The door banged open, interrupting my pleasantly spooky reverie. I opened my eyes and confronted Dahlia O'Neill Buchanon's puckery scowl. Her cheeks were puffing like a bullfrog's and her hands were clinched into ma.s.sive fists. Every ounce of her quivered quivered with fury, which meant there was a lot of quivering in the room.

"I got to talk to you," she said in lieu of salutations.

"If the road signs have taken to hiking in front of your house, it's not my jurisdiction. Call the highway department."

This disconcerted her, as intended, and a few of the quivers subsided. "Road signs don't go hiking, Arly."

"Don't be too sure of it," I said as I gestured at the uncomfortable chair I keep to discourage visitors. I was mildly curious to see if it could withstand her bulk, and mildly disappointed when it did. Just mildly, mind you. I am not a mean-spirited person, and to prove it, I asked a seemingly innocuous, neighborly sort of question. "How's married life?"

"It's just plain awful! I keep asking myself if I went and made a terrible mistake when I married Kevvie. It ain't to say that I don't love him, because I do, but I don't know if I can stand it any longer." She buried her face in her hands and began to sob, her shoulders convulsing and her feet stamping so violently that I glanced at the plastered ceiling.

"Dahlia," I said loudly to compete with her ululations of despair, "I'm not a marriage counselor. I'm not the right person for you to talk to. Listen to me, please."

I carried on in that vein until she finally calmed down, took a tissue from a pocket in the cavernous floral tent dress, and blew her nose in a manner reminiscent of a car's backfiring.

"I know you ain't a marriage counselor," she said between hiccups hiccups. "You being a cop, I figure you're trained to investigate like those private eye fellows on television. They're mostly in the reruns these days, of course. You know who I mean?"

I didn't, but I wasn't about to contradict her and I sure as h.e.l.l wasn't going to ask any more "innocuous" questions. "My expertise is geared more toward radar guns and paperwork."

"But you know how to investigate crimes, doncha? Every time somebody goes and gets murdered in MagG.o.dy, you're the one who solves the case. You snoop around and find little clues and question people just like that nice Perry Mason, except he asks his questions in the courtroom. At least that's where he did it until he had the accident and had to get hisself a wheelchair. I always felt real bad about that."

"What are we talking about, Dahlia?"

"I want you to follow Kevin and find out what he's doing."

"He's selling vacuum cleaners in Farberville. If you want to know the ins and outs of it, why don't you ask for a demonstration in your living room?"

"He already practiced on me so much that the carpet's worn through and I have nightmares about some of the attachments," she said in a voice that hinted of an impending eruption of some sort. "He's up to no good, and I have to know. Our vows said through sickness and health, and richer and poorer, but I didn't swear to sleep alone every night. His mother says he's just tuckered out from carrying that case every day, but when he was a stockboy at Jim Bob's supermarket and stacking heavy cases, he wasn't ever too tired to make the bed springs squeal, and even when we were trapped all night in that outhouse, he--"

"Have you asked him what's wrong?" I said hastily.

"I've asked him a hunnert times what's wrong, but he just shakes his head and goes to sleep in the recliner. Last week I got so plum fed up that I dragged him right into the bedroom, yanked off his clothes, and told him in no uncertain terms that I expected him to act like a husband. He wasn't up to it, if you get what I mean, and afterward, he cried himself to sleep out on the sofa. Now he won't even set foot in the bedroom except to get dressed in the morning. He rushes out the door without a bite of breakfast, and this morning, he forgot to take the sack lunch I fixed for him. I cried so hard I could barely choke it down."

"I don't see what I can do, Dahlia. I'm not a private investigator. I'm the one and only cop in MagG.o.dy and I need to hang around town on the off chance someone takes it into his or her head to break the law. Isn't it likely that Eilene is right and Kevin's simply tired?"

