"Maybe whatever we didn't use up, we ought to take with us," Murdock said as he put a box of fireworks left over from the 4th of July down by the rest of the stuff they were packing to take with them the next day.
Jean reached into the box and took out one of the novelty fireworks that had a cardboard covering making it look like a howitzer and said to Face, "You know, I don't know, what with a lot of guys that came back from the war with PTSD and all that, don't you think some of these that look like tanks or helicopters or paratroopers, think it might be in poor taste?"
Face shrugged, "Don't ask me, I never buy them, you and Murdock were the ones that went out and picked them up, remember?"
She didn't answer him, he looked over and saw she had leaned back in her chair and seemed to be scrutinizing every detail of the novelty firework, but he could tell her mind wasn't on the cannon in her hand.
"Oh come on, Jean, it was a great 4th, we all had a great time and your parents got to come out," Face said.
"Yeah," Jean moped as she put the cannon back in the box, "But they sure didn't stay long…and when they did, Murdock had to stay in the guest room." She looked at him and explained, "Even though there's nothing going on, somehow I don't think the fact that he and I share the bedroom would sit too well with them."
"Well why don't you just tell them that you're getting married already?" Face asked as he sat down between the two of them, "That would clear everything up, wouldn't it?"
"I can't," Jean told him as she leaned further back in the chair so the front legs tipped, "I can barely tell her that we're dating."
"Speaking of which, how's that going?" Murdock asked.
"Well," she said, "I remember to call and tell her either every week or every other week…so we're building up to that little revelation."
"Yeah but you guys don't go out every week," Face pointed out, "You two hardly date at all."
"I know that!" Jean told him, "But I have to tell her something, otherwise when I tell her we're getting married, it'll be too big of a leap, she's going to know something's wrong and that I've been lying to her this whole time."
"Oh come on, she'd have to know that with a guy like Murdock things aren't exactly going to be 'normal'," Face said.
Jean shook her head, "That's the point, she doesn't know Murdock like you do, she doesn't know him like I do, she doesn't know any of you like I do…and I'm trying to convince her and dad to move out here and live in the same neighborhood as us? What the hell was I thinking?"
It was a question Face truly couldn't answer, though Murdock was able to offer some insight, "You was thinking they're not getting any younger and after being out here for more than a year already, it would be nice to be near them again without having to commute back and forth 6,000 miles each time. And it's a very good point, whether or not they're going to be grandparents any time soon doesn't matter, you still need them around."
Jean shook her head, "They're never gonna go for it."
"You said the same thing when we invited them out here for the 4th, we pulled that off," Murdock pointed out, "As you said, it's a gradual process…we'll get them out here yet, just you wait."
Jean dismissed the topic and asked Face, "Did you get my glasses?"
"Oh yeah," Face reached into his pocket and took out a set of pitch black shades and told her, "Blind man black, just as you requested."
Jean grimaced as she unfolded them and put them on, "Look like Jim Jones."
"Now the next question, Face," Murdock said, "The real important one, did you get us a car?"
"Yes, I found one," Face told him, "I found this old junker convertible that looks like it was showroom new over 40 years and a couple hundred thousand miles ago."
"Ah, that's perfect!" Murdock beamed.
"Sure, but for what?" Jean asked.
The next morning, Jean sat alongside Murdock in the back seat of the car as Face rode up front with Hannibal. Everybody was about sick from all the bumps in the road they kept hitting, and Jean kept having to readjust her sunglasses after every time.
"So what kind of a place is this we're heading to?" Jean asked as she looked at the old map they'd brought with them.
"I don't know," Hannibal confessed, "I haven't been out to see the old place yet myself."
Jean gave up trying to figure out where they were and where their final destination was and gave the map to Murdock and instead pulled a pocket book out from under her seat and opened it to the middle. Face caught this in the rear mirror and turned around and asked her, "What do you think you're doing?"
"It's a funny little habit I picked up when I was 3, it's called reading," Jean cynically answered.
Face snatched the book away from her and said, "Jean, you're supposed to be blind, you're not able to read, remember?"
