Ruby Holler

  “Yes,” Sairy said. “He’ll know how to find Tiller and Florida—and us.”

  As Sairy and Dallas started toward the diner, Dallas glanced back at the boys, who were now sitting beside Sairy’s and Dallas’s backpacks, smiling.

  “Bye-bye,” they called. “We’ll be right here, waiting for you.”

  CHAPTER 51

  Z

  As Z drove down the road away from Ruby Holler, he wished he’d never gotten mixed up with Trepid, and he hoped he could keep Trepid at bay until Tiller and Sairy got back.

  What Trepid hadn’t reckoned on was that Z had known Tiller and Sairy most of his life, and that Z’s cabin was over the far side of the holler, which made Z their nearest neighbor. It was Z who had driven Tiller and Florida and the boat down to the river, and Sairy and Dallas back home again. It was Z they had asked to keep an eye on their place while they were gone, and it was Z who would meet Tiller and Florida at the end of their journey and drive them and the boat home.

  Z glanced at himself in his rearview mirror. I gotta get a haircut, he thought. And a shave. And clean up my place. Maybe wash these clothes. Maybe clean up this here truck, too.

  He wished Sairy and Tiller would hurry up and get back. He needed to tell them about Trepid, and he also needed to make his confessions.

  His first confession would be easy enough. He’d tell them that he was the one who’d gotten Dallas’s passport. He hadn’t seen any harm in doing that job for Trepid, except that he couldn’t locate a birth certificate so he’d had a friend forge one. Z hadn’t felt too guilty about that until he’d discovered that Dallas was the boy who was going to accompany Sairy on her trip. He’d have to tell Sairy the truth.

  His second confession was going to be harder.

  He thought about Tiller and Sairy’s place, with its cozy quilts and always the smell of something good cooking. I’m a lousy cook. There’s fleas in my place.

  Z opened the glove compartment and fished through the mess of papers inside. He pulled out one wrinkled piece and smoothed it against the steering wheel. It was a copy of the hospital records he’d found after Sairy, Dallas, Tiller, and Florida had gone off on their trips.

  He didn’t know what had made him go back and look at more records. He didn’t need to; he’d already gotten a passport for Dallas. But he’d found it interesting, looking at those things, at the lists of all the babies born and how much they weighed and how long they were. One little baby weighed only four ounces. That’s not much more than a little bird, he thought.

  Z had already checked the records for February and March of the year Dallas and Florida were born. Now he flipped to April. And there, in the entry for April fourth, it listed twins born at seven forty-five a.m. A boy and a girl. His eye moved to the middle column, where the mother’s name was listed.

  He thought he was going to have a heart attack.

  That’s my wife. My old wife. My only old wife.

  He tried to do some quick figuring, but his mind was racing. He could hardly breathe. Was that the year she left? She’d left one snowy cold November day. A snowy, snowy, freezing, cold November day. What year was that?

  An idea took hold in his brain and raced around like a rabid dog. Those twins could be my twins. They could be my kids. I could be a father.

  Z didn’t know what to do with this information. It’s too much for a man to take in. I gotta let my head find a place to put it.

  Maybe he should tell those kids straight out and take them to his place, and they’d be a ready-made family. But he didn’t know the first thing about kids. Maybe he’d better study up first. Maybe he’d better check what year his wife left.

  Now as he drove away from the holler, he folded the paper and shoved it back in the glove compartment. Maybe oughta learn how to cook first. Maybe oughta save up some money. Maybe oughta…

  And on he went down the road, thinking Maybe oughta, maybe oughta....

  CHAPTER 52

  THE ONE-LOG RAFT

  Florida tumbled along underwater, knees and elbows scraping rocks. The current surged and rolled over her, batting her around like an old sack. When she could push against the bottom hard enough, she lunged to the surface to gulp air before the river dunked her again. She was mad: mad at the river, at the rocks, and at herself for not knowing how to swim. You are not going to beat me, putrid river!

  Her next lunge to the surface brought her forehead smack against a wide log, floating free in the water. She grabbed for it, pulling herself across it, hanging on as it careened wildly down the river. A raft, she thought. A crazy, one-log raft!