"There can be only one reason why he's acting this way." She paused with an impressively gothic expression, then turned her palms upward and said, "He's having an affair with another woman. It ain't necessarily his fault. He's not as glamorous as Matt Montana, but ever since his voice dropped and he grew a little hair on his chest, he's been irresistible to most every woman he meets. Some desperate, s.e.x-starved s.l.u.t from Farberville sunk her fangs in him and is draining him of his precious fluids." Let's. .h.i.t the pause b.u.t.ton for a minute here. Kevin is one of the scrawniest, dopiest, most hopelessly inept people I've ever known. He may well be responsible for the introduction of the word huh? into the English language. He and Dahlia have managed to intrude into my investigations every now and then and, with their b.u.mbling and stumbling, caused me numerous headaches and nearly brought on their own unnatural and untimely demises. I could imagine him in a lot of roles, but a mesmeric Casanova was not among them. Now hit play.

"An affair?" I said weakly.

"Which is why I want you to follow him and get me the name and address of the woman who's trying to steal my beloved and destroy our marriage. Then I'll march up to her door and tell her how the cow ate the cabbage, and if she doesn't swear to give him up, I'll knock her upside the head or shoot her through the heart or--"

"Wait a minute! You don't know for sure that he's seeing another woman, so let's not get all excited about exterminating her just yet." I glanced out the window in hopes I might see a white-coated attendant approaching the PD, an extra-large b.u.t.terfly net over his shoulder for her, or even a medium one for me. Reminding myself that I was the one responsible for the basic parameters of the situation (I hadn't packed my bags and flagged down a Greyhound bus several years ago), I looked back at her smoldering eyes, ham-sized arms, and bloodless fists. A calm, soothing voice seemed called for. "Now, Dahlia, I am not going to tail Kevin on his appointed rounds. I realize that you're unhappy, and maybe you have a good reason for worrying. If your talk with Eilene wasn't helpful, why don't you find someone else who can give you advice?"

She rose as if she were a thundercloud appearing over the ridge, and I could definitely feel the barometric pressure plummeting. "I reckon I can think of someone else who can give me advice. I'm gonna have a nice talk with the man at the p.a.w.n shop in Hasty, and let him give me advice about which gun to buy and how many bullets it takes to kill a man-eatin' harlot!"

I was still gaping as she swept out the door and continued down the road. Most of the time, folks in MagG.o.dy mind their own business (and their neighbors') in a mundane fashion, but at other times, everybody turns downright queer.

This appeared to be one of 'em.

Dahlia was without a car, and I decided to call Eilene and warn her not to loan hers to her homicidal daughter-in-law. I looked up the number and was reaching for the telephone when it rang, I reacted as if it'd hissed at me, but I finally took a deep breath, picked up the receiver, and admitted the caller had reached the MagG.o.dy PD.

"This is Patty May Partridge," whispered a voice.

"This is Arly Hanks," I whispered back.

"We got a terrible problem out here at the county old folks home," she continued in the same insubstantial voice, "and Miz Twayblade'll skin me alive if she finds out that I called you. She's awful worried about losing our license, but I think when you lose a resident, that's a lot worse."

"So who'd you lose?"

"Adele Wockermann. Every day after lunch, all the residents are supposed to take a nice little nap so Tansy and me can clear the tables and help the cook clean up the kitchen. Well, today the dishwasher was leaking all over the floor, so Miz Twayblade had to mop right alongside us until the plumber could get here and do something. Usually she sits out at the desk and keeps an eye on things, but what with the flood in the kitchen and all, there wasn't n.o.body to notice Miz Wockermann was gone until I went in at two to fetch her roommate's tray."

"What does her roommate say?"

After a pause, Patty May said, "She didn't say anything about it. Miz Twayblade sent Tansy and me to search outside. We went all the way to the edge of the woods without catching sight of anybody, and then we got in our cars and drove both ways down the road for miles."

I rubbed my face and tried to calculate how far an octogenarian, or perhaps a nonagenarian, could get in a maximum of two hours. "Stop whispering, okay? This is quite a bit more serious than a license, which Miz Twayblade will lose in an ex officio minute if anything's happened to Mrs. Wockermann. I'm going to notify the sheriff's department. What's she wearing?"

"I don't know," Patty May said, sniffling but speaking in a more normal fashion. "She wadded up her robe and gown and pulled the blanket over 'em so no one would notice she'd left. Her dark brown coat isn't hanging on a hook inside the closet. Her spending money, just a couple of dollars, is gone from her drawer. I can't tell what else is missing--except for Miz Wockermann, of course."

