Sunset and Sawdust

30

Sunset drove away, her mind on McBride, those eyes of his, the way he moved, as if he might suddenly turn into something liquid and molten, flow over her and burn her to death. And the one called Two. Jesus. Two gave her the jumps.

Hillbilly, she thought of him too, what he had done to Karen. Hell, what he had done to her. The lying silver-tongued sonofabitch. She had given him everything and showed him everywhere, and he had played her like a fish on the line, landed her, gutted her, devoured her, gone on his way, ready to cast again.

Goddamn that Hillbilly.

It was all her fault, dealing with and trusting Hillbilly.

Her knack for picking men had not changed. It was the same. She could still pick them. As long as they were bad.

And now she had a father. After all these years, a father, and maybe, just maybe, he was okay. Still, she had to keep her guard up. Her luck, he’d probably leave one morning with her car packed full of her belongings, maybe take Ben too.

She drove by the cutoff to her tent, went on toward Holiday. Drove to the spot where Hillbilly had enjoyed her, parked there, looked out over the town, down on the blood-red apartment and the drugstore, the courthouse, looked across to the sheriff’s office, all the places of business, Main Street dotted with people and automobiles, animals and wagons, the oil wells sticking up. In the day, without the lights, it wasn’t so pretty. She heard a man say once that at night, with the light just right, any whore that wasn’t big as a house could look pretty, but in the light of the day, a whore was a whore and looked that way. Holiday was a whore.

She took the pistol from its holster, checked it for loads. It had five. She put in another. Six now. She spun the cylinder. Sat for a while. Backed the car around, drove on into town.

She went along the streets slow, hoping to see him, but no sign. She stopped, went into the cafe. No Hillbilly. She tried a number of other spots but didn’t find him. People on the street, they saw her face, they stepped aside.

Walked all over, but didn’t find him. Finally, she felt weak, as if she were recovering from some kind of disease. The Hillbilly disease. The fever was breaking.

She knew then she couldn’t find him. Must not find him. Couldn’t let that happen. Not right now. Not the way she felt. Not with six loads in her gun. She did, she’d do what she wanted to do, and she couldn’t do that. She was the law. She had Karen to take care of. That old abandoned dog, Ben, who she’d promised not to leave. She had to watch after him. And now she had her father, and there was that silly kid too, the one they called Goose. He probably came with the package. Maybe he had a goddamn dog somewhere, with three or four pups perhaps, a sister with a cat.

No. She couldn’t do what she wanted. She had to do something, but shooting Hillbilly in the head wasn’t it, fine as the thought seemed right then. She’d be crucified. Not only because she’d be guilty as homemade sin, but because, as Henry said, so many hated her. An uppity woman. Almost as bad as an uppity nigger. No. Worse. She was not only a woman and uppity, she was a nigger lover, way they saw it. A woman with a badge and a gun, her husband dead by her hand. She ought to be bent over a stove, cooking, her dress hiked up with a husband entering her from behind while she used one foot to turn a butter churn, the other to rock a cradle.

She walked back to her car like she was stomping ants, drove away.

The day was falling off now, getting toward afternoon. The horizon looked as if it had been slashed with a razor.

When she reached home, Marilyn was out to one side of the property with posthole diggers, digging away. Clyde’s truck was gone. She didn’t see anyone else.

She walked up to Marilyn.

“Where is everybody?”

“I nearly messed myself, dear, way you came up.”

“Sorry.”

“Karen is in the tent. Goose borrowed a shotgun, went squirrel hunting. Lee and Clyde said they were going into Holiday on business.”

“What business?”

“They just said business.”

“Probably a beer.”

“Maybe,” Marilyn said. “Hillbilly, he beat hell out of Clyde.”

“Hillbilly?”

“Whipped him like a galley slave.”

“I can’t believe it.”

“Believe it. He looked any worse you’d have to bury him. I think Lee went with him to cheer him up.”

Sunset nodded, said, “What are you doing?”

Marilyn smiled at her. “Digging a hole.”

“What for?”

“A clothesline. Karen said you hang clothes over bushes.”

“That’s right.”

“It’ll be easier with a clothesline.”

“I was going to dig holes and cut posts myself. Just haven’t gotten around to it. I hate shoveling. I hate chopping too. Come to think of it, I hate work.”

“Posthole diggers are better than a shovel. I can work these all day. Easier to dig a hole straight down, and deep, and you can widen it with the diggers pretty quick. A woman can handle these good. It’s kind of fun, good for you, out here in the fresh air. And from the looks of your face, maybe I ought to loan you my posthole diggers.”

“Henry won’t be with the sawmill much longer.”

“How’s that?”

Sunset told her all she knew. It came out first like a hole in the dike, a trickle, then more, till finally the dike collapsed and it flooded out.

When it was over, Sunset said, “I’m not going to cry. I’ve cried too much. All I’m doing lately is crying. I’m the constable. I’m not supposed to cry.”

“Who says?”

“I say. Except I am going to cry.”

Marilyn slammed the posthole diggers in the dirt so that they stood up, then she hugged Sunset, and Sunset cried. The gray sky had gone black and now it was night and the stars were slipping out as if being squeezed from a bag, and Sunset, she was crying.

“Hell,” Sunset said, “I ain’t supposed to cry. I’m the constable. I cried on my daddy just a bit back, and I don’t even know him. I cry all the goddamn time.”

“I hope it’s not because Henry’s quitting.”

Sunset guffawed. “No.”

“I was going to let him go anyway, soon as I looked the books over good. Figure he’s been stealing for years. Jones wouldn’t believe me when I said it, and that’s why Henry hates me. He knows I know. He knows too, deep down, I’m pretty vengeful. I can put up with a lot, like Jones, but when I’ve had enough, I let loose. Jones found that out.”

Sunset wiped her tears away with the back of her arm.

Marilyn said, “Pete come to me sometimes and cried.”

“Really? What about?”

“I don’t know. Really don’t. He’d come see me, I’d fix him something to eat, then he’d tear up.”

“All the time?”

“Now and then. But he cried about something. Cried on my shoulder like when he was little, and it was nice. He seemed like my boy then, not like the man he’d become, a man like his father.”

“I wonder if he was crying about me? Not being like he wanted, however that was.”

“I don’t know.”

“He could have cried for me. Just once. I would have liked it, same as you.”

Sunset took a deep breath, steeled herself for what she had to say next. “Daddy told me Karen is pregnant. You told him.”

“I should have told you. But when I found out Lee was your father, thought maybe he was the one to do it. Are you mad?”

“No.”

“Come on, dear. Let’s you and me go in, see what we can find for supper. I’ll finish this another time. And maybe you can talk easy to Karen. She needs support right now, like you did when you was ripe with her.”

“She ain’t all that ripe. She could get rid of it, she took a mind to.”

“I don’t think that’s the way she’ll go.”

“All right,” Sunset said. “It’s her choice, and whatever choice she makes, I’m here for her.”

“We both are.”