“You really know this guy, don’t you?”
Molly Reed was new to Crystal Falls. Its ways were still mysterious to her.
“Know him too well,” he said. He thanked her and hung up.
So the Senator really was going to try and spring Ron Stander out of jail.
Angry, Sam stood up, grabbed the ancient smoking pipe that had belonged to his grandfather and that he still liked to toy with from time to time, and marched out of his office.
He hadn’t been invited to the meeting between Chief Hadley and Senator Cummings but he was sure as hell going to attend anyway.
2
As Amy pulled into her driveway, the handyman Jimmy Wade paused the lawn mower he was pushing and waved to her. Amy waved back and then put the car in the garage.
The two-story white Colonial she lived in was technically more than she could afford. But the place had belonged to her dying aunt, who had made her a very good deal. Amy didn’t have much extra money now but she did live in a very nice home.
She walked to the front yard to say hello to Jimmy.
As usual, when Jimmy saw her, he hung his head slightly and broke into a shy grin. Jimmy had been doing her yard work and home repairs ever since she’d moved in here a year and a half ago.
The lawn smelled sweetly of newly mown grass. Several birds sang in the trees. Long afternoon shadows were stretching across the yard. It was a quiet and melancholy time.
As she approached Jimmy, he let the lawn mower die and then reached into his pocket for something.
She’d assumed he was digging a tool out of his pocket.
She was surprised to see him produce a small gift-wrapped box. White wrapping paper with a little pink bow. The box had gotten roughed up while riding in Jimmy’s pocket but that wasn’t the sort of thing Jimmy would have thought about.
“Got something for you, Amy,” Jimmy said, handing her the box and smiling shyly.
She accepted it with a smile of her own.
“They told me you won your case today, so I thought I’d get you something.”
“That was very sweet of you, Jimmy. Thanks.”
“You can open it up. I won’t care.”
Jimmy spoke with a certain halting quality to his words, as if he weren’t quite going to get to the next phrase.
Jimmy was Amy’s age. They’d gone through grade and high school together. These days, Jimmy was a huge, lumbering giant. The summer of high school graduation he’d been struck in the head while playing baseball. His injury had left him severely impaired. He had the personality of a ten-year-old. It was odd, seeing a big man like him, one who looked so purposeful, and with a full head of graying hair, talk like a young boy. You could never be sure what Jimmy understood — or didn’t understand.
“Well, that sounds like a good idea,” she said to his suggestion of opening up the package.
She eased the ribbon off and then started to neatly undo the paper.
“Mrs. Foster wrapped it up for me nice and pretty,” Jimmy said, looming over her.
“She did a great job, Jimmy.”
She opened the package and there it was.
“It’s purty, don’t you think?”
“I sure do.”
“Hold it up to the sun.”
She did just that.
“See how it sparkles?”
“It’s lovely, Jimmy. It really is.”
“I told Mrs. Foster you’d like it.”
“Well, you were right.”
“Will you put it in the front window with the other ones I brought you?”
“I sure will.”
The shy grin again. “I dreamed about you again last night, Amy.”
“Who’d I look like this time? Dracula?”
He grinned. “You only looked like Frankenstein that one time, Amy, and that was ’cause I seen that Frankenstein movie that one night.”
Usually when men told you they’d had dreams about you, the idea was romance or sex or both.
“I dreamed you’n me got married.”
His words stunned Amy. She didn’t know what to say. The important thing was not to hurt his feelings. Jimmy could be very sensitive. Once, she’d said something cross to him and huge silver tears had appeared instantly in the corners of his eyes.
“That’s very sweet, Jimmy.”
“You was in a white dress. You looked real beautiful.”
“And what were you wearing, Jimmy?”
“Me?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Oh, you know, one of them black suits men wear to big fancy parties.”
“Dinner jackets?”
“Yeah. Dinner jackets.”
“Did we have a lot of guests at the wedding?”
“Amy?”
“Yes, Jimmy?”
“You’re not makin’ fun of me, are you?”
“Oh, no,” Amy said, sliding her arm through his. He smelled of heat and sweat. “I’d never make fun of you, Jimmy.”
“That’s why I like you and Richie so much. You’re always nice to me. Richie even said he’d take me up to the old line shack again someday.” Back when electricity was brought to the rural areas, the power company built a line shack for their workers in the boonies. Jimmy loved it when Richie went up there with him.
“People shouldn’t make fun of you.”
“One day, Mrs. Watts said I was just this big dumb guy who was a burden to everybody since my mom died and couldn’t take care of me no more.”
“She shouldn’t have said that, Jimmy.”
“It made me cry.”
“It would’ve made me cry, too.”
“Honest?”
“Honest. Now tell me more about our wedding.”
Jimmy smiled. “Well, they tied balloons to the bumper of our car. You know what kind of car it was?”
“What kind?”
“A new Cadillac. Right from the showroom over at Gruber’s Cadillac-Oldsmobile.”
“He let us borrow it. Mr. Gruber must’ve been in a very good mood. He’s not usually that generous.”
“No, he just give it to us.”
“He did? Mr. Gruber?”
“Uh-huh. That was the best part of the dream. I was just walkin’ down the street the way I do and I was walkin’ past the showroom and Mr. Gruber come out and said, T hear you’re marryin’ Amy’n I want you to have this brand-new Cadillac.’ ”
Then Jimmy said, “Hey, watch this. Three out of three.” He picked up three small rocks from the ground, kicked back like a major league pitcher, and then let them fly, one at a time, at the nearby oak tree.
“Pretty good, huh?”
Before his accident, Jimmy had wanted to pitch in the local American Legion league. These days, he just threw rocks a lot to convince you — and himself — that he still had the talent. He must have spent half an hour a day throwing rocks at trees.
Inside, the phone was ringing.
“I guess I’d better go get that.”
“You looked real, real purty, Amy. I wish I had a photo of it.”
Every once in a while, Jimmy came up with intriguing if not downright poetic ideas.
Photographs of your dreams.
It really was a lovely idea.
Chaucer, her cat, was waiting for her right inside the kitchen door. He’d likely been there ever since he heard her pull in the driveway.
Chaucer was an overfed tabby who’d shown up at her back door one day covered with fleas and looking horribly lost and frightened. He’d appeared to be about three weeks old.
Amy advertised him in the lost-and-found section of the local paper. Nobody claimed him. Amy had herself a cat.