Sunset and Sawdust

34

Next morning, when Zendo got his mules out of the shed out back of his house, fed them, dressed them in harness and took them to the field, he found Bull sitting under his oak where he stopped for lunch every day. He had seen Bull only a few times before, but now, up close, he was frightened by him. He was huge and his hair was wild and he had a kind of dead look in his eye, way a fish does when it’s laid out of water too long.

Zendo had been leading the mules with their lines, ready to hook them to the plow he had left in the field, but when he saw Bull he stopped by calling “Whoa” to the mules.

“You Zendo?” Bull asked.

Zendo nodded.

“How you doing, Mr. Bull?” Zendo said, walking around from behind the mules, standing to the side of one, holding the long lines.

“Oh, I’m making it. Ain’t no reason to complain, I reckon, as it don’t change much if I do.”

“Well, me too, I reckon.”

“Naw,” Bull said, “you ain’t doing so good.”

Zendo felt a sensation akin to someone suddenly poking a stick up his ass. If there was one thing he didn’t want, it was having the legendary Bull Stackerlee mad at him. It amazed him Bull even knew who he was.

“How’s that, Mr. Bull?” Zendo said, surprised at how high his voice sounded.

“Well, now, let me say on that different,” Bull said, standing up from the tree. “In one way, you doing so good the angels would sing, and you don’t even know it, and in another, you got your dick in a wringer and whitey, he’s got his hand on the crank.”

“That’s quite some difference, one from the other,” Zendo said.

“It is,” Bull said. “You want the good news first, or you want the shit?”

Zendo, as confused as if he had awakened in another town and found himself naked, said, “Well, Mr. Bull, I think it would be best to get the bad news out of the way, then have the sugar.”

Hillbilly half filled a cup with water from a pitcher, held the cup under his balls, and by spreading his legs and bending his knees, lowered them into it. It helped ease the pain a mite. He stood like that, as if riding an invisible horse, his left hand holding the cup of water and his balls, and with his other hand, he drank directly from a bottle of whisky.

Last night he had been drunk, and he awakened this morning feeling terrible, had to have enough of the hair of the dog to take the edge off the buzz, but he wasn’t drunk now and he wasn’t going to get drunk today. What he was going to do was get dressed, go over to see this McBride fella.

It took him a while to scrape his life into a heap, but he finally got dressed and went out. It was a hot day and the sky, though blue, looked heavy, as if it might fall and crush him. There were a few strands of clouds, like strips of cotton torn from a blue mattress, stretched out across the sky.

The street was full of dust and grasshoppers. Hillbilly had never seen that many on a street before. In a field maybe, but not like this, leaping all over and in the middle of town.

Hillbilly, walking slightly bowlegged, grasshoppers jumping about as he went, waddled to Main Street, over to the red apartment above the drugstore. It took him a while to get there, and when he went up the stairs it was sheer pain. He hurt everywhere, but the small of his back, from the fall, and his balls, from the kick, were the worst. Every step, those two places felt as if they were being struck with an iron rod.

When he reached the landing he knocked on the door, and after a while it was answered by the blond whore he had had with him when Sunset’s old man broke in.

“Well,” he said, “you get around.”

She looked at him for a long moment, said, “I am a whore, you know.”

“Oh, I know,” Hillbilly said.

“How are you?”

“Never better.”

“You looking for me?”

“I wouldn’t have known where to look. And no. I wasn’t.”

“Why are you here?”

“At least that’s a question I don’t have to ask you, is it?”

“No,” she said, “I suppose not. I still owe you a finish.”

“Sure,” Hillbilly said. “McBride, he in?”

She nodded. “Go now, and I’ll tell him you were a salesman.”

“Why would I do that?”

“I got some ideas about what you want to do,” she said. “I don’t know all of it, but I know enough from hearing things here, know what happened to you, and I can put some of it together. Like maybe you want to get back at that woman constable, her father through these men. But these people, they’re bad, Hillbilly.”

“You do pick up a lot of information.”

“I get around.”

“I bet you do,” he said. “But, darling, I’m bad too.”

“Not really.”

“Oh, yeah,” Hillbilly said. “Really.”

She took a deep breath, let it out.

“You answer the door along with selling ass?” he asked.

“I do pretty much what I’m told to do.”

“I’m telling you, get the man.”