"Is there any vital medication she needs?"

"Not really. We give her vitamin supplements and calcium pills. Missing them shouldn't cause her any harm. Actually, she's one of our feistiest patients, all the time complaining and getting into arguments about which television show should be on in the lounge. Two times last week she started food fights in the dining room. Last spring she crept around in the middle of the night and switched all the dentures. You can't imagine what a time we had trying to match the sets to the mouths!"

"And I don't want to." I badgered Patty May until I had a decent description of the prodigal prankster, swore not to reveal my source to her supervisor, and then hung up on her and started calling area law enforcement agencies. In the middle of one call, it did occur to me that Ruby Bee and Estelle had also disappeared, and I'll admit I stuttered until I convinced myself it was just a coincidence.

Once everybody'd agreed to cruise for Adele Wockermann, I grabbed my purse and went out to my car. The sun was shining, but there was a bite to the wind and the forecast had mentioned a chance of rain. Even if Adele Wockermann was mentally competent, she could hardly fare well once the sun went down. First the county home, I decided, and then some cruising of my own.

"Katie," Matt whimpered through the locked door, "why won't you let me in? I'm so lovesick I'm gonna die out here in the hallway."

The door opened as far as the chain permitted. "You're making a fool of yourself Go away."

"Katie, you know how much I love you. I gotta come in where at least I can see you."

"You've seen me before, and I haven't changed. I haven't changed my mind, either. I told you that I'm not going to mess with a married man. The way my pa carried on with every wh.o.r.e in the county liked to kill my mama, and I ain't gonna be the source of another woman's grief."

He sank down to the floor, and if he'd had a tail, it would have been wagging pathetically. "Lillian understands. She's seventeen years older than me."

"Then go home and cry in her lap." Katie tried to close the door, but Matt had managed to slip his boot into the crack in the midst of his eloquent entreaty.

"I've begged her to divorce me," he continued, bravely ignoring the pain in his toes, which in all reality was a sight sharper than the one in his heart, "but she wants to think about it a little longer. I don't want to hurt her, so I have to give her time to get used to the idea."

"I'm closing the door. If you don't aim to hobble through life without your toes, I suggest you move 'em." He did, and the door banged shut. He would have stayed if the elevator doors hadn't opened and a woman with a bag of groceries hadn't stopped in her tracks and gasped his name. He rose, gave her a shot of the aw-shucks, autographed her grocery list, and went down the stairs to avoid fans in the elevator. The tinted windows of his car protected him from further adulation, and after a few minutes of gazing at Katie's window, he drove toward the Dazzle Club to see if the boys in his band might be in the mood for a couple of beers and a game or two of eight ball.

Lillian drove past the Dazzle Club and headed for her office. Matt wasn't likely to get into too much trouble at this time of day. He'd been inside Katie's apartment building for almost an hour, moping outside her door and making a fool of himself as he'd done the other times when she'd crept up the stairwell and watched him through the cracked window.

Unbeknownst to him, he was her fourth husband. She wasn't trying to set a record; the first three just hadn't worked out well. She'd been fond of them, but she'd known from the minute she saw Matt that she needed him in ways that frightened her. She was so tangled up in l.u.s.t and tenderness and fierce protectiveness that his announcement that he wanted a divorce had left her shivering like a hound dog in a blizzard. But she hadn't let it show; she wanted him, not his pity. All she could do was keep searching for ways to hold on to him until his infatuation faded and he could see how foolish he'd been. But now Charlie was back.

Chapter Five.

When I returned to the PD, the red rat's eye was not blinking on the answering machine. I went ahead and called LaBelle, the day dispatcher at the sheriff's department, to make sure they hadn't forgotten to call with the information that they'd found Adele Wockermann and were offering her coffee and cookies in the lounge. They hadn't, so they weren't. LaBelle a.s.sured me that the sheriff himself, a sly ol' boy named Harve Dorfer who took pride in playing the stereotypic southern lawman right down to the splintery cigar b.u.t.t between his teeth and a beer belly that shielded his feet from the sun, was out checking logging trails in his own four-wheel drive. Every deputy was doing the same. We may not venerate the elderly in the outlands, but we do try to keep track of them.

