Mad Cow Nightmare (27 page)

There was no reply, only the deep, erratic breathing, an occasional moan like she was dreaming of lost cows. She was still in her barn clothes. Sharon had tried to undress her but Ruth would have none of it—she’d fought even in her sleep. If she didn’t come to by tomorrow morning, Colm decided, he’d take her to the hospital. Of course, Ruth had no health insurance, couldn’t afford it—she’d be furious if he took her to the hospital.

Another thought occurred to him. She hadn’t peed in hours— had she? He pulled back the covers, but the bed was dry. Jeez, she must have to do something. . . . “Ruthie?” He said it again louder, then shook her. This was getting to be ridiculous, she had to wake up and face life. Colm’s great-great-grandfather had come over from Ireland during the famine. He’d buried his parents and left his farm: he knew what it was to lose everything. Ruth had to learn to face adversity.

“Ruth, wake up, goddammit. They need you in the barn.”

She opened a rich brown eye, it glared at him through the tangle of hair. Then shut again. She pushed deeper into the covers. The voice came back at him as if from underwater. “Go ‘way. Leave me ‘lone. Go ‘way.”

Downstairs a familiar voice was hollering: “Ruth—Ruth? Ruth, it’s Franny, I have something to show you I found in the swamp. Sharon said you’re upstairs in bed. It’s important, Ruth, it can’t wait. Ruth? Can I come up?”

“Jesus,” Colm said, and ran downstairs to ward off the woman. And was knocked over by the smell of horse. The heat intensified the smell; he clapped a hand to his nose. At the same time, the bathroom door opened and there was Maggie, a mere towel between her bare self and the world. Her red hair was wet and wild, her head haloed by steam. “I forgot to bring clean clothes,” she said.

“She was taking a shower,” he told Franny, aware of the stupid grin on his face. “My cousin’s wife,” he added, seeing Franny’s open mouth. “My third cousin, to be exact. Well, maybe fourth, I don’t know. They’re the ones who live in the trailer. You two’ve probably met. You just didn’t, um, recognize her.” He pointed.

“I came to see Ruth,” Franny said, her blinders on, and started upstairs. She had something dangling from her fingers. Colm couldn’t make it out because of the steam hanging in the air from Maggie’s shower.

“You can’t go up there. She won’t see you. She won’t see anyone.” He held her back by the arm.

“What’s that in your hand?” Maggie cried, and lunged toward Franny. Her towel fell off and Colm had to look—what else could he do? He gave up, sank into a chair. It was too much. Too too damn much. Naked women, hysterical women, crazy women! He was wishing he was back in his father’s mortuary. Dead people didn’t shout and run around naked.

“That was Nola’s. What were you doing with that, you!” Maggie held up the object. Colm saw a small gold cross hanging from a leather cord. It looked like any gold cross to Colm, but Maggie seemed to recognize it. She was turning it over in her hand, pressing it to her chest. Colm tried not to look at Maggie—but what could a man do? He was here first.

“I knew it! It was Nola took Ophelia from my barn!” Franny cried.

“What? She never!” yelled Maggie, waving a towel, like any minute she’d wrap it around Franny’s neck. “Nola’s afraid of horses. Why would she go and steal one?”

“She had one later, didn’t she? They saw her and my baby at that orchard.” Franny smiled grimly, she had reason on her side.

“That doesn’t mean she stole it in the first place.” Maggie wrapped the towel about her torso, grabbed up her bundle of dirty clothes, stomped out of the kitchen.

“It’s evidence. I found it in the swamp. You can’t take evidence!” Franny cried, and ran out after her.

Colm let them go. He wasn’t in cop mode today. He just wanted Ruth back in his life.

Though it was an interesting thought. The traveller woman stealing that horse. Possible, he supposed. Even if she was leery of horses, it was a means of getting away. Besides, who could believe what Maggie said? Colm had had a few bits of dialogue with Maggie that didn’t add up.

Or had someone gone to the swamp later and planted the cross? He had to think of that.

The thought struck him that Nola might have ridden the horse into the swamp where she’d feel safe, and Ritchie found her there and she strangled him. A furious woman could strangle a bigger person than herself, he was certain of that—he knew his Ruthie. The fury could do it. If so, he thought, they’d have to find Nola. And soon.

Through the window he saw the two women running down into the pasture. Franny was gaining on the younger one. Goddammit, he didn’t need to have to break up a fight between two screaming females. But jeez, he’d have to go into his cop mode, run them down.

He dashed outside. “Hey! Stop! Will you both stop? Let me have the damn thing—it’s evidence.”

