The Prophet of Paradise

Chapter 4

Chapter 4

FERGUS MCKENDRICK, RYMAN’S father, and Muriel Hudkins, secretary-receptionist-bookkeeper-housemother, sat at their adjoining desks in the cramped office they had shared for more than forty years.

“Here are the paychecks,” Muriel said as she handed him three envelopes.

“Where’s yours?” Fergus asked.

“The same place it’s been for the past two months,” she replied.

“I told you, Muriel, you gotta stop skipping your check.”

“I will not put this business in the red any farther than it already is.”

“You let me worry about that.”

“I’m sure you are worrying about it. I’m just not going to add any more to your worries.”

“You can’t just go on not taking your pay. And things will turn around soon. We’ve been through tough times before.”

“I truly pray that things will turn around soon. Yes, we’ve seen difficult times before, but this situation is serious. Mister Sensabaugh called yesterday. They’re getting impatient at the bank.”

“Bing’s never let me down. He’ll understand we just need a bit more time.”

“Bing’s retired. Bob runs the bank now.”

“I know that.”

Muriel caught a faint question skim over her boss’s face.

“But Bing’s still got some say, don’t he? He’s—what they call it?—chairman meritorious.”

“Chairman emeritus.”

“Yeah, that.” Fergus hunched his shoulders, then pulled them back, stretching his chest into a wide barrel. “Seems I got a belch here I can’t get up. Must be that cheap warehouse coffee you been buying.” He withdrew a faded bandana from his hip pocket and wiped his brow. “And is it just me, or is the AC on the fritz again?”

“I’m sorry, but there isn’t any money for your expensive special blend of coffee. It feels fine in here to me, but if the air conditioning is not working properly, we’ll just have to live with it for now. We’re in arrears with Jessup HVAC. And other suppliers are threatening to cut us off. Mac Tools already has. The John Deere franchise could be in jeopardy.”

“Oh, everyone just needs to be a little more patient. Better times will be here soon.”

“Things aren’t like they used to be. No sir. Times have changed. It’s a shame in many ways. But that’s how it is.”

“Well, at least y’all get to knock off early for the weekend,” Fergus said. “Me and Ryman can hang around in case any customers show up.”

The conversation stopped at the sound of the front door opening. Ryman’s footsteps echoed in the empty showroom.

“You get that wrench Bar needed?” Fergus asked as Ryman entered the office.

Now Ryman realized why the sight of the Mac Tools truck had troubled him. He’d been so focused on the Glenfiddich label that he’d forgotten his main reason for driving into town. He briefly considered fibbing to his father, covering his mistake by telling the old man that they didn’t have the correct wrench at Tractor Supply. So why hadn’t he gone to Home Depot, Southern States, or the Farmers Coop? Why hadn’t he called to ask Bar if there was another tool that would do the job? No way out. He had to own up to it. “Sorry, Daddy, I completely forgot. Lots on my mind this morning.”

“Damn, boy. I don’t suppose you forgot to go to the liquor store?”

Ryman did not answer.

“No,” Fergus said, shaking his head, “I didn’t think so. Bar ain’t gonna be happy.”

Ryman stood silently, a fifty-six year old man in the pose of a petulant child.

Fergus rose, wiped his forehead again, stretched out his left arm, then brought a fist to the middle of his chest, trying to bring up that reluctant belch. Muriel pretended to busy herself with an accounting task. The old man looked more closely at his son. Something about Ryman’s eyes did not seem right, a distant dullness in them. “You okay, boy?”

“Fine, Daddy.”

“You sure?”

“Took a spill this morning. Deer spook. No big deal.”

“You riding that young chestnut we got from the track last week?”

“Colby, yeah. But I can’t say it was his fault. Damn deer jumped right in front of us. Big buck, huge rack.” The light began to return to Ryman’s eyes. “Just flew right out of the woods. Surprised us both. I went off over his head, but no harm done.” The more he recounted the event, the more animated he became. Muriel halted her paperwork pantomime and stared up at him. He was now pacing back and forth in the tiny office, his head c****d to one side, as if trying to work out a puzzling question. “And there was something…damn, I wish I’d gotten a better look. What the hell was it? Right in the middle of that huge rack. Could it have been…? No, no way. But it did kind of look like… And then the Glenfiddich stag. ‘Valley of the Deer.’ Son-of-a-b***h. Never occurred to me. Then I’m driving back and damned if he isn’t there again, right after the Mac Tools guy ran me off the road. Or maybe I just imagined it. When I went after him he…he just…”

“Ry!”

