Chief wasn’t next to me when I woke up. The room was filled with light, which meant it had already turned morning. I yawned the sleep from my brain and stretched. I was all about to get out of bed when Maggy walked in.

“Good, you’re up.” She had my dress in her hands and my shiny black shoes dangling off two of her fingers. She set them all at the end of the bed. “Would you like some help getting ready?”

I looked at her, then at the dress. It was my Sunday dress. Only Maggy had sewn a bunch of pink ribbons and lace all over it. I felt the air pushing on my ribs again. I could hear Preacher’s warnings fire off in my head. Looking at the shoes I figured my fate was truly set. I was a goner. I could almost feel the breath of the tiger on the back of my neck.

“Thanks, Maggy,” I told her, “but I don’t need any help.”

“Look,” she said. “I know that’s not what you would choose to wear–”

“It’s all right.”

She stared at me some more.

“Thank you for making it for me, Maggy.”

She looked at me like she thought I was probably crazy, then said, “You better hurry up. Everyone is downstairs. Chief thought you could use the extra rest so we let you sleep in.”

I nodded and went about putting on the dress. Maggy stared at me some more, then she left the room, closing Chief’s door behind her. It didn’t take me very long to put the things on. The tights were a bit of trouble. They kept getting twisted up and angled off with the toes pointing the wrong way. But once they were on the slip and the dress were a breeze. I slipped my feet into the shoes and left Chief’s room only stopping off at the bathroom to quickly brushed the fur from my teeth.

When I got to the bottom of the stairs,  I heard Maggy say, “I don’t know Chief, there’s something wrong with her.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, you should see her. She didn’t make a single fuss over the dress. She even thanked me for making it for her. Now that’s not like her.”

After a heap of quiet Chief said, “She found out about going home with your aunt.”

“I guess that would explain it.”

There was a knock on the front door andI peeked through the window like Chief told me to, first. It was just Mike so I unlocked the door and let him in.

“Hey there, Squirt,” he said. “Are you ready for the big day?”

I nodded. He was wearing a suit that went real long in the back and a striped handkerchief stuffed into his shirt. It sort of looked funny and on any other day I probably would have laughed, but that day I just didn’t feel up to it. All a sudden, I felt real tired.

“Chief’s in the kitchen.” I turned to go there.

“Hey,” Mike said and pulled me around. “What’s up, Squirt?”

I looked at him and shrugged.

“I don’t buy that.”

“It’s done...over...” I turned to leave, but Mike held my arm.

“What is?”

I pulled my arm free and walked down the hall with Mike following. When we got to the kitchen I saw that Chief was wearing the same thing Mike was and I was glad I didn’t feel like laughing at Mike.

“Well, well,” Mike said. “So how does the last hour of freedom feel?” Mike smiled one for Chief, showing all his teeth, but Chief only looked at him. I guess he wasn't in a smiling mood either.

“Coffee, Mike?”

“From what I understand about my duties as best man, you’re to get something a little stronger than coffee.”

“I’m afraid that today I might need to count on my sobriety.”

“Yeah, I guess you’re right.” Mike dropped his smile. “In that case coffee sounds great.”

Aunty went to fix him a cup.

“Well, I guess I better get going, Elly is going to need help getting into the dress.” Maggy turned to Chief. “I can’t wait until you see it, Chief. It’s simply beautiful.”

The corners of Chief's lips flicked up a fraction, then his face turned serious again. “Before you leave, I want to give you something.” He led her into the hall and when I heard the hall closet open, I got up to look. He pulled a small wood box down from the top shelf and took a tiny little gun out of it. 

“What’s that?”

“It’s a Derringer. It belonged to your mother,” Chief told her. “You have two shots, baby. Make sure the first one counts.”

“You think I’m going to need this?”

“If I thought so, I wouldn’t allow you out that door.” Chief kept his words low; and his eyes on hers. “This is in case I’m wrong. Now... the safety is on. This is how you take it off.” He turned something on the gun. “Now, we’ll put it back on.” After handing her the gun, Chief pulled another box out of the first. He took out two bullets and put them in the gun for Maggy. “These are .41 caliber bullets. They have good stopping power. Use this only if absolutely necessary- at close range, Maggy. The gun isn’t very accurate at a distance. If you aim it at anyone, you better be prepared to pull the trigger. And again, make sure you hit your mark on the first shot. You don’t want to have to count on the second.”