"Well we're not there yet," Jean replied, "And I want to find out how Rambo dies at the end."
Murdock turned to her and asked in disbelief, "He dies?"
"Mm-hmm."
Jean waited a couple of seconds and then pulled a large hardback book out from under her seat and started to read it instead; Face also caught this in the mirror and turned and jerked it away from her. Jean waited until he was distracted again, and this time she took out a comic book to read. Face turned from the other side this time, yanked it away from her and hit her on the head with it.
"Don't dent my comic book!" Jean told him as she grabbed for it, "It's going to be a collector's item."
"Yeesh," Face murmured to Hannibal, "She's sounding more like Murdock every day."
Hannibal looked up to the rear view mirror and chuckled under his breath, Face turned around and saw Murdock was reading a comic book in one hand and a novel in the other.
"I give up," Face said.
"You should've done that long ago," Hannibal told him.
Face half groaned as he looked down at his clothes again, he still didn't know how he had let himself get talked into this. Murdock had been gung ho about getting the chance to play a country hick, 6 A.M. he'd come in and gotten everyone up, wearing jean shorts, no shoes, a blue and white gingham button up shirt, a straw hat, and was even chewing on a piece of ragweed. Jean was at least partially going along with it, she too had suddenly decided to go barefoot for this trip, though it wasn't much surprise, it seemed to Face that lately she was going through some kind of delayed rebellion against wearing shoes, something you'd expect from a kid but hardly from a 25-year-old woman. Hannibal had taken the liberty to pick out Face's clothes to make sure he looked just right and he'd gotten stuck wearing a dirty white T-shirt and a set of blue denim bib overalls. Hmm, maybe B.A. would fit in after all, he thought. And as for Hannibal, he was doing a fine job of looking like something between Jed Clampett and Pa Kettle, nobody would ever know him, and ooh what a fine bunch they made up, he was sure.
"So Hannibal, who is this friend of yours?" Jean asked.
"Yeah Hannibal, how come you never told us about him before?" Murdock asked.
"Well like I explained before, I hadn't seen him for several years," Hannibal said.
"And still he obviously knew you," Jean told him.
Hannibal shrugged and said lightly, "A curse, mine is a face you don't forget. But to answer, he used to work with my father a long time ago, I met him when I was about 4 years old."
"So what's he been doing for all this time?" Face asked.
Hannibal took a moment to answer before finally saying, "Traveling. He apparently came into some money a while ago and has just been seeing the world."
"And he chooses to settle down here for his twilight years?" Jean asked, "Weird guy."
"Well it is California," Hannibal remarked.
"So did he give you any specifics about what the problem with his neighbors is?" Murdock asked, trying today for a more southern drawl.
"Hector's not a man of many words," Hannibal said.
"You mean like Unc Nunkie from the Oz series?" Jean asked.
Hannibal chuckled, "Thankfully he's a little better than that…but I know the man, I can tell when something's wrong. Add to the fact that there're about a dozen of them and only one of him, those aren't good odds for an elderly man."
"Well," Jean said with a huff, "I still don't understand what it is we're going to do, but you're the leader, we'll follow your order."
Murdock leaned over to the front seat and snatched one of Jean's books back from Face.
"Ah," he said as he opened to the title page, "Dracula…" he held it up so it was only from his eyes up that he looked over the top to Jean and asked her, "You read this one before?"
"About 10 years ago," she answered, "I don't even remember most of it. I sure wish now that I'd taken that speed reading course when I was back in school."
Murdock flipped to the last page inquisitively and noted, "This doesn't seem all that long."
"Not that one," Jean handed him a second book, then reached under her seat again and this time she dropped down a couple inches and showed him another book that looked like somebody tried putting all 26 encyclopedias into one volume and dropped it in his lap.
"Oof!" he commented.
Jean pointed to the two older books and told him, "I found these in a second hand shop a while back, these were written decades before Dracula ever was."
"Huh, how bout that?" Murdock asked, "And that shyster Stoker gets the credit for creating the vampire genre, go figure…and…" he glanced over the titles, The Vampire and Varney the Vampire, or The Feast of Blood, "How do these compare?"
