"I don't know yet," June said. She stood up and brushed the straw off her jeans. Her legs felt like water. Her mind was going very fast, the way it had under the counter with the flashlight in her teeth, turning over weights and lines. "What time tomorrow?"
"Ten," Shelby said. "At your stand. He wants to do it in front of everybody."
"Okay," June said. "Okay." She climbed the gate. At the top she looked back. Shelby was still sitting in the straw, very small for someone so tall.
"Shelby," June said. "Go say goodbye to him. Before the truck comes. You'll be sorry if you don't."
She went to find Wendell.
* * *
At ten o'clock Saturday morning, the last Saturday of the fair, Rollie Kruse came up the concourse with Lorraine Pettit from the concessions office on one side of him and a man from the State Department of Health on the other, and by the time they reached the striped awning they had a crowd behind them, because Rollie had made sure of it.
Lorraine Pettit was a small, square woman in her sixties with reading glasses on a chain and a clipboard she carried like a shield. The health man was young and sweaty and looked like he would rather be anywhere else.
"Mrs. Halvorsen," Lorraine said to June's mother. "I'm sorry to do this on a Saturday. Mr. Kruse has filed two complaints, and I'm obligated to look into them."
"Go ahead," said June's mother. She'd been up half the night. She stood very straight.
"First," said Rollie, loudly, to the crowd as much as anybody, "this whole floating business is a fraud. It's a fishing line. My daughter saw it plain as day. They've got a fishing line strung up over an open food counter, and they've been putting it through the cups people drink out of. That's a health violation if I ever heard one." He swung toward Lorraine. "And second, Dot Lindgren's lease is in Dot Lindgren's name, and Dot Lindgren's in a hospital bed, can't walk, can't talk, can't sign. That lease doesn't transfer to her family. Fair rules. I've been on the waiting list for this corner since 1971."
A murmur went through the crowd. June saw faces she knew by now, regulars from the week, Bev from Ames, the lavender pantsuit lady. Their faces were worried.
The health man cleared his throat. "Is there a line?"