Calamity Jayne Heads West (27 page)

“Who’s this Kookymunga and who got solicited?” Gram demanded. “And where’s this friendly phallus you’re talking about?”

“Mother!” Aunt Kay said. “There are children pres-ent!” “Gramma, where is Gloria Grant?” I said, stepping over to the empty place-setting that held her name card. “Wasn’t she also invited to dinner?”

“Ain’t she here?” Gram asked, and I shook my head. “Well, don’t that beat all? She was at the wedding. Wasn’t she?” Gram asked. “I confess. I had my eye on a certain handsome feller and didn’t notice,” she added.

“Oh, Hannah, that’s nice of you to say,” Joe said, blushing.

“I was talking about that tight-bunned bellhop,” Gram said, sending me a gotta-keep-’em-on-their toes wink.

“So, who last saw Gloria Grant?” I asked.

“I visited with her before the wedding,” Joe said.

“You did?” Gram asked, giving her new groom a sharp look.

“While I was waiting for my beautiful bride to come downstairs,” Joe added. Gram nodded. “She got a phone call and stepped outside. I never saw her after that,” Joe said. “Honest!” he added, looking at my gammy.

“You think Gloria Grant took that fertility god?” Gram asked.

I stopped and turned to look at her. “Gram? How did
you
know I got you a fertility god as a gift?” I asked,and her eyes darted back and forth. I took a step in her direction. “Did you open that gift early?” Another step. Still no eye contact. “You did, didn’t you?” I accused.

“I figured what could it hurt?” Gram said. “It was for me anyway. And it was a good thing I did open it, ’cause the derned thing was broken,” she said.

I frowned. “The bottom came off again?” I asked. “That’s weird. I was pretty sure I’d fixed that,” I told her.

She shook her head. “Naw. It wasn’t the bottom. It was the winkie,” she said. “I gave it a twist and the damned thing came right off in my hand,” she said.

At hearing Gram’s description of her erectile en-counter, Joe Townsend’s eyes began to glimmer. Whether out of fear or excitement, I was not about to speculate. I shook my head.

“So, you broke my gift to you and just wrapped it back up?” I asked. “And then what? When you opened it up in front of everyone, I would look like a dope for giv-ing you a fertility god with a missing johnson?” I asked.

“What’s a johnson, Aunt Taylor?” Kelsey asked.

“Ask your mother,” Taylor said, putting a glass of champagne to her lips.

“Of course not, dear!” Gram said. “I wouldn’t do that to you!”

“Okay, so what
did
you do?” I asked, totally confused.

“I went out and bought a boney-fide, Native Ameri-can fertility fella. Saw it in a first-rate shop while I was dress hunting, with Kay. Wrapped that up instead,” she said. “This one was a beaut, too. Sleek lines,” she added. “Nice package, and I ain’t talkin’ ’bout the gift-wrappin’ either.”

I stared at her.

“You . . . bought . . . a different one?” I asked. “And you wrapped that one up?
That
was the one sitting on the table earlier today?” I asked.

Gram nodded.

“That bee-atch, Gloria Grant. I knew she wasn’t any better than she ought to be,” Gram said. “She was all over Joe here like an Indian blanket on a paint pony,” she added.

“Listen, Gram,” I said, walking up to her and taking each side of her face in each hand, smooshing her cheeks together. “This is very important. What did you do with the gift I bought you? The one you broke,” I added.

“You’re not going to try to glue it back together like you did the one you broke from my collection, are you?” she asked. ‘ “Cause he never was the same after that. You got his willie glued on cockeyed.”

I shook my head. “I’m not going to try to correct any inadequacies, Gram,” I said. “I just need to know where you put it. So. Where is it, ol’ woman?” I said, pasting a strained smile on my face.

“I stuck it in the bottom of Craig’s suitcase,” she said, and I stared at her. “Kimmie wants a baby,” she went on, “and I want a great-grandbaby while I’m still young enough to dandle it on my knee, so I figured what could it hurt? Maybe it could still do its thing even though its thing was detached.”

I took a step back and dropped my hands from her face. I turned to my brother Craig.

“Quick! Craig! Your key card!”

“What the—?” Craig said.

“Give it to her!” Taylor screamed and jumped to her feet, finally figuring out where I was headed with this.

“Would someone please tell me—”

“Now!” Sophie roared, and Craig furiously fumbled for the key.