"I don't know, I haven't read them yet," Jean said, "Who knows how long we're going to be staying out here?" She did a double take looking at him and added, "Now you're not going to tell me that you can speed read too?"
"Ah…okay, I won't," Murdock said indecisively.
"Brother," Jean groaned as she got settled in her seat.
"Hm?" Face turned to look towards her.
"Not you," Jean said as she kicked the back of his seat.
"Oh yeah," Hannibal said deadpanned, "They'll definitely buy our act."
"You know, Hannibal," Murdock said as they neared the house, "We're gonna need some groceries while we're staying here."
"I'd say that's a safe bet," Hannibal said.
"Well when we get the shopping done, I'm going to pick up a few things to try my hand at some Cajun cooking," he said.
"No!" the other occupants of the car told him.
Murdock twisted and turned in his seat looking at them all and said, "Alright, southern cooking, let's see, gonna need some catfish, some cornmeal, dirty rice…"
Jean reached over and jabbed Face's head with her elbow and she said to him, "If it's a choice between letting these two cook, I say we get pizza."
Face laughed in response.
"Hey look!" Jean pointed up ahead.
And it didn't take long to find out what she was pointing at. If this was the place they were to stay at, then what a place it was. The house was three stories tall, had three windows on the third floor right under the roof, and tall white pillars that divided the space between each window on the first and second floors and a white wraparound balcony on the first and second floors.
"I believe the term is southern plantation style home," Murdock said as they came to a stop on the house's property.
Jean leaned over to Face and murmured, "Perfect considering we're staying with a guy who's new thing is trying to talk like Tennessee Williams."
"Where's B.A.?" Face asked.
"And where's this guy Hector?" Jean added.
Hannibal stood up in the front seat and looked around, also puzzled, he had expected Hector to be waiting for them when they arrived. Then he saw the old man come around from the corner of the house and he smiled, "There he is."
Murdock almost seemed to be hissing as he took in the sight of the tall, thin man with short white hair and tiny spectacles, dressed in a black suit. He pulled his jacket up over part of his face and held his other hand out and said in a gravely voice, "The master approaches."
Everybody got out of the car, Face and Murdock remembering to help Jean before getting their bags. Hannibal went over to Hector and greeted him, "Hello, Hector."
"Hello Johnny," the old man replied, "I'm glad you could come."
"Well we're happy to be here," Hannibal told him, "So what's the trouble?"
"Uh…" Hector pointed to the other three and asked, "Will they be alright alone for a moment?"
"Sure."
"Alright, follow me," Hector said and went around to the side again, with Hannibal following behind him.
"See that house over there?" Hector asked.
Hannibal looked across the way and said, "Hector, there's only one house over there."
"Well good, you pass the eyesight test," Hector joked, "Anyway, that's where they are."
"How many did you say there were?"
"Oh, who can tell?" Hector asked, "They all look like duplicates or something…first couple months I lived here, we didn't pay much attention to each other…now I've had everything from my mail stolen to holes dug and covered in my yard where I can about break my neck, to my power lines knocked down to rocks thrown through my windows…I don't mind telling you I'm not too eager to see how they plan to up the ante, one of the last things they did was dump a dead animal on my front porch."
Hannibal clapped the older man on the shoulder and said assuredly, "Well now that we're here we'll get it taken care of, but you don't have any idea why they're onto you?"
Hector shook his head, "If a feller don't do nothing to them, why should they ambush me? I had nothing against them, all I can be blamed for is not making more of an effort to know them, but why would I want to?"
"Yeah," Hannibal nodded, "Well don't worry, Hector, we'll deal with it."
"Now, I've already given some of the basics to that sergeant of yours," Hector said, "But I'll give you the full details of what you can expect while you're staying here…it's not just the neighbors, Johnny, at least I don't think it is…"
"Well what for example?" Hannibal asked.