The sound of his father’s voice jolted him out of his reverie.

“You ain’t all right, boy. You got yourself a helluva concussion. You shouldn’t a drove all the way to town. You leave your truck…damn.” He placed a hand on his abdomen. “I do believe that cheap coffee’s given me a powerful dose of indigestion. You leave your truck here and I’ll run you home after I hand out the paychecks. C’mon with me, boy.”

At eighty-five Fergus was the force behind McKendrick and Sons, a big man with a contagious enthusiasm for life. He sported a wavy mane of silver hair and his huge smile had lost none of its luster, thanks to top quality dental work. He moved with the self-assurance of a man who had seen combat; the scarlet tails he wore to the annual hunt ball were decorated with his medals from the Korean conflict. Other than his brief, youthful stint as a US Marine, he never wanted to live anywhere but Paradise Gap or do anything other than succeed his father into the farm implement business, as McKendrick men had done since his great-grandfather started the company in 1885.

When Fergus wasn’t bedazzling a customer with the wonders of the latest developments in John Deere technology, he threw himself into his other passion—chasing foxes around the Virginia countryside, another tradition handed down over several generations within both the McKendrick and Billington families.

Ryman shared his father’s love of mounted hunting but not the old man’s dedication to the sales and service of farm implements. He was, though, equally happy to have never left Paradise Gap, other than that year and a half at Bridgewater College. After three semesters he became convinced a college education would be of no benefit to him. Given his GPA and spotty attendance record, the school’s administration readily agreed.

Ryman followed his father from the office into the showroom filled with unsold merchandise, devoid of prospective buyers. The space had the unnatural feel of a museum display. The sound of thick-soled shoes on the bare tile floor rattled around the motionless pieces of equipment, a dozen empty padded yellow seats waiting for butts that might never come.

Before they reached the swinging door into the service bay, Muriel stepped out of the office, purse and car keys in hand. A severely prim and proper woman, she was a matron of the African Methodist Episcopal Church. Their building sat a half mile outside the village, the vestige of a time when mingling the races for an act as personal as worship services was not condoned. Not much had changed in that regard. Sunday mornings were still the most segregated hours in America, none more so than in Crutchfield County.

“I’ll be leaving now,” she said. “Have a pleasant holiday weekend. See you on Tuesday.” Muriel was well schooled in the social graces and proper speech, her diction always perfect, her grammar correct. She steadfastly guarded herself against allowing even one “y’all” or “ain’t” to escape her lips. It wasn’t easy, working around such heathens, hearing the Lord’s name abused and the Queen’s English mangled every day.

From the service bay came the sound of clattering metal, a tool tossed in anger. “Goddamn piece a s**t! Who the f**k designs these sorry ass machines? For Christ-f*****g-sake, I ain’t never gonna get this cocksucker finished. What were y’all thinking, putting the clutch way the f**k up there?”

The question was rhetorical. There was no one else in the bay except Bar Reinhardt, head mechanic.

Muriel tried not to flinch. With a “Hmmph!” she turned and left.

Fergus and Ryman headed on through the swinging door that led to the service bay. The showroom’s aura of fresh tires, clean metal, and bright expectations gave way to the practical aroma of diesel fuel, heavy lubricants, sweat, and swear words that still hung in a menacing cloud over Barstow “Bar” Reinhardt. Bar alone was menacing enough. At six-four and two-eighty he made the McKendrick men look “medium.” But his size was secondary, relatively normal even, compared to the wide, jagged scar where his left eye and ear had once been. The remaining eye swam in a pale blue pool, its opaque lightness a glittering contrast to the grotesque absence of its partner. He wore grease-stained white bib overalls, no shirt underneath, and heavy Red Wing work boots. His upper body showed a thick matting of red hair over his fair, freckled white skin. A spreading patch of gray peaked out over the top of the bib. What remained of the hair on his head was also a mix of red and gray. The thinning patches fore and aft threatened to convene amidships.

He looked up as Ryman entered the service bay, an expectant glint in his one good eye.

Fergus gave Ryman a poke in the arm. “You’d best tell him.”

“Ah, Bar, man, I’m sorry,” Ryman stammered. “I didn’t get that wrench.”

“Why the hell not?” Bar began to straighten up from his crouched position.

“Oh, well, I guess I…kinda forgot.”

“You forgot to go? Or you went on your liquor run and forgot the tool?” Bar got bigger with each word as he raised himself up to full height. Ryman tried to make himself smaller.

“Look, man, I’m sorry, just had a lot on my mind. I’ll run back right now and see if I can get it.”

