Feast Day of Fools - James Lee Burke [75]
“He says he wants to talk with you about something,” Hackberry replied.
“I think I can forgo the pleasure,” Pam replied.
“Anton Ling says he saved her life.”
“If he did, it was by accident.”
Pam went back to work, stringing the tape behind the barn and around the back of the stucco cottage and the bunkhouse. She secured it to a fence post on the far side of the main house and returned to the windmill, her hair moving in the wind, strands touching her mouth. In moments like these, when she was totally unguarded and unmindful of herself, Hackberry knew in a private place in the back of his mind that Pam Tibbs belonged in that category of exceptional women whose beauty radiated outward through their skin and had little to do with the physical attributes of their birth. In these moments he felt an undefined longing in his heart that he refused to recognize.
“Mind if I see what he wants?” Pam asked.
“Suit yourself,” Hackberry replied.
“Come with me.”
“What for?”
“This is the same guy who claimed I assaulted him. I don’t want him telling lies about anything I say to him now.”
“Then I’d leave him alone.”
“Jesus Christ, Hack, first you tell me the guy wants to talk to me, then you tell me not to talk with him. In between, you tell me he saved someone’s life.”
“What are you laughing at, R.C.?” Hackberry said.
“Not a thing, Sheriff. I was just enjoying the breeze and the freshness of the morning. This cool wind is special. Lordy, what a fine day,” R.C. said, folding his arms over his chest, gazing at the sunlit greenness and clarity of the hills, puffing out his cheeks, sucking his teeth.
“I’ll talk to you later,” Hackberry said.
“Yes, sir,” R.C. said.
Hackberry walked with Pam to the gallery, where Cody Daniels was sitting on the steps in the shadow of the house, staring into space, a bandage taped to his forehead. “You wanted to say something to Chief Deputy Tibbs, Reverend?” Hackberry said.
“I’d like to do it in private, if you don’t object,” Cody Daniels replied.
“Say what’s on your mind. We have work to do,” Pam said.
Cody Daniels looked back and forth, his mouth a tight seam. He fiddled with his shirt buttons and made lines in the dirt with the heel of his shoe. Strands of his hair were stuck inside the tape on his bandage, which gave him the appearance of a disorganized and hapless child. “I apologize for the way I acted when you arrested me. I deliberately provoked you,” he said to Pam.
She touched a nostril with one knuckle and huffed air out her nose. “Is that it?” she said.
“I also made some smart-ass remarks when I was in the holding cell. I’m sorry I did that.”
“What smart-ass remarks?” Pam said.
“I said something to the sheriff. I don’t remember it real clear. I should have kept my mouth shut, that’s all.”
“What remarks?” Pam said.
Cody Daniels wiped a piece of dirt off his face and looked at it. “Just idle, disrespectful stuff that doesn’t mean anything. The kind of things an uneducated and angry man might say. No, ‘angry man’ doesn’t cut it. The kind of thing a half-baked mean-spirited pissant might say. That’s me I’m talking about.”
“What did you say?”
“Sheriff?” Cody Daniels said, raising his eyes to Hackberry’s.
“The man said he was sorry. Why not let it slide?” Hackberry said to Pam.
“Reverend, you’ve got about five seconds to get your head on right,” Pam said.
“Cain’t recall.”
She pulled a braided slapjack from her side pocket and let it hang from her right hand.
“I said I’d rather belly up to a spool of barbed wire,” Cody Daniels said. He knitted his fingers together and twisted them in and out of one another, his teeth clenched, breathing through the side of his mouth as though he had just eaten scalding food, patting the soles of his shoes up and down in the dirt. Hackberry could hear the blades of the windmill rattle to life as R.C. unchained the crankshaft and cupped a drink of water from the pipe.
“What did Sheriff Holland have to say about your remark?” Pam asked.