Speaker 1: This podcast may not be suitable for young listeners. Poachers
Speaker 1: by Tom Franklin. Dawn, on the first day of April,
Speaker 1: the three Gates brothers banked their ten foot aluminum boat
Speaker 1: in a narrow slew of dark water. They tied their
Speaker 1: hounds and strapped their rifles, and stepped out, ducking black
Speaker 1: magnolia branches heavy with rain and Spanish moss. The two
Speaker 1: thin younger brothers denim overalls tucked in their boots, lugged
Speaker 1: between the starfoam cooler of iced fish, coons and possums.
Speaker 1: The oldest brother, twenty bearded in heavy set, carried a
Speaker 1: sunbeam bread sack of eels in his coat pocket. Hooked
Speaker 1: over his left shoulder was the pink body of a
Speaker 1: foam they'd shot in skin and over the ride a
Speaker 1: stray dog, to which they'd done this With skins and
Speaker 1: heads gone and the dog's tail chopped off, they were
Speaker 1: difficult to tell apart. The Gates has climbed the hill,
Speaker 1: clinging to the vines and saplings and slipping in the
Speaker 1: red clay, their boots coated and enormous. By the time
Speaker 1: they stepped out of the woods. For a moment, they
Speaker 1: stood in the road, looking at the gray sky, the
Speaker 1: clouds piling up. The two younger ones kneel and Dan
Speaker 1: set the cooler down. Kent, the oldest, removed his limp
Speaker 1: cap and squeezed the water from it, and his brothers
Speaker 1: did the same. Then Kent nodded and they picked up
Speaker 1: the cooler. They rounded a curve and crossed a one
Speaker 1: lane bridge, stopping to piss over the rail into the creek,
Speaker 1: water high from all the rain, and then went on,
Speaker 1: passing houses on either side, dark warped boards with the
Speaker 1: knotholes big enough to look through, and cement blocks for steps.
Speaker 1: Black men appeared in the doors and windows to watch
Speaker 1: them go by. To most of these people, they were
Speaker 1: something not seen, often something nocturnal and dangerous. Along the
Speaker 1: stretch of the Alabama River, everyone knew that the brother's father,
Speaker 1: Boo Gates, had married a girl named Anna when he
Speaker 1: was thirty she was seventeen, and that the boys had
Speaker 1: been born in quick succession, with less than a year
Speaker 1: between them. But few outside the family knew that a
Speaker 1: fourth child, a daughter unnamed, had been still born, and
Speaker 1: that Boo had buried her in an unmarked grave and
Speaker 1: a clearing in the woods behind their house. Anna died
Speaker 1: the next day, and the three boys, dirty and naked,
Speaker 1: watched their father stoop shouldered descent into the earth as
Speaker 1: he dug her grave. And by the time he'd finished it,
Speaker 1: it was dark, and the moon had come up out
Speaker 1: of the trees, and the boys lay asleep upon each
Speaker 1: other in the dark, like wolf pups. The name of
Speaker 1: this community, if it could be called that, was Lower
Speaker 1: Peach Tree, though as far as anybody knew, there'd never
Speaker 1: been an Upper Peach Tree. Scattered along the leafy banks
Speaker 1: of the river were ragged houses, leaning and drafty, many
Speaker 1: empty and caving in so close to the water they'd
Speaker 1: been built on stilts. Each April, floods came and the
Speaker 1: crumbling land along the bank would disappear, and each May,
Speaker 1: when the flood waters were seeded, a house or two
Speaker 1: would be gone. Upriver, near the locking dam stood an
Speaker 1: old store, a slanting, weathered building with a steep tin
Speaker 1: roof and a stovepipe in the back. Two rusty gas
Speaker 1: pumps on the left beside the road. The regular pump,
Speaker 1: empty for years, had a garbage bag tied over it.
Speaker 1: Around the store, mimosa trees sagged water logged in front.
Speaker 1: Long steps led up to the door, wherein the window
Speaker 1: a red sign said open inside. To the right, like
Speaker 1: a bar upon maple counter ran along the wall, and
Speaker 1: behind the counter hung a rack of wire pegs for tools, hardware,
Speaker 1: and fishing tackle. To the left were rows of shelves
Speaker 1: made of boards and concrete blocks, and beyond the shelves
Speaker 1: a Coca Cola cooler buzzed faintly by the wall. The
Speaker 1: store owner, an old man named Kirksey, had bad knees,
Speaker 1: and this weather settled around his joints like rot. For
Speaker 1: most of his life, he'd been married and lived in
Speaker 1: a nice two story house on Highway thirty five fireplaces
Speaker 1: in every bedroom a china cabinet. But when his wife
Speaker 1: died two years ago cancer, he found it easier to
Speaker 1: avoid the house, to keep the bills paid in the
Speaker 1: grass mode, but the doors locked, to spend nights in
Speaker 1: the store and to sleep in the back room on
Speaker 1: the army cot and the warmest meals of corned beef
Speaker 1: and beef stew on a hot plate. He didn't mind
Speaker 1: that people had but stopped coming to the store. As
Speaker 1: long as he served a few long standing customers, he
Speaker 1: thought he'd stick around. He had his radio in the
Speaker 1: Thomasville station and money enough. He liked the area and
Speaker 1: knewest regulars weren't the kind to drive half an hour
Speaker 1: to the nearest town. For those few people, Kirksey would
Speaker 1: go once a week to Grove Hill to shop for goods.