Hector started to count off on his fingers and do a little gesturing towards the house and property, "The lights have a tendency to go out at any given time…now you wouldn't think with only two houses out here that we'd have much to fight over to get the power divided, but apparently it's something to do with problems the electric company's having…so there're a few flashlights throughout the place and a lot of candles, we had enough kerosene lanterns explode in the house I won't trust them."
Hannibal chuckled in remembrance when those were a more common household object, "I don't blame you."
"Also," Hector told him, "The water's not so good."
"It's polluted?" Hannibal asked.
"Well no, not much anyway given this is the country, but I mean it's not too reliable either, sometimes it don't come on, or if it does, the pressure's bad."
"I can have B.A. look into that and the lights," Hannibal said.
"Well suit yourself, but there is a pump around back if you need to bring some water in, the rain ain't always so good to fall around here you know. Now…lately the winds have been picking up here, makes an awful racket but so far everything's been good to not blow away or fall over, except for the lines on occasion."
"Okay," Hannibal replied.
"And look, Johnny, I know you and your boys were Special Forces and therefore don't have a lot of competition to worry about from a bunch of drunken idiots with shotguns, but all the same be careful, they do like to see if they can make ya dance."
"Hmm, sounds like we'll have a good ol' time here," Hannibal joked.
Hector looked at Hannibal and smiled, and when the colonel wasn't expecting it the old man reached over and mussed up his hair.
"Same ol' Johnny, nothing ever could faze you," he smiled, "You just take care of yourself, I don't want to have to come back here and bury you under my roses."
"Don't worry about me, Hector, we know what we're doing," Hannibal assured him.
"I know you do," Hector chuckled as he drew the younger man into a strong bear hug, "My little Tweedledee's all grown up."
Hannibal felt some color rising in his cheeks, apparently as old as both of these two lived he was never going to be allowed to forget that.
"Alright Hector," Hannibal said as he drew back from him, "Now do you know what you're going to do when you leave here?"
"Yeah," Hector held up a key and said, "I use this to get into your house, if anybody asks I'm Max Murdock and I own the place and am keeping three bedrooms up for my unruly grandchildren coming to visit. I take the second bedroom down the hall…stay out of the bedroom at the far end of the hall because that's little Murdock's room."
Hannibal chuckled, "Close enough."
"Also don't touch anything in the first bedroom or your sergeant will wring my neck like a dishcloth," he added, "And don't call any of the numbers in the little black book in the third bedroom."
Hannibal laughed even harder, "Only if you want to give those women the shock of their lives."
"Oh one more thing," Hector said, "Do I need to look out for the dog, or did you bring him with you?"
"Uh…" Hannibal tried to remember, "I'll get back to you on that."
Jean lolled her head from one side to the other as she rocked back and forth in the white wooden rocker on the front porch as they waited for Hannibal to come back around front with the old man. Face stood by the porch's railing looking out on the yard below and Murdock was in a rocker next to Jean's and reading from Dracula in a hissing tone. Jean looked to Face and told him, "I've only been blind for 10 minutes and already I'm bored out of my skull, how do these people do it?"
"They don't have any choice," Face pointed out.
"Still," Jean took her glasses off and rubbed her eyes, "Can't read, can't drive, can't see anything, whoever decided there was still a point in living?"
"Helen Keller?" Face replied.
Jean didn't seem to listen and continued, "4th of July would be among the worst, hearing the fireworks don't mean anything if you can't see them.
They heard the front door open and Jean put her glasses back on and swooned her head to the side to see B.A. come out.
"Where you suckers been?" he asked.
"Waiting for Hannibal to get back," Face answered, "What do you make of the place, B.A.?"
B.A. just shook his head, "This a weird place."
"Well then we ought to fit in just fine," Face said.
Murdock looked up from his book and said in a thick accent sounding like some variation of German, "Enough shrubbery out there to hide a dozen assassins!"
"Huh?" both Face and B.A. asked.
Jean giggled as she pushed back in the rocker and said, "Old movie on last night."
Murdock continued by standing up and gesturing dramatically as he said in a grandstanding matter, "The Bat always flies at midnight…and always in a straight line!"
"So if you see any odd drag marks around the property, don't be surprised," Jean told them.
