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Missing Millie Karin Vingle Ralph swallowed the last of the beer, then tipped the can upside-down and caught the last few drops like snowflakes on his tongue. He crushed the can between his palms and tossed it over his shoulder, where it landed with a tinny clatter among the growing mounds oftrash under the trailer. He stood and stretched, his joints cracking and popping the way they always did after a coast to coast haul. He bent to stroke his beagle's smooth head. "What do you think, Tripod?" he asked the small threelegged dog. "It'll be dark soon. Time to get started?" Tripod stood and shook, then hopped over to the large plywood sign, "Deer Meat—Cut & Wrapped," leaving behind a brief yellow streak on the faded white paint. Not much point leaving the sign up anymore, Ralph thought. His deer-cutting sideline pretty much disappeared not long after Millie. Ralph tried freeing the sign, but it held firm, so he left it. The last slice of sun disappeared behind a distant hillside, the sky glowing angrily crimson. It was strangely quiet, Ralph thought, for such a pleasant fall evening. There were no buzzing chain saws cutting firewood for winter, no whining dirt bikes or four-wheelers. A silver truck chugged up the gravel road, followed by clouds of swirling dust. As it neared the trailer, the driver sped up, turning his head to look at anything but Ralph. Before his Millie disappeared, Ralph remembered, the neighbors would visit from time to time or wave as they passed. They had all adored Millie, called her a saint. Ralph laughed bitterly at the thought, remembering how he'd met Millie at a Cleveland truck stop where she'd worked as a Lot Lizard, as the truckers called them. Thirty bucks a pop. Mother Nature had been kinder to Millie than was to most. The extra pounds put on those first few years they were married made her look womanly instead ofgirlish, and she looked better scrubbed clean than she did tarted up. Millie eased into her new life. She clipped Karin Touscher Vingle writes, "I began writingseveralyears ago as a means ofescapingfrom a bad marriage, and I continue to write now that I am happily married to the bestsportswriter in West Virginia, and mother to our first child, Celeste. In my business life I am secretary to the publisher ofthe Charleston Gazette." 46 Coupons, collected cookbooks, and traded recipes with the neighbor ladies, who admired her openly. As did most oftheir husbands. None ofthem knew ofMillie's prior profession, and Ralph found it a handy thing to hang over her head on those occasions when she got out ofline. And toward the end, she'd gotten out ofline quite a bit. Ralph remembered how Millie enjoyed goading him with Benji, the teenager who was always coming by to cut the grass and help with her garden. Once, he overheard the kid call her Mrs. Robinson, and Millie had giggled and told him to hush. Millie took great pride in her garden. Looking around the yard now, Ralph could imagine how ashamed it would make her, and the thought gave him an empty sort ofpleasure. Vines had crept up the hill and draped themselves over what had once been neatly staked rows of tomatoes, greenbeans, and herbs. The concrete birdbath rested on its side, nearly hidden under a looming wild rose. The tractor, rusty and paint faded, crouched low in the grass on four flat tires, stuffing sprouting from its torn vinyl seat. Ralph didn't mind that the neighbors didn't visit, didn't wave or acknowledge him when they passed in the store. He knew they were suspicious ofMillie's disappearance, since one or two of them had called the police, demanding an investigation. The local police force were excited by the opportunity to do something outside their routine. They'd looked under Ralph's trailer and in the old well, dug around in the garden. They even brought a huge German shepherd who'd sniffed one ofMillie's old socks so deeply Ralph had watched to see ifit would get sucked up inside that shiny black...

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