“Evidence! What did I tell you?” Franny hollered back over her shoulder, and kept on running.

* * * *

Sometime in the middle of the night Ruth staggered up out of bed, stood a moment, ghostlike in her tan coveralls, then headed for the closet. Afraid of what she might do there, Colm led her to the bathroom, where she peed in silence. He might have been a nurse, or no one at all—certainly no one of importance to her.

He handed her the toilet paper and she wiped herself, pulled up the coveralls, then turned and shuffled back zombielike into the bedroom.

He wasn’t going to let her get away with it. He turned on the light, shone it in her face. “Ruthie. It’s me, Colm, your lover. Talk to me, Ruthie.”

She rolled over on her left side, her rump bumping up whalelike under the sheet.

“Ruthie, we have new evidence.” He described the gold cross, told how he and Franny had wrestled the cross away from a shrieking Maggie. “It was a scene, I’ll tell you. The potbellied pig got loose in the middle of it, the old lady running after, screaming like a banshee. Maggie pulling Franny’s hair—then throwing potatoes at me, a whole bushel basket of ‘em, jeez—I’m all black and blue. Look.” He dangled an arm in front of her face. Tried to make her laugh.

Ruth didn’t move. But she was awake, he knew she was awake. He knew the strong, raspy breathing of her sleep mode—and this time it was shallow.

“So this proves Nola did it, right? We’ll get the prints off the cross, prove it. She strangled him with the reins and then took off with the mare. Franny thinks the mare got into the fight, too, bit the cord right off Nola’s neck. Quite a scene, huh?”

Ruth burrowed deeper into the pillow and finally Colm gave up. He needed the sleep himself. He’d promised Sharon he’d get up at four-thirty and help prep the cows. It was a dirty, smelly business, prepping cows, but his conscience made him agree. His watch read one-fifty. Less than three hours till he’d have to get up. He’d have to sleep fast. He turned out the light.

He spooned into Ruth’s back, shoved an arm under her pillow, and draped the other arm around her breast. She always liked that position: it was intimate, warm, loving; she’d give soft sighs that made his eyes water.

Tonight there was silence. He sighed, but kept his arms around her. He was afraid to let go.

Chapter Twenty

Colm woke up to a series of screams from outside and, sitting up, cried, “Wha?” Ruth made a gurgling noise in her throat when he pulled his arm out from under her pillow but she didn’t move. There were more screams, a loud banging on the kitchen door. A flickering light filled the open south window, but it wasn’t yet dawn. His watch read three-ten.

“What’s going on?” he hollered, and Darren’s voice yelled back, “Trailer’s on fire. Call somebody!”

The screams grew louder. Colm dialed the fire department. “Willmarth farm,” he shouted into the receiver. “Fire down back in that trailer. People sleeping there. Hurry!”

Though he doubted anyone was still sleeping with all the noise. He stuck his bare feet into shoes and started out the door.

“Wait,” Ruth said.

He turned and there she was, sitting up, the whites of her eyes reddish, like a feral cat. “I’m coming,” she said. “No, don’t wait. Just go. I’m behind you. It’s those letter writers did it.”

“Huh?”

“The ones who wrote the letters to the editor. They hate travellers. They hate me.”

“Ruthie, no—it’s probably Boadie left a candle going. Damn pig knocked it over.”

But Ruth was awake and talking. She was running out behind him in bare feet. “Put on your shoes,” he called back, but her feet kept slapping along. He was done arguing with her. He ran. He heard cows bellowing in the field, Maggie’s mutt barking, the pig squealing—Old MacDonald’s farm on fire. Then the fire engines, streaming into the drive, men unreeling hoses, feet stomping the ground—what would happen to Ruth’s Christmas trees?

Ruth’s voice rose above the other noises, directing them to the trailer—though who could miss it? Flames were leaping out, smoke coiling into the air—the trailer was frail enough to begin with. Figures were pulling stuff out the back: lamps, rugs, screens, boxes, and more boxes. “Watch it!” he cried. “Firemen coming. Don’t go back in, you’ll get burned.”

No one listened. He made out Darren and Maggie—the latter dressed in a thin nightie—but at least dressed. Boadie, clutching the pig to her chest. Liz, leaping out of the back of the trailer, collapsing on the ground, and Maggie running to her, screaming. The firemen racing down with their axes and hoses. There was water everywhere, soaking the earth, the trees, people, animals. “Good for your trees, anyway,” he hollered at Ruth, but she wasn’t listening.