“You aren’t paying me. I do it for money, Hillbilly. You, you haven’t given me a dime.”

“But I gave you a good time.”

“You and everyone else. I thought, you and me…”

Hillbilly grinned. “Every woman I know thinks that.”

The blonde’s face got tough. She said, “Wait here.”

It was a great patch of land and once it had been covered in trees, but they had long since been cut, gone to the mill, except for three. The three were two oaks and a sweet gum, and the oaks were at the front of the house, and the sweet gum was to one side. The house was two-story and it had a porch around the bottom that went all the way around, and it had the same on the second floor. It was painted white as hope and the grass that had been planted had been cut close to the ground by enough negroes with push mowers to form a tribe. Dry as it was, the short grass was well watered and pretty green.

Sunset noted that it was more of a house than Marilyn had and she owned a chunk of the mill. But here Henry’s house was, bold as a tick on a patrician’s ass, not caring if the look of it made you wonder where the money came from.

Sunset, Clyde with her, parked her car in front of the place, sat and looked.

Clyde said, “That bottom porch is big enough to live on.”

Sunset got out of the car and went across the lawn, Clyde hustling to catch up. They went up to the door and she knocked. The door was opened by a big fat colored woman with a bandanna on her head and enough pattern in her floor-length dress to confuse and make you dizzy. There was a noise inside, a kind of snapping sound. It came and went, but it was pretty steady.

“Yes, ma’am, what you be wanting?” the colored woman said.

“Henry,” Sunset said. “I want to see Henry.”

“I go ask him.”

“No,” Sunset said. “That’s all right. We’ll just come in.”

“I got to have you invited,” the maid said. “I just got this job.”

“It may not be a job long,” Sunset said. “Sorry.”

“She’s the constable,” Clyde said.

The maid studied the badge on Sunset’s shirt. “She sure is. I ain’t gonna be stopping no law.”

The maid stepped aside and Sunset and Clyde went in.

“Where is he?” Sunset said. The maid pointed, and at the same time Sunset saw him. He was in front of a large fireplace mantel, a couch between them and himself, taking ceramic knickknacks off of the mantel, throwing them down as hard as he could. He had hold of a pink cat when they came up. He threw it down and smashed it and its pieces mixed with the stuff already there.

Henry looked up as they came into view.

“Hate these things,” he said. “Wife had them all over.”

“Nice way to treasure her memory,” Clyde said, “smashing her knickknacks.”

Henry smirked. “What you want, girl? Think over what I told you the other day?”

“I did.”

“I take it, him here, you decided not to go with what I suggested.”

Sunset nodded.

“That’s your choice, girl. Now, thanks for coming to tell me. Leave.”

“We’re leaving all right,” Sunset said. “Leaving with you.”

Henry’s mouth opened slightly. “You ain’t gonna arrest me?”

“I am.”

“What for?”

“All the things you told me the other day.”

“I didn’t tell you nothing. I was just talking. It’s just my word against yours.”

“I’m the law. You shouldn’t have told the law.”

Henry’s face looked as if he had just been given a mouthful of alum.

“Thought I could talk to you,” he said, “reason with you. I said some things that were tough, but I thought you’d listen. Thought you were smart.”

“Guess you were wrong,” Sunset said. “Clyde. Bring him along. He resists, knock the hell out of him.”

Clyde went over, said, “Resist, Henry. Make me a happy man.”

As they went out the door, Clyde holding Henry by the arm, the maid said to Henry, “Want me to sweep up that mess you made back there?”

Henry didn’t answer.

“You gonna pay me?”

He still didn’t answer.

“Then you gonna clean it up yourself, that’s what you’re gonna do. I ain’t got nothing against them knackers.”

“… and I can be of help,” Hillbilly said, finishing off a kind of diatribe, and when he said it, he tried not to let his voice crack, hoped he wasn’t sweating too bad. It was hot in the apartment, but he was sweating more than the man in front of him, McBride. McBride was sitting in a chair that he had drawn up right in front of Hillbilly, whom he had asked to sit on a low couch by the wall.

Hillbilly sat there with his hands in his lap, for once not thinking about how bad he hurt, because this McBride, his eyes made Hillbilly queasy, and he was wearing a funny wig and a goddamn apron. A frilly thing that went from chest to knees, had red splatters on it. But he didn’t look sissy and it didn’t seem funny. Not this fella.

