I knew what Ava Dupree looked like now, and now I remembered hearin how she got that way; but Herman was so deep into his tale that, like the Ancient Mariner, he was constrained to finish.

"Tink got me to come in and show him how to add another circuit for the attic. That fuse box of his was so old and rusty, I told him right off I didn't feel good about adding anything else to it. But he kept on and on at me, swore it had to be done or Ava wouldn't give him no peace, promised they'd be careful about overloads, and then said he was going to do it whether I helped him or not. The long and short of it was that I told him how it could be done and I give him a good price on the stuff to do it with, but I said not to come blaming me if his house burned down-never for a minute thinking it would."

"And he didn't," Nadine said loyally, -cause it wasn't your fault."

"So you say and so says Tink." Herman set his empty gla.s.s back on the tray. "But every time I look at the scars on Ava's face and arms-every time I think of Miss Mary dead in that fire- Well, I know and Tink knows, too, who bears half the blame."

"If I recall," I said, "it was her insurance policy that gave Tink the money to buy the Coffee Pot?"

"That and selling her mobile home down in Fayetteville," said Nadine. "The insurance wasn't supposed to be all that much but it paid double because of the way she did die. The Lord moves in mysterious ways, doesn't he? Miss Mary used to fret about Tink and Retha living hand to mouth and then she was the cause of them getting the Coffee Pot. I thought they did a real good job fixing Ava's face, don't you? You can't hardly tell she was ever in a fire at all."

"Mother!" Annie Sue was appalled. "You look at her arms and her hands!"

"Well that's her own choosing. Retha says they've tried to get her to let the plastic surgeon fix those, but she won't and I can't say as I blame her. Long as her face looks all right. Didn't keep her from getting a husband, did it?"

Ba.s.s Langley wasn't much of a husband, far as I could tell. Amiable enough, but a full two slices short of a loaf. Did the heavy lifting and cleaning at the Coffee Pot.

"Might've got him, but couldn't keep him," said Herman gloomily. "He's gone."

"Who's gone?" asked Nadine. "Ba.s.s? When? Where?"

"Don't know where. He took off last week sometime. Just packed all his things and left without a word to anybody. Tink was sort of telling me about it around the edges when Ava wasn't nearby."

"So that's why she was so short with me yesterday," Nadine mused. "How come you didn't tell me?"

Herman shrugged. "Only reason Tink told me was because I was sitting there when somebody came in and said he'd come about a help wanted ad in the paper."

Nadine clearly wanted to cross-question Herman about the details, but the sun was almost down, mosquitoes were starting to rise, and Annie Sue was still champing at the bit.

"Listen," I said to her, "it's all very well to want all the work done by women, honey, but in this county, all the building inspectors are men. Long as one man's going to be inspecting it, what's the harm in a second?"

I turned back to Herman. "What if you just come over and look at what she's done after we knock off Sat.u.r.day night? Would that ease your mind?"

"I reckon," he said grudgingly.

Not the most gracious acquiescence, but enough to erase Annie Sue's scowl.

I myself was right pleased. I'd come to borrow a hammer and had wound up with the use of a whole truckful of tools.

Maybe I'd have to rethink that chromosome chart.

CHAPTER 4.

HARD HAT ZONES.

"When men... are directly below other men working above, the men below must be sheltered against possible falling objects by a protective covering. The men below MUST wear protective headgear."

Superior court had a jury still deliberating Friday morning, but I should have realized that didn't account for so many attorneys cluttering up the hall when I came through robed and ready. Yet even when I saw Doug Woodall himself waiting there to prosecute, no alarm bells went off.

Doug's in his second term and he runs as a "hands on" district attorney, so if I gave his presence a second thought, it was merely that he was a considerate boss who'd let Cyl DeGraffenried and the other ADAs get an early start on their weekend.

On the other hand, Ally Mycroft was clerking, not Phyllis Raynor. Ally's a two-faced priss pot who simpers and coos over male attorneys and gives short shrift to females.

An antic.i.p.atory air hung over the crowded front benches. John Claude wasn't there, but Reid was. I beetled my eyebrows at him and he gave a don't-blame-me shrug.