Southern Discomfort (5 page)

As Ambrose escorted Mrs. Englert from the courtroom, most of the attorneys left, too.

No blood drawn from the new kid today.

When we resumed after a fifteen-minute recess, Cyl DeGraffenried was back behind the prosecutor's table.

First up was a DWI revoked license and I gave him ninety days of active jail time. Even though it was my toughest sentence yet, I didn't give it a second thought. His daddy owns the largest building supply business between Raleigh and Wilmington, and I guess it was daddy's money paying for the services of Zack Young to defend him.

Zack's probably the best attorney in Colleton County, but I'd seen his client in this particular courtroom a lot of mornings over the last three years since he got his driver's license and I knew he'd had the benefit of doubt extended to him more times than one.

Zack gave notice of appeal and asked for bail.

I looked to Cyl, who stood and said, "Your Honor, he's only nineteen; he can't even buy beer legally, yet this is his fourth DWI. If you'll look at his record, you'll see that not only does he drink, he just will
not
stay off the road when he's drinking. So far, he hasn't killed anyone, but by the law of averages, he's overdue. The state recommends that bail be denied on the grounds that he does pose a danger both to himself and to the community."

For once I thoroughly agreed with her. "But we can't deny bail," I said before Zack could protest. "So how about we make this a half-million cash bond?"

Zack bolted upright. "
Cash
bond? Your Honor, my client's father may own Tri-County Supply, but even he can't raise that kind of cash money at the snap of his fingers."

"Good," I said. "Bailiff, take the defendant into custody."

Three rows back, a fortyish woman in a designer black-and-white polished cotton and white jade necklace rose with a devastated face as Zack came down the aisle to her. They went out together with Zack patting her shoulder.

Mrs. Tri-County Supply. But under the expensive dress and jewelry, a mother too, it would seem.

We briskly disposed of the rest of the calendar before lunch and I was about to adjourn for the day when a Mexican hurried up to Doug from the back of the room, waving a shiny plastic card. His English was so poor that Doug couldn't understand what he was saying, nor why he kept waving the card toward me.

It was the bailiff who finally recognized him. "Tuesday," he reminded me. "Driving without a valid license. You gave him till today to bring you a North Carolina license."

"Jaime Ramiro Chavez," said the preacher. "The man you were never going to forget."

"Welcome to the bench, Judge Knott," said the pragmatist.

"Load-bearing structural members support and transfer the loads on the structure while remaining in equilibrium with each other."

In my teens, Friday nights were TGIF necking at the only drive-in left in Colleton County, hotdogs with slaw and chili at the Tastee-Freez afterwards, and cruising Cotton Grove in an endless looping traffic jam of open convertibles and loaded pickup trucks, every radio blasting—R&R going head-to-head with the Okie from Muskogee.

All through my twenties, except for the times I lived off, winter Friday nights were dinner dates and dancing at one of the Raleigh clubs; in summer, they were often the beginning of lazy weekends spent shagging at the beach, before everybody drifted off and got married or settled into "meaningful relationships."

Now that I'm in my thirties, a lot of the people I used to party with are back single again, only this time we all have so many strings attached, partying is almost more effort than its worth.

Terry Wilson had called me earlier in the week. His fifteen-year-old son, Stanton, was in a summertime baseball league and they were scheduled to take on the Dobbs team Friday night. Did I want to watch?

"Sure," I said. Terry and I go back a ways and I've known Stanton since he was six and Terry used to get him for the weekends. Terry's been married and divorced again since then. As an SBI agent, he was working narcotics undercover at the time. Hell on marriages. On Friday I played phone tag and finally left a message at SBI headquarters that I'd meet them at the field because I had to drop by a funeral home first.

Just because I had that fall's election wired didn't mean I could let up. The mother of one of the county commissioners had died. I never met the woman, but her son is one who'd remember if I didn't go and offer my condolences. Besides, once you gain elective office, you find yourself treating almost every gathering as another golden opportunity to press the flesh.

I was in and out in under forty minutes, but then I had to go home and change from funeral home decorum to jeans and sneakers.