  She had no control over the log, but it kept her head above water so that she could breathe more than one gulp at a time. Ahead the river churned toward the next bend. If only I could get to the bank, she thought. If only I could see Tiller. It was hard to look back without tipping off the log. She saw the boat spinning crazily, upside down, but she didn’t see Tiller.

  “Tiller!” she shouted, and then again, louder. She didn’t recognize her own call, so loud and urgent, like a bellowing bull. “Till-errrrr!” But there was no answer as she barreled on down the river on her one-log raft.

  CHAPTER 53

  THE DUNCES

  This sure is more than five minutes we’ve been hiking,” Sairy said.

  “More like forty-five minutes,” Dallas said. “Don’t see any sign of a diner. You know what I’m thinking, Sairy? I’m thinking those two boys were pulling our legs. There’s no diner out here, and they’ve probably stolen our backpacks.”

  Sairy halted, smacking her hand against her forehead. “I am such a dunce sometimes.”

  “No, you’re not,” Dallas said. “You just think everybody’s good, and that everybody tells the truth.”

  Sairy put a hand on Dallas’s shoulder. “I do think that,” she said, “and that’s why I’m feeling like such a dunce right now.” Sairy untied her yellow scarf and jammed it in her pocket. “Okay, then, us two dunces are going to find a way out of this place.”

  Overhead the sun was covered with haze. The air felt heavy, steamy, pressing in on them as they continued along the narrow path.

  “We better find a town pretty soon,” Dallas said. He didn’t want to tell Sairy that the awful feeling he’d had about Florida being in trouble was getting stronger. He was certain of it now. She was in trouble, and she was in the river. He knew it as clearly as if he had a crystal ball. “If we find a town, the people in the town will at least know where they are, and then we’ll know where we are. Does that buddy of Tiller’s, that Z guy, have a phone?”

  “No, but I can leave a message for him at Grace’s Diner. He checks in there regularly.”

  “I think I’ve seen that guy before,” Dallas said. “I think I’ve seen him with Mr. Trepid.”

  “No!” Sairy said. “I certainly hope not.”

  “That Z guy doesn’t talk too much, does he?” Dallas said.

  “Not too much. He lives by himself, so he’s not used to talking much.”

  “What happened?” Dallas said. “Did he one time have some brothers or sisters or kids or wife and they all got drowned or killed or something?”

  “You’re starting to sound like Florida,” Sairy said. “I think Z has a brother or two, but they live out west somewhere. I’ve never met them anyway. And he did have a wife once, but not for long.”

  Dallas was picturing Z living with his wife, and the two of them strolling through the holler. “What happened to his wife?”

  “She didn’t much take to living in the holler, I guess. Wanted to see the world. She hated being stuck up there in his little cabin, so one day she up and left.”

  “Did they have any kids?” Dallas asked.

  “No.”

  “Did he ever see her again?”

  “Dallas, you sure ask a lot of questions.”

  “I was just wondering, that’s all. Seems to me if your wife up and left, you’d go after her, wouldn’t you?”

  “I suppose.?
??

  “So why didn’t Z go after his wife?”

  Sairy picked up a stick lying across the path. “It was a long time ago—ten, maybe fifteen years ago. I think he did go after her, but I don’t think he found her.”

  “That’s a shame,” Dallas said. He pictured Z sitting all by himself on the porch of his cabin. “Hey! Look—we’ve been yakking and not paying any attention, and I think we’ve found a farm. See? Way over there?”

  Sairy raised both her arms in the air. “A farm! Civilization! People! A phone! Let’s run!”

  And the two of them took off, running through the woods, leaping over logs and dodging branches.

  CHAPTER 54

  SLOW MOTION

  Tiller had been swimming toward Florida when his arms gave out. They were numb and heavy, and he felt crushing pressure against his chest. The water pulled him under, where everything seemed suddenly slow and quiet. Tiller tugged at his jacket, as if that could release the weight against his chest.

