All the Earth, Thrown to the Sky

43

It was late afternoon when we got to Lindale, and I had to drive around and ask a couple of people before someone could tell me where the carnival was going to take place. Turned out it was out near the Lindale canning factory, and that made me think of peas and Sheriff Big Bill.

When we got there, the carnival was setting up for the night. There were people pulling ropes for tents, and there were people putting together stands for places where you tossed balls at bowling pins or tried to flip rings over bottles, and there were carnival rides going up.

I parked the truck on one side of the highway and we went over to the carnival.

When we were on the lot, a man by a Ferris wheel, who looked like his last bath had been taken about the time of his birth came over to us. He walked like he had one leg in a ditch, and the other was short.

“You ain’t supposed to be here till tonight,” said the carny. “You could get hurt around here before then, things going up and all.”

Jane eyed one of the rides not far from the Ferris wheel. It was some kind of ride that looked as if it would swing way out and high and then swing back close to the ground. It was fastened down by ropes and stakes. A couple of men were positioning and tightening bolts that held the ride in place. She said, “Looks to me like we could get hurt tonight, way those bolts are being fastened. They could come loose and throw the whole lot of the riders out there in the street, not to mention puncturing them to death with all those spokes, dropping the seats on them. I’ll tell you now, I’m not going to ride that stuff.”

“Then don’t,” said the carny, “it’s no skin off my nose.”

“We’re looking for Strangler,” she said. “I’m the captain of his fan club, and he promised an interview for our newsletter. We send it out to thousands.”

“He’s got a fan club?” the carny said.

“Oh yeah,” she said. “He’s modest, and probably didn’t tell you about it. And I’m going to tell you something I shouldn’t, ’cause it might take away from how you feel about him having a fan club. But I’m his cousin.”

“Cousin?”

“That’s right. Truth is, he hired me to come up with the club, but then it caught on. Who knew? But the main thing is, that interview should promote the carnival in the next town, wherever that might be.”

“Atlanta, Texas.”

“Good. Now, where is he?”

“Do you really know Strangler?”

“Boy, do I,” Jane said. “All right. I’m not his cousin, and there’s no fan club.”

“I didn’t think so,” he said.

“Can I speak to you privately?” she said.

“I suppose so.”

Jane walked off with the carny and whispered something and came back to join us. The carny, looking a little stunned, went back to the rickety rides.

“I got directions to Strangler’s trailer,” she said.

“What did you tell him?” I said.

“That I was pregnant with Strangler’s baby.”

“And he believed you?”

“It’s a better story than the fan club one.”

Strangler’s trailer was a colorful one with a painting of him on the side. In the painting he had on wrestling shorts and shoes and he was bare-chested and well muscled. He had bright red hair.

The door to the trailer was open, and we could see Strangler sitting inside on a stool reading a comic book. He had on wrestling shorts, wrestling shoes, and a big gray sweatshirt.

Jane knocked on the side of the trailer, “Knock, knock, Mr. Strangler.”

Strangler looked up. He resembled the painting on the side of the trailer enough you could tell it was him, but he had gone a little to fat. His red hair was touched with gray around the ears.

“Who are you?” he said, without getting up.

“We’ve come to see you don’t get killed by a couple of gangsters,” Jane said. “Do Bad Tiger and Timmy ring a bell?”

Strangler tossed the comic on the floor. “Come in,” he said.

We went inside. There was a couch and a chair, and through an open door I could see a bed.

“What do you know about them guys?” he said.

“What we know,” said Jane, “is that they have guns, they are mean, they don’t like you, and they want some money back.”

“They do, huh?”

“Listen here,” Jane said. “We know why you stole it, and we get it. We do. The money, that’s not any of our business, not with what you had in mind about your daughter, but they really are serious.”

“I ain’t got no daughter,” Strangler said.

“No?” I said.

He shook his head. “I told them that so my reasons for stealing the money would be better than theirs. I just wanted the money.”

“You lied to a couple of gangsters to feel better about yourself?” Jane said.

I was thinking this was exactly what Jane did all the time. She’d rather climb a tree and lie than stand on the ground and tell the truth.

“Yeah. I didn’t want to just be a criminal. I’m no criminal.”

“Actually,” Jane said, “you are the definition of a criminal. You stole money from a bank.”

“I know, but I mailed it back. I mailed it back the second day after it was stolen. It took four good-sized boxes. I used the address on the money bags. I sent it from a post office in some little town. I forget the name.”

“You seem pretty open about it,” I said.

“If you know I had the money, and you know Bad Tiger and Timmy, what’s the use lying?”

Okay, he wasn’t exactly like Jane.

“Well,” Jane said. “You may not see yourself as a criminal, but Bad Tiger and Timmy are criminals, and they see you as one. A crook that took their money. They want it back, and then they want to shoot you. They’ll do it. We saw Timmy kill a man.”

“That would be Buddy,” Strangler said. “He was hit in the robbery. And pretty bad.”

“Did you shoot anyone?” I asked.

He shook his head. “I was outside in the car. I was the driver. A bank guard shot Buddy. We hadn’t no more than driven out of there with the loot than Timmy was looking at Buddy like he had to go. He didn’t want to play nursemaid, drag him around. I could see it in his eyes. I was certain of it.”

“Good call,” Jane said. “He shot him, all right, and you’re next. We found you easy, and so will they. I’m surprised they haven’t already. They’re bound to show eventually.”

“I figure the same,” Strangler said. “My guess is they didn’t find me ’cause the carnival has been in Missouri and Arkansas. This is the first week we been in Texas. So if they been in East Texas, they been having to wait on me.”

“It’s not exactly sneaky,” Jane said, “to go back to your old line of work in a trailer with your name and likeness on the side of it.”

“I ain’t running. I sent the money back. I’m no criminal.”

“Yeah,” Jane said. “You keep saying that.”

“I’m through running,” Strangler said. “I’m just going to hit people in the ring.”

“And those bad boys are going to shoot you,” she said, “and when they find out you gave the money back, they’re going to shoot you a lot.”

“Let them,” Strangler said. “I don’t care. I ain’t running. I gave the money back. I just got sideways for a time there. This Great Depression, as they call it, it got to me. Not having any money and thinking my future wasn’t nothing but twisting people in knots and throwing them around. What do I do when I get old? So I got in with some bad people who wanted my muscle. I guess I’d seen too many gangster movies. My mama didn’t raise me that way, and I come to that conclusion after we robbed that bank and I saw Buddy take a bullet. We could have killed some of them citizens. I decided it was better to starve. Thanks for trying to help me, but you kids go away.… Wake him up.”

Tony was asleep on the couch. He had sort of wadded up there and gone right out.

“We’ve had a rough few days,” Jane said. “All because we were coming here to help you.”

“That was some of it,” I said. “Don’t forget the adventure part. Speaking symbolically, of course.”

“Oh, go to hell,” Jane said, and went out of the trailer.

“She likes you,” Strangler said.

“You think?”

“Oh yeah. Can’t say how much, but the ones you irritate like that, they like you. They got to like you to get that mad.”

“No daughter, huh?” I said.

“Nope,” he said. “Made it up.”