Speaker 1: He'd resell, marking up the price just enough for a
Speaker 1: reasonable profit. He didn't need the money, it was just
Speaker 1: good business. Liquor wise, the county was dry, but that
Speaker 1: didn't stop Kirksey. For his regulars, he would serve plastic
Speaker 1: cups of cheap whiskey he bought in the next county,
Speaker 1: or bottles of beer he kept padlocked, and an old
Speaker 1: refrigerator in back. For these regulars, he would break packages
Speaker 1: of cigarettes and keep them in a cigar box and
Speaker 1: sell them for a dime apiece a nickel stale Ashburn's
Speaker 1: were seven cents, and he would open boxes of shotgun
Speaker 1: shells or cartridges and sell them for a mouse at
Speaker 1: varied according to caliber. And he'd known to find specialty
Speaker 1: items paperback novels, explosives, and once an old magneto telephone.
Speaker 1: At Euphrates Morset's place, Kent gates pounded on the back door.
Speaker 1: In Morset's yard, a cord of wood was stacked between
Speaker 1: two fence posts, covered by a green tarp. Brick halves
Speaker 1: holding the tarp down. A tire swing, turning slowly and
Speaker 1: full of rain water hung from a pine limb. When
Speaker 1: Morset appeared, he was a large, bald black man. Kent
Speaker 1: pointed to the fawn and dog hanging on the porch rail.
Speaker 1: Morset put on reading glasses and squinted at both. How
Speaker 1: about that, he said, stroking his chin right out, young men's.
Speaker 1: He closed the door. Kent sat on the porch edge,
Speaker 1: and his brother's on the steps. A skinny, wet dog
Speaker 1: trotted from under the house, wagging its tail, and Dan
Speaker 1: began to pet it. When he found a swollen blue
Speaker 1: tick in its ear, he pulled it off and flicked
Speaker 1: it across the yard. The door opened and Morset came
Speaker 1: out with three pint jars of homemade whiskey. Each brother
Speaker 1: took a jar and unscrewed its lid and sniffed the
Speaker 1: clear liquid. Morset set his steaming coffee cup on the
Speaker 1: window sill. He fastened his suspenders, looking at the carcasses
Speaker 1: hanging over the rail. The brothers were already drinking, Dan
Speaker 1: still petting the dog, which had its head in his lap.
Speaker 1: Where's the girl, Kent asked, his face twisted from the
Speaker 1: sour whiskey. My stepdaughter, you me morsets items apple pumped
Speaker 1: in his throat. She had sid far away. A rooster crode. Well,
Speaker 1: get her out here, Kent said. They drank again, and shuddered.
Speaker 1: Now she ain't of fifteen, Kent scratched his spard. She's gone.
Speaker 1: Look at her. When they left, the stepdaughter was standing
Speaker 1: on the porch in her white nightgown, barefoot and rubbing
Speaker 1: the sleep from her eyes. The brothers backed away, clanking
Speaker 1: with hardware and blushing and grinning at her. More sets
Speaker 1: jaw clenched. The dog watched them go, and then turned
Speaker 1: and trotted back underneath the house. Sipping from their jars,
Speaker 1: they took the bag of eels down the road to
Speaker 1: a half blind, conjured woman who stood waiting on her porch.
Speaker 1: Her house, with the stark drapes and empty bird cages
Speaker 1: dangling from the eaves, seemed to be slipping off into
Speaker 1: the gully. The younger brothers wiped their noses on their
Speaker 1: sleeves and shifted from foot to foot by the gate.
Speaker 1: As Kent walked across the muddy yard held the bag out,
Speaker 1: she snatched the eels from him, Squinting into the bag
Speaker 1: with her good eye, grunting. She paid them from a
Speaker 1: dusty cloth sack on her Apron muttered to herself as
Speaker 1: Kent turned and walked through her gate, and the three
Speaker 1: of them went up the dirt road. Only Dan, the youngest,
Speaker 1: looked back. They pedaled the rest of the things from
Speaker 1: their cooler and then left through the dump, pausing while
Speaker 1: Kent and Neil shot at liquor bottles, Dan through into
Speaker 1: the air out of ammunition. They stumbled down the ravine
Speaker 1: and the rain, following the water's edge to their boat,
Speaker 1: and in the back Kent wedged his jar between his thighs,
Speaker 1: ran the trolling motor with his foot. His brothers leaned
Speaker 1: against the walls of the boat, facing opposite banks, no
Speaker 1: sound but rain and the low hum of the motor.