  A simple, clear image floated through his mind. It was of him, diving into a river after his younger daughter, Rose, had gone under and hadn’t surfaced. He found her sitting cross-legged on the bottom, holding her nose. Tiller snagged her arm and pulled her to the surface. “Aw, Daddy,” she’d spluttered. “I almost broke my record!”

  Now, underwater, Rose blurred with Florida. He hoped Florida was holding her nose. And then he thought of Sairy, and he wished he’d said he would go with her to search for her rocking bird.

  The last thought he had was about how he and Sairy had had to keep one little secret from each other all those years, that understone fund secret, that silly secret. He felt he understood that now. Maybe keeping that secret would be protection, in case something happened to the other person. Then the person remaining would have one thing left to grip on to. Or maybe it was because there might be times, like now, when, if you knew everything about someone else, your heart would be too full and it might overflow.

  CHAPTER 55

  ON THE ROAD

  As Z drove Sairy and Dallas away from the farm and down the bumpy road, he felt jittery. They had to find Tiller and Florida quick. Sairy and Dallas had made that clear. Z thought it perfectly reasonable that they had sensed that Tiller and Florida were in trouble. The mind worked in strange ways, he believed.

  Z kept stealing glances at Dallas. He doesn’t look anything like me, Z thought. Fortunate for him. I’m an ugly son-of-a-gun.

  “What do you think, Z?” Sairy said. “How are we going to gauge where they might be on that river?”

  “Not sure,” Z said. “We’re going to go with our gut feelings.” He sped over the bumpy road and careened out onto the highway. I should have shaved, he thought. I should have changed clothes. That kid must think I’m a bum.

  “There’s something I ought to tell you,” Z said. “About that Trepid fellow—”

  “He stole the understone funds?” Dallas blurted. “He’s been down in the holler poking around, and—”

  “Dallas! What on earth would put that in your head?” Sairy said.

  “Well, he ain’t far off,” Z said. “He’s a mighty smart cookie. He must have some of that extra-sensory whatever, you know, reading people’s minds and such.”

  “Huh?” Sairy said. “What’s going on?”

  So Z filled them in on how Mr. Trepid had asked him to check out the holler and find any “special stones” and make a map.

  “So you think he’s looking for our understone funds?” Sairy asked.

  “Yep.”

  “How on earth would he have heard about our understone funds? I can’t for the life of me imagine who could’ve told him. I know you wouldn’t tell him, Z.”

  “You got that right,” Z said.

  Dallas opened his mouth, closed it, opened it again.

  “I got a little confession, though,” Z said. “I took your funds. For safekeeping.”

  “How’d you find them?” Dallas said.

  “Got a nose for buried things, I guess,” Z said. “Don’t worry, Sairy. It’s all safe.”

  “I’m not worried,” she said. “Not about that—”

  “Got the two metal boxes,” Z said, “and the loose money in those other two holes—”

  “What other two holes?” Sairy asked.

  “Probably mine and Florida’s,” Dallas said.

  Sairy touched Dallas’s hand. “You mean you two have your own understone funds? Just like me and Tiller?” A little sound, like a stifled sob, came from her mouth. “That’s so … so … sweet,” she said.

  Dallas felt terrible. He wished he could disappear into the seat. Not only was he feeling guilty about having told Mr. Trepid about the understone funds, but he feared they wouldn’t find Florida and Tiller, or that if they found them, they might be dead. Instantly, his mind moved elsewhere, to the holler, to the cabin, to the loft, to the bed with its soft quilts.

  “So is that Trepid fellow still going to be nosing around the holler?” Sairy asked.

  “Good question,” Z said.

  Dallas studied Sairy. He knew she was as worried as he was about Tiller and Florida, because of the way she was wringing that yellow scarf in her hands and staring intently at the road ahead, as if staring would get them there faster. Dallas turned to look at Z, who maneuvered his truck around the curves as if he were an expert race car driver.

  “You know that Kangadoon place?” Z said. “I’ve been doing some asking around, and found a guy who’s been there.”

