Cowboy Sing Me Home (10 page)

            “What was it this time?”

            “Betty Wells wanted to sing “Nearer My
Lord To Thee,” and Louise – you know how Louise is, absolutely no control over
this part of her body – ” Helen made a sweeping motion toward her own mouth.
Louise made a remark about Betty wanting to be nearer to
Brother Mark
,
not the Good Lord.  And she also said that Betty would probably rip off her
choir robe for a dramatic climax to the song and have nothing on but a t-shirt
and those tacky black bicycle shorts she wears all over town.”

            Luke groaned.

            “I know, Louise shouldn’t have said it. 
She should have at least kept her voice down.  But really, Luke, those shorts
are tacky.  Betty passed the spandex-wearing age a long time ago.”

            “Okay, so we lost Betty Wells.  But we had
the choirs from all four churches, so we should have at least a decent showing,
right?”

            “Actually,” Helen said slowly.  “After
Betty burst into tears and stormed out, Louise tried to explain herself by
saying that it was only natural that she and Betty would hold different points
of view, since Betty is a Methodist, and Louise is a Baptist, and everyone knew
that Methodists just naturally had more relaxed moral standards than Baptists
do.  So then…”

            “So then we lost the Methodists.”

            “Eventually. After a few more words out of
Louise.”

            “I don’t want to hear what the ‘few more
words’ were.”  Luke stood and paced the office.  “This is like the sinking of
the Titanic.”

            “Yeah, except the band played on when the
Titanic sank.  You don’t even have that,” Toby said.

            “You hush, unless you have a solution.” 

            “Can you get the flower shop to deliver
four dozen bouquets of roses by tomorrow afternoon?”

            Luke ignored him.  “Okay, let’s take
stock.  We’ve lost half in support of Mavis.  Plus Betty Wells, who was our
strongest soprano.  Then the Methodists.”

            “Plus the entire Church of Christ girls.”

            “The entire Church of Christ?  They were
our best singers!  What happened to them?”

            “I’m not sure exactly, because it was
right in the middle of all the hullabaloo between Louise and the Methodists.  I
just heard someone scream ‘sanctimonious blowhards in ugly shoes’ and then the
entire Church of Christ turned up their noses and left.”

            Luke rubbed his face with both hands.  “So
that leaves…”

            “Me and Louise.”

            “You and Louise,” he echoed flatly.

            “And between the two of us, we can’t carry
a tune in a bucket.”

            Luke, Helen and Toby stood in the quiet
room and looked at each other.  The air conditioner came back on with a groan
and clank, and Luke blew out a gust of air.  He clicked his tongue and reached
for his hat on the rack by the door. 

            “Where you going?” Toby asked.

            “I’m going to find some new talent for the
Jubilee.”

Dusty stood in the open doorway of
Tumbleweeds and held her hair up on top of her head, waving a hand near her
face to create the only breeze for miles.  Her amplifier wouldn’t come on, and
she couldn’t figure out why not.

She blew a gust of breath at her forehead
and said a few choice words. Their first gig was tomorrow night, and the
chances of finding anyone near here who knew how to fix her amp were not even
worth considering.

Maybe it was just a breaker, she thought. 
She didn’t hold out much hope, but she felt silly for not thinking of that
first.

She let her hair fall and wheeled the amp
to another outlet, and felt even sillier when it lit up instantly.

“Rodney?”

His muffled reply carried from the office
at the back of the room.

She headed that direction and poked her
head through the doorway.  “Breaker box?”

Rodney’s body was in his chair, but his
head was tucked between his knees, and he was searching through the stack of
paper at his feet. “Yes,” he said.

“Yes what?”

“Yes, we definitely have a breaker box. 
I’ve seen it.”

“Ummm…do you remember where it is?”

“Oh.”  He straightened and placed his
hands on his thighs.  “Where is it?  That seems to be the question of the day,
doesn’t it.”  He stood and turned in a slow circle, taking in the room.  “I
thought it was in here.”

