Sue Ann said she’d relay that message, and her uncle pumped my hand, looked right at me and laughed like I was the funniest thing he’d ever seen, advised me again not to get caught, and left.
We sat on the couch. Sue Ann did not seem as puzzled as I was, so I asked her, “What was he talking about?”
“About not getting caught? What do you think? He knows you’re here to see me. He knows we’ve been alone together all afternoon in the house. He probably means don’t let my daddy catch you and me in my bedroom, silly. What else could he mean?”
“Oh, I don’t know.”
“He’s a fantastic uncle. Really great. I mean, look at his attitude about when you streaked my cousin’s wedding.”
Cousin’s wedding? Okay. Okay... now Uncle Phil the DeKalb Police Chief was making sense to me. I hadn’t had the time to put it together before.
Sue Ann had been staying at the Holiday Inn in DeKalb because she was there for the wedding. That’s what she’d been talking about earlier, when she said she knew how I figured out where she lived. She thought I had checked at the Holiday Inn to get her name, and that I’d found out she was the niece of the DeKalb Police Chief, and that I’d looked up the Chief to find out more about her.
“Tell me, Sue Ann,” I said. “Why weren’t you at the reception? Why were you in your swimming suit when I bumped into you?” Which of course was the reason why I hadn’t thought of connecting her to the wedding.
“I’d already been there,” she explained. “It was just a lot of old people, and boring relatives, and my cousin Kathy and her husband are older than I am too, so even the young guests were old. Clear into their twenties.”
“I’m twenty-one, Sue Ann.”
“But you don’t seem that old, silly.”
But I feel older, I thought. Much older.
“Anyway,” she continued, “I got bored and left. So did Mom. We caught heck later, because we missed out on the family picture. Either way, I guess you and me would’ve run into each other, huh?”
“I guess so.”
“Uncle Phil was tickled by all the publicity you got him by doing that at Kathy’s reception. It saved him money on the wedding pictures.”
“Yeah, he told me.”
“Are you getting tired of hanging around here? You want to go back and do some of the Founder’s Day stuff?”
“Maybe we should. Listen, I got to think for a few minutes. You suppose you could get me something to drink? A Coke or some ice tea or maybe some coffee?”
“Sure!”
She trotted off, and I sat and tried to put some more pieces together.
I doubted the Chief (Uncle Phil) had been talking about Sue Ann and me fooling around when he advised me not to get caught. But it was insanity to think he’d caught onto the robbery somehow and was not blowing the whistle because he liked me or thought it’d be good publicity for Wynning or something.
Then Sue Ann was handing me a glass of ice tea. I glanced up to thank her, and noticed she was naked.
When some girls take off their clothes, they just take off their clothes. When Sue Ann takes off her clothes, she’s naked.
I forgot my problems for a second and smiled and reached out for her and she let out a giggle and ran off.
And I got an idea.
No, not the idea you think...
Chapter 33
I found Elam sitting on the cement steps behind the Grange Hall. He was stripped down to his tee-shirt, with a dirty white apron around his waist and a battle-worn chef’s hat on his head. He was smoking a cigarette and looked tired and, well, content. Lights were on in the kitchen behind him, where some guys were busily and somewhat noisily washing dishes.
“Long time no see,” Elam said. “Have a seat.”
“I see you’ve been keeping busy,” I said, joining him on the steps.
“Keeping busy? Ha! Worked my butt off is what I did. Kid, I ain’t worked so hard in years. Hell, I even made, what?” He stuck his hand in his pocket, took out some bills and some change. “Twenty-four dollars and forty cents.”
“No kidding? How’d you manage that?”
“I told ’em I was just passin’ through and had stopped to see what all the Founder’s Day fuss was about, and heard the announcement they needed a cook, and I was one and’d be glad to do it. But since I wasn’t a native citizen or anything, I felt I should get something for my trouble. They offered me two forty an hour and I grabbed it.”
“You think it was smart, taking money from these people?”
“Would’ve been stupid not to. Ha! Why would a stranger offer to help out, otherwise? Just for the hell of it? Not damn likely. World ain’t built that way, kid. But I got to admit I had a good time. That’s a nice big kitchen to work in. Us short order jockeys usually get stuck in some closet with a griddle in it, and it’s a kick workin’ a nice big kitchen. People were okay, too. Not a bunch of hicks like I pictured.”
“It’s a nice little town.”
“Yeah,” Elam agreed, nodding. “Yeah, it is, isn’t it?”
We sat there for a few moments, not saying anything, just enjoying the breeze that was skimming through the trees that stood in a row behind the Grange Hall, ruffling the leaves like a proud father playing with his kid’s hair. I felt relaxed, almost comfortable.
I had dreaded coming to see Elam, even though I did have a way figured out to get out of town. Elam still frightened me, and parts of what I had to say to him might not go over too well. But right now, sitting here on the steps with him, enjoying the breeze, I didn’t think it was going to be so bad.
Finally Elam finished his cigarette, arched it into the grass where it sizzled for what seemed like forever. The longer it sizzled, the less comfortable I felt.
“So,” Elam said. “Where you been all day? I expected a progress report, now and then, you know.”
“The Highway Patrol car is still parked in front of the Mustang,” I said, “up against the bumper. The concession wagons are pulled in right behind. We’re as trapped as we ever were.”
“I see. Well, this Founder’s Day isn’t going to last all night.”
“No. Just till around two o’clock this morning, is all.”
Elam sighed. “Those lousy Highway Patrol guys must be getting paid overtime and then some. What are they doing at a thing like this, anyway? Why aren’t they out patrolling the highway where they belong?”
“The County Sheriff’s people are here, too,” I said, “Haven’t you seen those guys in the brown shirts and tan pants?”
“The guys that look like Forest Rangers or senile Boy Scouts or something? Yeah, I seen ’em. I didn’t see any badges or guns on ’em, though.”
“They don’t have any. They’re just a civilian volunteer outfit that helps out the Sheriff’s department at functions like this. Sue Ann says the Highway Patrol isn’t usually present for Founder’s Day, but because this is the Centennial and the Governor came and the road’s blocked off and everything, those two guys got assigned here.”
“Who the hell is Sue Ann?”
“That’s a long story.”
“I been workin’ in the kitchen all day, and you been foolin’ with something called Sue Ann?”
“Well, if you want to make a long story short, yes.”
“And I was telling you what a good time I had.”
“You made twenty-four bucks, didn’t you?”
“Yeah, and forty cents. So. Did you have anything else to tell me? Or did you just come around to say we’re still stuck here?”
“I have something else to tell you.”
“What, already?”
“I got a way figured out for us to get out of town.”