"You know," LaBelle continued, "I read just the other day about some senile old fool who wandered away from a nursing home over in Blytheville and was found three days later in the woods, stiff as a board. Animals had gnawed off most of his face but didn't touch his feet."

"Thank you for sharing that with me," I muttered, then called the police department in Farberville to see how long it'd take to get a dog. A minimum of two hours, I was told, which would be about the time it began to grow dark ... and the temperature dropped.

I called the county home and asked for Mrs. Twayblade. "No, no one's spotted her," I said in response to her question (which answered mine), "and we'll have a dog to try to find a trail in a couple of hours. If you hear anything, call the sheriff's department and have them get hold of me immediately."

I was too anxious to waste time making further futile calls. I could think of nothing else to do but continue driving down the same back roads looking for a white-haired scarecrow in a dark coat, and I was halfway to the door when it flew open in my face.

"What's this I hear about Adele Wockermann?" shrieked Mrs. Jim Bob, her face screwed up as tightly as I'd ever seen it and her hair as mussed. Her hat hung over one ear. Her fingers were blotched with anger and rigidly splayed as if she intended to throttle yours truly. The overall effect was that of a Queen Elizabeth impersonator on steroids.

"I don't know what you heard," I said truthfully, "but as much as I'd like to stay and find out, I've got more important things to do just now. Come back later and we'll chat, okay?"

"I'll say you've got more important things to do, Miss Chief of Police! The idea of that poor doddery thing wandering around in the woods! What if she was to trip over a log and break her hip? What kind of a chief of police would loiter in the office when someone is writhing in pain and being eaten by a bear?" She stopped short of shrieking "off with her head!" but it would have made a fitting finale.

"Not a very dedicated one," I said, bemused by this display of irrational yet sincere compa.s.sion. Mizzoner was notorious for rattling rattling on about the depth and breadth of her Christian charity, but she'd never actually displayed any of it, as far as I could recall. "I'd love to hang around and discuss this flibbertigibbet of a police chief, but I need to go search for Adele Wockermann."

"Why haven't you organized a search party? Helicopters? Why don't we have helicopters flying over the woods? How many helicopters can it take to find one old woman?" Suddenly her hands stopped rotating and fell to her sides. She went past me and sank down on the chair, now downcast and demoralized. I wouldn't have characterized her behavior as manic-depressive, but she certainly wasn't squandering time on the transitions.

"I cannot believe it," she groaned. "I cannot believe this is happening just when I ..."

I was becoming more and more suspicious with each of her utterances. "Just when you what, Mrs. Jim Bob? Do you know something about Mrs. Wockermann's disappearance?"

"Of course not! This is a dreadful thing, and if I had even the tiniest inkling where she might be, I'd be over fetching her instead of putting up with your impertinence. You owe your job to the town council, missy, and you'd best remember who's got the ear of the mayor of MagG.o.dy."

She was back to lese-majeste, and I hadn't learned anything that might help me. "You'd better give it back," I said as I started for the door.

Once again it flew open in my face, this time propelled by Ruby Bee and Estelle. The former grabbed my arm and began to shake it. "Where's Adele? The minute we got back to town we heard how she dropped out of sight earlier in the afternoon and n.o.body's seen her since."

Estelle latched onto my other arm. "Adele's nigh onto eighty, and there ain't no way she'll survive out in the woods all night!"

I jerked free before each of them ended up with a detached appendage, took refuge behind my desk, and said, "We have the makings of a fine search party. Why don't the three of you draw straws to determine who gets to be the patrol leader and start combing the woods within a two-mile radius of the county home?"

It was such a preposterous suggestion that all three of them stopped gabbling at me and locked eyes (we're talking five here; as I've said in the past, one of Estelle's wanders). The unspoken communication flying back and forth was hard to miss, but harder to tap than a politician's telephone line.

"I would dearly appreciate knowing what the h.e.l.l's going on here," I continued, and rather nicely, considering. "If you all are so d.a.m.ned worried about Adele Wockermann, you might try to help me find her. For starters, let's discuss this sudden interest in Adele's well-being. Why don't you go first, Mrs. Jim Bob?"