Dusty bit back a sigh of exasperation. 
Rodney was one of the nicest bar owners she’d ever met, and the best bartender
she’d never known.  But once he stepped away from the bar, he couldn’t seem to
find his butt with both hands.

“I don’t think it’s in here,” she said
after she checked behind the door.  “I’ll go check down the hall by the
bathrooms.”

“Good idea.  See if the liquor license is
back there, would you?”

Dusty leaned against the doorjamb.  “Don’t
tell me you can’t find the liquor license.”

“Okay.”  He held his hands up.  “I won’t
tell you.”

Finding the license suddenly seemed more
important than the breaker, which wasn’t going anywhere at any rate.  But
without the license they were sunk. 

She hated to ask, since Rodney looked like
he was either going to start throwing things or break down and cry, but she
said, “You’re sure you have one, right?”  Knowing Rodney, he had the paperwork
all ready to be filled out and sent in.  Somewhere.

“I’m sure about that.  Uncle Bob renewed
it right before he retired.  That’s the last thing he said to me before he
left, ‘be sure and hang up the new license when it comes in’.”

“And it came in?”

“About three months ago, if I remember
right.  I just happened to look up there and see the expiration date on the old
one, and I remembered.”

Instead of wasting time on dead-end
avenues like ‘where did you see it last?’ Dusty began digging through the stack
of papers on the metal file cabinet beside the desk.

She found a stack of receipts she was
pretty sure Rodney’s accountant was going to be interested in, and a bunch of
old newspapers she doubted anyone had ever been interested in. She found her
own publicity packet.

She shook her head as she slid the glossy
black and white photos from the envelope.  No wonder Luke hadn’t recognized her
when he saw her.  The posters that were supposed to be circulated a month ago
were still in Rodney’s office. 

“Why didn’t you put these up around town?”

“What?”  He looked at the pictures.  “Hey,
those are good pictures of you.  We should put them up somewhere.”

“Good idea.  They were in the envelope
with the songs and instructions for the band.”

Rodney cocked his head.  “No kidding?  I
didn’t even see those in there.  I gave the band stuff to Luke, though.”

Good thing, Dusty thought, or we’d be in
even worse shape than we are.  Although it was hard to beat a bar without a
liquor license.  “You are in serious need of some organizational skills, my
friend.”

“Tell me about it.”  He lifted a water
bottle off another large stack of paper.  “I was going to hire a secretary but
I lost her phone number.  Hey!”  He held up a sheet of paper.

“The license?”

“No, it’s the order form for the liquor
supplier. I looked for this all last week.”

“If you tell me you don’t have liquor, I’m
going to pack my bags.  Although I suppose that would minimize the problem with
the license.”

“No, I have liquor, because they faxed me
another form.  They were real rude about it, though.”

Dusty turned to search for the
still-missing breaker box, and met Luke coming in.  The sight of him threw her
off enough that she actually stopped for a moment before turning for the back
hallway.  “You’re about four hours early,” she said over her shoulder.

“Good to see you, too.  How’s it going?”

“We have no juice for the left half of the
stage, and no liquor license.  But other than that… how about you?”

“No choir for the Jubilee.  But other than
that…”

Dusty smiled as she spied the breaker box
down the dark hallway.  Good.  They had something to talk about besides her
sudden departure this morning.

“What’s the Jubilee – oh, that’s the
revival thing, right?”

“Yes, but don’t call it a revival.  The
Catholics thought that sounded too Southern Baptist.”

“What happened to the choir?”

“As far as I can tell, half the women are
afraid of Mavis, and half are outraged by something Louise said.”

Dusty studied the breaker switches and
flipped one.  “Do me a favor, would you?  Wheel my amp back over to the stage
and plug it in.  Louise is the little one with the face that looks like a
wadded-up paper bag?”

