SAFELY BURIED Chapter 26: Eye Contact

“I like the beard,” she said with a big smile. “What can I get you to drink?” She had a new hairstyle with feathery curls and was wearing a striped dress that looked a bit like a sailor’s uniform.

“How about a scotch and soda,” I replied.

“Can do. I’ll be right back.”

I didn’t see anyone I knew out there, so I followed her inside. In the family room, several kids ranging in age from five to fifteen were lying around watching MTV. The younger ones were on the floor, the others on the furniture. Scott knelt straight up on the floor, jerking back and forth to a music video. Two of the boys were imitating him. Lillian gave them a disapproving, disappointed look, but they went on snickering as if they couldn’t help it.

More guests clustered in the kitchen and dining room. Jodie and a woman who bore some resemblance to her formed half of one cluster. Jodie did a double take and waved when she saw me. Then she said something to the guy standing next to her, and I realized they were together. He tilted his head to hear what she was saying, and his eyes came up to look at me. He had spiky blond hair and wore a thick gold chain around his neck and a small gold ring in one ear. I looked away, trying to act as if it didn’t matter that he was with Jodie. The island in the middle of the kitchen was covered with fruit, cheese, and small pastries. I helped myself to some sour grapes.

“Where’s the guest of honor?” I asked Lillian when she returned with my drink.

“The Judge? He’s around somewhere. I saw him talking to my father a while ago.”

She began introducing me to people. I got the feeling that some of them were surprised to see Lillian with a man. She took it in stride. She had a relaxed, unassertive manner, long on smiles and nods, short on words. She did not act the least bit proprietary toward me, but I wished I had not followed her inside.

One woman that Lillian introduced me to grabbed my arm and said insistently, “What happened to your face?”

It was not what I wanted to hear. “I tripped and fell and scraped it on a wall,” I told her.

She crinkled her pointy nose, baring big teeth and gums that made her look like a donkey and told me about someone she knew who had broken his back by falling off a ladder. He was paralyzed, spent his life in a wheelchair, had his spleen removed, couldn’t do anything for himself. . . . She went on and on. . . . The teeth moved closer and closer.

I pried myself away, only to have someone else ask about my face.

“The disguise isn’t working,” I told Lillian.

“Some people are just too rude,” she said. “Come on, I want you to meet my mother.”

She found her mother sitting alone in a breakfast nook that jutted into the patio. She was watching the crowd out there and nursing a tall drink.

“What are you doing here all by yourself, Mom?” Lillian said. “Why aren’t you mingling?”

She introduced me to Adele Brandon, whose eyes popped up with a sleepy smile. She already seemed a bit tipsy. Thick, wavy blonde hair lay on her back like a rug. She had a friendly, open face, but there was too much makeup on it.

“So you’re the man who’s been writing all those stories about the murders,” Adele said. She began asking questions, and I realized she hadn’t read any of the stories in the paper.

While we were chatting, Scott came barreling through the kitchen like a bulldozer. “Papaw, Papaw, Papaw,” he said over and over. Guests hung on to their drinks as they dodged out of the way.

“Papaw’s busy,” Lillian said to him. “What’s the matter, Scott?”

“Papaw, Papaw. . . .”

Lillian shrugged helplessly as her cousin bulled his way through the dining room in search of the Judge.

“He should be in a home,” Adele said. She raised her tumbler and sighted at me along its moist sides.

“Not as long as his Papaw has anything to say about it,” Lillian said.

“Lillian takes care of him,” Adele informed me. “She’s like his live-in nurse. They take her for granted.”

“Now, Mom, don’t get started.”

“It’s true.”

There was a crash somewhere beyond the dining room. Lillian made a face and hurried to see what had happened. Her mother shook her head as if resting her case.

I wandered outside. The sky was a soft light blue, and Venus hung low over the fields. I took a turn around the pool. The water looked like smooth, green crystal full of trembling shadows. Citronella candles in netted vases were evenly spaced around the pool and patio. I sat next to one of them on the low wall. The air smelled like orange juice.

Jodie and her friend came out of the house, and someone immediately accosted her. I watched her laugh, sip her drink, nod quickly, say something, laugh again. She had a plain yellow sundress on, no jewelry, nothing fancy. She didn’t need anything fancy. I couldn’t take my eyes off her. I wondered if there was anything serious between her and the guy with the bling. They didn’t look like a match. I got up and moved on before she’d catch me staring.

I went back in the house to get some more grapes, and as I entered the kitchen a stout, elderly woman whom I recognized from photos in the paper, said, “You’re Phil, aren’t you? Lillian told me about you. I’m Beverly Brandon.”

I shook hands with the Judge’s wife. “Nice to meet you, Mrs. Brandon,” I said.

“Nice to meet you. Lill told me what happened while we were gone. We go away for two weeks, and all hell breaks loose.” Tall and busty, she had a merry, outlandish laugh. She struck me as a natural, earthy person, not the type of woman who lived in a place like this.

