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

"Then you also have custodial duties," I said, returning to reality with a major sigh of relief.

"Yeah, and cleaning, too. But now that I have a regular job, I'm getting up my nerve to ask Dahlia if she wants to get married. Do you think I ought to ask her, Arly? I mean, we could get us a mobile home over at the Pot O' Gold and save all our money right here in this bank so we can have a little house some day with a garden and a porch swing and a washer-dryer. Why, we might even have children when we can afford it. What do you think, Arly? Do you think she'll have me?"

"If anyone will, she will," I said, retreating from his enthusiasm. I was steeling myself to open the car door when Johnna Mae marched out of the bank, slamming the door behind her in the process, and took off down the edge of the county road, her jaw flung so high she was in danger of slipping in the loose rocks and ending up in the ditch. Miss Una's shadow flitted across the door, then faded into the dimness.

"Wow," Kevin said, twisting his head to follow Johnna Mae's retreat. "She looks madder than a coon in a poke. Wonder what got her so all-fired hot under the collar?"

"She's been having problems with Mr. Bernswallow."

"Him? I think he's a right slick guy. He always compliments me on the shine on the commodes and the sinks, and one time he gave me a sack of shirts with crocodiles on 'em. Said they was real expensive."

"He sounds like a jewel, Kevin." I watched Johnna Mae swing through the rusty arch of the Pot O' Gold. I toyed with the idea of driving down to her mobile home to make sure she was okay but reminded myself that there wasn't anything I could do beyond making sympathetic noises and admiring the baby. I told Kevin to keep the bank safe from Bonnie and Clyde, opened the car door, wincing, and drove back to the PD to work on the sauna sign. If my crayons hadn't melted.

...

"Ain't this amazing, just amazing?" Estelle demanded, shoving the letter across the bar to Ruby Bee. "You could have knocked me over with a snake feather when I opened the envelope this morning just before Elsie came in for a shampoo and set."

"Is her hair natural?"

"What transpires between a cosmetologist and her client is confidential, as you well know. How'd you like to lie in bed every night wondering if half the town knew the truth about your hair color? You'd be deeply offended if I went around telling folks how your hair's grayer than seasoned barn wood, wouldn't you?"

Ruby Bee went over to the cash register and punched a key or two while she tried to grab hold of her temper, which was as riled as a swarm of hornets. "My hair may have a silver tint to it," she said, avoiding Estelle's eyes, "but you have no call to say it's the color of barn wood."

"How would you know? You haven't seen it natural since before Hiram Buchanon's barn burned, and that was twenty years if it was a day. But I don't have the time to squabble with you, not with Perkins's eldest coming in for a perm in a while. Just unruffle your tail feathers and read this letter."

Ruby Bee relented and took the proffered piece of paper. Once she'd read it, she gave Estelle a bewildered look. "I don't recollect you mentioning that you borrowed money from the bank."

"That's because I never did. I considered it once when Jaylee was planning to study cosmetology, thinking I might expand the salon so she could have her own station right there with me. I was going to knock out that wall above the hydrangeas. But I haven't even thought one second about it since Jaylee was murdered a couple couple of years back." She stopped to wipe a smudge of mascara from under her eye, then cleared her throat and added, "What do you think this means, this letter?"

"I haven't got a glimmer," Ruby Bee admitted.

"Well, those folks at the bank in Farberville are riding mighty high to say that I'm late making a payment on a loan I never took out. I've got a mind to march right in their fancy bank and slap this letter down on some snippy banker's desk and demand to know what in tarnation they think they're doing."

"It might do some good," Ruby Bee said, smiling to herself as she envisioned the scene. "What'll you wear?"

"What difference does it make? The point is that they've got no cause to send innocent folks nasty letters, and I'm going to tell them so. I'm going to give them a piece of my mind like they've never heard in their fancy bank. Let me tell you, they'll be mighty sorry when I'm done with them!"

"I reckon they will." This time Ruby Bee had to turn around, aware that any trace of amusement would not sit well with Estelle. All that stuff about red hair and hot temperament was the gospel truth, she thought smugly, although she had sense enough not to say it out loud.

"If I didn't have Perkins's eldest in less than ten minutes, I'd do it right this minute," Estelle continued. She narrowed her eyes as Ruby Bee turned back. "I'd like to hope you're not making that smirky face because you think this is funny. It ain't funny."

"I never thought it was funny, Estelle. I was making that face because of this bodacious heat. In fact, I think I'll call that good-for-nothing repairman again so he can tell me how he's busier than an ant at a Sunday school picnic and I can tell him how my brain bubbles every time I have to stand over the grill in the kitchen. We know the conversation by heart, but at least it passes the time of day."

Estelle wasn't convinced, but it was time to give Perkins's eldest a perm. She curled her lip to let Ruby Bee know she wasn't anybody's fool and sailed out of the bar without so much as a see you later.

Ruby Bee picked up the letter and reread it. It was a puzzlement, to be sure. But everybody knew that the bank was always right, so Estelle must have slipped up somewhere and forgotten about taking out her loan. Still, Ruby Bee thought, sticking the letter in a cabinet under the bar where it'd be safe, it wasn't like Estelle to do something more befitting one of those dumb Buchanons. Not like her at all.

...