"Uh B.A.," Murdock said now in his normal voice, "How many…" he pointed up to the second floor, "How many bedrooms are there in this place?"
"Six," B.A. answered.
"Six," Face repeated, "Well then uh…we each get our own and have one to spare."
"What's on the third floor?" Jean asked as she rocked back again.
"Look like storage, old boxes and trunks, then another room about empty," B.A. answered.
"Well how many bathrooms?" Face asked, hoping that he wouldn't have to share one with the rest of them, it cut into his morning ritual; he simply did not roll out of bed first thing in the morning looking like this.
"Two, one upstairs, one down," B.A. told him.
"Well it'll be a little crowded but we ought to be able to deal with it," Face said.
"Hannibal ain't coming back, we might as well go in and check the place out," Jean said as she stood up suddenly.
"Remember you're blind," Face reminded her again, "You can't see where you're going, you feel everything."
"Fine," Jean went over to him and patted his face and mussed up his hair, then she moved over to Murdock and gave him a light frisking and tickled his stomach, making him laugh in a high pitched screech, then she went over to B.A., felt the muscle behind the bib of his overalls and said, "Excuse me ma'am," and headed for the door.
"Ma'am?" Face and Murdock lowly asked each other as they followed her in.
Despite it being early in the morning, the inside of the house was dark and Jean had to take her glasses off to be able to see anything.
"Looks like the way they furnished houses in those old movies," she said.
"I like it," Murdock noted as they passed through from the dining room into the kitchen.
"Yeah…looks like Hector's got some class to him after all," Face added.
The back door opened and Hannibal and Hector came in as Hector seemed to be wrapping up the tour for Hannibal, "And here's the kitchen, the ventilation in here is not so good so it easily becomes overheated."
"Sounds like home," Hannibal said with a grin as he looked around the place.
Hector chuckled and turned to see the others looking at them.
"Oh, allow me," Hannibal said, "This is Face."
"How do you do?" the Lieutenant replied, sporting a grin just as phony as Hannibal's that he knew so well.
"Murdock," Hannibal continued.
"Howdy," Murdock offered his hand to the old man.
"Oh little Murdock!" Hector said humorously.
Murdock gave Hector an unusual look in response to that oddball comment but didn't say anything about it.
"And this is Jean," Hannibal added.
Jean gave a little wave with her sunglasses and said unenthusiastically, "And I suppose for the day I'm supposed to be Elizabeth Hartman."
"Funny," Hector replied, "You look more fit for Julie Harris."
"Julie Harris never played a blind woman," Jean said, then turned to Murdock and added, "Did she?"
"No but once upon a time she did make a very convincing boy," Hector told her.
"You're on thin ice, Hector," Hannibal confided in the man, "I'd leave now or you won't have to worry about your neighbors killing you."
Hector laughed and replied, "Alright, Johnny, I'll see you 'round."
Face, Murdock and Jean looked at each other and asked in unison, "Johnny?"
Hannibal shrugged helplessly as he kicked the door shut behind him, "I said he was a friend of my parents." He turned to B.A. and asked, "You've already been here about a day, you notice anything out of our new neighbors yet?"
B.A. shrugged, "Seen a few people come in and go out, that's about it."
"Well it shouldn't take them long to notice that Hector's gone and we're here," Hannibal said.
"And when they do, then what?" Face inquired.
Hannibal shrugged and said coyly, "We introduce ourselves."
Jean leaned over to the others and murmured, "I get the feeling we've just stepped into another 'piece of cake' plan."
"You noticed that too, eh?" Face asked.
"I don't get why I have to have my own room," Jean said as she watched Hannibal get her stuff unpacked in the room farthest down the hall.
"Because," he said in an authoritative tone, "Our rooms on the other side of the hall face the Hatfields across the way…they try shooting us in the middle of the night you'll be the last target they'll aim for."
"How concerned of you," Jean dryly remarked, "But I can look after myself and I can do it just fine bunking with Murdock."
He grabbed her as she moved past him and knocked her down on the bed and told her, "Not until we get a handle on the place and know what to expect. Your windows face furthest away from where you're going to be sleeping tonight."
