O Little Town (2 page)

CHAPTER 2

Buddy Briggs was a local boy who went into WWII with a young wife and came out with a young daughter he saw for the first time when she was three years old. He never wanted to leave either one of them again, and he didn’t. He tempered his dream of being the best pilot in the service and instead used what he’d learned in the Army to become the best cop in a small town that needed him. With those adventures behind him, now he sat behind a desk that both hampered him and protected him from life’s opportunities and disappointments.

Lt. Briggs was on the phone in the small cubbyhole his subordinates called his office. One of two plainclothesmen on the force, today he felt the full weight of his enviable position. That wasn’t a lawyer or a witness on the other end of the phone. It wasn’t the mechanic up the street telling him his car was ready or the dress shop on the corner calling to say his order was finally in. It was his wife, Amanda, and the news she just shared caused his face to turn from red to white and back to red again.

On the second cycle of changing colors, a sergeant poked his head in the door and handed him a note. Buddy glanced at it and laid it on the desk ink blotter.

“Amanda, I’ve gotta go. No, it’s not more important than what you’re telling me, but it’s my job. I gotta go. I’ll call you back just as soon as I can. I do care, and I’ll take care of it. We’ll take care of it. I promise you. Okay. Okay. Good-bye.”

But then he just sat there, pulled from the conversation not by the urgency in the note—though it was important to him—but by the urgency to have a minute to himself to consider what his wife had just told him. He needed to cool down and use all his professional power to stay calm and reasonable. He looked back at the note, frowned and yelled for the sergeant.

“Carl. What’s this all about? A shoplifter at Macalbee’s and you’re giving it to me? Don’t I have a few more important things to do around here than question a shoplifter in a dime store?”

“Your pal from the store called. What’s his name?”

“Milton?”

“Yeah, Sandridge. Milton Sandridge. He said to give it to you and to nobody else. He wants you to come personally.”

“That’s all you got?”

“I just take the messages, Lieutenant. You want me to send Sikes or Trainum?”

“No, I’ll take care of it.” At this he picked up the phone again and dialed the number from memory. Lois, always the efficient assistant manager, answered on the first ring. He could almost see her small, prim face under her tight, prim permanent and could even hear the perpetual worry lines around her tired gray eyes in the way she said, “Macalbee’s. Merry Christmas.”

“Lois, let me talk to Milton.”

“He’s not here. He’s down in the storeroom. You want me to go get him?”

Feeling the weight of all of his forty-two Christmases coming down on his shoulders, he sighed and said, “No,” and put the phone back in its cradle. He put on his overcoat and hat and walked out the door and down the alley for a half a block and into the back door of Macalbee’s. He knocked before opening the storeroom door and found Milton Sandridge sitting on a box of draperies, smoking.

Milton’s receding hairline seemed to recede a little more than the last time Buddy had seen him, and his white dress shirt already had that three o’clock sag. The way Milton leaned forward while rubbing his neck served as a barometer of the situation as he slouched more with each drag of the cigarette.

“You got a violent thief here you need me to shoot or just what is up?”

“I got a little thief for sure but she’s not violent. Not yet anyway. She’s in the bathroom right now.”

“What makes this one so special I couldn’t send a uniform to take care of it?”

“It’s Millie Franklin, the preacher’s daughter.”

“Millie? Are you sure she was stealing?”

“Her pockets are full. I haven’t checked them yet so I don’t know what all she took. I wanted you here before I took this thing any further.”

“And you let her go to the bathroom. You know she’s probably flushed all the evidence by now.”

As he spoke, his words were accented by the loud echo of a flushing toilet on the other side of the door marked Employees Only. That same door opened and a silent, pale, girl walked out and sat down on a box marked “Fragile.”

She was teenaged thin and looked even younger than fifteen, lost in her heavy navy winter coat. Her blonde hair was pulled back tight on her head, making her blue eyes look larger than they were. She was frail and cautious but there was something defiant about that sweet, apple-pie face that didn’t fear staring you in the eye.

Buddy opened his overcoat and removed his hat from a head of hair so thick and curly it showed no indenture from the brown fedora. He looked around and found a box to sit on that put him on her level.

