Chapter Fourteen

 

Bubba’s Road is Paved with Good Intentions

 

Monday, August 20^th

 

“Luke, I am not your father,” Big Joe said into the device. Then the chief of police breathed heavily for effect. “Hoooooo-heeeeee.”

“That is not a bomb, Bubba,” Sheriff John said to Bubba.

“Sorry,” Bubba said but the word was far from contrite. In fact, his tone of voice was sorely aggrieved and frustrated; it was all wrapped up in one little word. His mood could be connected to one pertinent fact. He couldn’t see his mother as they stood outside, and for the moment, he wanted to see his mother. He needed to be certain she was well. He had wanted to leave immediately, but Big Joe had threatened him with violence, and Willodean had jumped in to protect him, so Bubba held back. But the dam was about to burst.

“I kin understand why the boy would be a tad jumpy,” Big Joe said in Darth Vader’s voice as he held the device up to his mouth. The voice that came out on the other side was purely James Earl Jones. “Hoooooo-heeeeee.”

Bubba felt an urge to stick the device in a location on Big Joe that was not appropriate to mention in polite society. Without Vaseline, he added to himself.

“Why did you want to know who was on the payphone, Bubba?” Willodean asked him from the other side.

Bubba was again stuck in the middle of a crowd. Once the police had determined that the voice changer was not a bomb, they set about interrogating him properly. Fortunately for Bubba, the consensus was that the previous evening’s bomb had rattled his brain and made him wound up tighter than a Gibson guitar.

“Someone called me on David’s phone,” Bubba muttered to Willodean. “Played a nasty little trick on me using that there voice-changing thing.”

“What kind of trick?” Willodean persisted.

Bubba sighed a little as his mother waded into view. Miz Demetrice was loaded for bear. She chastised Big Joe, Sheriff John, the Republicans, the Democrats, society in general, and there was even a glancing blow at the Boy Scouts of America, although Bubba couldn’t fathom how they were involved or in what way they could possibly be responsible. Once his mother had ascertained that all was well with her only child, she started in again on Sheriff John and Big Joe. “You call this festival secured?” she said. “Bombs, bodies, and bad business, oh my.”

“These are not the law enforcement men you are seeking,” Big Joe said through the device. “Hoooooo-heeeeeee.”

“Something in the milk ain’t clean,” Miz Demetrice decided.

“Just a trick,” Bubba said to Willodean.

Willodean put her hands on her waist and glared knowingly at him. “I don’t believe I like what I’m not hearing, Bubba.”

People were watching Bubba. He was well aware of the fact. There were a hundred and more looking at him, wondering what was happening. Some of them were heavily invested in the festival and wanted to know if what was going on had to do with the mysterious note. The level of excitement was like wildfire running rampant through the attendees, and everyone wanted in on the action.

However, there was at least one person who wanted to know if Bubba was going to blab to the police and, therefore, put two people’s necks on the chopping blocks. Bubba didn’t care to tell lies, but when the occasion warranted it, he didn’t mind doing it.

“Right sorry,” he said to Willodean. “I got jumpy on account of last night. It weren’t nothing.” He looked out at the crowd. “It was nothing,” he said louder. “I reckon my head got bumped harder last night than I thought.” On the inside, his gut winced with what he was about to say. Then he added deliberately, “Ah shucks.”

Miz Demetrice turned from chastising Big Joe and studied Bubba with a mother’s unerring gaze. “Boy should have gone straight home,” she pronounced. “Looks like he could use shoes to go with those bags under his eyes.”

“I’ll give you a ride home,” Willodean said, and Bubba glanced at her just in time to see a significant look pass between his girlfriend and his mother. It made a shiver run down his spine. Willodean is in cahoots with Ma. The world may be about to end.

“Arr, matey,” David called to Bubba, “I be off to do some wee festival business. Catch you later, bucko.”