“Just point and shoot?”

“That’s all there is to it.”

Maggy stared at him a spell. “What am I supposed to do with it, Chief? I can’t just walk around with it.”

“Your mother wore it in her garter.”

“Oh,” Maggy told him, her voice was soft.

I watched Chief put the bullets into the gun for her.

“Kelly, dear,” Aunty said behind me. “Your breakfast is on the table.”

I turned towards the kitchen and saw Mike standing by the door. He had also been watching Chief and Maggy. I caught his eyes lock onto Chief’s. They both wore the same expression plastered across their faces. Worry. 

Maggy told us all good-bye and disappeared through the front door. They watched her leave and didn’t stop watching until the door closed behind her. I could tell Mike wanted to say something to Chief, but didn’t know exactly what.

Finally he settled on, “You think she’ll be all right?”

Chief looked at him and in a quiet voice he said, “I hope so.”

“Why aren’t you calling this whole thing off, if you feel that way?”

They both came back into the kitchen and sat at the table. 

Chief looked at Mike a long time. Then his attention went around the table and landed on Aunty and me. He looked at Mike. “I want to. But Elly won’t hear of it. And Mort keeps assuring me there’s nothing to worry about. There’s also the possibility that Perretti may slip the noose once the ledger is found; that would condemn Elly to looking over her shoulder the rest of her life. I hate to admit it, but this is the best opportunity we’ll have to nail him.”

“What’s the plan?”

“Mort has the church surrounded inside and out with Feds. He’s got an extra man on Elly and two men tailing Perretti.”

“Sounds effective,” Mike said to the table. He looked up when Aunty handed him his coffee. “Thank you, Martha.”.

“I just don’t like it,” Chief said after several seconds crawled by. “I have this tremendous feeling of dread in the pit of my stomach.”

I looked from Chief to Mike to Aunty. They all looked as badly as I felt.

“Eat your cereal, dear,” Aunty ordered. “It will turn to mush, then you won’t want to eat any of it.”

“Yes ma'am.” I started in on the cereal, but it was too late, it had already turned to mush. I ate it anyway.

“Not to change the subject any,” Chief said. “But do you have the ring?”

Mike smiled and patted his chest. “Right here.” 

Chief nodded, then sipped his coffee some more as Joe walked in. He had his shoes in his hands and he showed them to Chief.

“I think I got them shiny enough. What do you think?”

“They look fine, son.”

Joe came around the table and sat by me to put his shoes on. It was then that I figured out why eating breakfast seemed so odd. Hoover wasn’t begging at my feet like usual. I looked down for him; then turned to see if he was in the back room. I hadn’t seen him upstairs. And everyone was now in the kitchen–Hoove never stayed anywhere by himself. The air was suddenly heavy in my lungs. My ribs ached with each breath. My feet were getting cold and my face hot. My stomach felt like it did when Chief drove his truck too fast over a bump in the road.

“What is it?” Aunty asked me.

“Where’s Hoover?”

“It’s all right, dear. He’s outside, but I made sure to tie him up securely.”

My stomach sank to the cellar.“What?”

I turned to Chief. He and Mike were just staring at me, but they moved like one of the penny theaters in Springdale, when you turned the cards too slow. I got out of my chair so fast it slammed to the floor behind me and ran to the back door.

“Kelly!” Chief hollered after me.

But he was too late; I was out the door and on the porch. I saw Hoover from there. He was still tied to his leash. But the leash was tied high in the tree and Hoover hung from it. His head flopped to the side of the frayed rope. His eyes were half shut. 

The fog of the Dead Place moved in, closing me off, leaving me alone as it pushed down into my heart and turned it to ice. It narrowed my view so's all I could see was Hoover’s little yellow snout and his tiny little white teeth and the pink tongue slipped easily between them. I heard far off screaming echoing through my head, but couldn’t tell if it was me or not.

My dog had been cut from head to tail and his insides were spilling to the ground. I had to get him free. It all a sudden was the most important thing. I flew off the porch and grabbed the rope that held Hoover, just above his head. I pulled. Blood spattered all over my Sunday dress, but it didn’t matter. I had to get Hoover loose, to keep him from choking further. So’s he’d be okay again. I just couldn’t stop pulling the rope...

Somewhere behind me Chief said, “Get your car, Martha. We’ve got to get her out of here!”

