Drop by Drop

2

He staggered back until he encountered the reassuring reality of a desk. The color drained from his face.

“What’s wrong, Mr. Nyeberger?” asked the chief teller.

“I saw… I mean…” He sank lower, resting his buttocks on the desk.

“Are you sick?” When he didn’t respond to her question Bea snapped, “Dwayne!” Still no response.

She hurried from her cage. As she passed Nell Bennett she murmured, “Help me, will you?”

Nell swung into action. Bracketing Dwayne between them, the two women loosened his tie and fanned his face.

He was embarrassed. Having Nell observe him in a moment of weakness was bad, but not as bad as what he had just seen.

“It’s her,” he said hoarsely.

Bea leaned closer to him. “What are you talking about?”

He waved a hand in the direction of the front windows. “Lila. She’s back.” A large vein began throbbing in his temple.

“He’s having a heart attack,” Nell determined. Someone else’s emergency was having a steadying effect on her own nerves.

Bank staff and customers gathered around the stricken man. “Make him bend over and put his head between his knees,” said a portly man wearing plaid golf trousers.

“No way,” the woman with him contradicted. “With a heart attack they have to lie down.”

A bank clerk added, “If he’s having a fit, don’t let him swallow his tongue.”

“It’s not a heart attack or a fit,” said Bea. “He’s just upset. Sit down, Dwayne, you’ll be all right in a minute.” She steered him to the nearest chair.

“I know what I saw!” He waved toward the windows again. Stabbed the air with his forefinger.

The others turned to look, but by then it was too late. Ordinary people were passing by, going about ordinary business.

Dwayne Nyeberger moaned like an animal in pain. “Lila Ragland’s come back to ruin me!”

Nell patted his shoulder. “Ssshhh, it’ll be all right.”

He responded with an inarticulate croak and flung his arms around her hips.

While Nell was prying him off, two women entered the lobby, paused, looked at each other and left. “What d’you s’pose that’s all about?” one asked when they were outside.

“Maybe she just paid off a gigantic mortgage,” the other guessed.

Dwayne was taken to his office and given a glass of water. He dutifully drank while wishing for something stronger. Much stronger. In the bottom drawer of his desk was a practically full bottle of single malt, but he didn’t want to take it out with Bea Fontaine watching him. The chief teller had strict views on alcohol in the workplace.

What he really needed was…

No, that was what got him into trouble in the first place. When he was younger. And stupid.

What had Lila said? “It’s fairy dust,” she had told him, laughing. “Takes your troubles away.”

It had for a while.

But sometimes when he least expected it the evil fairies came back.

Dwayne bent over and vomited into his lap.

Nell flinched away to avoid being splattered.

“Go on home,” Bea whispered to her, “and we’ll take care of him. This has happened before, it’s only an hallucination.” She squared her shoulders, raised her voice and became the chief teller again. “I’ll see that your bank card is replaced, Mrs. Bennett—it’ll come to you in the mail—and if you’ll stop by the front desk on your way out, Janine will arrange for your cash. Just tell her how much.”

When Nell left the bank the heat off the sidewalk hit her like a giant fist. She paused for a moment to catch her breath.

Lila Ragland? Wasn’t she the one who…

Nell recalled the headline in The Sycamore Seed. Ten years ago, but not forgotten. The scandal had hit the quiet town like a thunderclap.

The story had run for weeks. The local newspaper had boosted its circulation dramatically by relating the lurid details of a drug-fueled party on the north side, with everything available from horse tranquilizers to Zee tablets. The police had staged a raid and arrested several men, including the mayor’s brother-in-law, but the town’s best-known party girl had disappeared under mysterious circumstances. The river was dragged for her body, but it was never found.

Dwayne Nyeberger had been among those questioned, to the embarrassment of his wife and the fury of her father.

Nell had good reason to remember that time. She and Rob had been planning a “second honeymoon” to make up for not taking one after their marriage. She had been too heavily pregnant with Jessamyn when she walked down the aisle. Except there was no aisle, just the registry office, with her mother looking embarrassed and her father assessing Rob’s prospects. Two giggling bridesmaids, hastily recruited. A bouquet purchased at the last moment, comprised of lilies that shed pollen all over her not-white maternity outfit.

Three years later, with their two toddlers temporarily lodged with her parents, the locale of their long-delayed trip had become a source of contention. She had wanted to go to Europe—to Paris. For years she had dreamed of honeymooning in Paris.

Over breakfast Rob had announced they were going to Panama City.

Nell set down her coffee cup. “But what about Paris?”

“Paris is such a cliché, Cookie,” he’d chided. Pushing his plate aside, he had propped his new AllCom on the table and begun scrolling through the stock quotations. Earlier AllComs had employed several metal alloys for the sake of versatility, but now were considered too heavy. More recent models used plastics that imitated metal in everything but weight. Rob’s, which was waterproof, functioned as a videophone and texter and provided full internet access as well as computing. The insatiable consumer market created by PCs and smartphones had morphed into a demand for total electronic connectivity. Microchips were embedded in every possible object. AllComs could even control security systems and household appliances from miles away.