The game was tied 1-1 when I got there in the bottom of the second and it stayed that way through the next six innings. Two of my nephews were playing for Dobbs, so I sat on a bleacher between home and third with Terry and my brothers and their wives, and I hollered for both sides indiscriminately. In the top of the ninth, Stanton batted in the go-ahead run for his team; in the bottom, as shortstop, he caught a hard-hit line drive down the middle and stepped on second before my nephew could get back from third. Unassisted doubleplay. A high pop-up to center ended the game.

Terry yelled himself hoarse, hugged me hard, and wanted to take everybody out for pizza, including my two nephews and their parents.

"Can't do it," I said. "We carpenters have to get a full night's sleep."

All through the game, my brothers had teased me about being so out of shape I probably wasn't fit to swing anything heavier than a gavel—I swear, I can't spit in Dobbs without having a brother in California call up the next day and tell me spitting's not very ladylike. They'd heard I was borrowing tools from Herman and thought they'd get my goat singing choruses of "If I Were a Carpenter and You Were a Lady"—words changed to suit my situation, of course.

"Better do a good job," said Will as we climbed down from the bleachers, "or ol’ Rufus here'll make you do it all over again."

My eyes met those of a trim, fiftyish man with thinning gray hair and an easy smile who had been seated a few rows down from us and whom we had overtaken on our way out. I'd seen that face around the courthouse occasionally, but couldn't remember that we'd ever been introduced. Will knows everybody by their first names, of course.

"Say what, young man?"

"You know my sister, don't you?" Will said. "Deborah, this is Rufus Dayley. He's the county's chief building inspector."

"Everybody knows who Judge Knott is," he said gallantly. "Pleased to meet you, ma'am. Did I hear Will say you're building something?"

"Only helping," I said.

Will couldn't let it go. "She's gonna be pounding nails tomorrow over at that house those women are building by themselves."

"Oh, yes." Dayley nodded. "I've had to pay one of my men overtime, so we can fit the inspections in around you weekend workers." He seemed to hear the less-than-gracious tone in his voice and backpedaled for my benefit. "Of course, if we're going to have a lady judge on the job, I'll have to tell him to go easy on y'all."

"Oh,
please
don't do that, Mr. Dayley." Girlish sweetness sugared my words till it's a miracle I didn't choke. "Why, I'd just
hate
for him to think you've got a different set of standards for people you know."

He had to use his fingers to work it out, and then he didn't know whether or not to take it as a joke. His laughter sounded forced as he wished us a good evening.

Amy shook her head. "I'm no feminist, but—" she began.

"I'm a feminist,
and
," I grinned.

"Can't take you anywhere," Terry grumbled.

Out in the clay-and-gravel parking lot, the night air was hot and still. White moths fluttered in the headlights as the cars pulled out in swirls of heavy red dust that fell straight back to the ground. No moon and too hazy to see many stars. Terry's hunted and fished with all my brothers, and we stood and talked lazily about dogs and bass till the boys were released by their coaches.

They were laughing as they came up, loping dark shapes silhouetted by the field lights behind them. It'd been a satisfying, hard-fought game, nothing sloppy on either side and none of the three had been charged with errors, so they felt good about their performances. I hugged all three of them, loving their gangly height, their awkward social graces, their clean sweaty smell like young horses that had galloped through long grassy pastures. Aunts and former-almost-stepmothers can get away with stuff like that.

"Aren't you coming with us?" they chorused as car keys jingled and our group scattered across the nearly empty parking lot. "Aw, come on, Aunt Deb'rah."

"Next time," I promised. I got a brotherly kiss and a "Seeya, gal" from Terry, then he was gone, too.

For a small town Friday night, the main streets back through Dobbs were busy with cars and trucks full of couples sitting close to each other, wrapped in their own bliss. As I drove through the white brick gate and pulled up to the side entrance of the house, WQDR was playing the Judds's "Grandpa, Tell Me 'Bout the Good Old Days."

"And the good old nights," sighed the pragmatist, even as the preacher was patting me on the head in approval. —Bout time you quit burning your candle at both ends."

