Half an hour later, making good time on the horse, McKissick with his b.a.l.l.s bouncing on the saddle and his thighs blistered and his burns coated with sand rode harder yet and seemed to lift from the horse"s back. They skidded to a stop before the farmhouse, the mule chewing gra.s.s.
McKissick ran up the steps and through the open door, rifle at ready. The naked woman, tied to a chair, raised her head and bared her teeth and hissed, Did ye come back for more? She writhed against her ropes and flung her strings of hair about and, still bound, began to scoot toward him chair and all. I got some sugar for ye, she said and licked her tongue over her front teeth. Come here let me give ye a kiss.
He stepped back, onto the porch. I reckon I"ll pa.s.s, he said.
She spat at him and snapped her teeth, foam clinging to the corners of her mouth and her fingers clawing the seat of her chair. She writhed in her ropes and craned out her neck and in her fervor to bite him upset herself and crashed to the floor.
McKissick wiped sweat out of his eyes with the back of his hand and c.o.c.ked the over & under.
Now she was scootching toward him over the floorboards. He could see scabbed-over bite marks on her b.u.t.tocks and legs and t.i.tties. A wide circ.u.mference of mouth, huge radius of teeth.
Smonk do extract a price, McKissick said. He raised the rifle and fired and the concussion rang in the room. She lay still with a trace of smoke rising from the hole in her forehead. Behind him the mule brayed and a dark cloud of crows blackened the sky. McKissick steadied himself against the wall. Dern. He bet she"d been a good ole girl in spite of it all and suddenly he missed his wife.
Meanwhile, Gates had crept up behind him, and before the bailiff could turn, his own partner had whacked him across the back of the head with a rifle b.u.t.t. McKissick stumbled forward with blood hot like sunlight on his neck and fell across the wh.o.r.e.
10.
THE MISSISSIPPI GAMBLER.
THOUGH SHE HATED TO, EVAVANGELINE HAD FORSAKEN THE PONY with the star on its forehead since to reclaim it meant chancing upon the speckled man with the tore-up arm and the rifle. She wished the pony well, hoped it got out of the madman"s way.
Her head throbbed from being conked and from time to time her vision blurred, but she kept walking, trying to ignore the dogtooth marks on her elbow, leading Junior and the children away from the path and north through the tangled woods as fast as she could make their legs go, ducking briars and battling through a vicious crossfire of thistle and th.o.r.n.y weeds and sticker bushes, her skin redlined with cuts and clothes snagged to threads. Snake tails melted into the brush before her and twice whitetail deer rose on springs out of the bramble and bounded away as if the bushes were air. She shivered.
Presently they happened upon some luck, a dry creekbed curving through the bottom of a gully, and they began to follow it, the going easier through the sand and pebbles. She stopped in the lowest, shadiest place she could find and dug into the bottom for water but found only more sand. Walking a few yards behind her, the children held hands in a line, quiet and obedient, with Junior bringing up the rear, slicing at green snakes with his Mississippi Gambler.
Late in the afternoon there was light up the hillside on the left and they ascended the incline using vines and at the top the eight of them peered out at a field of sugarcane with another field after it and field upon field as far as any of their eyes could see. Evavangeline was about to push through out of the woods when Junior tugged her sleeve.
Miss Wh.o.r.e? he said. You don"t want to go this a way. That goes where I jest come from. Old Texas. It"s a bad place.
She looked back at the children, standing half-asleep, their clothes torn to rags, thorn welts laced over their skin.
It"s a town ain"t it? It"s got people in it ain"t it? Ain"t it?
The boy didn"t respond.
She repeated: Ain"t they people there?
The boy shrugged.
Ain"t they no children to play with?
He shook his head. I never seen nare one. Ner dog neither. We lived there for a while. Fore that we was traveling around. We went all over the wilderness till we fount Old Texas slap dab in the middle of nowheres. They was real happy to see us all the men was and ladies specially and they said what job did Daddy always want and he said he always fancied being a bailiff. Well what do ye know, they said, they happened to be bad in need of a bailiff.
