- you don't understand what a big
deal that is for her, Navarre. It's Ruby admitting she's here for keeps; she ain't going to get away."
The sound of a motorboat went by out on the lake. The smell of burnt pork and beans was slowly giving way to cedar from the open windows.
"Where is she now?" I asked. "Do you know?"
Clyde gave me a look I couldn't quite read. "Yeah, I know. She don't always let me tag along."
"Like when she goes to meet with Matthew Pena?"
Clyde shook his head. "I ain't your enemy, Navarre. I ain't Garrett's enemy. But you ask me, you're barking up the wrong pole. I seen Garrett around Ruby, how they dance around each other. I seen how Garrett looked when she told him she was marrying Jimmy Doebler. You want to help your brother - maybe you should start by thinking: Hell, yeah, he killed the guy. Go from there. You understand me?"
"This advice from you, who wanted to kill Matthew Pena months ago?"
But when I met Clyde's eyes, I understood what he was saying. Clyde could believe Pena deserved to die. He could also believe Garrett had murdered Jimmy Doebler. He could also believe that Garrett was a decent man who deserved to be free. These ideas were not mutually exclusive. For Clyde, murder was no more astonishing than chicken pox, certainly no reason to judge a man.
I stood. "I'll keep your advice in mind, Clyde."
"And I won't kill you," he decided. "But stay off Ruby's boat, hear?"
I left Clyde on his chewing gum couch, Miata the ferocious dog sleeping at his feet.
Outside, the lake spread out glittering and blue, but for once I couldn't help seeing it the way Ruby must've seen it all her life - as a cool heavy funeral cloth over a million acres of land.
Date: Mon 12 Jun 2000 20:03:12 0400
ReplyTo: The Original Jimmy Buffet* List Sender: The Original Jimmy Buffett List From: Automatic digest processor Subject: Clara/First Show of the Season
She was sitting by the water, on the tailgate of the truck, not twenty feet from me.
Her hair had gone almost steel gray. Her face was swollen, no longer delicate. Fifty years of crying will do that to you. She wore a white blouse and white shorts, so she fairly well glowed in the night.
She would write a word or two, then look up and talk for a while, but she would look through me - dazed. I couldn't be sure if I was still there to her; I could only hope. I hoped she heard me tell her that this was a reunion.
The fact that she had the gun made it all the more exciting. I wasn't quite sure what would happen, how long I had. My recipe was still pretty new.
She was apologizing. She was crying.
It wasn't everything I wanted, but it was close. I felt that painful sting in my mouth, the tension of waiting, like I'd bitten into a lime and couldn't yet swallow. I wanted to step out of the darkness. I wanted to close the distance between us, embrace her, kiss her forehead.
But then, the intrusion.
I'd timed things as best I could, tried to err on the side of caution, but here came company, much too early - boots cracking twigs.
"Ma'am?" he called."You all right?"
She turned toward the voice.
She could've ended things for me right there. But in her mind, the deed was already done. She'd signed her name.
She raised the gun, and the intruder's voice got frantic. He ordered her to drop the weapon.
And then she turned the barrel, raised it to her mouth for a kiss.
A thousand tons of pressure, an entire miserable lifetime, escaped in one tremendous burst.
The intruder's face saved him then, it really did. I wanted to show myself. I wanted to destroy him. But his expression told me that Providence had spoken.
He was meant to see what he saw. I couldn't have hurt him any worse than that.
P.S. Sorry for the offtopic post.
It's going to be a great tour this summer.
First show tomorrow night, and I am pumped.
Chapter 23
Despite how close Jimmy's dome looked from the water, it took me half an hour to get back on the winding lakeshore roads.
I found no new presents on the front porch, no signs that anyone had tried to get past my newly installed lock. The minicam timer I'd placed on the door - set for motiondetection, three freezeframe shots per hit - had not been