"Then why can't Murdock stay in here with me?" she asked.
"Because I want him by the front side incase we have to spring into action tonight," Hannibal told her.
"Will you stop that!" she grabbed her bag and raised her foot, threatening to kick him in the stomach if he didn't back off, "I packed this thing myself, I can unpack it myself."
"Just as long as you understand that tonight you are going to stay here in your room and Murdock is going to stay across the hall in his room," he reminded her.
"Can't I just sleep on the floor with Billy?" she asked.
Hannibal shook his head, "Sorry, kid."
Jean felt like somebody just shoved a rock down her stomach. Forgetting was as bad as being forgotten, but the only thing worse than being forgotten was when people started to forget things about you. If Hannibal had been paying any attention, a light bulb would've gone off in that 20 watt head that she didn't even like dogs, and especially didn't like Billy; so he should've realized that this wasn't anything to be taken lightly, but apparently that didn't matter. She didn't get what was going on but she didn't like it; she'd been along to help them several times before and she'd never been treated like this, and for that matter, how could this bunch of dumb hicks be any worse than anyone else they'd gone up against? Worse than Decker, the MPs, the Cong soldiers? It just wasn't possible, so what was Hannibal making such a big deal about?
A few minutes after Hannibal had left the room, Jean was still fuming as she shoved her clothes into empty dresser drawers, the only thing that got her attention was the sound of somebody knocking on the doorframe. She turned on her heel and saw it was Murdock.
"Hey darling, what's up?" he asked.
She marched over to him and told him, "Hannibal says I've got to stay in my own room tonight. Murdock what is going on here?"
Murdock shrugged, "You got me, hon, I'm as clueless as you are."
"You was born clueless, fool," B.A. said as he walked past them on the way to his own room.
"I don't get it, Murdock," Jean said, "Why is Hannibal suddenly being so cautious?"
"He's got a plan," was all Murdock could say for certain, he shrugged and told her, "I'll see if I can't sneak over after curfew tonight and pay ya a little visit." He leaned his upper body in over the threshold and kissed her. "Oh by the way, I almost forgot."
"What?"
Murdock reached into his back pocket and took out her sunglasses, "You forgot these downstairs."
"I knew I was seeing too well in here," Jean said, hinting towards the windows that already had the shades drawn to keep the heat out, what seemed to be an exercise in futility.
"You gotta be more careful with them, darling, we want the neighbors to think you're truly and legally blind."
Jean put the shades back on and straightened them out and asked him, "What about illegally blind?"
Murdock may have been the crazy one of the bunch but even he couldn't help wincing and letting out small yelps every time his bare feet came in contact with a jagged piece of rock or a brown dead weed in the yard as he took the laundry basket over to the clothesline in back. They hadn't really needed anything washed or dried but he figured this would be as good a way as any to get the people across the way to take notice that somebody else was here. He also figured it would probably help if they heard him singing, but his mind was coming up empty for a proper southern song, so instead he tried adding a southern twang to 'Sympathy for the Devil'.
"Hey you!" he heard somebody call from what sounded like very far away. He turned and saw a man coming over from the other house, just their luck this yard didn't come with a fence to keep the pests out. But looking at this guy, Murdock didn't think that it would've made much difference, if the 50-something year old Billy goat couldn't climb the fence he would surely have been able to break it.
"Yeh-sir?" Murdock asked.
"Watchu doing here?" he asked.
Murdock took the opportunity to miss a beat before responding questioningly, "Hanging laundry?"
"Who are you?" the man asked, getting much closer to him now, and suddenly stopping.
"Uh…"
They heard the backdoor slam shut and Murdock turned to see Hannibal coming out, doing a fine imitation of an old man's limp as he walked.
"Oh Pa!" Murdock called, "Looky, Pa, our neighbor come over to get acquainted."
"So I see," Hannibal grumbled as he made his way over to them, he held his hand out to the other man and said, "Howdy-do sir? Name's Clem Browning."
"What're you doing here?" the man asked, not taking his hand.