  It was hard for Dallas to keep his mind on the conversation. Why was Z chattering away about Kangadoon? Why wasn’t he coming up with a plan to find Tiller and Florida?

  “So what’d that guy say about Kangadoon?” Sairy asked.

  Dallas wanted to scream. Shut up about Kangadoon!

  Z slapped at the dashboard. “He got eaten nearly alive by mosquitoes! Came home with malaria.”

  “Malaria?” Sairy said.

  “Yep.” Z swerved off the main road and down a narrower one. “This here road goes to the Mackalack River,” he said. “That’s where my gut is telling me to go. What’re your guts telling you?”

  Dallas pressed his hand against his stomach and closed his eyes. “Mackalack,” he said. “Sounds right to me.”

  CHAPTER 56

  ON THE RIVER

  With the help of her one-log raft, Florida had made her way to the bank and crawled up its muddy side. She lay there for a minute, trying to catch her breath, and then she sat up and scanned the water. She was feeling a little mad at Tiller, that he hadn’t rescued her.

  Florida spotted the boat, stuck in the mud upstream, on the same side of the river. She saw one life jacket bobbing against the opposite bank.

  “Till-errr!” she shouted. She saw a flash of color upstream, near a boulder. Tiller’s jacket? Then she saw his head bob up and go back down.

  She raced upstream and tugged at the boat, flipping it over. No paddles. She saw Tiller’s jacket and head bob up again and go down. She hurried to untie the tent ropes from the struts, and then tied one end to a tree on the bank. Holding the other end in her hand, she waded back into the water.

  “Till-errrr!” she shouted. “I’m coming! I’m coming through this putrid stupid river. I’m probably going to die doing it, but I’m coming. I hope you appreciate this.”

  The water pushed at her, whirling and swirling around her knees and then her waist and chest. Knocked and dragged by the current, Florida held tight to the rope, her eyes fixed on flashes of Tiller’s jacket, which ballooned up out of the river and skittered in the air before settling back down again.

  “Listen, river,” she said, as she inched along the river bottom, “I’ll make you a deal. You let up on me and I’ll … I’ll …” but she couldn’t think of what bargain she could make with the river. “Sweet river,” she tried, “beautiful river—” but the water surged at her, knocking her under. She pulled herself upright with the rope. “Cruddy, scummy, pea-brained river.”
/>
  Tiller’s jacket billowed up again, and she lunged, snagging the jacket and pulling it toward her. She grabbed Tiller’s arm, wrapped the rope around it, and fished under the water for his head.

  When she saw his face, she wanted to bust out crying. Oh man, Tiller, you are not looking so good. You are looking purely dead.

  She dragged him to the bank and rolled him on his stomach and mashed on his back. She wished she’d paid more attention in health class, when that nurse had come in with a rubber dummy and showed how to do that artificial perspiration stuff.

  A splurt of water gushed from Tiller’s mouth. Florida rolled him onto his side and probed her finger in his mouth to see if anything was stuck in there. All the while, she was shouting at him. “Tiller! Tiller! You hear me? You breathing? I don’t want to have to do that breathing stuff. I don’t know how. I don’t remember.”

  She pinched Tiller’s nose and thought of Dallas trying to breathe air into Joey. As she was about to breathe into Tiller’s mouth, his eyes opened.

  “I sure hope that means you’re alive!” she said. “I hope you’re not going to putrid die on me.”

  Tiller raised one hand and placed it against his chest, patting it. “My heart’s feeling soggy,” he said. “Get help.” His eyes closed again.

  “Well, where am I supposed to get help?” she said. “Wake up. Don’t you putrid die.” She scanned the banks, and then she shouted the only thing she could think of to shout: “Dal-las! Dal-las!”

  Z and Sairy and Dallas, who were downstream searching the banks, heard her. When Florida saw them running toward her, she felt as if she would break apart into a zillion pieces, and all those pieces would scatter into the air and disappear into the clouds.

  CHAPTER 57

  THE SOGGY HEART

  Florida was in the hospital waiting room, wrapped in a blanket. Beside her were Dallas and Z.