“Not that you’re not welcome, Deborah, but what’re you going to do with so much food?” they asked me.

“I thought I’d take it over to the family of that boy that got killed yesterday,” I said. “They’d probably like something a little more substantial than corn dogs and elephant ears.”

That’s all I had to say. I don’t know if it’s genes or something in the water, but death or sickness always triggers the female impulse to provide food for the afflicted, and the next thing I knew, Nadine and Isabel were cutting into the serving line to fill more foam boxes with hushpuppies and banana pudding, too. They divided the boxes between two shopping bags and I set off down the midway like someone making a delivery from a Chinese restaurant.

When I reached the compound where all the carnival vehicles were parked, I saw Dwight standing beside the open back end of a tractor-trailer van with Arnold Ames and a couple of uniformed town officers. I didn’t have to ask him which travel trailer belonged to the Ameses. There was a small spray of white carnations wired to the lamp beside the door.

CHAPTER 5

SATURDAY AFTERNOON

I tapped on the metal door, and eventually Tally Ames opened it. Like me, she was wearing a long blue skirt and her charm bracelet. Her eyes were red rimmed and bloodshot, and she stared at me a moment as if trying to think why I was there.

“I thought you were another reporter.”

“Have they been bothering you?” I asked.

“Not as much as you’d’ve thought. Carnies are like migrant workers far as the local newspapers ever care.” Her tone was bitter as she held the door wider for me to step inside. “They’re always so sure it’s one of us whenever there’s any trouble, and as long as we’re killing each other...” She shrugged in resignation.

Those first few minutes of a condolence call are always awkward. Anything I say sounds so trite in the face of such loss and it’s even worse when it’s the death of someone young.

I held out my shopping bags of food cartons. “My sisters-in-law thought maybe you and your family might be able to eat a little something.”

“That’s nice of them.” She took the bags with a wan smile and set them on the kitchen counter that probably doubled as a snack bar.

This travel trailer was fairly big, designed to be pulled by a two-ton truck. The master bedroom was two steps up over the flatbed, and there was a pop-out bedroom at the back end. In the middle were a bathroom, a tiny kitchen, and a surprisingly roomy dining room/den combination. The deep blues, turquoise, and amethyst of the furnishings had been chosen with a knowing eye for her dark hair and blue eyes, and the space was brightened by September sunlight that spilled through a line of skylights in the ceiling.