Chapter 3

By the end of the day Cris had been able to refer all of our ongoing cases except for the gambling wife, and since we'd found nothing after two weeks the husband was willing to accept the idea that he was wrong, and have us send him a bill. That cleared that slate.

I'd also called the church office, and left a message to pass on to the other elders about the trip. It would bobble the preaching schedule, but one of the advantages of a plurality of elders is that if one can't be there, any of several other men can step in to fill the gap – and in practice, what I usually did would wind up going in shares to all of the other elders. And they're used to my work interfering with church stuff – my spot in the preaching rotation is always subject to revision if a case just won't let me be in the pulpit, and while I work very hard to be in my church office all day Saturday every week, even that can slip sometimes.

We would still have to see to stopping mail delivery, and see to the payment of the light and gas and cable bills – unlike most people these days, we've got a gas stove at Cecelia's insistence – and we'd have to ask various people to check on the place from time to time. Cris could handle the office, filing the junk mail in the appropriate receptacle, putting mail that could wait on our desks, and sending the urgent stuff on to us in Leanna. And she could send out bills, deposit payments, and all that good stuff. By now doing all that was routine, for we've been going places as long as we've been married.

But that would be tomorrow. For today, I'd done what I could, and Darlia had called to ask if she could spend the night with a friend, which I'd allowed since this particular friend's clothes would fit her – not a universal thing, with Darlia being bigger than average for her age. As I left the office at the end of the day, wondering whether Cecelia's case had run long since she still hadn't gotten back and hadn't called either – they don't let you just whip out a cell phone during a trial – I could look back at a lot of stuff I'd accomplished, and look forward with anticipation to visiting Leanna. I'd hate the humidity – I find Albuquerque too humid, and Alabama's a lot wetter – but I love Mama and Daddy, and Cecelia's siblings Albert and Bella, and the church where Cecelia grew up, and the whole slow rural life there. I'm a country boy – where I grew up makes Butcher Holler, Loretta Lynn's home, seem like the big city – and while I've lived in towns and cities since I left California at 21, I'll never be really comfortable in a place where I can't step out the back door and in 15 minutes be out of sight and hearing of human activity.

As it turned out the trial had gone long, and when Cecelia called to let me know I updated her on Darlia, and she said that with the circumstances being what they were, she'd as soon eat out as cook. It's unusual for her to choose not to cook, but it does happen occasionally. She wasn't in a mood for anything fancy, so I told her I'd meet her at the Blake's on Wyoming just a little north of Central. When we were done there we could shoot straight up Wyoming to Indian School, turn left there, and almost immediately turn right again onto Wisconsin and be home.

I got to Blake's first, it being more difficult to get out of downtown than out of Hoffmantown, and Cecelia looked tired when she pulled up. When I mentioned it, she said, "I speak Spanish as fluently as I do English; I find it a delightful language and easy to handle. But handling both, simultaneously, back and forth, for the length of time this proceeding required, is not unburdensome work."

"You're not too tired to use your double-barreled words," I said with a grin as we went through the door.

"I trust I shall never be that frazzled. To reach such a state of exhaustion that I prefer simple words over esoteric ones would terrify me; my sesquipedalian propensities are as integral to my being as my fingers or my liver."

It's true. As long as I've known her Cecelia's loved her fancy words, and loved stringing them together in ways that you don't meet anymore outside of 19^th century writing.

"But enough of the discussion," she said as we stood in front of the counter. "I am fatigued, and would prefer to simply order, eat, and go home. And with Darlia providentially out of the house, I propose to luxuriate – in my tub, in my robe, on my sofa, and eventually in my bed."

"How 'bout you use Darlia's tub, an' I'll get a shower real quick while you're in there. I bet you'd love some of her bubble bath too – I don't think you've done that in a while."

She smiled. "You're correct on that point – since she became too mature to bathe with me, I've gotten out of the habit of bubble baths." During Darlia's early years Cecelia would often get into the tub with Darlia, and they'd spend forever playing in the bubbles, but that's just not appropriate for a daughter who's going on 14.

I didn't answer – the lady behind the counter was ready to take our orders, and I dislike making service people wait while I carry on my personal business right in front of them. If there's anything I hate it's rudeness, and that's about as rude as you can get. If you ever want surly service, just make someone stand there doing nothing while you waste their time – and if you happen to do that and then complain about the surly service in my presence, I'm just liable to forget that I stay out of other people's business, and tell you exactly what I think of your foul manners.

We ordered, and ate – Cecelia eating just as much as I do, though she must have a tapeworm to eat that way and stay as skinny as she is – and then went home. She indeed went into Darlia's bathroom, while I got a shower and shaved under the falling water – I'd neglected to shave that morning, and my heavy whiskers were on their way to being a beard. I've had a thick walrus mustache almost all my life, one I started growing the day I graduated from high school, but I've never had a beard and don't care to have one. I love my mustache, but I'm a cowboy, not a mountain man ... or I was a cowboy, for a year after I was out of school. I can still rope and ride, and punch cattle, though I only do it when we're in Lanfair Valley every August, and I dress like a cowboy. And I've got a mustache like a cowboy too – there've never been many bearded cowboys, whether it's just never been fashionable, not that I give a single care about fashion, or whether whatever makes you want to be a cowboy also turns you off on beards.

It didn't take me long, and after I dried off I put on a pair of jeans so worn that they were nearly white, and growing holes that I don't care to take out in public, and a Dale Earnhardt t-shirt. I'd loved Dale in the days when everyone else hated him, and I still love him though he's been dead for 10 years and everyone now claims to have loved him forever. The t-shirt's nearing the end of its useful life, even though the only time I wear a t-shirt is around the house, and I'll be sorry to see it become rags. But it'll either be that or toss it in the trash, and I can't see any point in wasting good rags.