2 Heroes & Hooligans in Goose Pimple Junction (12 page)

“One moment, please.” She spoke into the intercom. “Dolly Parton on line one.”

A few seconds later, Johnny came on the phone. “Dolly, I stand corrected,” he said with a smile in his voice. “You said you’d call me, but I didn’t believe you.”

Martha Maye spoke a mile a minute. “Johnny, I didn’t want to bother you with this, but Saturday night somebody left a package at my doorstep, and today I think somebody’s been in my house.” She finally took a breath.

He sat straight up. “I’m putting you back on with Teenie. You stay on the line with her until I get there. I’m on my way. Be there in a jiffy.” Johnny punched a button on the phone, dropped the handset, and ran out of his office.

A sharp axe is better than big muscle.

~Southern Proverb

J
ohnny was true to his word. He arrived at Martha Maye’s house three minutes and twenty-four seconds after he hung up the phone. Martha Maye was waiting outside for him.

“You okay?” Johnny rushed up the walk, his face full of concern.

“I’m okay.” She nodded. “Just really scared.”

“What happened?”

She sensed he wanted to reach for her. And she wanted him to pull her into his arms and comfort her. But he didn’t. He was, after all, there in an official capacity. And she really hadn’t yet given him the green light to be anything but official. At that moment, she sorely wished she were divorced. She led him inside.

“I came home from school and found this on my kitchen table.” She handed him a homemade CD. “I was so scared, I grabbed my phone and hightailed it outside to call you, thanking my lucky stars that I sent Butterbean over to Mama’s after school.”

Johnny looked at the CD in his hand. “What’s on it?”

“C’mere and hear for yourself.” She put the CD into a player, and the song “If I Had Shot You When I Wanted To, I’d Be Out by Now” came on.

“What the—”

“That’s not all.” She hit Skip and then pressed Play. Johnny looked at her questioningly. Her eyes went to the CD player, not able to hold his gaze. She held up one finger. “Just wait.”

A new song came on: “My Head Hurts, My Feet Stink, and I Don’t Love You.”

“Mart, are you kidding me?”

She slowly shook her head. “I wish I were. Hold on, that isn’t all, either.” She pushed Skip again, and when she hit Play, a third song came on: “You’re a Hangnail on My Heart, and I’m Gonna Cut You Off.”

“Great day in the morning, Martha Maye. This was on your kitchen table?” Johnny’s voice was an octave or two higher than normal.

“Yes sir,” Martha Maye sank into a chair and put her face in her hands. “All wrapped up in a pretty package.”

“Who would do that?”

“Don’t you think I would have been forthcoming with that information if I had it?” Martha Maye’s tone came out harsher than she meant. Her head snapped up, and she saw that Johnny looked hurt, so she added, “How about I get us some sweet tea?”

Johnny called the station while Martha Maye poured sweet tea over ice in two glasses. She cut a lemon and put the wedges in a small bowl shaped and hand-painted like a lemon, and she put some Mississippi mud bars on a plate. She couldn’t help stealing glances at him through the doorway.

The man sure is handsome in a uniform. Heck, he looks good in anything. Matter fact, I’ll bet he’d look real good in nothing, too.
Martha Maye was so surprised she was having such impure thoughts, she jerked her hand up to her mouth, knocking the lemons out of the bowl, spilling the yellow wedges all over the table and sending the scent of lemon through the air.

Johnny came into the kitchen. “One of my officers will be bringing some things over. What in the world happened?” He bent to help her pick up the lemons.

“I must be all butterfingers today.” She washed the lemons and put them back in the bowl.

While they sat at the kitchen table and waited, Martha Maye admitted to him about the gifts.

He listened intently without interrupting her until she finished. “You’ve got yourself a stalker.”

“I know.” She slumped back against the chair. “I’m scared, Johnny.”

“Why’nt you tell me about this stuff before now?” Hurt, puzzlement, agitation, and concern played across his face.