“How was your trip to Asia?” I said.

“Wonderful! I loved every minute of it. Cambodia—that poor country, what it’s been through—it’s just incredible. The people are so friendly. Have you ever been to Asia, Phil?”

“No, I’ve never been anywhere.”

Her head tossed back and she laughed a big horsy laugh. “We’ll have to take you with us next time we go. You’re a newspaperman. You’ve got to see the world.” She laid a hand on my wrist and whispered in my ear, “Thank you for helping with Scott. Lill said they might have had a disaster on their hands without you.” She let go of me and stretched out her arms toward the next person waiting to speak with her.

I wondered what had happened to Lillian. Was she gone for the night, taking care of Scott? I squeezed through the crowd and bumped into the coach of the Campbellsville High School football team. He had a beer in one hand, a mini cream puff in the other. Preseason practice was underway in the heat of August. We discussed the team’s prospects, which usually were not good. Basketball was the big game around here.

Through a kitchen window I saw Jodie on the edge of the patio. Her golden friend was gone, but now she was talking to a gangly guy who laughed too hard at what she was saying. With each rollicking laugh his nose dipped closer to his cocktail, like the beak of a toy bird. She said something else, and his head bent straight back, howling at the sky. He laid a hand on her shoulder, shaking his head in hilarious delight.

She happened to turn in my direction, and our eyes met as she raised her glass to her lips. This time I waved at her. Our eyes held a moment longer. Then she gave me a wry little smile and looked away.

I carried that look and a second drink into the main hall. No one else was there, but party noise seeped in from adjoining rooms. As if in a museum, I studied the pictures on the walls. The door to the Judge’s den was closed, but I thought I heard angry voices arguing inside. I parked myself in front of a large, dark painting by T. C. Steele on the wall next to the den.

Suddenly the door opened and Frank Brandon stormed out. His hair was disheveled, his shirt splotched with sweat. “Do you need something?” he demanded.

“I’m waiting to see the Judge,” I said.

He called over his shoulder, “Phil Larrison’s hanging around out here. He says he wants to see you, Dad.” He gave me a dirty look and left the house by the front door.

I poked my head into the den. The judge was in his swivel chair, and Ralph Brandon, Lillian’s father, slouched on the sofa. Scott was sitting on the floor eating a pepperoni pizza out of a box.

“If you’re busy, it can wait, Judge,” I said. “It’s not important.”

“Good,” he replied. “We’re in the middle of a family issue.” He looked at Scott as if that explained everything, but I couldn’t help thinking something else was going on. “You know my son, Ralph, don’t you?” He gestured toward the beagle-faced man with a receding hairline.

“Yes, of course,” I said. I knew him from meetings and from Mackey’s, that’s all. “Good to see you, Ralph.”

“How ya doin’?” he said, weary and indifferent.

“Maybe we can talk some later, Phil,” the Judge said, “but right now—”

“Sure. Sorry I disturbed you, sir.”

“Thank you, Phil. Would you mind closing the door, please.”

I loitered in the hall another minute, but the argument had apparently ended with the exit of Frank, so I went back outside. It was beginning to get dark. A few couples were dancing on the patio. I couldn’t stick around much longer. I had to get back to the paper.

Don Grapevine, athletic and aristocratic, stood near the pool with a glass of red wine while a large round woman bent his ear. Her bosom was a pair of bowling balls, and a pearl necklace disappeared down her cleavage. Like a saint, or a pastor hoping for a big donation, Grapevine gave her his complete attention.

“There you are,” Lillian said from behind me. “I was beginning to think you went home.” She had a man with her. I hoped it was a boyfriend.

“No, I’m still here,” I said, turning. “It’s a nice party.”

“Thanks. Did you get anything to eat?”

“A little bit. I’m not really hungry.”

A mosquito landed on my arm, and Lillian flicked it off. “We need more candles,” she said.

“What was that crash earlier?” I asked her. “Did Scott break something?”

“He knocked over a lamp, but it didn’t break, fortunately.”

“That’s good.”

She nodded. “He’s still out of control. It’s my fault for messing with his dosage. Maybe the Judge can settle him down in a few days. I hope so.”

“Maybe you should think about what your mother said—put him in a home.”

“The Judge will never go along with that.”

I felt like saying the Judge must be senile, but I kept my trap shut.

“Phil, she continued, “I’d like you to meet my brother, Doug.”

We shook hands. I felt as if he was sizing me up as a possible brother-in-law. He had wide square shoulders, thick arms, and a flabby neck. I asked what business he was in, and he said he worked in the bank, no doubt meaning his father’s bank. He asked me how the newspaper business was doing, but as I began to tell him, he saw someone he knew and excused himself. I watched him bear down on a woman in an off-the-shoulders blouse.