“For God’s sake, here!” he said, holding it up. “Hell, did you tell everyone you wanted a kid?” he asked Kimmie. “Might as well have Tressa put it in the
Gazette
.”

I snatched the card from Craig’s fingers, kicked off my heels, and ran barefoot out of the room, heading for the stairs at a high lope, Taylor and Sophie on my tail.

“Was it the champagne?” I heard Gram inquire as we ran.

We rushed to Craig and Kimmie’s room and en-tered. I ran over to Craig’s suitcase—the much smaller one, naturally—and started tossing his clothes on the bed. Near the bottom I discovered Kookamunga. It took several additional minutes to locate his winkie.

I sat on the bed, Taylor on one side and Sophie on the other.

I picked the winkie up and looked at it.

“Ugh. That is downright disgusting,” Sophie said as we looked at it.

“Gramma said she twisted it and it came off,” I said. “I wonder . . .” I reinserted Kooky’s manhood in the opening and twisted one way and then the other. We heard a click and one side of the base cracked open.

“Would you look at that?” Sophie said. “I thought you said the base had fallen off. Wouldn’t that mean you’ve seen inside the statue’s base already?” she asked.

I examined the bottom of the statue. “I don’t know. There’s something weird about it. The dimensions don’t add up,” I said.

“You think?” Sophie quipped.

“Give me that,” Taylor ordered, and took the statue. “You’re right. There’s a small space along the side here that isn’t covered by that same base section,” she said, hading it back to me. “A tiny, secret compartment.”

We looked at each other. I took a deep breath and gently maneuvered the end piece so I could check in-side. I reached my fingertips in and pulled out a tiny object.

“Is that a flash drive?” Taylor asked.

I nodded and held it up, remembering Arturo’s words from the first clue:
He whose eye misses nothing is
aware of all that has gone on before and has made a record
.

“What do you suppose is on it?” Taylor asked.

I put it to my forehead in a Karnack the Magnifi-cent, I’m-picking-up-vibrations gesture from the clas-sic
Tonight Show
DVDs my dad still chuckled at. I closed my eyes.

“I see one washed-up actress who is about to have her greatest wish granted,” I said. “I see this star . . . in pictures once again,” I predicted.

“Who? Gloria Grant?” Taylor asked.

I nodded and concentrated for a few seconds longer. “Yes!” I said. “Yes! I see her! I see her! I see her in . . . mugshots!”

“Arturo used hidden cameras to capture the crimes in progress,” Raphael explained. “The ring of procur-ers and purchasers is rather extensive, but we’ve got some of the key players already in custody or under surveillance.

“Gloria Grant?” I asked, and Raphael nodded.

“She had to find some way to support herself once her career dried up,” he said. “I feel her son mostlikely talked her into starting a family smuggling busi-ness,” he added.

I frowned. “Her son? I didn’t even know she had a son. She never mentioned him,” I said.

Raphael handed me a picture. “That’s him,” he said, and I stared at the photo.

“Son of a Skecher! That’s Ozzy! My shoe fetish speed-dater from Numbers!” I yelled. “He admired my leather black half Calfy with the zippered sides and two and a half inch heels.” I looked at Gram. “You know the ones. You borrowed them for the senior cen-ter New Year’s Eve party,” I added. “This guy lifted So-phie’s designer bag?” I shook my head. “And I was certain you were the culprit.”

“Not I,” Raphael said. “It was Fabian.”

I raised an eyebrow. Fabian, not Fabio?

“That’s Fabian Carroll,” he said, motioning to the printed photo. “Apparently Grant starred in a beach movie or two with an actor so-named a long time ago,” he added. “Fabian here is your basic mooch, but not without intelligence. He organized the smuggling network and got the distribution setup. I imagine he also talked his mother into getting her spiritual ad-viser involved.”

“Cadence? Have you found her yet?” I asked, and Raphael shook his head.

“No. Not yet. We found no body at The Spiritual Boutique, but I am fairly certain she is deceased. I sus-pect Fabio Carroll realized her allegiance to the ring of smugglers was ending and he had to kill her. It is my belief we will shortly discover her body buried at one of the illegal excavation sites,” he said.

“Among the very artifacts and ancient relics she val-ued so much,” I observed sadly.