“Millie,” Lt. Briggs said in his best professional-yet-fatherly voice, “what’s going on here?”

Millie shrugged as only a fifteen-year-old can.

“Did you take something from the store without paying for it?”

“I reckon.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know.”

“What did you take, Millie? Let me see your pockets.”

Millie stood and reached into the pockets of her jacket, pulled out two fistfuls of merchandise and laid them on a packing table. Buddy picked them up one by one. A pair of imitation leather gloves, a pack of bobby pins, two combs, a small picture frame with a headshot of Rhonda Fleming, and a boy’s ID bracelet. The whole mess came to less than twenty dollars. At least we were talking about petty larceny here. “Petty” made it sound good. “Larceny” made it sound bad.

“What were you gonna to do with this stuff, Millie?”

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t know? Didn’t you have something in mind when you pocketed these items?”

“I reckon.”

“Millie,” Milton interrupted, “I don’t want to cause you and your family any trouble, but if I don’t press charges, I could lose my job.”

Buddy cut his eyes at Milton with a look that said, “Shut up and let me handle this.”

“Millie,” Buddy said, leaning over and looking her in the eyes, “have you ever done this before?”

“Not really.”

Buddy rifled through the merchandise again. “Who’re the gloves for? You? They’re about your size. Do you really need bobby pins and combs and a picture frame that bad? And this bracelet. This is not for you is it?”

“They aren’t for me. They’re Christmas presents.”

“You got any money on you, Millie? Cause if you do, I think we can just walk this stuff up to the cash register and you can pay and we’ll all go home and forget all about it. What do you say?”

“I don’t have any money. I can get some, but I don’t have any with me.”

“You can go home and get some?”

Milton broke in again, “I can’t do that, Buddy. Too many people already know about this. I could get fired by the home company if they found out I let somebody go just because I know ’em. I can’t do it.”

“I said I
can
get the money not that I
will.
”

“What do you mean by that?” Lt. Briggs’ voice was all professional with no hint of fatherly anywhere to be heard.

“Do whatever you want to do with me. I don’t care. I’m not payin’ for anything. Take me to jail. I don’t care.” The blue in those young eyes was no longer pretty. Iced and penetrating and hard, but not pretty.

A funeral silence overcame the dusty stockroom and lingered for at least sixty seconds, which is a long time for three people to stare at one another. Lt. Briggs stuffed the pilfered items in his overcoat pockets, then took Millie Franklin by the arm and they walked not out the back door, but the length of the store to the front door and down Main Street until they were both out of Milton Sandridge’s line of sight. Customers and clerks alike watched the unlikely couple marching past the toys and kitchen utensils and finally the magazine rack and out the frosted doors. Some were silent, some were smiling, and some were just glad the Christmas season was almost over.

Milton stood in the storeroom doorway, lit another cigarette, and wiped the sweat from his forehead. Thirty-six degrees outside and he needed a cold drink.

CHAPTER 3

Two days before Christmas as many patients as possible had been sent home from Lenity General Hospital. Some would return the day after, but, for now, the hospital was only a third full and the second-floor waiting room was empty except for two sisters waiting for their father to wake up from his mid-morning nap in room 213. Walter Selman was seventy years of age and in perfect health, except for the flu bug that had hit him a week ago. Routine symptoms turned into something more serious a couple of days later, and he was suddenly facing the threat of spending Christmas morning in a crank-up bed watching a snowy television. He was not happy. As a matter of fact he was more angry than sick to hear him tell it. He mostly blamed his doctor son-in-law for the time he was spending in this antiseptic environment. When he slept, he was happier and more peaceful than he had been in days, but when he awoke, it would be hell to pay all over again for the family that was keeping him here.

Walter’s daughters, Colleen Sandridge and Doris Sterrett, were concerned for his health and at the same time a little amused at his attitude. He was a perfect mixture of love and dread in his waking hours.

“Do you think Camp will let him go home for Christmas day?” Colleen asked.

“That’s not officially his call. You know, being family, he can’t legally treat him as his patient. But he’ll get him out if it’s safe.”

“Where would he go? He can’t go home by himself. He’d have to stay with one of us.”