“I’ll talk to you later, Bubba dear,” his mother called after him, as well, with a practiced matriarchal eye settling on his large frame. If her eye had been a laser-guided weapon and he had been an enemy tank, he would have been a little blackened crater in the earth.

“Can I borrow your cell phone, Willodean?” Bubba asked politely as they walked away from the other police.

Willodean gave him such a look before she pulled the little phone out of one of her pockets. He gingerly grasped the cell phone and tried not to react to the expression on her face. Bubba took a moment to figure out the phone. Then he took another moment to say a prayer about not destroying her phone. He took another moment to remember Kiki’s number. Kiki answered on the third ring, all the while Willodean was energetically and transparently eavesdropping.

“Hey,” Bubba said quietly to Kiki.

“Bubba, dude,” Kiki said. “I haven’t found anything yet.”

“I know. Listen, this might be a little more involved than I thought.”

“Involved?” she repeated.

“Well, I just got a call from the person we’re interested in.”

“A call. M called you?”

“Not our writer. The person responsible for the writer’s…” he searched for a word that would confuse Willodean, “…conclusion.”

Kiki was silent for a moment. Willodean tried to stare down Bubba. He pursed his lips and blew the lovely sheriff’s deputy a kiss. Her face twisted into an annoyed grimace. Her hand twitched over the can of mace attached to her Sam Browne belt.

“You got a call from a killer?” Kiki asked. Her tone conveyed an air of how-cool-is-that?

“I reckon I did.”

“Oh, then we were right. It is someone in the area. That’s going to narrow the search down significantly.”

“You shouldn’t tell anyone,” Bubba said in a near whisper. Willodean nearly overbalanced herself as she tried to lean closer. “Not anyone. Dougie shouldn’t tell anyone. It’s not safe.”

Kiki was silent again.

“Or you should forget it, and I’ll find someone else to do it,” Bubba said.

“Oh no, you don’t,” Kiki said. “I get it. This person wouldn’t call you unless you’re close to figuring it out. They got something to lose. They’re trying to scare you off. They couldn’t kill you. You’ve got law enforcement friends. You’ve got your mama big in local politics and all. They want you to back off.”

“Yep.”

Kiki thought about it. “They threatened you.”

“Not me.”

“They threatened…your mother? Willy?” Kiki gasped. “I’m going to so track them down. Nothing is hidden on the Internet. Fret not, brothah. We’ll get their twisted ass tied into a little Gordian knot so fast, their mama’s head will be spinning.”

“Be careful.” Bubba looked up as Sheriff John called Willodean’s name, and she reluctantly walked away to listen to what the sheriff wanted. Bubba said, “Listen, ifin Willodean gives you some cake to et, don’t do it.” He hated to say it, but it had to be done. “That cake ain’t right.”

“Oh, that explains why the smoke alarms went off so many times last night,” Kiki said shrewdly. “We know about Willy’s cooking.” There was a significant pause. “She only cooks when she’s nervous about something, you know.”

Bubba disconnected the line and looked at the phone. He knew that Willodean would probably call the number back. In fact, she might even recognize the number. She was friends with the neighbors. Furthermore, she had heard half of the conversation although he had been trying to keep his voice down. He might as well have been pouring gasoline on a campfire.

Willodean came back to him and took the phone. Returning it to her pocket, she demanded, “Are you going to explain that conversation?”

“I asked Kiki to do some research on who M might be,” Bubba said. He weighed the statement in his head. It was truthful and suitable. It didn’t cross the line. It might make Willodean happy. It might keep him out of relationshipal hot water. Ifin I’m lucky.

“You asked Kiki,” Willodean said. She turned and walked toward the street. Bubba followed, but he felt like scuffing his feet on the grass like a small child.

“Kiki thought that…” Bubba started to say and cut himself off. Whenever Willodean was about, his brains pretty much melted into a warm mess of grayish matter. You were supposed to wait until the festival was over, he told himself. But you know that wouldn’t have gotten anywhere. And I done tole her that I would look into it a little bit. But that was before the little incident at the front gate of the Snoddy Estate. You know, the whole exploding bomb thing. And the whole threatenin’ thing. Especially the whole threatenin’ thing.

