Chapter Twenty-Seven

Mama had a saying for times of trouble: Good intentions in a crisis are like feathers on a pig, they get in the way and probably do more harm than good. I was sure Detective Marshall Weathers had good intentions, but I knew the Spivey family from the inside out, and therefore I was the best candidate to sort out the whole mess.

If you want something done, do it yourself. Save yourself a whole lot of trouble and pig feathers. I could continue to sit by and wring my hands, or I could take the bull by the horns and steer the course of fate. It seemed only logical to direct my little Beetle over to the Mobile Home Kingdom. Furthermore, if I was responsible for Jerry Lee Sizemore's death, then I had a duty to his remaining kin and to his memory.

I pulled my little car up into the lot and parked right in front of the model trailer. This time no one came rushing up to greet me. No prowling salesmen, cigarettes dangling from their lips. No slick finance managers. There were a few cars and pickup trucks in the lot, but no sign of their owners.

I stepped out into the sunshine and squinted to read the sign on the door of the model. It was a cardboard clock, the little red hands pointing to two P.M., and a red-lettered sign that said "Gone to lunch." I ran up the steps and tried the door handle, but it didn't budge. I looked around the lot. Columns of single-wides and double-wides stood like rowhouses, some with their storm doors hanging open, some leaning back at an angle, as if not securely fastened to their temporary piers.

It was like a ghost town. The trailers were so closely packed that they cast one long gray shadow the length of the lot. Behind them, the cars whistled past on I-85. Out on Holden Road, it was lunchtime. Traffic moved along at a fast clip, carrying hungry workers to the nearby Mexican restaurants and fast food joints. The lot was eerily silent.

"Good a time as any to look around," I said out loud. "Not like I'd be trespassing."

I started off down the walkway, my cowgirl boots crunching into the fine gray gravel. The first three mobile homes I tried were locked, but the fourth was wide-open, the product of a forgetful or careless salesperson. I stepped inside the double-wide, reaching for a light switch before realizing that, of course, display homes weren't fully set up with electricity and running water.

Sun streamed in through the back windows, making it bright enough to see without lighting up the poor construction. It looked like a dream home. Fully furnished down to fake food on plates in the eat-in breakfast nook, children's toys in one of the bedrooms, and plants in planters by the back door.

"Oh, this is nice," I said aloud. "This is really nice." I walked down the long hallway to the master bedroom, touching the wallpaper, letting my feet sink into the thick, pile carpeting, and thinking that maybe Vernell and Jimmy had really been on the cutting edge of what was now a booming business. I stepped into the master bedroom and glanced up at the skylights in the vaulted ceiling.

The four-poster bed was piled with pillows and quilts. For one uncontrollable second I found myself thinking of Marshall Weathers.

"Stop that!" I said loudly. "Hum," I said. The old Mama trick for bad thoughts. Humming will keep him out of your head. "I'm Falling in Love with You" came unbidden to my lips, and I hummed away at full volume. But it didn't seem to do the trick. For when I stepped into the master bath and saw the oversized Jacuzzi tub, my wicked thoughts were back. I hummed louder and stepped into the walk-in closet.

I still heard a faint whistle behind me, but there wasn't time to react. Something collided with the back of my skull and the humming stopped. I remember falling forward into the darkened closet, but little else.

"Mama? Mama, answer me!" It was Sheila's voice, trembling with anxiety, begging me to answer her, and yet I couldn't quite rise up out of the mist that surrounded me.

"What should we do?" she cried. "Should we call nine-one-one?"

A deeper, adolescent male voice answered. "I don't think we oughta jump to that," Keith was saying. "Remember, she and the cops don't gee-haw too good right now."

"But what if she's dying?" Sheila cried.

I must've moaned. I thought I was speaking. I thought I'd said, "Keith is right for once. Don't call the police." But Sheila and Keith didn't act as if they heard me.

"Listen," he said. "I think she's coming around. Maybe we can get her to a doctor."

I blinked my eyes and saw only blue sky. The brightness made my head pound.

"Mama?" Sheila's face loomed into view. The blurriness of her features began to fade as the world swam into focus. I was lying on the bed in the mobile home's master bedroom, staring up at the skylights.

I tried to sit up, but Sheila pushed me back against the pillows. "You'd better not move," she said.

"What in the world is going on?" I said, my voice coining out in a hoarse whisper. "What happened?"

"You tell us, Mama. Keith was checking to make sure the trailers were all locked up so he could take off for lunch and when he saw the door wide-open, he decided to check around. That's when we found you."

Keith stepped out from behind Sheila. He looked worried and I noticed his hand placed protectively on Sheila's thin shoulder.

"Honest, Mrs. Reid, I thought for a minute you was dead! There you were, facedown on the closet floor, still and cold. I didn't even know if you were breathing! Sheila liked to have died when we realized it was you."

"You shoulda seen Keith, Mama," Sheila beamed proudly. "He had CPR training in vo-tech school." I looked up at pimply, skinheaded Keith and shuddered. The thought of those chapped lips wrapped over my own and blowing stale breath into my lungs made me cringe.

"Surely I was breathing?" I asked, once again attempting to push myself up off the pillows.

"Oh, yes, ma'am," Keith said. "That's how come I knew you wasn't dead or nothing. I used to get knocked out all the time skateboarding."

That explained a lot, I thought. My head was pounding. "Sheila, why aren't you in school?" I demanded. "And what are you two doing here?"

Sheila favored me with her most adult expression. "Mama, it's a teacher workday. Keith let me use his truck while my car's in the shop. I was just coming back to take him to lunch."

"Back where?" I still couldn't pull myself together.

"Mama! Keith works here! I told you he had a regular job. He's the clean-up man." I looked at Keith, all decked out in a dirty blue jumpsuit, his name embroidered in red on the pocket. "He cleans out the trailers and helps set them up when they come in."

Keith tightened his grip on Sheila's shoulder. "Sheila's uncle gave me the job a couple of months ago," he said. "I'm working my way up."

Everyone's entitled to their fantasies, I thought. Working his way up, indeed! I really tried to sit upright this time, and finally succeeded, although my head hurt like crazy and my entire body felt detached and unresponsive.

"Mama," Sheila said, her face rigid with worry, "what happened?"

"Honey, I have no idea. One minute I was looking around, the next, I'm here with you two."

"Mrs. Reid," Keith said, "it just isn't safe to go roaming around in these trailers, not without a salesperson or something. This isn't the first time someone's gotten into one of our trailers, looking for stuff to take or a place to stay for a little while. We're right by the highway, you know."

Well, duh, I should've been more careful. Of course. But what good was that piece of advice gonna do me now? I'd come to the Mobile Home Kingdom looking to find something the police could've overlooked. Instead, someone had found me, and I didn't for a second subscribe to the theory that a vagrant had bopped me on the head.