Nancy Bell - Biggie and the Devil Diet

Biggie and the Devil Diet

Nancy Bell

THOMAS DUNNE BOOKS/

St. Martin's Minotaur

New York

THOMAS DUNNE BOOKS.

An imprint of St. Martin's Press.

BIGGIE AND THE DEVIL DIET. Copyright 2002 by Nancy Bell. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. For information, address

St. Martin's Press,

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ISBN 0-312-70885-8

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ALSO BY NANCY BELL

Biggie and the Quincy Ghost

Biggie and the Meddlesome Mailman

Biggie and the Fricasseed Fat Man

Biggie and the Mangled Mortician

Biggie and the Poisoned Politician

Prologue

I see the Angel of Death," Rosebud said, gesturing toward the afternoon sky with one big, black hand. "See her? Up yonder, settin' on a cloud." He pulled a cigar out of his pocket and slowly unwrapped it, then sniffed it, just as casual as could be, for all the world like he'd just made a comment on the weather. "Un-huh."

I looked at the sky, but all I could see was a pair of big thunderheads rising up like soapsuds behind the Muckleroy house.

Willie Mae dropped a just-peeled potato into the pan in her lap. "Humph," she said.

"Funny, I always thought the Angel of Death would be a man." Biggie sat in the swing next to Willie Mae, shelling peas. She nudged the porch floor with her toe to get the swing going. "Was she carrying a scythe, Rosebud?"

Rosebud held a kitchen match to the end of his cigar and puffed hard to keep it lit. "Nuh-uh," he said, "that there's the Grim Reaper. The Angel of Death looks just like any other angel."

"I'll bet you know a story about that, Rosebud." I looked up at him from where I was sitting on the porch steps. Rosebud has a story for just about every occasion.

Rosebud didn't answer. He was blowing smoke rings and watching them disappear in the slight breeze that rustled the leaves of the big pecan tree in front of the house.

I live with my grandmother, Biggie, in a big, white house on the corner of Elm Street and Sweet Gum Lane in Job's Crossing, Texas. Rosebud and Willie Mae live in their own little house in Biggie's backyard. I am thirteen and starting the eighth grade this fall. I have lived with Biggie since I was six. Before that, I lived with my parents in Dallas. My daddy owned his own business renting portable toilets to construction sites. My daddy died, and my mother, who is the nervous type, could not take care of an active child like me, so Biggie came and packed up my things and brought me here to live with her. Rosebud and Willie Mae came to us a year later. Willie Mae is a voodoo lady. Biggie is a very important person in town and is a charter member of the Daughters of the Republic of Texas, James Royce Wooten Chapter.

I sat for a while listening to the "pop-pop" of peas falling into the bowl and the occasional "thunk" of a peeled potato dropping into Willie Mae's pan.

"Biggie," I said, "tell about how Job's Crossing got its name."

"My soul, J.R. You've heard that a hundred times." She dropped a handful of pea hulls into the grocery sack at her feet.

"I'd like to hear it again." I know how much Biggie loves that story.

"Well, if you insist." She set her bowl on the swing beside her and commenced to speak. "It was back when Mr. Stephen F. Austin decided to bring a colony of settlers to Texas. My people all lived in Tennessee before that time. Your ancestor helped found the city of Knoxville. Did you know that, son?"

I nodded.

"Well." Biggie sat up straight in the swing and put her hands on her knees. Her little-bitty feet hung six inches above the floor. "So, my great-great well, I can't remember how many 'greats' he was grandfather, James Royce Wooten, set out from Tennessee to Texas to join Austin's colony down in central Texas. He was a brave man to make that trip alone, doncha know, and many hazards awaited him along the trail, from bandits to bears to hostile Indians."

"Golly," I said, thinking how the story got better every time Biggie told it.

"We Wootens have always had grit." Biggie reached for her glass of iced tea, which stood on the porch rail. She took a sip. "Grandpa James Royce wasn't afraid of man nor beast but there was one thing he couldn't fight."

"What, Biggie?"

"Disease, that's what. A plague descended on that poor brave man so that he was unable to pursue his dream of joining Mr. Austin and his colony. But true to the Wooten character, when handed a lemon, my great-great whatever grandfather made lemonade."

"What kind of disease, Biggie?" I knew, but I also knew she wanted me to ask.

"Boils," Biggie said. "James Royce Wooten came down with a bad case of boils. You don't see that much in modern times, but back in the old days it wasn't an uncommon disease at all. Naturally, James Royce knew what to do. He doctored himself with slabs of salt bacon to draw the poison out, but, still, they bothered him quite a lot. Once one boil would heal up, two more would appear on another part of his body. Still, James Royce forged on, determined to reach the center of Texas." She stuck her fingers down to the bottom of her now-empty tea glass and pulled out a piece of ice. She plopped it into her mouth and chewed thoughtfully before continuing. "And he would have, too, except for the fact that somewhere around Fort Smith, Arkansas, a big red boil popped up on his, um, his rear end, doncha know."

I nodded.

"Well, seeing as how Grandpa James Royce was traveling on horseback and leading a supply wagon pulled by two oxen, he was becoming more than a little uncomfortable on the trail."

"I bet!" I said.

"He decided to cross over into Indian Territory, which is now Oklahoma, and enter Texas by crossing the Red River."

"I bet he was attacked by Indians."

"Nope. He never saw any. But his boil was getting worse. When he came to the Red River, he found a ferryman to take him across into Texas. He camped there for the night and then set out again traveling due south. About sundown, he came to Wooten Creek of course, it wasn't called that then. Weary and burning with fever from the boils, he decided to make camp there for the night. That evening along about twilight, as he was resting beside his campfire looking around at the tall trees, listening to the sound of the running creek, and thinking about the nice bass he had just fried up for his supper, what should he see but a family of white-tailed deer come out of the woods to stand in the clearing not fifty feet from where he sat. The deer stared at Grandpa just as bold as you please, and Grandpa stared back. Thoughtfully, he dug his bare toe into the fine black loamy soil. It felt rich and cool against his bare skin. It reminded him of his home back in Tennessee. 'Ample game, good soil, and a creek full of fish,' Grandpa thought, 'a feller could live right well in these parts.' Then he thought about how he'd heard central Texas was full of scrub oak and limestone boulders the size of a cow. He pondered how much he hated the thought of getting back on his horse what with his boil paining him so terribly." Biggie frowned like she had the boil herself.

"So that's when he decided to stay here?"

"Not quite," Biggie said. "First, he decided to have a little swim in the creek before bedding down for the night. He swam back and forth across the creek. Once he rolled over on his back and just floated there, watching the moon up in the sky."

"I've done that before."

"You bet you have. Well, when Grandpa got out of the creek and was getting back into his clothes, he noticed a funny thing. His boils were all gone vanished without even a trace of a scar! 'It's a miracle!' he shouted. 'Praise the Lord!'"