Lights were still burning down in Aunt Zell and Uncle Ash's sitting room, but I went on up to my bedroom, brushed my teeth, popped a cassette of Donovan's Reef in my VCR and was sound asleep before the drunken Aussies had sung a single chorus of "Waltzing Matilda."

Next morning, Annie Sue came for me well before seven in one of the company's four trucks. She pulled right up to the front veranda and leaned on the horn till Aunt Zell went out and flapped a dishtowel at her to make her hush.

"Some folks in this neighborhood like to sleep on Saturdays," she scolded as Annie Sue followed her back down the wide hall to the kitchen where I was finishing off a plate of sausage and eggs.

"Sorry, Miss Zell," said Annie Sue. She snagged a biscuit and didn't look one bit repentant to me. No, ma'am, she didn't want a glass of milk or a cup of coffee; and no, she didn't want to sit either. Eagerness to get going kept her lithe young body in perpetual motion until she suddenly spotted the cardboard box in the corner of the kitchen.

"Oh, is that the puppy you were telling us about?" She touched the fat little rump and the puppy immediately began to cry and snuffle about. "Oh, he's darling! May I pick him up?"

"And feed him," said Aunt Zell, handing her the pup's nursing bottle as Uncle Ash came into the big sunlit kitchen.

"Here, now, what's all this hoo-hawing this early in the morning?" He cocked his head at my niece and said, "Well, it's plain as those blue eyes in your head that you're a Knott. Haywood's or Herman's?"

She smiled back at him as the wiggly little puppy in her lap suckled noisily. "Herman's, Mr. Ash. I'm sorry if I woke you up."

"Not you, child. It was the smell of Miss Zell's coffee." His face was smooth and rosy from its morning shave. "She's a sneaky lady. Leaves the door open on purpose just to roust me out."

Aunt Zell rosied up herself. Married forty years this May and they were still like that. I could never decide if it was natural, if they worked at it, or if it was because Uncle Ash was on the road so much as a buyer for one of the big tobacco companies. He'd been saving his frequent flyer miles and in less than two weeks, they were flying off to Paris for a second honeymoon, something Uncle Ash had been wanting to do ever since RDU became an international airport with direct flights to Paris.

From the day he brought home the tickets, there'd been an air of "Let the Games Begin!" Nice to be around.

He gave Aunt Zell a squeeze, then poured himself a cup of coffee and topped my cup, too. The puppy held our attention. It was about two and a half weeks old and required round-the-clock feeding every four hours, which was why there were dark circles under Aunt Zell’s eyes.

Still didn't have a name, though. Aunt Zell was of the school that believed an animal would reveal its real name if you waited long enough. Of course, Aunt Zell once owned a dog that was called Dog from the day Uncle Ash brought it home till the day it got hit by a truck three years later.

Today she was trying out the names of gods: Thor, Zeus, Apollo. "What do y'all think of Jupiter?"

"How about Greedyguts?" Uncle Ash teased.

"Poor little orphan," Annie Sue cooed. "What do you reckon happened to its mother?"

Aunt Zell shrugged. "Sallie had her a box fixed out in the garage where she could come and go. She thinks the mama dog must have been moving them somewhere else and either got hit by a car or just stolen because she took one of the puppies and never came back for the other four and that's certainly not natural."

Annie Sue set the pup on the floor and it took a few wobbly steps toward Aunt Zell, who scooped it up and matter-of-factly began to sponge its bottom with a warm damp washcloth. The short lapping strokes she used were supposed to feel like its mama's tongue because that's the way nursing bitches stimulate their babies to urinate and defecate.

Puppies or nieces, Aunt Zell has always been a nurturer and, as I drained my cup and picked up my gloves and cap, she cautioned, "Now don't you overdo out there today."

"I bet you're gonna have bad sore muscles tonight," said Uncle Ash. "Maybe Miss Zell and me'll let you have the Jacuzzi first tonight."

Annie Sue was thoughtful as we climbed into the truck. "You mean they still get in a Jacuzzi together? At their age? They're older than Mom and Dad."

Not really, I thought. Through closed doors I had heard them splashing and cavorting like teenagers more than once. No way could I imagine Herman and Nadine in a tub together. Both naked
and
with the lights on?

I didn't think Annie Sue could either.