Speaker 1: They drank silently, holding their burning whiskey in the hollows
Speaker 1: of their cheeks, before gathering the will to swallow. And
Speaker 1: along the bank's fallen trees held thick stands of cotton
Speaker 1: mouth black sparkling creatures, dazed and slow from winter, barely
Speaker 1: able to move. If not for all the rain, they
Speaker 1: might still be hibernating. Comatos in the banks of the
Speaker 1: river are beneath the soft yellow underbellies of rotten logs.
Speaker 1: Randing in Ben, the brother saw a small boat down river,
Speaker 1: its engine clear, loud and unfamiliar. It was heading this way.
Speaker 1: The men in the boat lifted a hand in greeting.
Speaker 1: He wore a green poncho and a dark hat covered
Speaker 1: with plastic. Kent shifted his foot, turning the trolling motor
Speaker 1: and steering them toward the bank, giving the stranger a
Speaker 1: wide berth. He felt for their outboards crank rope while
Speaker 1: Kneel and Dan faced forward and sat on the boat seats.
Speaker 1: The man drawing closer didn't look much older than Kent.
Speaker 1: He cut his engine and coasted up beside them, smiling
Speaker 1: morning fellas, he said, showing his badge. I'm the new
Speaker 1: District game Warden. The brothers looked straight ahead, as if
Speaker 1: he weren't there. The warden's engine was steaming. A flock
Speaker 1: of geese passed overhead. Dan slipped his hands inside the
Speaker 1: soft leather collars of two dogs who'd begun to growl. Now,
Speaker 1: you fellows ought to know, the warden said, pointing his
Speaker 1: long chin to the rifle at Neil's feet, that it's
Speaker 1: illegal to have those guns loaded on the river. Now
Speaker 1: I'm going to have to check them. I'll need to
Speaker 1: see some licenses too. When he stood, the dogs jumped forward,
Speaker 1: tonails scraping the aluminum. Dan jerked them back and glanced
Speaker 1: at Kent. Kent spat into the brown water. He met
Speaker 1: the warden's size, and an instant knew the man had
Speaker 1: seen the telephone rig and the floor of their boat.
Speaker 1: Pulled to the bank, the warden yelled, drawing a pistol,
Speaker 1: y'all are under a rest for poaching. The gates is
Speaker 1: didn't move. One of the dogs began to claw the hull,
Speaker 1: and the others joined him, and a howl rose shut
Speaker 1: them dogs up. The Warden's face had grown blotchy and red.
Speaker 1: The spiteed hound broke free in sprang over the gun
Speaker 1: slopper strung from his teeth, and the man most surprised
Speaker 1: by the game wardens shot seemed to be the game
Speaker 1: warden himself. His face drained of color as the noise
Speaker 1: echoed off the water, and died in the bent black
Speaker 1: limbs and the cattails that bobbed in the current. The
Speaker 1: bullet had passed through the front dog's neck and smacked
Speaker 1: into the bank behind them, missing Dan by inches. The
Speaker 1: dog collapsed, and there was an instant silence before the others,
Speaker 1: now loose, clattered overboard into the water, red eyed, tangled
Speaker 1: in their leashes trying to swim. Pulled to the goddamn bank,
Speaker 1: the warden yelled right now. Scowling, Kent leaned and spat.
Speaker 1: He moved his thirty thirty aside, Using the shoulders of
Speaker 1: his brothers for balance, he made his way to the
Speaker 1: prow kneel, his cheek bones flecked with the dog's blood.
Speaker 1: Moved to the back to keep the boat level. At
Speaker 1: the front, Kent reached into the water and took the
Speaker 1: first dog by its collar, lifted the kicking form and
Speaker 1: set it streaming and shivering behind him. His brothers turned
Speaker 1: their faces away as it shook off the water. Kent
Speaker 1: grabbed the rope that led to the big three legged
Speaker 1: hound and pulled it hand over hand until he could
Speaker 1: work his finger under its collar. He gave Dan a
Speaker 1: sidelong look, and together they hauled it in. Then Kent
Speaker 1: grabbed the smaller bitch while Dan got the black and tan.
Speaker 1: The warden watched them, his hip swaying with the rise
Speaker 1: and fall of the current. Rain was coming harder, now,
Speaker 1: spattering against the boats. Kneeling among the dogs, Kent unsnapped
Speaker 1: the leash and tossed the spotted hound overboard, and it
Speaker 1: sank and then resurfaced and floated on its side, trailing blood.
Speaker 1: Kent's lower lip twitched and he looked at Neil and
Speaker 1: opened his mouth, and Dan whispered to the dogs and
Speaker 1: placed his hands on two of their heads to calm them.
Speaker 1: They were wretching in trembling and rolling their eyes fearfully
Speaker 1: at the trees. Neil stood up with his hands raised
Speaker 1: as if to surrender. When the game warden looked at him,
Speaker 1: relief softening his eyes, Kent jumped from his crouch into
Speaker 1: the other boat, his big fingers closing around the man's neck.
Speaker 1: Later that morning, Kirksey had just unlocked the door and
Speaker 1: hung out the open sign when he heard the familiar
Speaker 1: rattle of Gates truck. He sipped his coffee and leant
Speaker 1: behind the counter and sat on a stool. The boys
Speaker 1: came several times a week, usually in the afternoon, before
Speaker 1: they started their evenings of hunting and fishing. Kirksey would
Speaker 1: give them what supplies they needed, bullets and fishing line
Speaker 1: and socks, a new cap to replaced one lost in
Speaker 1: the river. They would fill their trucks in cans with gas.