It was like facing an oncoming wave. Colm backed off and ran into a drenched Ruth. She shoved past him in her wet coveralls, her hair flat to her scalp, shouting orders, like she was the fire chief. She was pushing the old lady out of the spray, ordering Liz, “Stay put, dammit, you want to die from smoke inhalation?” Ordering Darren and Maggie, “Take your valuables up to my kitchen. They’ll get watersoaked here, trampled on. And don’t look back!”

Colm wasn’t immune to her orders. “Colm, go back to the kitchen and see to these people, quiet them down. Get them something to drink—hot cocoa.”

“Cold milk?” he suggested, a furnace himself. “Iced coffee?”

“Just do it,” she said.

* * * *

After the firemen left and the place was a charred desert (or so he imagined), when he and the angry, weeping travellers were sitting around the kitchen, dripping onto the scuffed linoleum—the door cracked open and Ruth reappeared.

“Well?” she said. “What happened? How’d it start?”

The weeping and wringing of hands ceased; they looked at one another. No one spoke.

“You were all sleeping, I suppose,” Ruth said. “No one left a cigarette burning? Maggie?”

“Not me!” Maggie cried, “I’m extra careful, I never—”

“A burner going on the stove?”

“Turned it off. I always do.” yelled Boadie. “ ‘Less Darren left it on, he was the last one up.”

“Not me,” Darren said. “I always check to see if Maggie dropped a fag or Boadie left the burner on. Or Liz didn’t snuff her secret candle after lights out.”

“I never. Didn’t! Don’t!” the women cried, and then went quiet, their eyes pleading with Ruth for support.

“Sometimes,” said Liz, pointing at her sister and then at Boadie, “you do.” Then it was a brouhaha as the three females lashed out at one another. Colm put his hands over his ears. All he wanted was to go back upstairs and sleep. But now they had four guests in the house. And a pig. Jeez.

“Okay,” said Ruth, “Colm and I will go back down with a flashlight and take a look. Don’t touch anything down there—nothing! There’s no rain in sight. Your things won’t get wet out there on the ground.”

“They’re already ruined from those hoses,” Boadie complained, and Maggie burst into loud sobs. Darren put his arms around her and rocked her.

Colm shut his eyes. He couldn’t take all this. Was he still supposed to go out—he checked his watch—in one hour and prep the cows? The cows were probably spooked, too, by the yelling and the fire. God knew what mood they’d be in. He’d once been kicked and fouled with manure, helping Ruth tag the cows’ ears. He wouldn’t want to repeat the experience.

Ruth was busy pulling pillows, sheets, and towels out of a downstairs closet. She ordered Maggie and Darren into daughter Emily’s room—”a double bed there, Keeley can have the couch, and Boadie and Liz, you can have Vic’s room. Vie won’t be back till late next week. By then—well, God knows what by then. We’ll just have to get you another trailer, that’s all. You have insurance?”

“Just minimum insurance—I didn’t read the fine print.” Darren shook his head woefully.

“We’ll worry about that in the morning,” Ruth said. “You coming, Colm?”

“So everyone gets to sleep but us?” Colm complained as they went out into the charred night. A blanket of heat enveloped him; he waved it off but it clung to his skin. This time at least Ruth had pulled on her boots. She seemed full of beans; after all, she’d had almost twenty hours of sleep. His joy at Ruth’s revival was over; he just wanted to go to bed. He wanted the travellers to go back to New York. Maybe they would, with their trailer burned up—that was a hopeful thought. It was a fiery, smoking ruin when the firemen departed.

But Ruth had him by the wrist, dragging him with her, down into the scorched pasture where the astonished cows were standing in line behind Zelda, staring at the ashen remains; he could see their dark silhouettes in the half-moon that, oddly enough, was still shining down at three-forty-five in the morning. But then, everything was out of sync these days. He remembered that black Mercury, patrolling the road.

“Let’s wait till daylight, go back to bed,” he argued, his last shot. “We won’t find anything in the dark.”

She was pulling him onward, as though they were heading down into Hades. The downward slope increased their momentum, they were practically running—Ruth so crammed with energy he could hear the adrenaline pumping in her toes.

“It was arson,” she said. “You bet your boots it was arson. Someone—some
ones—
who wanted these people out of here. Who wanted my farm destroyed.”

She was yanking him forward so fast he was flying. “Jeez, Ruthie, have a heart.” But her fingers were steel on his wrist. They were at the trailer site now, the ground was still soaked from the hoses, the fire done but the air a reddish color, smoke curling up into it—an unbearable stench. Ruth was sweeping her flashlight around in wild circles. The light landed on something, passed by, then came back. She stooped for a closer look, then cried out loud, a whooping cry like a savage with his trophy scalp.