The Do-Right by Lisa Sandlin Page A

like?”
    It was or it wasn’t. Mrs. Speir delivered her opinion in such shrewd, definite syllables that Delpha believed she could understand if only she strained sufficiently. Couldn’t. Offered spoonfuls of soup, which were accepted until a hand began to spider toward the nightstand. She set down the bowl, picked up a pair of cat-eye glasses lying there, stroked back the white topknot, and fit them on the old woman’s head.
    Said, “Hello there.”
    Ten thirty on a hot May night. Block east of the New Rosemont, Delpha got off the bus to the distorted chords of pedal steel. She sat down on the bench, slid around to face Crockett Street’s yellow party-glow. Surge of guitar, thump of drum, again the twang of pedal steel. Not a tune she recognized, but then she didn’t know many of them now. The Beatles, The Beach Boys, The Supremes, she’d missed all that. The last honkytonk song she’d heard blaring across a dance floor might have been Elvis’ “Hard-Headed Woman” or Johnny Cash’s “I Walk the Line.”
    A distant crowd clapped and whistled. Delpha stood up from the bus bench and walked on to the New Rosemont’s steps, picked up an empty of Night Train and, swinging it by the neck, carried it in to throw away.

VI VI
    HANK AARON WALLOPED his 685 th homerun—just thirty more to beat The Babe’s record—and next week was here.
    Phelan strolled out onto Leon’s pine floor at quarter till ten, taking inventory. Two young pool players were having their fencing match refereed by a red-faced man in a bar apron. Three guys sat at the bar, across from the neon Jax sign, heads angled to view baseball on the corner-mounted TV. A twined couple whispering in a booth. Pack of women past forty who seemed to be laughing with genuine pleasure. Few tables of Monday night spouse-avoiders with half an eye on the Astros game and a jukebox urging them to “go home to the armadillo.”
    â€œTommy Phelan!” A pointy-chin waitress might have flung herself on him if she hadn’t been toting a tray of longnecks and a dish of peanuts.
    Behind the Max Factor and the red lipstick overlaid with Vaseline for shine, Phelan picked out the freckled face of his junior prom date. The one he didn’t know he was supposed to get a corsage for until his grandmother Lila had sent him off to buy a white carnation dripping with ribbons.
    â€œPatty Peavey. How you been?”
    â€œIt’s Johnson now. I got two kids, a divorce, and this new job. Just a minute.”
    Patty dealt the round of beers to a table of raucous guys,slipped out from under one of them’s grabbing arm and returned to Phelan.
    â€œTommy,” she said seriously as she took in his suit, “who died?”
    Phelan fingered a lapel. “Just business.”
    â€œHeard the army made you a medic in Vietnam. Then you went off to the rigs and hadn’t heard nothing since.”
    â€œCame back. There a lady in here by herself?”
    Patty glanced around. “No, all the crazy people are where you can see them.”
    â€œIf one comes in, I’ll be in that back booth. Send her over. I’ll take a Salty Dog, and…you liking this job, Patty?”
    â€œTell me what likin’ has to do with workin’, baby.”
    Phelan smiled, passed the line of unoccupied bar stools, saluted the three occupied ones, and paused to take in the score: Astros tied in the bottom of the ninth. He slid into the back booth. Smell of frying hamburger, maybe a little catfish wafted from behind the swinging doors to the kitchen.
    He unfolded the sheet of paper Miss Wade had given him: available info on Mrs. Lloyd Elliott.
    â€œYou want me to research the client?” Miss Wade had asked.
    â€œCover all the bases,” Phelan’d said. Why not? Might be something useful there. Besides, Mr. Phelan and Miss Wade had beaucoup time on their hands.
    â€œIsn’t much there,”