Speaker 1: Eighteen year old Dan would get the car battery from
Speaker 1: the charger near the wood burning stove and replace it
Speaker 1: with the drained one from their boat trolling motor. Kirksey
Speaker 1: would serve them coffee or cokes, never liquor, not to boys,
Speaker 1: and they'd eat whatever they chose from the shelves, usually
Speaker 1: candy bars or barbecue potato chips, ignoring Kirksey's advice to
Speaker 1: eat healthier Vienna sausages and denty moore or shift boyard.
Speaker 1: Today they came in looking a little spook, Kirksey thought.
Speaker 1: Neil stayed near the door, peering out the glass, fogging
Speaker 1: by his mouth. His arms folded, and Dan went to
Speaker 1: the candy isle and pocketed several Hershey bars. He left
Speaker 1: a trail of muddy boot prints behind him. Kirksey would
Speaker 1: have to mop later morning, young Fellas he said coffee,
Speaker 1: Dan nodded, Kirksey refilled a starfoam cup and then grinned
Speaker 1: as the boy loaded it with sugar. You take coffee
Speaker 1: with your sweetener, he asked Kent, lending them the computer,
Speaker 1: inspecting the items hanging on their pages, A hack saw
Speaker 1: a Lucky thirteen lure, a set of Alan wrenches, a
Speaker 1: gizmo with several uses, knife and measuring tape and all.
Speaker 1: He took off his cap and bought it in his fist.
Speaker 1: Kirksey could smell the booze on him. Y'all need something
Speaker 1: in particular, he asked, that spotted one you give us,
Speaker 1: Kent said, not meeting his eyes. Won't bark no more.
Speaker 1: She won't bark no more, no tree. Im fine, but
Speaker 1: won't bark neary a time? Got a shoot her his
Speaker 1: mouth full of chocolate. Dan looked at Kirksey and by
Speaker 1: the door, Neil unfolded his arms. Now, Kirksey said, I
Speaker 1: ain't no need for that, Kent, do what that conjured
Speaker 1: woman recommends. Now, go out in the woods and find
Speaker 1: you a locus shell stuck to a tree. This is
Speaker 1: a time of year for him, if I'm not mistaken,
Speaker 1: akus hyeah, Kent asked, yeah, bring it back home and
Speaker 1: crunch it up in the dogs scraps, and that'll make
Speaker 1: her bark like she ought to. Kent nodded to Kirksey,
Speaker 1: walked to the door, and he went out, and his
Speaker 1: brothers followed. See Kerksey called you're welcome. Dan waved with
Speaker 1: a hershey bar and closed the door. Kirksey stared after
Speaker 1: them for a while. It had been more than a
Speaker 1: year since they'd paid him anything, but he couldn't bring
Speaker 1: himself to ask for money. He'd even stop writing down
Speaker 1: what they owed. He got his coffee and leant from
Speaker 1: behind the counter to the easy chair by the stove.
Speaker 1: He shook his head at the muddy footprints on the
Speaker 1: candy isle. He sat slowly and tucked a blanket around
Speaker 1: his legs, and took out a bottle and added a
Speaker 1: splash to his coffee and sipping, he picked up a
Speaker 1: novel Louis Lamore sack its Land, and reached in his
Speaker 1: apron pocket for his glasses. Though she had been one once,
Speaker 1: the woman named Esther wasn't much of a regular and
Speaker 1: Kirksey store these days. She lived two miles up river
Speaker 1: in a shambling white house with massive magnolia trees in
Speaker 1: the yard. The house had to wrap around porch, and
Speaker 1: when it flooded, you could fish from the back, sitting
Speaker 1: in the tall, white rocking chairs, though you weren't likely
Speaker 1: to catch anything. A baby alligator maybe, or sometimes bullfrogs.
Speaker 1: Owls nested in the trees along her part of the river,
Speaker 1: but in this weather they'd grown quiet. She missed her
Speaker 1: hollow calling. Esther was fifty. She'd had two husbands and
Speaker 1: six children who were gone and had ill feelings toward her.
Speaker 1: She'd had her female parts removed in an operation that
Speaker 1: she was still paying for. Now, she lived alone, and
Speaker 1: most of the time drank alone. If the Gates boys
Speaker 1: hadn't passed out in their truck somewhere in the woods,
Speaker 1: they might stop by after a night's work. Esther would
Speaker 1: make them strong coffee and feed them salty fried eggs
Speaker 1: and link sausages, And some mornings, like today, she would
Speaker 1: get a far away look in her eyes and take
Speaker 1: Kent's shirt and her fingers and lead him up the
Speaker 1: stairs and watch him close the bathroom door and listen
Speaker 1: to the sounds of his bathing. She smiled, knowing these
Speaker 1: were the only baths he ever took. When he emerged
Speaker 1: his long hair stringy, his chest flat and hard. She
Speaker 1: let him down the hall, past the telephone nook to
Speaker 1: her bedroom. He crawled under the covers and watched her
Speaker 1: take off her gown and step out of her underwear. Bending.