“Mmm, yep, that’s Louise.”

“And Mavis?  Is she the loud one with the
tall hair?

“The very one.”  He plugged the amp in and
turned it on.  “You’re good to go.”

“Excellent.”  She walked back down the
hallway.  “Now I have to figure out how we can distribute everything so we
won’t blow it during the show tomorrow night.”

“I’ll help.  And I have to find somebody
to help me do the music for the Jubilee before tomorrow night.  You interested
in teaming up with me for some duets?”

She raised one eyebrow.  “At a revival? 
You’re not serious.”

“Jubilee.  And of course I’m serious.  Why
not?”

“A, I don’t do revivals, period.”

“Not a problem.  It’s a Jubilee, not a
revival.”

“And B, I don’t have time.  Neither do
you.  We have rehearsal tonight.”

“We could learn three or four songs in no
time.  You could come up to the office tomorrow morning and we could get it all
worked out.  Just imagine it.  Two people, two guitars.  It’ll be folksy.”

“What it will be is one guy, with one
guitar.  And you’d better not let it interfere with your previous
responsibilities. I’ve heard your new boss is a real hard case.”  She put her
hands on her hips and surveyed the scene, mumbling to herself.  “We’ve
rehearsed twice and haven’t blown anything, why is it blowing breakers now?”

            “My new boss is a pussycat.  And she’d be
doing me a big, big favor if she helped me out with this choir thing.”

            “Don’t start.  It’s not going to happen.”

            “You haven’t even thought about it.  And
the truth is, the whole fiasco is your fault.”

            “My fault?  How do you figure that?”  She
leaned over a speaker and jiggled a wire.

            “You’re the one who said Mavis was a
screechy no-talent.”

            “I never said she was a no-talent.  Just
screechy.”

            “You started a landslide.  Mavis is home,
wrapped up in her crocheted bed jacket, swearing she’ll never open her mouth to
sing again as long as she lives, and she doesn’t know how she could have been
blind enough to spend the last forty years singing her heart out in that
church, and not know that the entire congregation thought she sounded like a
cat during a mating ritual.”

            “Now, I never said that.”

            “No, that was Louise.”

            “Anyway, it’s not my fault.  Entirely.”

            “But you could help.   Every woman in town
has their nose bent out of joint over something.  It’s going to be a very sad
revival.”

            “Jubilee.  And I guess you’ll need to
start praying for a miracle.”

            His eyes met hers.  “I have been.”

She fought to keep from shifting her gaze
away.  She lost the fight, then told herself it didn’t matter. 

“Come on, Dusty.  Just consider it.  If
you could lend that angelic voice to such a good cause—“

Dusty snorted and unplugged Stevie’s steel
guitar.

“Okay, that was laying it on a bit thick. 
But seriously, you’d be doing Brother Mark and me a great favor.  I hate to get
this Rain Fest started off on the wrong foot.”

            “No thanks.  I’ve played churches before. 
They’re not my cup of tea.”

            He chewed his lip and studied her.  “You
know, you get the most awful look on your face when the subject of church or
religion comes up.  What happened?”

            “Nothing happened.  I just know how ‘the
church’ works, and I don’t really buy into it.”  She unplugged the drummer’s
microphones and snaked them over to the other side of the stage.  “My parents
and I played a revival one time.  I was about thirteen.” 

She could still feel the hot air beneath
that tent, and if she tried hard enough – which she wasn’t going to do – she
could probably still smell the honeysuckle bushes outside the tent, the scent
carried in on the evening wind.  She didn’t have to try to remember the boys
coming in with their hair slicked down and shirts tucked in, the girls with
their cotton dresses and white Bibles.  Neither did she have to try very hard
to remember how she wanted to be one of those girls.  For just one moment, she
wanted to be the girl with the cotton dress and white Bible, with barrettes in
her hair that matched her shoes, and a bedroom all her own with a poster of
kittens on one wall.