Nell sought to get her husband’s attention. “What’s so romantic about Panama City, darling? I don’t even know where it is.”

His eyes had remained fixed on the small screen. “It’s in Central America and there’s a famous cathedral. You really must expand your horizons.”

“Paris would be expanding my horizons. Please, Rob, I’ve been looking forward to this for ages.”

They had gone to Panama City.

Rob had made business contacts in the Canal Zone and spent most of the time in meetings. Nell went shopping for clothes she would never wear again and souvenirs that would mean nothing to the people she bought them for. The semitropical heat caused sweat to pour from her scalp. Constant rain depressed her. When she retreated to the relative comfort of the hotel beauty salon, they insisted on brightening her hair with peroxide and ruined it.

I wonder if Lila Ragland dyed her hair, Nell thought now. Probably. Did Rob know the girl? Probably not.

In the years following their marriage the ferocious determination that had allowed a young Robert Bennett to destroy an enemy sniper nest single-handed had been channeled into his business. RobBenn had become his obsession, his one true love.

It would have been easier to compete with Lila Ragland.

Nell resolutely tucked her handbag under her arm and headed toward Mortenson’s In-a-Minnit to pick up her dry cleaning. From there she would go to her office, two rooms on the first floor of the Liberty Life and Casualty Building. Tasteful black-and-gold lettering on the glass door identified “Eleanor Bennett, Real Estate.”

When she reached the corner a sudden impulse made her glance back at the bank. Someone else was struggling with the ATM. Shay Mulligan, the red-haired veterinarian who took care of the Bennett dogs, pounded the machine with his fist and looked around in frustration.

At this moment Shay reminded Nell of a small boy—though he was a widower struggling to raise his son by himself. It couldn’t be easy. Evan Mulligan was a few months older than Nell’s daughter, Jessamyn, and horse crazy at an age when only girls were supposed to be horse crazy.

When he saw Nell looking in his direction Shay called out, “Damn thing’s chewing up my card, Miz Bennett!” His easy drawl was as much a part of him as the forest of freckles he had never outgrown.

“Don’t wait, go inside and ask Bea Fontaine to help you. Hurry up now, beat the rush!”

Shay nodded his thanks. The Bennetts were valuable customers. Their three dogs—two pedigreed Irish setters for Eleanor and the kids, and a massive Rottweiler for Robert Bennett—were given the best care money could buy.

You could tell a lot about people by their animals, Shay thought, as he passed through the security doors and entered the bank. The setters, Sheila and Shamrock—known as Rocky—were smarter than their breed’s reputation would suggest and devoted to Nell and the children. The Rottweiler was a status dog, purchased to guard the house and grounds. On rare occasions Bennett walked the dog on a very short chain to impress his neighbors. Poor Satan—and what kind of man calls his dog Satan?—wouldn’t have felt any attachment to Bennett. Mary Shaw, the housekeeper, fed him and let him into the garage on stormy days. She was his god in an apron.

Dogs, thought Shay. Dogs know who people really are.

The scene inside the bank caught his attention. The door of the vice president’s office stood wide open. Dwayne Nyeberger could be seen inside, with his arms folded on his desk and his head resting on them. Other people were milling around the lobby, eagerly telling each other what had just happened.

Shay found Bea Fontaine at her window. The position enabled her to keep an eye on the vice president’s office. “Yes, Mr. Mulligan?” She sounded distracted.

“It’s about my bank card and the ATM…”

“You too, I suppose. How much cash did you want?”

“I… uh… enough for a good tip in a French restaurant. I’m taking Angela to the…”

For a moment he had Bea’s full attention. “Are you still going out with the Watson girl? It’s been three years that I know of; you should marry her and give Evan a mother.” Bea slid a withdrawal slip toward him on the counter. “Here, sign this and we’ll give you your cash.”

Shay’s ears reddened with embarrassment. Why did people keep pressuring him to marry? His son’s feelings had to be considered; the boy loved his mother very much and had taken her death from cancer hard.

The vet fumbled with the counter pen in its black plastic receptacle, but he could not free it to sign the withdrawal slip. When another customer came up behind him, Shay gave the pen an impatient shake. It seemed to be permanently affixed to its plastic cup—which was not only chained to the counter, but stuck to it. He tugged harder.

Pen and cup stretched like bubble gum.

Bea leaned forward. “What happened? Oh. Uh, don’t try to force that, I’ll give you another one.” From a drawer below the counter she took a black ballpoint pen imprinted with the bank’s logo.

The pen softened in her hand like melting chocolate and began to ooze down her wrist.