She shrugged. “At first I thought it was just harmless, maybe one of my students. Then, to tell you the truth . . . oh Lordy, this is embarrassing.” She put her head in her hands.

“Tell me, Mart.” Johnny reached over and touched her arm.

“See, at first I thought maybe the gifts were from you, Johnny. I don’t mean to be presumptuous, and maybe I just hoped they were from you,” she said, finding the palms of her hands intensely interesting.

“Mart, number one, I like your presumptions.” He leaned forward with his elbows on his legs, dipping his head down so he could look at her face. “And number two, I wish I’d thought of it—except for the last two
gifts
, and number three,” his voice softened, and he reached for her hand, “I’m awful glad you hoped they were from me.”

His hand engulfed hers, and they stared at each other for a long moment. Johnny opened his mouth and then closed it when they heard Hank knock on the door and let himself in.

“Yoo-hoo, anybody home?”

“In here,” Johnny called, clearing his throat and standing up.

“Chief, I brought those things you asked for,” the officer said, coming into the kitchen. He held a black box by its handle in one hand and a sizable toolbox in the other.

“Thank you, Bean. I want you to dust for prints. There wasn’t any sign of a break-in, so dust all the doorknobs, do the countertop—oh Hell, you know what to do, just go do it. This is a B&E, no doubt about it, but she doesn’t think anything was taken. In fact, it was a backward B&E.”

Hank’s brow furrowed, and he looked quizzically at the chief.

“The perp left something instead of taking something,” Johnny explained.

Hank looked confused but just said, “Yes sir, Chief.”

Johnny took the toolbox and turned to Martha Maye.

“Mart, I’m going to install some dead bolts.”

“Excuse me?” Martha Maye stared at him.

“You need dead bolts on your doors. I’m putting them in right now.”

Martha Maye’s brow furrowed. “Sure.” She nodded. “Okay.” Another nod. “Thank you.” She stood and watched him install an extra lock in the front door as if he were her hero, then she followed him to the kitchen and watched him go to work on the back door. Johnny looked up at her at one point and saw her watching him.

“What?” he asked.

“Thank you, Johnny. Just . . . thank you.” Martha Maye paused, and then her head jerked up and she added, “Is it okay if I call you Johnny when you’re on duty?”

Honey interrupted Johnny’s answer when she suddenly rushed into the room. “What in the Hell’s bells is going on over here? Why are there two police cruisers here?”

“My secret admirer left me another gift. This time it was inside my house.”

“Oh my gosh!” The last word came out as two syllables: gow-ush. She hugged Martha Maye, and then held her at arm’s length. “Sweetie, are you all right?”

“I am now.”

Honey looked at Johnny working on the lock. “You moonlighting, Chief?”

“All in the line of duty, ma’am.”

“Ma’am. Pshaw.” She gave him a mild scolding look, but he was intent on his work and didn’t see it. “I’m only thirty-five. You call me ma’am again, and you’ll have to arrest me for assaulting a police officer.”

“Honey, he’s just a polite gentleman,” Martha Maye cut in, before things got out of hand. She could see Honey’s feathers were ruffled even as she joked.

“I just can’t believe all this is happening to you, Mart. How do you think he got in?”

“Don’t know. There isn’t any sign of a break-in. Nothing’s broken or torn up.”

“But she didn’t have the best of locks on her doors, either,” Johnny said, his eyes on the screwdriver in his hand. “One putty knife’s all a person would need to get through those old locks.”

Honey sat at the table and picked up a thick chocolate brownie with nuts and marshmallows, topped with an inch of chocolate icing. “Ooh, Mart, you know I love your Mississippi mud bars.”

Officer Beanblossom appeared in the kitchen doorway. “I think I got everything except for in here. Hidee, Ms. Winchester,” he said, seeing her at the table.