"Oh well my kin and I reckoned we'd come up and pay cousin Hector a visit…turns out he had to go into the city and will be gone for a few days so we decided to watch the house for him and make sure it don't go nowhere," Hannibal told him, "And who may I ask is you, sir?"
"Name's Anderson Bakewell," the man told him.
"Hmm, mighty fine name I reckon," Hannibal said, "What is it?"
"It's mine," the man said.
"Ah see," Hannibal replied, "Well I see you've gone and met my son Edwynn," he reached over and covered Murdock's ears as he said, "Nice boy, but not the brightest bird in the barnyard if you know what I mean." He removed his hands and used his fingers to smooth back a few strands of Murdock's hair as he added, "Nice boy he is."
"If I was you, neighbor," Bakewell said, "I wouldn't get too comfortable here."
"Oh…no?" Hannibal asked.
"Been a lot of problems for your cousin," he said.
"What kind of problems?" Hannibal asked as he took a cigar out of his jacket pocket.
"You stick around long enough, you'll find out," Bakewell warned him.
They heard the back door swing shut again and this time heard Jean calling, "Pa! Pa…" Hannibal turned around and even he about broke character laughing. Jean also was never big on explaining her plans to the rest of them, so nothing could've prepared them for this one.
Jean had her sunglasses on and was slowly feeling her way along to meet with them, but since she was too far away to feel along the garage, she was walking on her hands and feet, feeling along the ground.
Somehow Hannibal was able to maintain a serious smile as he said, "Come over here, darling and say hello to our neighbor." He turned to Bakewell and introduced, "My daughter, Luella, bless her heart, lost her eyesight a month ago, still tryn'a cope."
Jean made her way along on two feet and one hand and held the other one out for Hannibal to take and said, "Just keep talking, Pa, I'll find ya."
Hannibal hoped he didn't look as embarrassed as he felt, here they were supposed to be the same family from the south, and they all spoke with a southern accent, and none of them sounded alike. He took Jean's hand and said, "Right here, darling, stand on up and say hello to the nice man."
Jean stood up and deliberately faced away from Bakewell and held her hand out saying, "Hello nice man."
"The other way, dear," Hannibal said.
Jean turned to the side and repeated, "Hello nice man."
"The other way, dear," Hannibal told her.
Jean turned to the other side, "Hello nice man."
"Behind you, dear," Hannibal pointed out.
"Well tell him to quit moving around," Jean said as she turned and deliberately held her hand far away from Bakewell and said to the thin air, "Hello nice man and I hope you stop playing tricks on a cripple, you go to hell for that."
Hannibal had expected a fight to break out then and there but to his surprise, Mr. Bakewell left them with another subtle warning about the house, which he pretended to be completely oblivious to.
Murdock waved him off and said, "Y'all come back now, ya hear?" followed by an "Oof!" when Jean elbowed him in the ribs.
"I told you not to do the Beverly Hillbillies," she hissed under her breath.
"Pa! Luella's being mean to me!" Murdock said as he ran behind Hannibal.
"Luella?" Jean repeated.
Hannibal shrugged, "Sounded southern enough to me."
"Hannibal, I'm gonna kill you," Jean told him.
"Would you rather be 'Blanche'?" he asked.
"I'd rather not be in this mess in the first place," she said, "I'm only here as a favor to you, and even that's starting to be less than reason enough."
"Well we did what we initially set out to do, we got the neighbors to notice us," Hannibal said, "Now we just have to wait and see what they do next."
"One question," Jean said as she pulled at the frays on the bottom of her shorts that were shorter than she usually wore, "Whose idea was it to pick out my wardrobe?"
"I don't know what the problem is," Hannibal told her with a feigned innocent shrug, "Daisy Dukes they're not."
"Well that's fine because Daisy Duke I'm not," she replied.
"I'll say," Murdock said as he glanced down the backs of her legs, "No hosiery."
Jean turned to him and without a word and only an odd look on her face, stomped her foot down on his big toe.
"Yeouch!"
"Come on, Edwynn," Hannibal said, resuming his southern drawl, "This is no time for dancing, we've got work to do."