Maybe he was just getting soft, getting his ass whipped like that by an old man, and it was making him less confident about everything and everybody. He hadn’t had an ass whipping since he was a boy and his daddy beat him with a razor strop, beat him unconscious a couple of times. But since leaving home he hadn’t lost a fight, and now he had lost one to an old man, and here was another old man, and he was scared of him. More scared of him than of Sunset’s father. This fella, something had fallen away from him that ought to be there, that was for damn sure. You could see it in his eyes.

That wasn’t bad enough, there was the big nigger too, and he was called Two, and he had been talking to himself, asking questions like someone was with him, not questions directed at him or McBride, but questions in the air, questions he answered himself. And now, goddamn it, the big nigger was sitting on the couch beside him, and he had one hand on Hillbilly’s knee, and Hillbilly, he couldn’t figure that, didn’t know what that was about, but the hand lay there like a big black crab, heavy and warm and firm as a log grapple.

The blonde had been made to leave the room, and he wished she was there, wished he had been nicer to her. He needed a friendly face right now. These fellas, he found it hard to charm them. Men were like that a lot of the time, saw through him, maybe not all the way, but deep enough to get bothered. Women, that was another matter. He liked to talk to women. He liked to move around women, and they liked to watch him move, but these two, or was it three, they weren’t impressed.

“So, you want to get even with this guy you had a fight with?” McBride said, lighting his cigar. He was sitting there in his frilly white apron and his nigger-black wig, and the big coon, he was wearing a jacket like you might expect to see on one of those guys had a wand, waved it around in front of a band, an orchestra. He had on a bowler hat too.

“That’s one thing, yeah,” Hillbilly said. “Another is, I thought maybe I could make some money.”

“You know all about the oil deal, to hear you tell it,” McBride said. “You know everything.”

Hillbilly nodded.

“Knowing everything, that could get you in some shit, couldn’t it, Two?”

“It could,” Two said. And then, in another voice. “That’s the facts, my friend.”

“Show him just a little bit of shit, Two,” McBride said. Two squeezed Hillbilly’s kneecap so hard, Hillbilly thought it would pop off. He reached down with both hands and got hold of Two’s wrist.

Two said, “Let go.” And his other voice said, “Yes, do.”

Hillbilly let go, and Two, he kept squeezing, and Hillbilly, without even realizing it, put the side of his hand in his mouth and bit down on the flesh to keep from screaming. Just when he thought he was going to bite through his own hand or his kneecap was going to come off, Two let go, gave Hillbilly’s thigh a pat.

“That’s a little shit,” McBride said. “I don’t like someone knowing my business, and me not telling it to them. I don’t like you getting it from Rooster, cause I don’t like Rooster. He ran off, you know. Smarter than he looked. I didn’t have much more use for him and I guess he knew it, figured what was coming. You, maybe I got some use for. That face of yours, it heals up, bet it looks pretty good. It look good?”

“Yes,” Hillbilly said. “It does. But my nose, it ain’t never gonna be straight again.”

McBride burst out laughing, and Two, he grinned, big and wide and white.

“I fought Jack Johnson once, before he was anybody,” McBride said. “He broke my nose. I didn’t even know it till later. It hadn’t been for a hurricane coming, messing up our fight, I think I’d have won. Never got to find out. We had to stop it before it got started good. A nose, it’s a funny thing. It’ll break easy. Let me show you.”

McBride leaned out of his chair very fast and hit Hillbilly in the nose with a short right. Blood sprayed and Hillbilly dropped his head and moaned.

“You just thought it was broke before,” McBride said. “Wasn’t nothing before. Now it’s something. You come to me, and you tell me things I don’t think you ought to know, and I’m thinking, thing to do is have Two give you the big nigger job. He can twist your head off like you was a chicken, fuck your neck stump while you bleed out. He could do that, and he wouldn’t bat an eye. I could do it, but I don’t want to get blood on my dick. You hear me, Used To Be A Pretty Boy?”

“Yeah,” Hillbilly said. “I hear you.”

“Good. I’m gonna let you live, but take what we done here as a kind of lesson, a message. You twisted on that gal, come to me, and that’s all right, but you twist on me, I’ll twist you. Hear me?”

“Yeah. I hear you. Loud and clear.”

