Cruddy - Lynda Barry [97]
Doris said, “He drank three bottles of government iodine and went into the cave and just never came out.”
“Shit,” said the father.
“It’s a shame,” said Auntie Doris. “Because the government has been very good to us. They pay me and Gy-Rah to stay.”
“What the hell for?”
“We’re useful to them.”
“How?”
“Classified, Ray.”
“You are full of shit, Doris.”
“Am I?”
And the conversation was mellow like this and they went on drinking heavily and talking like this and the sun arched from one side of the landscape to the other. Cookie and I came out of hiding. We took a walk. We turned around and came back. And then it was dark. And I kept on thinking about Fernst. I had been feeling bad about Fernst. I meant to kill Pammy but instead I killed Fernst. And now I found myself feeling bad about Pammy. Found myself feeling curious about her condition and location and why she had been absent all day.
The father and Auntie Doris had gotten very slurry in their words. I could not understand what they were saying and they could not understand each other but it did not stop them from talking. They kept on talking until a weak beam of light appeared in the darkness, bouncing and approaching. Auntie Doris said, “Thas Ghy-Rath naw.”
Gy-Rah’s prissy voice crackled from a loudspeaker. “I am out of ointment. For this and this only I return. Mother, make ready. Arrival is in progress. ETA thirty seconds—” A painted-over bread truck with a bad muffler and high wiggling antennas rolled straight at the father with one headlight shining. From the four-horned speaker on top of the cab the distorted voice said, “Pollutant, be GONE!”
The father suddenly tore toward the truck. The speakers blared, “INvader! INtruder! MOTHER!” In an attempted tight turn the engine died. The father yanked open the driver’s door and Gy-Rah flew out of the passenger side. He was a tall person with a pear-shaped body and skinny arms and a face that looked like a horse and a rat and a nearsighted hog all crossed together. He wore short-shorts and his legs were bony. He was visible only for a moment before he shot into the office door and slammed it behind him.
Auntie Doris puffed calmly on her Salem. She said, “He doesn’t like you, Ray.”
The father threw open the back doors of the truck and began yanking out contents, all electrical, all bouncing onto the asphalt. The father shouted, “GodDAMN it. Where IS it?”
Doris rose. “I’ll talk to him. Calm down. We’re going to work this out. Quit throwing his equipment around. He’ll get a rash.”
The father jumped out of the truck. “I’ll talk to him. I’ll—” Auntie Doris went into the office and slammed the door.
The father stood there. He tapped some polite taps. “Doris, you going to let me in?” He stood a moment longer and then walked across the gloss asphalt to the car, popped the trunk, pulled out a crowbar, and carried it back to the office door. He tapped again.
“Avon calling,” said the father.
He tried the door. Locked.
I laid low in the shadows. I knew what mood he was in.
He called to me. “Where you at, Clyde. I could use some help here.”
And then he saw Cookie. I watched him squat down and call to her sweetly. Talk to her convincingly. There is a saying about dogs. That they can sense a person’s intentions. That they have a special power of knowing if a person is good or bad. It isn’t true. If the camouflage is good enough, the dog will