“I think it best if he stays with us. That way Camp will be there if he has any setbacks,” Doris said.

“But you have your kids. At our house it’s just Milton and me, and we have the room. It really is no problem.”

“We could always leave it up to him.”

“Yeah, that’s a good one. Like he’s not going to want to go home by himself. When Mamma was alive, she could handle him, but he’s going to get mad at us no matter what decision we make.”

“Let’s wait till Camp gets here. Maybe he’ll have a better idea.”

The room fell silent and they both went back to reading; Colleen her
Reader’s Digest
and Doris her
Look
. The room was silent till Doris finished leafing from the back to the front and laid the magazine in her lap. She looked at Colleen for a long time without saying anything.

Finally Colleen looked up and asked, “What?”

“I’m just wondering.”

“Wondering what?”

“Are you okay? I mean is everything all right?”

“Everything’s fine. Why do you ask?”

“Hey, you’re my little sister,” said Doris. “I can tell these things. I’ve always known when something was wrong.”

“Nothing’s wrong.”

“Colleen, you know what I mean. How are things between you and Milton?”

“Milton is Milton and all is well.”

“Oh, I really wish you would have adopted. And it’s still not too late. I shudder to think what life with just Dr. Campbell Sterrett would be like. I love him and all, don’t get me wrong. But it could get really … you, know. The kids make all the difference. Louis Wayne, of course, is practically grown. Did I tell you he made the varsity basketball team again? We were so proud of him. You’ve got to come to some of the games. The girls go crazy over him. But then you probably already know that. You teachers know everything about everybody. And little Hoyt. He was a blessing coming along nine years later. His big thing this year is Santa. He’s beginning to wonder, you know? I say tell him the truth and let it go but Camp wants to keep the mystery alive as long as possible. You know what I’m trying to say? You need something more. Maybe Milton needs something more. I tell you, it’s not too late.”

“Doris, we’re fine. You love your kids. I love your kids. Leave it at that. And as far as that Santa thing, Milton is playing Santa at the store Christmas Eve again this year. From two to four. Bring Hoyt by and I’ll tell Milton to give him an extra boost.”

“You weren’t listening … as usual. I said I want to tell him the truth.”

“Tell who the truth?” Dr. Campbell Sterrett, asked as he walked into the family waiting room. “When doctors are forced to tell the truth, the whole world is going to be in trouble.”

“Hi, Camp. “

“How’s my prettiest sister-in-law? And my prettiest wife?”

“What’s the verdict on Dad?” Doris stood, showing her impatience and eagerness to leave.

“I think we can take him home tomorrow. Maybe for good. If we get his temperature to stay down overnight, he’ll be okay.”

“To our house or to Colleen’s?”

“Better make that ours. There we always have a doctor in the house.”

Colleen smiled at Campbell’s feeble attempt at a joke. Doris sneered. Things were almost back to normal.

“Let’s go see if Dad’s awake.”

Walter was awake and everyone one on the second floor knew it. His TV blasted at full volume, the blinds were open wide, and he was in high gear. He looked up and saw his two daughters and his son-in-law come through the door.

“When am I gettin’ out of here?”

“Hi, Dad.” Colleen kissed him on the cheek.

“How about tomorrow … if you’re willing to come home with us and behave yourself?” Doris asked.

“Tomorrow is one day too late but if that’s the best I can do with the connections I have, then so be it.”

Campbell smiled and held his tongue.

“Dr. Yandell will have to make the official decision,” Doris added before Campbell had a chance to retort.

“That little bandicoot. He ain’t got no more business being a doctor than Hoyt does ridin’ a bull. He told me two days ago I had pneumonia. Then it was bronchitis. Now he’s gonna send me home. I oughta just get up and go right now. And I would if I knew where my pants were.”

“There’s a pair in the closet, but I’ll bring you some more clothes in the morning or Milton can bring them tonight when he comes.”

“Yeah, tell Milton to do that. I may want to go to the cafeteria and eat supper. Milton will take me.”

The temperature fell two more degrees outside and ten more in Walter’s room as Doris gathered her coat and she and Dr. Sterrett headed down the hall. Colleen stayed and fluffed Walter’s pillows and his spirits.