Speaker 1: She looked in the mirror to fluff her hair, and
Speaker 1: then climbed in beside him. He was gentle, at first, curious,
Speaker 1: and then rougher, the way she liked him to be.
Speaker 1: She closed her eyes, the bed frame rattling and bumping
Speaker 1: in her father's old pocket watch slipping off the nightstand.
Speaker 1: Water gurgled in the pipework in the walls as Neil
Speaker 1: took a bath to hoping for a turn of his own,
Speaker 1: which never had happened, at least not yet. Slow down,
Speaker 1: baby Esther, whispered into Kent's ear. There's plenty of time.
Speaker 1: On April third, it was still raining. Kirksey put as
Speaker 1: out his crossword to answer the telephone. Can you come
Speaker 1: down to the lock, and Damn Goodlow asked, we got
Speaker 1: us a situation developing here. Kirksey disliked smart ass good Low,
Speaker 1: but something in the sheriff's voice told him it was serious.
Speaker 1: On the news, he'd heard that the new game warden
Speaker 1: had been missing for two days. The authorities had dragged
Speaker 1: the river all night and had a helicopter in the air.
Speaker 1: Kirksey sat forward in his chair, waiting for his back
Speaker 1: to loosen a bit. He added a shot of whiskey
Speaker 1: to his coffee and gulped it down as he shrugged
Speaker 1: into his denim jacket, zipping it up to his neck
Speaker 1: because he stayed cold when it rained. He put cotton
Speaker 1: balls in his ears and set his cap on his
Speaker 1: bald head and took his walking. Came from beside the
Speaker 1: door in his truck, the four wheel drive engaged and
Speaker 1: the defroster on high. He sank and rose in the
Speaker 1: deep ruts and gobs of mud flying past his windows,
Speaker 1: the wiper swishing across his view. The radio announcer said
Speaker 1: it was sixty degrees and more rain on the way.
Speaker 1: Then the red or Lin began to sing. A mile
Speaker 1: from the locking down, Kirksey passed a grove Hill ambulance
Speaker 1: axled deep in the mud. A burly black paramedic was
Speaker 1: wedging a piece of two by four beneath one of
Speaker 1: the rear tires, while the board looking driver sat behind
Speaker 1: the wheels, smoking and racing the engine, Kirksey slowed and
Speaker 1: rode down his window. Y'all going after a live one
Speaker 1: or a dead one? Dead to Kerksey, the black man answered.
Speaker 1: Kirksey nodded and accelerated. At the locking down, he could
Speaker 1: see a crowd of people and umbrellas, and beyond them
Speaker 1: he saw the dead man lying on the ground under
Speaker 1: a black raincoat. Some onlooker had begun to direct traffic.
Speaker 1: Goodlow and three deputies and yellow slickers stood near the
Speaker 1: body with their hands in their pockets. Kirksey climbed out,
Speaker 1: and people nodded sombrely and parted to let him through. Goodlow,
Speaker 1: who had been talking to his deputies, ceased as Kirksey approached,
Speaker 1: and they stood looking at the raincoat. Morning sugar Baby,
Speaker 1: Kirksey said, using the nickname Goodlow. Hated. Is this who
Speaker 1: I think it is? Yep, Goodlow, said rookie game Warden
Speaker 1: of the Year with his cane. Kirksey pulled back the
Speaker 1: raincoat to reveal the white face. He's a young fella,
Speaker 1: he said. There was a puddle beneath the dead man,
Speaker 1: twigs in his hair and a clove of moss in
Speaker 1: his breast pocket. With the rubber tip of his cane.
Speaker 1: Kirksey brushed a snail from the man's forehead. He bent
Speaker 1: and looked into the warden's left eye, which was partly open,
Speaker 1: and he noticed the throat, the dark bruises there. Goodlow
Speaker 1: unfolded a handkerchief and blew his nose and then wiped it.
Speaker 1: Don't go abusing the evidence, Kirksey. He stuffed the handkerchief
Speaker 1: into his back pocket. Evidence now, sugar baby. Good Low
Speaker 1: excelled and looked at the sky. Don't shit me, Kirksey,
Speaker 1: you know good and will who done this? I expect
Speaker 1: they figured the law wouldn't apply to them up on
Speaker 1: this part of the river, the way things has been
Speaker 1: all these years. Them other wardens scared of him, are
Speaker 1: feeling sorry for him. But I reckon that's fixing a change.
Speaker 1: He paused. I had to place a call to the
Speaker 1: capitol this morning to let him know that we was
Speaker 1: all out of game wardens. And you won't believe who
Speaker 1: they patched me through to. Kirksey adjusted the cotton in
Speaker 1: his right ear. Oh, Frank David himself, the sheriff said,
Speaker 1: Ain't nothing ticks him off more than this kind of thing.