He nodded. “From what we have learned so far, itappears Cadence was pulled in initially because she desired the artifacts. In fact, we have discovered quite an extensive collection at her home. I think, however, when she began to realize how many of the artifacts were being sold and even leaving the country, Ca-dence had a change of heart and started to see this was not spiritually a good thing or the right thing for her, her business, or those who had left these gifts from the ages behind. However, backing out of a busi-ness this lucrative is clearly not without its own risk.” He sighed. “Anyway, with the evidence we have and the cooperation we’re receiving from Gloria Grant, I feel confident we have enough leverage to obtain a confession from Fabian Carroll. Ms. Grant seemed shocked to hear that her spiritual adviser had appar-ently met with foul play. Since she’ll be looking for a deal, I think it’s only a matter of time before we dis-cover the truth.”

“Poor Cadence,” I said. “She should have seen it coming.”

Raphael nodded.

“I’m still a little fuzzy on why Arturo chose Kooka-munga to place the clues and the Flash drive in,” I said.

Raphael looked uncomfortable. “I imagine he it was as safe a place as any to facilitate such an exchange,” he said. “That no one would pay good money for such an . . . unappealing slice of Native Americana.”

I winced. “Uh, could we keep that little observation between the two of us?” I asked.

He smiled. “Of course.”

“So. You really are one of the good guys,” I said. “Does Whitehead know?” I asked.

“She does now!” I heard, and looked up to discover Carena Whitehead had joined our little post-wedding party. “I can’t believe you hid this from me all thistime,” she said to Raphael. “How could you?” she asked.

His gaze locked on the fetching Carena like mine does on a Meat Lover’s pizza from Thunder Rolls Bowling Alley and a frothy mug of brewsky.

“How could I not?” he said. “You mean the world to me.”

I watched the romantic interlude with alternating emotions. Fascination, envy, curiosity, and yes, a wee bit of voyeurism thrown in just to be naughty.

A heavy arm settled on my shoulders. “Looks like you scared one more man into the arms of another woman, eh, Calamity?” Ranger Rick observed, his breath warm on my cheek.

I watched the couple embrace. “I’ll start to worry when I scare one into the arms of another man,” I re-sponded.

“I guess I owe you an apology, don’t I?” Ranger Rick said, gaining my undivided attention.

“Just one?” I asked. “I could’ve sworn we were into triple digits by now.”

He tucked a lock of hair that had escaped my tightly braided crown behind my ear. “You were right about Kookamunga,” he said.

“Which means?”

Townsend smiled. “I was wrong,” he admitted. “There. Happy? I guess it’s still hard for me to recon-cile the girl who stuffed my gym locker full of horse shit in high school with the ace cub reporter who keeps stepping in that same horse shit now but man-ages to somehow come out smelling like a rose. I’m sure you understand my difficulty.”

I looked into his firewater-colored eyes. “I’m sorry. I missed that last part. I got stuck back on ‘I was wrong,’ ” I said. “Frankly, I wasn’t sure I heard you right.”

“How about this? I learned a valuable lesson from you and Kookamunga, Calamity. One I hope will stay with me forever,” Ranger Rick stated.

I licked my desert-dry lips. “Lesson? What lesson?”

His arms went around my waist and he drew me to him. “Never judge a book by its cover, of course,” he said. “That there’s more to a person thanmeets the eye.”

I poked him in the chest. “Isn’t that what I’ve been trying to teach you all these years about a certain blonde, Mr. Ranger, sir? That looks can be deceiv-ing?” I said. “And you’re just now learning that?” I shook my head. “And people think
I’m
developmen-tally delayed.”

My recent exposure to a ten-year-old who initially had me rethinking the merits of aunthood, and to a Dances with Poles cousin comfortable enough in her own skin to shed her apparel and any shame associ-ated with not being a single-digit dress size, had re-minded me we were all works in progress.

“There’s a lesson here for you, too, you know,” Townsend said, gripping my arms.

I looked up at him. “Oh? And what might that be?” I asked.

He put a hand to my face and stroked my cheek with his thumb. “That beauty is in the eye of the be-holder, of course,” he said, looking into my wide-open eyes. “And right now? In the
arms
of the beholder, as well.”

I stared at Townsend, replaying his words. If he was the beholder, that would make me . . .

I put a hand to his forehead. “Is the altitude getting to you? Or have you been hitting the peace pipe again?” I asked. “Because you’re sure seein’ things that aren’t there, pilgrim.”