She looked down as she considered her response, which probably meant it wouldn't be worth the expenditure of carbon dioxide. "Adele is Matt Montana's great-aunt, and as you know, he's coming to MagG.o.dy in a few weeks. He'll be real disappointed if she's not here to welcome him home."

"That's right," said Ruby Bee. "He'd be heartbroken. You can tell from his photographs that he's sensitive."

Estelle ran a finger under her eye. "Imagine coming home for Christmas and finding out something terrible had happened to your beloved great-aunt ... That'd sure take the twinkle off the tinsel."

"In a flash," Ruby Bee contributed sadly.

I waited in case the other two wanted to offer another shovelload of manure. "Then you all are motivated strictly by concern for Matt's emotional well-being? You don't have any self-serving motives?"

They were into denial. I listened to them bristle and sputter for a minute, then stomped out to my trusty police car and squealed out of the parking lot, all the while cussing up a storm and vowing to find a way to arrest the three of them so they could continue their mendacious little games under the supervision of a burly matron with an overabundance of body hair.

Halfway back to the county home, I realized I'd forgotten about the Wockermann house. It was a good five miles from the county home, and it didn't seem likely that Adele could have made it that far on her own. Then again, there wasn't much else to do until the dog and its handler arrived from Farberville.

I parked in the rutted driveway and unenthusiastically walked through knee-high weeds to the porch. The front door was locked, and there was no indication anyone had entered through a window. I went around the side of the house. The windows were too high to be entered by an elderly lady, no matter how feisty she was purported to be. In back, the cracked flagstones of the patio were ringed by yellow crabgra.s.s and sow thistles. Beyond that was a screened-in porch, although the screens had pretty much disintegrated with rust and the door lay out in the yard.

I stepped over more broken gla.s.s and tried the back door. It opened with a shudder. It was just a big, vacant house, I told myself, and I was more likely to encounter roaches and rodents than characters from a Stephen King plot.

The kitchen was a holy mess, the floor thick with mud and garbage, the dinette set and appliances victims of brutality. The beer cans scattered about and piled in the sink let off a sourness that seemed to settle in my stomach. Everything was stale, dusty, in some stage of decay. No doubt Matt Montana would have bit his lip and held his tongue as he walked through the room. All I could do was grit my teeth.

The hallway led to a sitting room, where vandals had been equally successful in their impact on the interior decorating. I peeked in the other rooms on the first floor, then tested each step as I went to the second floor and regarded several closed doors.

The musty air was beginning to clog my sinuses, and the odd creaks to induce the stirrings of anxiety. I checked the bedrooms in rapid succession. The iron bed frames were broken. Mice had chewed the mattresses and left dribbles of stuffing on the floor. Cigarette burns marred the surfaces of dressers and bureaus, none of which had k.n.o.bs. Initials had been carved in the drab wallpaper, and light bulbs methodically broken, the fragile gla.s.s mingled with the st.u.r.dier shards from mirrors. The porcelain fixtures in the bathroom had fared no better. A single sodden towel was so mildewed that its color was indistinguishable--not, of course, that I meant to hang it in my bathroom if it fit the decor. Relieved at not encountering any embodiments of my worst nightmares, I was about to go downstairs when I noticed a narrow door at the far end of the hall. Self-congratulations on this display of acuity were out of the question, but so was sneaking away without making absolutely certain Adele was nowhere in the house.

I went up the narrow steps to the attic. The only light came from long windows at the far ends of the three narrow corridors made all the more claustrophobic by trunks, stacks of boxes, and wardrobes with splintered panels. The shadowy rafters looked like a dandy place for bats. I explored one of the corridors, peering as best I could over and around the junk. The window offered a view of the road and the field across the street. I retraced my path and tried the center corridor, which led to an uninspired view of the chicken houses and the ribbon of sludge called Boone Creek. The last window was on the back side of the house. The yard looked no better from my lofty perspective, nor did the scrubby growth beyond it and the denser tangle of stunted trees and ma.s.ses of thorns. Late afternoon sun glinted on the broken gla.s.s on the patio, reminding me that I needed to stop worrying about rabid bat attacks and find Adele Wockermann. She wasn't hiding behind any of the trunks, and if she was hiding in one ... well, I hoped she was in a nice one. A piece of white fabric on the floor caught my attention. I picked it up and went down to the second floor, where the light was better. It was a handkerchief, trimmed with frayed lace and darned in several places. The initials A.W. had been embroidered in blue thread on one corner.