Speaker 1: A dread stirred in Kirksey's belly. Frank David was see
Speaker 1: a relation to this fellow teacher, Goodlaw said, said he's
Speaker 1: been given lessons to young game wardens over at the
Speaker 1: Forestry Service. He asked me a whole bunch of questions
Speaker 1: regular interrogation. Said this here, young fellow was the cream
Speaker 1: of the crop, the best new game warden there was.
Speaker 1: Wouldn't know it from this angle, Kirksey said, good Load grunted.
Speaker 1: A photographer from the paper was studying the corpse. He
Speaker 1: glanced at the skies if gauging the light, and when
Speaker 1: he snapped his first picture, Kirksey was in it like
Speaker 1: a sportsman. Well, what do you want from me, he
Speaker 1: asked Goodlow. You tell them boys, I need to ask
Speaker 1: them some questions. Ain't fixing the traps all over the county.
Speaker 1: I'll drop by the store this evening if they're there.
Speaker 1: They're there, Kirksey said, ain't their damn father. Goodlow followed
Speaker 1: him to the truck. You might think of getting them
Speaker 1: a lawyer, he said through the window. Kirksey started the engine. Shit,
Speaker 1: sugar baby. Them boys don't need a lawyer. They just
Speaker 1: need to stay in the woods where they belong folks
Speaker 1: ought a note to let them alone by now Goodlow
Speaker 1: stepped back from the truck and smacked his lips. I
Speaker 1: don't reckon anybody got around, telling that to the deceased. Driving,
Speaker 1: Kirksey remembered the Gates brothers when they were younger, before
Speaker 1: their father shot himself. He pictured the three blond heads
Speaker 1: in the front of Boo's boat as he motored up
Speaker 1: river past the store, lifting a solemn hand to Kirksey,
Speaker 1: where he stood with the broom on his little back porch.
Speaker 1: After Boo's wife, a newborn daughter, had died, he taught
Speaker 1: those boys all he knew about the wood. It's about
Speaker 1: fishing and tracking and hunting and killing. He kept them
Speaker 1: in his boat all night as he telephoned catfish and
Speaker 1: checked his trotlines and jugs and shot things on the bank.
Speaker 1: He'd given each of his sons a job to do,
Speaker 1: one cranking the phone, another netting the stunned catfish, the
Speaker 1: third adjusting the chain that dragged along the bottom and
Speaker 1: the wire which conducted electricity from the telephone's magnet into
Speaker 1: the water. Boo would tie a piece of rope around
Speaker 1: the sun's waists and loop the other endto his ankle
Speaker 1: in case one of the boys fell out. Downriver in
Speaker 1: the moonlight, Kent would pull in the trotlines while Dan
Speaker 1: handed him a cricket or a cataba worm for the hook.
Speaker 1: Neil took the bash or perch or catfish Kent gave
Speaker 1: him and slid its soft, cold belly with a knife
Speaker 1: and ran two fingers up into the fish and drew
Speaker 1: out as palm full of guts and dumped them overboard.
Speaker 1: Sometimes on warm nights, grinnel or cotton mouth or young
Speaker 1: alligators would follow them, drawn by the blood. A danger,
Speaker 1: too was catching a snake or snapping turtle on the
Speaker 1: trot line, and each night Boo whispered for Kent to
Speaker 1: be careful to lift the line with a stick see
Speaker 1: what he had there, instead of using his bare hand.
Speaker 1: During the morning, they would leave the boat tied and
Speaker 1: the boys would follow their fathers back through the trees
Speaker 1: from trap to trap, stepping when he stepped, and not talking.
Speaker 1: Boo emptied the traps and rebated them, while behind him
Speaker 1: Kent put the carcasses in his squirrel pouch. In the afternoons,
Speaker 1: they gutted and skin what they'd brought home. What time
Speaker 1: was left before dark. They spent sleeping in the feather
Speaker 1: bed in the cabin where barely a memory. Their mother
Speaker 1: and sister had died. After Boo's suicide, Kirksey had tried
Speaker 1: to look after the boys. Their ages twelve, thirteen and fourteen,
Speaker 1: just old enough who must have thought to raise themselves
Speaker 1: for a while. Kirksey let them stay with him and
Speaker 1: his wife, who never had a child. He tried to
Speaker 1: send them to school, but they were past learning to
Speaker 1: read and write. Got expel the first day for fighting
Speaker 1: and ganging up on a black kid. They were past
Speaker 1: the kind of life Kirksey's wife was used to living.
Speaker 1: They scared her the way they watched her with eyes
Speaker 1: narrowed into black lines, the way they ate with their hands,
Speaker 1: and the way they wouldn't talk. What she didn't know
Speaker 1: was that from those years of wordless nights on the
Speaker 1: river and silent days in the woods, they had developed
Speaker 1: a kind of language of their own, the language of
Speaker 1: the eyes, of the fingers, and the way a shoulder twitched,
Speaker 1: not of the head. Because his wife's health wasn't good
Speaker 1: in those days, Kirksey had returned the boys to their
Speaker 1: cabin in the woods. He spent most saturdays with them,
Speaker 1: trying to take up where Boo had left off, bringing
Speaker 1: them food and milt and clothes and new shoes, and
Speaker 1: reading them books and teaching them things and telling them stories.
