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Show page 86 orange with red trim, was now faded, with a weathered green canopy over the entrance and two steps leading to a screen door. Near the words Mullet Heaven painted on a large front window in gold lettering was an eight-pound mounted carp, its gray-gold tail caught in an arc to the left, as though in motion. It was effective advertising, conceived by Struther Chain several years previous. Ruby had inherited the diner from Struther, her husband of six years, who had been bitten by a cottonmouth while fishing for a larger carp on the nearby Flint river. Ruby, first chairperson of the Freedom of Choice committee, first deaconness of the Rocky Anne Sanctified church (named supposedly for a slave ship), proprietress of the best fish house anywhere around, exerted considerable influence on the lower section of our town; as much influence as Durango Jackson, said Flam Farrell. Ruby was several years younger than Fad, was straight, tall, firm of face, with bronze,part-Indian features, and a well-kept fortyish figure. She worked in colorful dresses, purple shoes and purple earrings, but on Sundays she was more stylishly attired, in the best fashions from Atlanta, usually with Fad in tow, his black suit tight over his huge buttocks, the bottom of his trousers showing an Inch or two of snowwhite socks. Fad was always sedate on these occasions, but not always on other occasions. A few nights back, before his death, he was far from sedate. It was late July, but he sat at Ruby's front table, under the mounted carp, and ordered coffee. Ruby brought him coffee, and his midnight snack, and seated |