“That’s good. That’s damn good. Now let me tell you what you’re gonna do, and at this stage of our association, you ain’t got no say anymore, hear me?”

“Yeah.”

Two slid over and put his arm around Hillbilly’s shoulders. When Hillbilly turned, Two was real close, his white teeth grinning, his green eyes bright as emeralds.

He turned back to McBride, and McBride began to talk.

While Sunset and Clyde were gone, Lee and Goose and Karen, using Clyde’s pickup, had moved the tent and all the belongings, making four or five trips, to Clyde’s place.

When Sunset and Henry and Clyde pulled up at Clyde’s place, the tent was up, and out to one side of it was the tarp Clyde had erected, and to the other side, the house he had burned down. Out front of the tent a large post had been cut and there was a thick chain fastened around the post, fixed so that it ran through a place drilled in the center. The chain was pretty long and Ben was fastened to the chain by means of a collar made out of an old belt. Lee and Goose and Karen came out of the tent and Lee was carrying a chair with him.

“What in hell are you doing?” Henry said.

“Jail,” Sunset said. “You’re going to jail.”

“What jail?”

Sunset put the car in gear and pulled up the hand brake, turned in the seat to look at Henry, who sat in the back with Clyde. Clyde had used a short piece of rope to tie Henry’s hands together, and Henry looked as mad as a hornet in a fruit jar.

“That’s exactly what I got to thinking,” Sunset said. “What jail? I need a jail for Henry, but I haven’t got one. And I got to thinking too, you got friends, and I take you to my place, leave you there, they might come and see me. So, we’ve moved. People know where I live, that’s got around, but Clyde, they might not think of his place, and if they do, well, Clyde, he’s lived out here pretty much by himself for years. Right, Clyde?”

“Oh, yeah. And except for Hillbilly for a while, I ain’t had any visitors, so anyone might matter to you, I doubt they know where I live. It could be found out, but that’s what shotguns are for, nosy bastards.”

“You’re gonna regret this, girlie,” Henry said.

“I already regret it,” Sunset said. “Regret the day I took this job and found out anything about you.”

Henry looked puzzled. “Then let me go. Drop the job. Take off. Hell, the money offer is still open. We can toss Clyde in too.”

“I regret the day, all right,” Sunset said, “but there’s this thing about having a center, and damn it, I got one, and I don’t want it to shift.”

“Do what?” Henry said.

“You wouldn’t understand,” Sunset said.

They took Henry out of the car. When they got to the post in front of the tent, Sunset spoke to Lee, said, “Well, Daddy, is the post in solid?”

“Ben thinks so. He tugged for a while, then laid down.”

“All right, then.”

Clyde went in the tent, came out with a pair of handcuffs and a padlock. He used a knife to cut Henry loose, then put the handcuffs on him.

Sunset took the collar off Ben, who came over and sniffed Henry’s crotch like he might like to bite it off.

“What in hell are you doing?” Henry said.

“Putting you in jail,” Sunset said. She looped the chain through the cuffs and used the small padlock to stick between links.

Lee put the chair up against the post.

“This is your jail,” Sunset said.

“Out here?” Henry said.

“It’s kind of shaded,” Sunset said.

“You can’t do this.”

“Sure I can. Just hope I haven’t lost the keys to the cuffs or the padlock. Sit down, or I’ll have Clyde sit you down. Karen, go get Henry some water, would you?”

“You are going from bad to worse,” Henry said.

“Sit down, Henry.”

“How long you going to keep me here?”

“I don’t know. I got to figure what to do with you, which lawman will not let you go, which ones aren’t with the Klan or got Klan connections, or who won’t change their minds by letting money touch their hands.”

“You may find that a difficult person to find,” Henry said.

“Not everyone’s crooked,” Sunset said.

“I believe they are,” Henry said. “I believe, it comes to push or shove, everyone’s crooked, or at least willing to compromise. It’s the way of the world, girlie.”

“Sir,” Lee said, “call my daughter girlie one more time, and we’ll see how many times I can chase you around that post before the chain seizes up.”

Henry sat in silence. Karen came with a cup of water. Henry took it and threw it on the ground.

“Damn, Henry, and that’s all you get until nightfall,” Clyde said.

“Can I sic Ben on him?” Goose said.

“Not just yet, honey,” Sunset said.