“How many brothers and sisters do you have?” I asked Lillian.

“Just Doug.”

“He’s a big guy.”

“Too big. He needs to lose some weight.”

We walked like a couple around the pool to the patio. Jodie seemed to watch us with bemused interest. As we approached, she smiled as if we shared a secret and said, “Phil, I want you to meet my mom. Now where is she? There she is.” Lillian did not seem pleased.

Jodie hurried through the crowd and came back dragging her mother.

“Mom,” she said, “this is Phil Larrison, the editor of the Gleaner.”

“Oh yes,” said Jackie Grapevine, “I know all about you. I see you in the newspaper office sometimes when I drop off Tri-Kappa news, but it’s nice to finally meet you.”

“Nice to meet you too,” I said. “I was in your house last week, but you were in Cincinnati.”

“Yes. I went to see my sister.”

“Her name’s Anita, isn’t it?”

“Yes. And I have two brothers, Ralph and Frank. They’re both here tonight.”

She had Jodie’s eyes and hair, but her face was wider and had too many wrinkles for someone probably still in her forties. She had a very dark tan, and I wondered if the wrinkles were caused by years of overdosing on sunshine. She wore a short-sleeved pink top and snug-fitting tan capris that showed off a fairly voluptuous figure.

“Why’d you decide to grow the beard?” Jodie asked me.

“I guess you can’t see it in this light,” I said, “but I got a big scrape on my cheek.” I turned sideways to show them. “The beard’s meant to hide it.”

Jodie peered at the wound. “Yikes, what happened?”

“I went sneaking around the Garths’ house again, and somebody tripped me while I was going down the steps in the cellar.”

“Good Lord!” Jackie exclaimed. “Do you know who it was?”

“No, I don’t.”

Jodie said, “If I were you, I wouldn’t go back there anymore. It’s too dangerous.”

“That’s right,” her mother said. “Maybe it was the killer who tripped you.”

“I doubt it,” I said. “I’m still alive.”

Lillian chimed in: “And you need to stay alive, or one of these days we’ll be reading your obituary in the paper.”

“I guess I should write it up while I still can.”

“You shouldn’t joke about things like that,” Jackie said.

The Judge appeared at the French doors and scanned the crowd. When he spotted Lillian, he waved at her to come inside.

“Oh shoot,” she said, “it’s time to get Scott in bed.”

“Why does it matter when he goes to bed?” I said.

“We try to keep him on a schedule. Otherwise he gets confused. And you know how excited he can get. I’ll be back as soon as I can.” She walked quickly toward the Judge.

I felt sorry for her. She was a good person, selfless, kind. But I was not attracted to her. Having spoken to her father a short while ago, I could see an unfortunate resemblance to his slack, doggy-like features. But it wasn’t her face that turned me off. It was the way she was. It was her lack of spirit.

Jackie said, “Poor Lillian. I’m going to help her with Scott,” and hurried after her niece.

I looked at Jodie. “Are you going too?”

“Uhhh, I don’t think so.”

“Where’s your friend?”

“Which one?”

“The one who looks like he just flew in from the golden West.”

She laughed. “You sound jealous.”

“Why would I be jealous?”

“I can’t imagine,” she said with a saucy smirk. “We were friends in high school. That was before he was gay. I bumped into him at the JayC store this week. We got talking, and I invited him to the party, but he wasn’t having a very good time, so he left.”

“That’s too bad,” I said.

“Don’t take it so hard.”

“Is that where you meet guys, at the supermarket?”

“Uh-huh, either there or they show up at the house around midnight to use the phone.”

I laughed and came back with “I hate to tell you this, but you’re about to get dumped again. I’ve got to go back to work.”

“So you’re not having a good time either.” She sipped the rest of her drink.

“I’m having a very good time, but I’m supposed to do some work for my paycheck.”

“Well, you’d better go where you’re needed then.”

“I could come back around midnight. How long will this thing last?”

“It will end precisely at 10:30, by order of the court.”

“Oh. Well, I could come to your place around midnight with the other guys.”

“Sorry. I’ll be asleep by then.”

“How about tomorrow then?” I said, serious at last. “I’ll take you out for lunch.”

“I don’t think I can. Mom wants me to go shopping with her.”

“You can go shopping after lunch. I’ll pick you up at ten, okay?”

She acted as if I had presented her with a perplexing problem. Then she laughed and said, “Sure, why not?”

“Great. I love enthusiasm,” I said.

We walked around the side of the house to my car. I hadn’t asked a woman out since my divorce. I felt the galaxy shift, but you have to take a chance. Life’s nothing but chance. If I hadn’t picked up Paula on the highway because she happened to be wearing a cast, if we hadn’t found a murdered couple in their bathroom, and if I hadn’t gone to the neighbors’ house to use the phone, I wouldn’t be walking next to Jodie Palladino right now on the Judge’s driveway under a starry deep-blue sky.