I took it out to my car and sat down on the hood, staring at the handkerchief as if it were a map of Adele's escape route to her current hideout. It was not remarkable to find an item initialed A.W. in the house. There well might be towels, sheets, and pillowcases with similar markings in one of the trunks. The "hers" of the towel sets would be initialed A.W. The reason that I was so baffled by the handkerchief was that it was clean, crisply ironed, and smelled faintly of lavender.

The radio in the car worked, although it crackled and popped periodically. LaBelle acknowledged my request for backup with a cheery "you betcha" rather than a trite combination of numbers, and ten minutes later, Les pulled into the driveway.

It was dark outside when we closed the last trunk. As he got into his car, Les gave me the strained smile of someone who did not suffer fools gladly, especially ones who ruined his chances for a pitcher of beer before he had to go home for supper.

For the record, we found no towels or sheets monogrammed with A.W. Or the body of an old woman. I wiped my hands on a napkin from the floor of my car, put the handkerchief in the glove compartment, and began to compose a written report that would make a h.e.l.luva dull screenplay. Coming soon to a theater near you: The Handkerchief firom h.e.l.l.

Matt stood behind Lillian and kneaded her shoulders, then bent down and let his lips tickle her ear as he said, "After we get divorced, you'll still be my agent and manager and get to see me all the time, and we can still make love whenever you want. Hey, we can do it right now on the sofa if it'll help you change your mind. I got a few minutes till I go to the studio."

She pushed him away, wondering what on earth was wrong with herself. Something obscurely ingrained and riddled with ghastly Freudian complexities, she supposed, although her family had been as healthy as the Cleavers. "I'd take you up on your charming offer, Matt, but I need to make calls. No matter what happens, I will indeed remain your agent and manager for at least four more years because you signed a contract. Right now I take ten percent of the gross as your agent and twenty percent as your manager, leaving you seventy percent to pay court fines. If you file for divorce against my wishes, I'll come back like a starving polecat and end up with alimony equal to half your net income. Seventy divided by two doesn't leave you much, Matt, especially when Uncle Sam's relying on you to help reduce the deficit. Katie's under contract to my agency, too, and I can make sure she never does anything more than two-bit county fairs and mall openings until she hits bottom within a year or two. Hillbilly singers seem to biodegrade biodegrade pretty quickly in this town. Are you and Katie going to live on love?"

Matt s.n.a.t.c.hed up his guitar case and stormed out of Lillian's private office and into her secretary's room, where he promptly stumbled over the outstretched legs of a shabbily dressed man with a beard.

"Hey," the man said, "aren't you ...?"

Matt got to his feet and jammed his hat back on his head. "It don't matter who I am."

"You're Matt Montana," he continued, beaming. "My name's Charlie, and we've got something in common, you know."

"The only thing we got in common, Charlie, is that we both f.u.c.ked your sister."

Lillian's secretary gripped the armrests of her chair and said, "Have yourself a nice day, Mr. Montana."

Matt did not reply, nor did he follow her suggestion. By the time he reached the sleaziest redneck bar in the county, he'd received one ticket for reckless driving and avoided another one only because the police officer was an unpublished songwriter and just happened to have a copy of "Nightcrawler Woman" in his glove compartment.

Mrs. Twayblade tilted her head like a chicken within pecking proximity of a worm, her sharp nose and piercing eyes reinforcing the image, as did the clipboard clutched under her arm like a wing. "Adele Wockermann did not wander away in a daze. She made a cunning effort to keep us from realizing she'd slipped away."

I sighed. "What if her friends on the far side of the moon suggested the plan and told her to wait for them down by the creek? The banks are slippery and the water's icy."