Speaker 1: He'd worked out a deal with Esther, who used to
Speaker 1: take hot food to them in the evenings and wash
Speaker 1: their clothes. Slowing to let two buzzards hop away from
Speaker 1: a dead deer, Kirksey lit a cigarette and wiped the
Speaker 1: foggy wind show with the back of his hand. He
Speaker 1: thought of Frank David Alabama's legendary game warden. There were
Speaker 1: dozens of stories about the man. Kirksey had heard and
Speaker 1: told them for years, and had repeated them to the
Speaker 1: Gage boys, even made some up to try to scare
Speaker 1: them into obeying the law. Now the truth and the
Speaker 1: fictions were confused in his mind, and he remembered one
Speaker 1: a dark, moonless night, and two poachers used a spotlight
Speaker 1: to freeze a buck in the darkness and shoot it.
Speaker 1: They take hold of its wide rack of antners and
Speaker 1: struggled to drag them big deer, when suddenly they realized
Speaker 1: that now there's three men pulling. The first poacher jumps
Speaker 1: and says, hey, it ain't supposed to be but two
Speaker 1: of us dragging this deer, and Frank David says, ain't
Speaker 1: supposed to be none of y'all dragging a deer. The
Speaker 1: Gates boys came in the store just before closing, smelling
Speaker 1: like the river. Nodding to Kirksey, they went to the
Speaker 1: shelves and began selecting cans of things to eat. Kerksey
Speaker 1: poured himself a generous shot of whiskey. He'd stopped by
Speaker 1: their cabin earlier, not finding them there, left a quarter
Speaker 1: on the steps, a signal he hadn't used in years.
Speaker 1: Sheriff Goodloaw's coming tonight, he said to Kent, wants to
Speaker 1: ask you if you know anything about that Dead Game Warden.
Speaker 1: Kent shot the other boys a look, now, I don't
Speaker 1: know if y'all ever seen that, fella, Kirksey said, And
Speaker 1: I'm not asking you to tell me. He paused, and
Speaker 1: in case they wanted to, but that's what old sugar
Speaker 1: Baby's going to have on his mind. And if it
Speaker 1: was y'all, I just wouldn't tell him anything. Just say
Speaker 1: that I was at home that I don't know nothing
Speaker 1: about any dead game war, nothing at all, Kent shrugged
Speaker 1: and walked down the aisle that he was on and
Speaker 1: stared out the back window, though there wasn't anything to
Speaker 1: see except trees ghostly and bent. When lightning came, his
Speaker 1: brothers took seats by the stove and began to eat.
Speaker 1: Kirksey watched and remembered when he used to read to
Speaker 1: them Tarzan of the Apes and the Return of Tarzan.
Speaker 1: The boys that wanted to hear the books over and over.
Speaker 1: They loved the jungle, the elephants, the rhinos, the gorillas,
Speaker 1: the anaconda's thirty feet long. They would listen intently, their
Speaker 1: eyes brighten the light of the stove. Dan holding his small,
Speaker 1: dirty fingers, the slinky Kirksey had given him as a
Speaker 1: Christmas present, his lips moving along with Kirksey's voice, spouting
Speaker 1: some of the words the Great Apes, Numa, the Lion,
Speaker 1: La Queen of a poor and the Lost City. They
Speaker 1: had listened to his Frank David stories the same way.
Speaker 1: The game warden rising from the black water beside a
Speaker 1: tree on a moonless night. A tracker so keen he
Speaker 1: could see in the dark, could follow a man through
Speaker 1: the deepest swamp by smelling the fear in as sweat,
Speaker 1: A bent over shadows, stealing between the beaver lodges, the
Speaker 1: cypress trees, the tangle of limb and vine, parting the
Speaker 1: long wet bangs of Spanish moss with his rifle barrel,
Speaker 1: and creeping toward the glowing windows of the poacher's cabin.
Speaker 1: The deer hides nailed to the wall. The gator pelts,
Speaker 1: the fish with their grim smiles hooked to a clothes line,
Speaker 1: and turtle shells like army helmets, straying in the window sills.
Speaker 1: Any pit bull meant to guard the place lying behind
Speaker 1: him with its throat slit. Frank David slips out of
Speaker 1: the fog, with fogs still clinging to the brim of
Speaker 1: his hat. He circles the cabin and peers in each window,
Speaker 1: mounts the porch, puts his shoulder through the front door, stands,
Speaker 1: with wood splinters landing on the floor at his feet.
Speaker 1: A man of average height, clean shaven, no threat until
Speaker 1: the big hands come up, curling the fist, knuckles scarred
Speaker 1: blue and sharp. Kirksey finished his drink and poured another,
Speaker 1: and it burned pleasantly in his belly. He looked at
Speaker 1: Neil and Dan occupied by their bags of corn curls.