William R. McKissick Junior wanted to tell Evavangeline more. How the ladies of Old Texas had watched him on the sly. They were all the time bringing covered dishes to the shack outside town where he lived with his father, trying to make Daddy send him to school and church, but Daddy said no. Schools and churches was for girls and sissies he"d said. Said a man had to make his own way and wasn"t nothing a book could say a gun wouldn"t say better. Said that"s why he liked being a bailiff. You got to collect people"s guns. What about the Scripture, the ladies of Old Texas had asked his daddy. It could sure tell ye plenty couldn"t it? the ladies said. Was it words scratched on paper? Daddy asked them. Most certainly, said the ladies. Not interested, said Daddy. Thank ye for the turnip greens but we"ll pa.s.s on the sermonizing. Herding them out. Yet when William R. McKissick Junior rode to town with Daddy and shot marbles in a circle drawn in dirt or played mumbly peg with Daddy"s three-bladed pocketknife while he was doing whatever business he had to do, the boy had always perceived the ladies" eyes on him from behind their drapes.
He shuddered.
Well, Evavangeline said, I"m the oldest and I say we bound for Old Texas. She burst out into the field, the cane a pleasure to tromp through the way the sugarcane stalks broke apart, the train of children following her, even Junior, skulking along at the end of the line. They crossed several fields without talking until she paused to hold open two strands of a barbed wire fence for the children to squeeze through.
As Junior pa.s.sed, she took his arm. Even if it ain"t no children, it"s got men and ladies, ain"t it?
Not no men, he said. Not no more. He dipped through the fence and held it for her, trying to see down her shirt as she ducked.
She let the children get a little ahead and walked alongside the boy.
A town that ain"t got children ner men neither?
I told ye. I don"t know where the children went, I never seen none the whole time we was there, but Mister E.O. Smonk killed the men. Ever last one. I told ye. I seen him myself a day or two ago. The boy drew out his Mississippi Gambler. He give me this knife.
Can I see it?
Nome. I don"t let n.o.body hold my knife.
I"ll trade ye, she said.
He looked slyly up. What ye got?
I got two size small t.i.tties and one genuine cooter with the hair shaved in a stripe. If ye give me that knife I"ll let you see em all.
Thow in a p.e.c.k.e.r tug.
When they walked on a moment later she was slipping the knife down the back of her pants and he was smiling. Far ahead they saw a cl.u.s.ter of buzzards hanging in the air. More were coming from the south behind them, attending some event of death the way stars attended the night. Soon she spotted the faintest smudge of smoke on the horizon.
She looked back at the children, dazed and filthy. Why don"t yall set down a bit. It"s some shade over yonder.
They walked to where her finger pointed, a sapling pine grown out of the field, its needles brown but not yet dried to falling, and sat around it.
She looked toward the town. Then down at Junior. How in the h.e.l.l can one fellow kill ever man in a town?
The boy shrugged. Mister E. O. Smonk ain"t no normal fellow. He"s of the devil.
Well. Even if they ain"t no children, and even if the men"s all dead, ain"t it a bunch of ladies there?
He didn"t answer.
Ain"t it?
Yeah.
Then they could feed these younguns and doctor em and see to they needs and yers too, and I could be along my way. I can"t lose no more time on account of a bunch of d.a.m.n younguns.
Why? Where ye going?
She stopped. For the first time it occurred to her: She didn"t know, she"d never thought of it. Well first, she said, I"m gone to get shed of the rest of yall and the closest place to do it in is Old Texas.
I ain"t going up in there.
Fine. You can stay in the d.a.m.n sugarpatch then.
I will.
h.e.l.l Mary, she said. She stood looking at him. Okay, wait here with the younguns, then. I"ll go in and check it out. If I don"t come back by dark, you get these here younguns to some other town. Do not, I repeat, do not, come up in there.
Yessum. Will ye do me one more time fore ye go?
She looked down. No. But I"ll do ye twice when I see ye next.
He watched her go. h.e.l.l Mary, he whispered, believing that to be the wh.o.r.e"s name. h.e.l.l Mary.