“Well, hidee yourself, big boy.” She exhaled a grunt through her nose. “‘Ms. Winchester.’ ‘Ma’am.’ Y’all are enough to break a girl’s heart.”

“Honey, they’re on duty. They’re just being professional. Don’t take it personally.”

She studied her fingernails and mumbled, “I’m a person. I take everything personally.” Honey crossed her longs legs, sat back, and looked up at Hank through her eyelashes. “In that case, do you want to frisk me, Officer Beanblossom?”

Hank blushed, as Johnny said, “Negative. But he would like to take your prints.” He stared pointedly at Hank.

“Oh. Yeah. Right.” Hank was flustered. He set the box down with a loud clang and fumbled with the latch. “I should get both of y’all’s prints for exclusionary purposes.”

Hank moved to the table and sat down next to Honey. She slowly licked the sticky chocolate residue off her fingers while she held Hank’s eyes. Red flushed across his face again and he looked away nervously. “I . . . I think Butterbean’s will be evident ‘cause they’re so small,” he stammered, getting the materials ready.

“Are you gonna fingerprint all my friends and family?” Martha Maye asked. “There must be a lot of people’s fingerprints in here.”

“Y’all will need to wash your hands before he fingerprints you.” Johnny stood up and tried the dead bolt he’d just installed. “Well, whatta you know. It works.” He handed Martha Maye a key. “You’ll have two different keys for your locks until you can get a locksmith over here to change them and give you one key for all of them.”

Hank began putting the materials back in the black box. “We’re all set, Chief. I’ll take all this back to the house and see if we get any hits.”

“Why are you taking them home?” Martha Maye asked.

“Not home. The house. The station house.”

Honey excused herself and walked the officer out, wiping a lemon on her fingers to remove the ink. Putting the tools away, Johnny turned to Martha Maye and said, “You know, Mart, we never did have that coffee.”

“No, sir. No we didn’t, Chief.”

“Oh, stop with the ‘Chief’ talk.”

She laughed softly, handing him the tools.

“It’s past quitting time for me,” he said, returning to his point. “How about we go now?”

“It’s pretty near dinnertime now, Johnny, and I’m supposed to go pick up Butterbean from Mama’s.”

“Maybe she could stay at Lou’s a little longer, and we could stretch coffee into some supper. If it’s all right with you,” Johnny added quickly.

“Well, I s’pose they won’t mind if Bean stays a while longer. Let me call and see.”

Ima Jean answered the phone. “Leggo my Eggo.”

“Aunt Imy, you’re using the phone, not the toaster,” Martha Maye said gently.

“Who’s that behind those Foster Grants?” Ima Jean shot back and Martha Maye suppressed a laugh. “It’s me, Aunt Imy, Martha Maye. Hireyew?”

“Somebody stole my waffles.”

“And your marbles,” Martha Maye whispered under her breath. Louder she said, “Waffles? I’m, sorry, Imy. Say, is Mama there?”

Lou came on the line. “What’s up, darlin’?”

“Aunt Imy sounds in rare form.”

“Oh, just another day in the nuthouse.” Lou whispered, “She thinks someone stole our waffles outta the freezer. I tried telling her Pickle prolly just ate them, but she’s all agitated about it.” Lou changed to her normal voice and said, “What’s going on, hon?”

“Mama, can Butterbean eat with y’all and stay just a while longer?”

“Of course she can. You all right?”

“I’m fine, Mama. I’m just going to get a bite to eat with Johnny.”

“It’s about damn time,” Lou shouted. Martha Maye’s eyes shot to Johnny, wondering if he’d heard her mother. Judging by his grin, he’d heard.

She turned her back to him, closing her eyes and pinching the bridge of her nose. “Okay, Mama. I’ll be over to get her in about an hour or two. Make sure she does her homework.”

She wanted to end the call before her mother could embarrass her any further, but Lou’s voice boomed out of the receiver: “Take your time. Don’t you come for Bean for at least two hours. Not a minute before. I mean it!”