"03 - Much Ado in Maggody" - читать интересную книгу автора (Hess Joan)

"She refused the promotion, saying she was happy doing what she's been doing for twenty years and didn't want to have to take on added responsibilities at her age. She enjoys visiting with the customers, and she has the patience of job when someone like Raz or Hiram starts pestering her. I didn't mind one bit, since we needed the money. She has three cats to feed. I have a family."

The office door opened and Bernswallow again appraised me. This time the door closed clicklessly.

Johnna Mae picked up the pencil and snapped it into two pieces. "I don't reckon I can stand this much longer, Arly. He's all the time spying on us like he thinks we're taking people's money and stuffing it down our blouses like call girls. For three nights running he's made us work late to make the over-and-long account balance to the penny. When I was head teller, we didn't worry about a few extra pennies in somebody's cash drawer; I just figured it'd even out over the duration."

"What does Mr. Oliver think?" I asked.

"The good Lord gave him a brain, but he may have forgotten to plug it in. Mr. Oliver comes in every morning to see how we re doing, then says he has to go into the main bank to work there. He used to be an officer before he became the branch manager out here in Maggody. He still does something about the portfolio, which conveniently keeps him from bothering us. He doesn't care a rat's ass about what goes on here."

Johnna Mae took a tissue from her cash drawer and noisily blew her nose under Miss Una's disapproving scrutiny. I was fresh out of anything to say and had reluctantly decided to face the outside world, when Bernswallow again came through what seemed to be a revolving door.

"May I trust that the service was satisfactory?" he said. His tone managed to imply that he would be more than amazed if it had been.

"I use a different bank, in Farberville. It gives me an opportunity to travel."

While he digested that, I did some appraising of my own. He was still young enough to have a plum-colored pimple or two on his chin. His hair was styled rather than cut, and his expression conveyed muted arrogance, from his clear blue eyes to the slight tilt of his jaw. I'd seen millions like him on Madison Avenue, all striding along while visions of power lunches danced in their heads. I would have wagered a year's ration of cherry pie that he owned the dark green Mercedes I'd noticed in a shady corner of the parking lot outside. Okay, so maybe I'd recognized Miss Una's ancient Crosley and Raz's pickup truck. All those months at the police academy honing my powers of observation had not been in vain.

"I'm sure your bank in Farberville provides good service," Bernswallow said with a condescending smile, "but we'd like to think that a local branch can provide more personal service to the citizens of Maggody. I hope that you'll consider us should there ever be anything we can do to help you, Miss...?"

"Hanks," Johanna Mae muttered. "Arly Hanks, chief of police."

Bernswallow's eyes lit up as though I'd introduced myself as the sole heiress of Howard Hughes. He came around the edge of the counter and extended his hand. "How nice to meet you, Miss Hanks. I'm sure your diligence is what's kept our little branch safe all these years."

I shook his hand. "I would imagine it's the lock on the door. None of the locals are clever enough to figure out how to get past it."

"Ah, certainly. In any case, please feel free to call on me if there's ever anything at all we can do for you. The First National Bank of Farberville will be delighted to serve you. Now, if you'll excuse us, Mrs. Nookim and I have a small situation to discuss in my office."

Johnna Mae may have loosed a remark as she stomped through the door, but it doesn't bear repeating. Miss Una gave me a twinkly smile and a little wave. I could almost smell the lavender water as I forced myself out the front door and into the swampy steam of Maggody.

I was working up the courage to touch the car door handle when yet another product of Buchanon inbreeding came around from the back of the building. Buchanons dot the county like ticks in a blackberry patch. Since very few folks are dumb enough to want to marry into the clan, they've been obliged to mate and consummate among themselves, until not one of them needs a costume on Halloween. Intelligence is out of the question; animal cunning is about all any of them can aspire to. This particular specimen, Kevin Buchanon, had no aspirations.

"Hot enough for ya, Arly?" he said, shuffling his feet in the dust until I almost choked. Although he had defied the laws of nature and graduated from high school a year or two back, he was still battling puberty. His voice cracked on every other word and his Adam's apple was enough to mesmerize the unwary. Had there been a breeze, his ears would have flapped like sheets on a clothesline. As it was, they sagged like the chickweed along the highway.

"Yes, it's hot, Kevin. It's so hot I'm afraid I'm going to get blisters if I try to open the car door."

"Yeah, it sure is hot. It must be hot enough to fry an egg on the sidewalk, don'tcha think? 'Course we'd haft to go all the way to Farberville to try it, in that there ain't any sidewalks in Maggody." He guffawed at that bit of wit, then scratched his ear and frowned at me. "You been in the bank?"

"That's why my car is parked out here."

"I dint know you were a customer here. Did you know I'm an employee now?"

"I didn't know that, Kevin, but I'm pleased for you." From his expression I could see that more was expected of me, and that I wasn't going to escape until I bit the bullet and complied. "And what is it you do for the bank? Loan officer? Executive vice president in charge of bullion shipments from Fort Knox?"

He would have stuck his thumbs under his suspenders and popped them, had he been wearing any with his dirty white T-shirt and scruffy blue leans. "I'm the night security guard, Arly. Ever' night I come in at nine and don't set foot outside until Miss Una arrives the next morning."

Despite the heat (which was pretty tough to overlook), I felt a shiver run down my back. "You're the bank's security guard?"

"That's right. Once I've mopped down the floors and cleaned the rest rooms and emptied the trash cans and generally tidied up, I'm supposed to make sure no one sneaks in to steal any money. I have a special chair in the back room by the door so's I can hear any suspicious noises. Once I heard something that I thought was going to be a bank robber, but it turned out to be a couple of stray cats doing it with each other."