I felt the sting of my tears as they flooded down the sides of my face. My throat was tight and wouldn’t let the air pass. I felt dizzy but I couldn’t let go of the rope– as if letting go would be letting Hoover go... forever.

Next I knew, Joe was at my side with his pocketknife.

“It’s all right, Kel,” he said, but the fog carried his voice away. It reminded me of the way Preacher sounded in my dreams. “I’ll get him down for you. You can let go now.”

“Get him down, Joe,” I heard myself say back. I said it twice more as the swirling fog pulled it away. My brain said it was best, let him cut him down, but somehow the message never got to my fingers– they clamped down harder.

Chief came up behind me and Joe. He pried my fingers loose, all the while telling me, “It’s all right, pumpkin; you can let go now. You can let go, we’ll take care of him.”

Once he managed to pull the rope loose, he scooped me into his arms and carried me around to the front of the house and across the front lawn to Aunty’s car parked at the curb. He sat me next to Aunty and slammed shut the door.

“Get her out of here,” he told Aunty through my open window. “Go the way we planned last night.”

Aunty nodded and then stomped down on the pedal. The car shot into the air and the tires spun awfully before we sped off down Main.

The numbness was fading when we turned down Walnut heading towards Elm. There was a red sticky stain down the front of my dress. I glanced over at Aunty and noticed her face was going gray. She had two red spots on her cheeks where she put on her rouge. I didn’t notice them before, but with her face all gray they stuck out. She looked like she was about to be sick. Aunty turned off Elm and onto the north service road. She took a right instead of the way we normally got to Four Oaks, which was by turning left. I thought that was strange. She was headed north towards Springdale, not south to Four Oaks.

The road was bumpy because it wasn't used much anymore, not since they put in the new highway. I could hear the stones pinging against the bottom of Aunty’s car, sounding  like the popcorn Chief made in the basket he shook over the fire in the fireplace. The air rushed by the car noisily, filling it with a warm wind and the sweet smell of lavender. Around me, the sound was muffled, like someone stuck clay in my ears. I saw the trees swaying and the leaves flipping from their bright green side back to their waxy, white side, but the noises they made weren’t enough to make it through the clay. My heartbeat was the only thing getting louder. It was pounding slowly in my ears...thump....thump...thump.... Everything was happening so slowly. I looked away from the window just in time to catch sight of the tree that had spilled across the road.

Aunty's foot came down too fast on her brakes and I slammed my head against her dash before crashing to the floor. 

After swiping the blood from my eyes, I took a look at the tree through the front window. It was huge and it landed where it completely covered the road. There was no way Aunty could go around it. It seemed funny to me that the tree fell at all, it didn’t look to be rotted on the insides and the ends weren’t all splintery like it was hit by any lightening. The top end of it was full of green leaves and broken branches, not dead limbs at all. Why did the tree fall?

I was giving that some thought when Aunty gasped. She was staring past me, her eyes flung open way too wide to be comfortable. Before I could turn around, the door was flung open and a hand the size of my official calfskin baseball mitt grabbed me by the arm and yanked me from the car. I was thrown to the gravel by the side of the road, but the mitt kept its tight hold of me.

“You have two seconds to slide over here, lady, before I break this kid’s neck.”

I looked up into the blinding sun and saw a shadow carved out of the bright light. I squinted at the thing that was after Aunty, and realized it was the tiger that had us and I started to shake.

Aunty slid over but had trouble getting out. I guess she didn’t move fast enough for the tiger. He dropped hold of me and, grabbing Aunty in his claws, ripped her from the front seat and slammed her against the side of the car. Aunty looked rightly scared. I started to cry again as the shaking took hold of me.

Aunty looked down at me and when she saw that the tiger didn’t have a hold of me no longer, she screamed, “Run child! Run!”

I stared at her, then the tiger. His eyes were red as fire and through them came a burning hatred.

“Run!” Aunty screamed again and pulled loose her handbag. She swung it sharply at the tiger and cold-cocked him on the side the head. I noticed a spot of blood leave a cut next to his ear. 

I pulled loose of the gravel and did like she said. I ran away from the road and headed into the woods hoping I had a shot at losing him in there. I turned around just before I cleared the trees to see Aunty ready her purse again.

But this time the tiger snatched it away and pitched it to the ground. Then he slammed his paw into Aunty’s nose. She slumped against the right front tire of her car; her hands going to her face. Between her fingers I saw spurts of deep red blood.

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