Willodean stopped abruptly. There was the vendor who started to say to her, “You, deputy, need the Polliwog Genuine Master Sleuth App—” but who snapped his mouth shut suddenly and stepped back. Bubba figured that the expression on Willodean’s face was likely enough to shut up most people. Her back straightened as Bubba watched. Finally, she looked over one elegantly shaped shoulder and stated politely, “You should get home and get some rest, Bubba.”

The rapid change of disposition made Bubba distinctly nervous.

So it was that Willodean drove Bubba home and didn’t say anything else the entire drive there.

Bubba climbed out of the official Bronco a minute second before Willodean gunned it and whipped back down the driveway. In fact, he hadn’t even shut the vehicle’s door all the way. The physics of her speedy departure made the door close for him.

Bubba’s initial thought was that Willodean was angry with him. But there was a funny little smile on her face as the Bronco passed him upon its breakneck exit from the grounds. He saw it and was momentarily disconcerted.

“Ain’t you goin’ t’offer to protect my body with yours?” Bubba yelled after her and then was immediately remorseful. Willodean didn’t deserve that. But there was that little niggling thought that came right after that, Neither did that poor woman who had to write a note and stick it in a car part hoping that someday someone might see it and not immediately throw it in the trash.

Turning to the porch, Bubba expected a flash of long ears, brown and white, and a sloppy tongue to jump upon him in the manner of a whirling dervish, but there was nothing. Alarm went through him until he heard her characteristic whine. His eyes quickly scanned for her remarkable nose and found it directly. Precious sat stalwartly on one end of the veranda. She wasn’t in the hunting position, but clearly she had cornered something. There she would stay until the prey escaped, or she was called back.

His eye followed the line that the hound was pointing in and discovered the very large figure hiding behind one of the wicker peacock chairs sitting on the end. The chair didn’t cover the figure. Neither did the matching peacock chair beside it. A third and fourth peacock chair probably wouldn’t have covered the person. Two very large brown eyes looked out nervously.

“Hey, Bubba,” the man said.

“Precious,” Bubba said, “heel.”

Precious bounded over to her master, and she spent the next thirty seconds silently protesting his recent absence in her life.

The figure slowly clambered to his feet and stared at the pair. “That hound don’t like me much.”

The figure continued to straighten up. And up. And up some more.

Bubba bent to scratch under Precious’s jowls and made sure to get behind her ears. One of her back legs happily thumped in accompaniment. “Who’s my precious-wecious-mecious?” he crooned to the hound.

She was. Precious fell on her side and put all four legs in the sky so that Bubba could properly worship her belly. Finally, Bubba looked at his visitor. There was a lot to look at.

“Dan,” Bubba said. Daniel Lewis Gollihugh finally straightened to his actual height. (A hair above seven feet in stocking feet, feet flat on the floor. It was said that he had come out of his mother’s womb at nearly three feet in length. Mrs. Gollihugh had never denied it, but she also never had another child.) The taller man didn’t look like he was particularly put out with Bubba. (This was a relief for Bubba because while Bubba was sure that he could give Dan a run for his money, he wasn’t sure that Dan wouldn’t pound Bubba into something that could be drenched and dredged and called chicken-fried.) Dan was known to have a vicious temper. (Once he had dumped a load of manure in his ex-wife’s convertible, but Bubba couldn’t remember which ex-wife it had been because Dan had six at the last count.) Dan’s most infamous action had been urinating on a police car while the police officer had been inside the vehicle. (Regardless of what that particular officer said in later years, he had not gotten out to protest the action until a platoon of other officers had arrived upon the scene.)

