“Ahem.” Gideon cleared his throat and shifted his weight from one foot to the other. I’d taken to playing with a small braid I had in my thick hair and staring at the Louisiana flag that had been pinned up on the wall behind the desk.
With great flourish, the deputy pulled the paper from the typewriter and set it aside. Then he looked up at us, managing a sickly smile as his eyes darted over the thick black tattoos that covered Gideon’s forearms.
“What can I do you for today?” Deputy Bob asked, his Southern accent dripping with condescension.
“We were just wondering if you could help us find someone,” Gideon said, and his words came out low and defeated. His shoulders slumped, and he fidgeted with the silver band he had on his finger.
“You’re not from around here, are you?” Deputy Bob arched an eyebrow.
Gideon sighed. “No. We’re with the carnival that’s in town for the week.”
“A girl who travels with us didn’t come home last night,” I added, before the deputy could comment on the fact that we were carnies.
“Maybe she’s just lost her way around town,” Deputy Bob suggested.
“We thought that was maybe the case,” Gideon said. “But we don’t really know where to look for her either.”
Deputy Bob let out a heavy breath, like he was doing us some great big favor. He opened the drawer to his desk and pulled out a form. Without saying anything to us, he took a pen and jotted down a couple things on the form.
“Since she hasn’t been gone long, I can’t file a missing persons report, but I can take her information in case she turns up somewhere,” Deputy Bob said finally. “Describe her for me.”
“Her name is Blossom Mandelbaum,” Gideon began. “She has frizzy brown hair, brown eyes. Lots of freckles. She’s about 5'2", maybe 5'3", I would guess. She’s sixteen.”
Deputy Bob looked up at us then, narrowing his already tiny eyes. “Sixteen? Is she your daughter?”
Gideon shook his head. “No.”
“Are her parents traveling with you?” Bob asked.
“No,” Gideon replied, swallowing hard. “She’s a runaway.”
The deputy set down his pen and folded his hands on the desk. “You’ve been harboring a runaway?”
“It’s not like that,” Gideon started, but Deputy Bob wasn’t having any of it. He leaned back in his chair.
“Maybe she ran back home.” Deputy Bob shrugged one shoulder.
“She didn’t,” I insisted, and he turned his harsh gaze to me.
Before he could say anything, the bell of the door chimed loudly. I glanced back over my shoulder to see a woman carrying a stack of fliers and folders in her arms.
“Hello, hello,” she beamed, her lips stained bright with lipstick.
She appeared to be in her early forties. She wore a pink pencil skirt with a loose blouse, and her blond curls cascaded around her, adding a couple inches to her petite frame. Her pumps clacked on the tiles as she walked over to the desk, and her golden chandelier earrings jingled.
The sour feeling returned to my stomach, twisting it up, and I realized that now would be a good time to make our escape, lest Deputy Bob decide to press charges against Gideon for traveling with a sixteen-year-old runaway.
“Sorry to interrupt, I just gotta get all these papers down,” the woman said as she slid in past me and plunked the stack on Deputy Bob’s desk. I’d taken a step back, but she turned her attention toward Gideon, alternating between speaking directly to us and the deputy.
“I’ve been going around collecting applications for the Summerfest in June,” she went on. “It’s been hard getting everything I need, since so many people went to the Equinox Festival over in Tangipahoa Parish. But you’re here, Deputy, so maybe you can start filling out the form, if you’re not too busy?”
Bob pushed aside our form and reached for the stack of papers the woman had set on his desk. “What did you want me to fill out?”
“Oh, just grab any old form in there as long as it’s empty.” She waved him off. Then she turned to face us fully. “I’m sorry, I’ve been rambling on and on, while you’re been standing here, looking lost. Are you new in town?”
“They’re with the traveling carnival,” Deputy Bob told her with a sneer.
“Oh!” she exclaimed, and put her manicured hand to her chest. “I’m so excited to have you here. I’m with the mayor’s office and work on planning community events, and I’m thrilled to have a fun attraction here like this to compete with all the hullabaloo going on in Tangipahoa Parish and down in New Orleans. I’m always telling the mayor, we gotta keep the excitement up if we wanna keep the kids here.”
“I’m sure these people have work they need to be doing,” Deputy Bob chastised her. “You should stop bothering them.”
She rolled her eyes, but offered us an apologetic smile. “He’s right, I’m sorry.” Then she stuck her hand out at Gideon. “I’m Della Jane, by the way.”