“You ain’t driving nowhere,” Fergus said, grabbing Ryman’s arm as he started to turn away. “Ry got hisself bonked on the head this morning. Seems a deer spooked his horse. He’s a little confused still.”

“Damnedest thing. See, this big buck just flew outta the woods…”

“You go ahead and wrap up for the day, Bar,” Fergus continued. “I’ll call Preston and tell him his bush-hog won’t be ready for a few more days. The…uh…part we had to order didn’t show up. Damn UPS, or something.”

Bar shook his head in disgust and trudged off to his workbench.

Fergus and Ryman continued on through the open bay door. A picnic table sat off to the side of the small paved area behind the service bay, its wooden planks so badly splintered only those with thick pants or bad judgment dared sit at it. Two men leaned against the table’s edge. Neither wore thick pants.

Recently past the ordeal of his fortieth birthday, Miles Flanagan retained his former jockey physique. His skin was tanned and weathered, his face rutted with frown lines. His dark, close-cropped hair showed the first hint of salt among the pepper. He wore a faded red polo shirt that strained across his chest and biceps, then billowed loosely around his narrow waist. A scuffed pair of paddock boots peaked out from below his faded jeans.

The other man, Conway Purvis, barely twenty but several inches taller than his co-worker, wore his unnaturally blonde hair long and stringy. If his skin was tanned, it was impossible to tell as much of it was covered with intricate tattoos. He wore a black tee shirt emblazoned with a Norse warrior wielding a battle ax beneath the name of the Southern rock band Molly Hatchet, the song title “Flirtin’ With Disaster” in ornate script across his belly. His greasy jeans hung low on his hips. As the McKendricks approached, Conway took a quick last drag on his Marlboro, dropped it onto the hard packed bare soil, and crushed it with the sole of a Red Wing boot, the same model Bar wore but several sizes smaller.

“Here ya go, boys,” Fergus said brightly as he handed them their paychecks. “Don’t spend it all on booze and women,” he added with a wink and a smile. “Save a bit to fritter away foolishly.”

Neither man smiled back. They’d heard the same line countless times, and hadn’t thought it particularly funny from the start. It became even less so as the size of their paychecks dwindled.

“Sorry there ain’t nothing else for y’all to do today. Might as well get a jump on the weekend though. Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do. And if you do, name if after me.”

Miles and Conway left separately, sullenly, exchanging no wishes for a pleasant holiday weekend, and Fergus and Ryman went back into the service bay.

“Looks like another weekend of cheap booze and ugly women for you, Bar,” Fergus said as he handed him his check. “Sorry it ain’t more.”

Bar didn’t bother to look at the amount. He just folded the check and stuffed it into a pocket of his overalls. “Well, boss, ain’t that a bitch.”

Fergus’s grin turned to a grimace as his left arm shot out again. He twisted it as if trying to work out a cramp while his right hand went to his chest, the palm flat over his heart. “Damn…coffee…” The grimace became surprise, his eyes wide, head up. His left hand landed on Bar’s sweaty bare shoulder, his right clutched at his chest. He looked straight at Bar, then his legs crumpled and he toppled over onto a pile of discarded lawnmower tires. His frozen gaze stared sightlessly up at the corrugated metal roof.

Ryman had never seen anyone die before. Bar had, but not for a long time. Bar knelt down and felt for a pulse. Then he looked up at Ryman and said, “I don’t reckon it’ll make much difference, but we’d better call 911.”

Ryman remained frozen, staring at the body of his father. “Shouldn’t we do CPR or something?”

“You know how to do that s**t?”

“Just what I’ve seen on TV. Pump his chest and stuff.”

Bar’s one working eyebrow arched. He stood up, pulled his cell phone from a pocket of his overalls, and jabbed the 911 key with a beefy, oil-blackened finger. Just before the operator answered, he turned to Ryman and said, “Looks like you’re the boss of this place now. Ain’t that a bitch.” Then back into the phone he said, “Huh? Uh, no, ma’am, not you. Appears we got us a dead man here. McKendrick and Sons, 235 Paradise Turnpike, west end of Paradise Gap. Am I sure he’s dead? Well, he could be takin’ hisself a noontime nap here in this pile a wore out tires. But my money’s on dead. Do I know CPR? s**t, lady, I cain’t hardly spell CPR. Anyone else here? Just Ryman but he don’t look so good hisself right now. And I sure ain’t doing no mouth-to-mouth on his ugly ass. Yeah, I think you’re right. We’ll wait for the amb-lance.”