Bubba couldn’t imagine why Daniel Lewis Gollihugh would be coming to see him. Bubba hadn’t slept with any of Dan’s ex-wives nor had he had anything to do with Dan at all for years. “Precious don’t care for no one who ain’t family to be coming on the property whilst we ain’t present,” Bubba said, although explaining that a man’s hound was protective was hardly necessary in the great state of Texas.

“I kin see that,” Dan said. “I weren’t breaking in or nothing. I dint even spit.”

Bubba waited. It wasn’t prudent to ask Daniel Lewis Gollihugh undue questions. After all, he blocked out the sun. Each one of his fists was the size of a soccer ball.

“I guess you be wondering what I’m doin’ out here,” Dan said conversationally.

“I am,” Bubba said. He was also tired, his head hurt, and he wanted to get something else in his stomach. An Ultimate Breakfast Sandwich with hash brown sticks and a bite of would-be red velvet cake only went so far in a man’s day.

“This last round in the slam taught me something,” Dan said gently, as if imparting a gem with which to deposit into the most secure of bank vaults.

“Okay,” Bubba said. He thought he was supposed to say something. Dan seemed to expect it and nodded applicably.

“There was a fella in there who taught all of us about Buddhism,” Dan said after a moment of silence. “The entire cell block.”

Bubba wasn’t really expecting that.

“You see, Buddha was a fella who believed in enlightenment,” Dan explained thoughtfully.

Precious whined.

“By ending our ignorance about suffering, we can become better folks,” Dan went on. “I had a great deal of ignorance.”

Daniel Lewis Gollihugh had become a Buddhist. Imagine that.

“I practice the concept of ahimsa,” Dan said. “That means that I shouldn’t harm other people or living things. I’m a vegan now. Also, I cain’t be bashing on folks what tell me something I don’t care for.”

“That’s good,” Bubba ventured.

“But your ma explained to me that some folks might be out to harm you,” Dan said.

There was a moment of comprehension. Daniel Lewis Gollihugh’s presence could be explained through the interference of Miz Demetrice. The odd little smile that Willodean had exhibited could also be rationalized. Willodean had met Daniel Lewis Gollihugh many times. To be precise, she had used her favorite can of mace on him on at least three separate occasions. Dan did not care for mace.

“Ma asked you to come out here?” Bubba said.

“Well, ifin a fella was to come out here to harm you,” Dan said, “then he might see me and be dissuaded thusly.”

Dissuaded. As if seeing the seven foot tall Daniel Lewis Gollihugh would be inviting to most people. His practiced scowl would scare away the most intent door-to-door salesman. His size and brooding expression would frighten away everyone else. “So you wouldn’t have to break your rule of nonviolence?” Bubba asked. “That is, ifin they just saw you and were dissuaded thusly?”

Dan smiled and showed that he had a gap in his top row of teeth. “I knew a fella like you would understand me. You wouldn’t believe some of these good ol’ boys who think Buddhism is right funny. Makes me proper angry and then I remember what Buddha would say about that.”

“So Ma said for you to come out and keep an eye on me? Be my bodyguard? Is that right?”

Dan nodded. “I parked ‘round back. My old Dodge be an eyesore, so I don’t want to make the front of your perty mansion all ugly.”

“The Chevy back there, too?”

“Your green truck is there,” Dan said. “Miz Demetrice said someone had blown up the front gate, and you was up there with the truck, so I guess that’s why some of it is so black now.”

“I suppose the deputy talked to you, too,” Bubba said.

“That gal is shore good as grits,” Dan said appreciatively. “Shore handy with a can of mace.”

Bubba paused to stare at Dan.

Dan quickly added, “Not that I’m after another wife. I need to straighten out my own bizness first.”

“I need something to et, Dan,” Bubba said. Precious woofed in agreement. “You up to something?”

“I reckon I’m so hungry I could et a horse and then chase down its rider,” Dan said agreeably. “That is,” he added, “if I weren’t a vegan now. Perhaps something in the vegetable or fruit group?”

Bubba nodded. That was usually the way of it.