The deputy had already moved away from the front window, and he held the parlor door open as An’gel and Dickce shepherded their guests out into the hall and toward the area An’gel suggested.
Their mother had been afraid of storms, particularly of violent ones, and she had passed that fear on to An’gel. Dickce was less bothered by them, but even she turned cautious during conditions like they were currently experiencing.
“Do you think there will be a tornado?” Bernice’s voice trembled. “Don’t you have a storm cellar?”
“There is a storm cellar,” An’gel said, “but I don’t believe there’s any need for us to get into it.” She worked hard to keep her voice calm. “The storm seems to be moving quickly, and I’m sure it will be out of here in a few minutes.”
“Thank goodness,” Maudine said with a shudder. “There are bound to be spiders in a storm cellar, and I can’t abide spiders. I’m not going in there no matter what.”
An’gel didn’t care much for spiders herself, but she’d rather share quarters with a few spiders than end up dead in a tree somewhere from the deadly force of a tornado.
Thunder rolled again, and it sounded like the storm was right over the house. An’gel felt the vibrations under her feet. Their position under the stairs should be safe enough, An’gel thought. They stood roughly in the center of the ground floor with no windows nearby and were protected by the house around them. She knew Clementine would have taken refuge in the pantry, along with her granddaughter, Benjy, and Diesel. An’gel prayed the storm would pass quickly.
For now they huddled close together as the thunder sounded loudly yet again.
CHAPTER 19
Half an hour after the storm had passed over Riverhill, Kanesha finished with Benjy. Dickce was waiting for him in the hallway when he came out of the library.
“Ready to go to town?” she asked. He nodded, and she gestured toward the front door. “I’ve got the car out on the drive.”
She waited until they were settled and seat-belted in the late-model white Lexus before she asked him how the interview with Kanesha had gone.
“Okay, I guess. I really didn’t know anything about what happened to my mom, but she asked a lot of questions about how my mom got along with the Wart and his family. Fine with the Wart, but not too good with the others, that’s what I told her,” Benjy said as Dickce shifted into drive and hit the accelerator.
The car jumped forward, and Dickce glanced over to see Benjy gripping the straps of his seat belt. “It’s not far into town. We’ll be there in a few minutes.” She accelerated, and the car sped down the drive toward the highway. An’gel had had the driveway resurfaced back in the spring, and Dickce liked the smoothness of it. She wished the highway into Athena were as nice as this.
Dickce slowed the car when they reached the highway and flipped the signal for a left turn. She glanced both ways to determine there was nothing coming and hit the gas again. She noticed Benjy was still holding on to his seat belt, and he looked a little pale. The poor boy must not ride in cars very often, she decided. She wondered if he knew how to drive.
“I’ve got quite a list from Clementine.” Dickce decided to keep the conversation away from what was going on back at Riverhill. “She’s a wonderful cook, good old-fashioned Southern food. It’s a wonder An’gel and I don’t weigh three hundred pounds apiece, the way she feeds us.”
She was about to launch into a description of the desserts Clementine often prepared when Benjy said, “Miss Dickce, stop the car. Please.”
Dickce immediately complied, slowing the car until she could safely pull to the side of the road and stop. He looked upset. “What’s wrong? Are you sick?” She hit the button to lower his window. “Just stick your head out the window.”
Benjy shook his head as he unbuckled his seat belt. “No, I’m not sick. I saw something back there. It looked like a dog. It might be hurt.” He opened the door and hopped out of the car before Dickce had time to respond.
She glanced in the rearview mirror and saw him walking fast back down the road the way they had come. She killed the engine and looked both ways before opening her door and getting out of the car. She started to follow Benjy slowly. If he had seen a dog, she hoped it hadn’t been hit by a car. She wasn’t sure she could handle seeing a badly injured animal.
About a hundred feet back she watched as Benjy slowed and then sank down on his knees in the grass verge. He held out a hand, and she heard him calling out in a gentle tone, “It’s okay. I won’t hurt you. Miss Dickce, don’t come any closer, okay?” He repeated his assurances to the dog, and Dickce stood rooted to the spot as Benjy requested.
Benjy kept talking, and as Dickce watched, she could see the dog slowly coming closer. It wasn’t very big, perhaps about twenty-five pounds, she thought. Its coat was a warm cream color, and the hair looked soft and fleecy, but wet from the recent storm. It didn’t look much like any dog she remembered seeing around the area.
Dickce wasn’t sure how long she had been standing there when the dog finally came close enough for Benjy to touch it on the head. She held her breath. Would the dog bite? Or turn and run away?
“What a good puppy you are,” Benjy crooned to the dog. “See, Benjy isn’t going to hurt you. Benjy only wants to be your friend and get you warm and dry, with some food to eat. You’d like that, wouldn’t you?”
The dog sat in front of the boy and allowed Benjy to rub its head. “He doesn’t have a collar,” Benjy said in the same singsong voice. “I’m going to see if he’ll let me pick him up and put him in the car. Is that okay with you?”
“Of course,” Dickce said as she started to back away slowly. She was thankful there was no traffic on the road just now. She couldn’t bear the thought of the dog getting excited or upset and dashing out into the road in the path of an oncoming vehicle.
Benjy put his arms around the dog, and Dickce saw the dog lick the boy’s ear. She smiled and turned toward the car.
She opened the back hatch and moved out of the way so Benjy could get the dog inside. The rear seats were already down, in anticipation of the large number of groceries she planned to purchase.
The dog barked several times as Benjy neared the car. It didn’t seem reluctant to get into the car, but there was a certain urgency in the tone of the barking, Dickce thought. She glanced back in the direction from where Benjy first approached the dog. Was there perhaps another dog out there?
She saw a sudden flash of reddish brown moving in the undergrowth a few feet from the grass verge. Maybe a puppy?
The dog barked again, and suddenly a small creature streaked out of the undergrowth to jump into the back of the car beside the dog.
Benjy spoke in singsong again. “Well, hello there, kitty. Where did you come from? Are you and Mr. Dog here buddies?”
Dickce stayed where she was, afraid that any movement might spook the animals into jumping out of the car. She held her breath again as Benjy talked to the animals while he slowly climbed into the back with them. When he was settled, his arm around the dog and the cat in his lap, he called out to Dickce. “Can you close the door now? I think they’ll be okay until we can get them to a vet.”
Dickce hit the button on her remote to close the hatch. She waited to be sure nothing jumped out before she got back in the car and started it up. She pulled out onto the highway after checking for traffic, but now she drove a bit more slowly. Her foot, however, itched to mash down on the accelerator. She hated driving at a snail’s pace.