Evavangeline had been smelling smoke for half an hour when she caught her foot on a set of rusted locomotive tracks that stretched as far as she could see east in one direction and west in the other. She doubted a train had rattled by in years, though. Nearby, an overflowing well-pipe gurgled water into a clay trough, its bottom coated with slick green moss. At her appearance several buzzards had flown from the rim of the trough, this likely the only water for miles. Lesser birds had congregated in the limbs of trees, waiting a turn that might never come. In the woods back from the road she saw the twin eyes of a wildcat and knew it had been watching her a long time. It wanted to eat her. Drink her blood.
There were flat stones arranged at the well for sitting and working and she imagined ladies washing clothes here. She dunked her head and shoulders in the trough and nearly lost her breath it was so cold. She straightened up and shook like a dog, keeping her eye on the wildcat. She drank handful after handful of the water-strong taste of sulfur-until she vomited it back up. She drank more in careful sips and looked around. The strip of shade she"d found to stand in was benefit a dead tree with medicine bottles and jars on the branches. She adjusted the knife in her waistband and walked up the hill into Old Texas.
The town was twelve or thirteen buildings facing one another across the road and houses scattered back among oak trees and dead gardens. Fences. Outbuildings. At the bottom the road turned a sharp right and there was a building still smoldering from a fire. Its chimney so tall it must of had stairs and a story up top. Across the street was what looked like a mercantile.
Women in black dresses and veils and holding rifles came onto their porches to watch as she walked along the street. She looked behind her and they were following her.
To ditch them she ducked right and went up the steps and through the screen door of what looked to be a nice house, hoping to find a lonesome gentleman who"d take her to his room. Maybe a bottle. There was a fellow reclining on a sideboard and she meant to sweep her hand up his leg to his crotch and see what he had. When she approached him, though, he was dead. Hence all the flies. His brown face had collapsed like a fallen cake.
h.e.l.l Mary, she said.
Beside him was a settee and a pitcher of water, a tall standing clock and a chaise lounge. There was a newspaper on a table. Out of nowhere her monthlies let go and ran down her legs into her boots. She began wadding the paper into a ball and stuffing it into her pants.
You can go on use my newspaper there to stop your flow, a woman said. I used to do it myself on occasion. Usually read it first, though.
Evavangeline spun. It was a bent little woman in black. White hair glowing under a black veil which obscured her features.
I"m sorry, the girl said. It come on me quick.
Do you get cramps?
Nome. Jest get a good ole hearty flood, then it"s done.
My mother used to say, Aunt Flo"s come to visit.
Evavangeline wished she"d had a momma to say wise things. Or a daddy one.
Well, it"s a nickel, the woman said.
What is?
That newspaper.
s.h.i.t I ain"t got no nickel. Can I take it out in trade? Maybe get a meal, too? I ain"t eat in a number of days. Who"s that?
That was my husband, the lady said of the dead man. He was killed yesterday early in the three o"clock hour by a murdering devil and his gang of swine.
The woman indicated that Evavangeline follow her and they pa.s.sed from the foyer into a parlor bathed in amber light through the drapes and sat together on the cushy fainting sofa.
What the h.e.l.l"s going on here? asked the girl.
Through the window, she saw women gathered in the street. A dozen maybe.
The lady crossed her legs and made a steeple of her fingers on her knees and cleared her throat.
My name is Mrs. Tate. I"ll answer all your questions, if you"ll answer mine. Now. One. What"s your name?
Evavangeline.
Is that your given name?
Well. Somebody give it to me.
Who did?
How long does this last?
Not much longer. What"s your Christian name?
My what?
Your last name.
I ain"t got nare.
The woman frowned. How old are you?
Perty old.
Where are your mother and father?
Dead I reckon. I never knew em.
The women outside had congregated on the porch. One separated and came inside.
Miss Evavangeline, Mrs. Tate said, this is Mrs. Hobbs. Mrs. Hobbs, I"m just interviewing Miss Evavangeline here. For our position. You ladies can go on back to your dead.
Mrs. Hobbs nodded and left the room and reported to the others who disbanded and disappeared.
Well, said Mrs. Tate. We"ve been needing someone like you in our town.