Speaker 1: A Merle Haggard song ended on the radio, and Kirksey
Speaker 1: clicked it off, sparing the boys the evening news. In
Speaker 1: the quiet, Kirksey heard Goodlaw's truck. He glanced at Kent,
Speaker 1: who probably had been hearing it for a while outside.
Speaker 1: Goodlaw slammed his door and he hurried up the steps
Speaker 1: and tapped on the window. Kirksey exaggerated his lamp and
Speaker 1: took his time, letting him in Good evening, Goodloaf said,
Speaker 1: Shaking the water from his hands. He took off his
Speaker 1: hat and hung it on the nail by the door,
Speaker 1: and then hung up his yellow slicker Evening sugar Baby.
Speaker 1: Kirksey said, if I can volunteer a little understatement here,
Speaker 1: Goodload said, it's a tad wet tonight. Yep. Kirksey went
Speaker 1: behind the counter and refilled his glass. You just caught
Speaker 1: the tail in the happy hour, that is, if you're
Speaker 1: off the wagon again, Can I sell you a tonic
Speaker 1: and warm you up? You know we're in a dry county, Kirksey,
Speaker 1: Would that be a no? It's a watcher ass. Goodload
Speaker 1: looked at the brothers, just wanted to ask these boys
Speaker 1: some questions. Well, have that it? Sugar baby. Goodlow walked
Speaker 1: to the lance rack and detached a package of Nipchie crackers.
Speaker 1: He opened it, offered the pack to each of the boys.
Speaker 1: Only Dan took one, smiling Goodlow bit of cracker in
Speaker 1: half and turned a chair around, sat with his elbows
Speaker 1: across its back. He looked over toward Kent, Half hidden
Speaker 1: by shadow, he chewed slowly. Come on out here so
Speaker 1: I can see you, boy. I ain't gonna buy nothing
Speaker 1: but these stale ass crackers. Kent moved a step closer,
Speaker 1: his eyes down focused on Goodload's boots. Good Load took
Speaker 1: out a notepad. Where was y'all between the hours of
Speaker 1: four and eight am two days ago? Kent looked at
Speaker 1: Neil asleep. Neil said, good Load snorty. Now, come on, boys,
Speaker 1: the whole Dern County knows y'all ain't slept a night
Speaker 1: in your life. Y'all was out on the river. Weren't
Speaker 1: you making a few telephone calls you saying he is
Speaker 1: a liar? Kirksey asked, I'm posing the questions here. Good
Speaker 1: Load chewed on another cracker. Hell, everybody knows them other
Speaker 1: game Boardings has been letting y'all get away with all
Speaker 1: kinds of shit. I reckon this dead fellow had something
Speaker 1: to prove being new, and all sounds like he ought
Speaker 1: to use the life jacket, Kirksey said, wiping the counter.
Speaker 1: It appears good Low studied Kent, that he might have
Speaker 1: been strangled. You got an alibi, boy. Kent lowered his eyes,
Speaker 1: took his hands out of his pockets and bought them
Speaker 1: into fists. Good Low side, I mean, Christ, is there
Speaker 1: anybody that can back up what you're saying? The windows flickered, Yeah,
Speaker 1: Kirksey said, I can. Good Low turned and faced the storekeeper.
Speaker 1: You that's right. They were here with me here in
Speaker 1: the store. Good Load looked amused. They was was they? Well? Okay,
Speaker 1: mister Kirksey, how come you didn't mention that to me?
Speaker 1: This morning? Saved us all a little time. Kirksey saw
Speaker 1: Kent's eyes, but saw nothing there, no understanding, no appreciation,
Speaker 1: no fear. He went back to wiping the counter. Well,
Speaker 1: I guess because they was passed out drunk, and I
Speaker 1: didn't want to say anything, being as I was given
Speaker 1: alcohol to youngins. But now they has come down to murder,
Speaker 1: you figured, you'd just better on up something like that,
Speaker 1: said Kirksey. Goodlaw stared at Kirksey for a long time,
Speaker 1: neither would look away. Then the sheriff turned to the boys.
Speaker 1: Y'all ever heard of Frank David? Dan nodded well, Goodlad said,
Speaker 1: looks like he's aiming to be this district's game warden.
Speaker 1: I figure he pulled some strings what he did. Kirksey
Speaker 1: came from behind the counter that all your questions. It's
Speaker 1: past closing and these youngins need to go home and
Speaker 1: get some sleep. He went to the door and opened
Speaker 1: it and stood waiting alrighty. Then the sheriff said, standing,
Speaker 1: I expect ought to be getting back to the office
Speaker 1: aity how he winked at Kirksey, see you or these
Speaker 1: boys don't leave the county for a few days. This
Speaker 1: ain't over yet. Put the crackers in his coat. I
Speaker 1: expect y'all might be hearing from Frank David too, he said,
Speaker 1: watching the boy's faces, but there was nothing to see alone. Later,
Speaker 1: Kirksey put out the light and bolted the door. He
Speaker 1: went to adjust a stove and found himself staring out
Speaker 1: the window, looking into the dark where he knew the
Speaker 1: river was rising and swirling tires and plastic garbage can
Speaker 1: lids and dead wood from upriver floating past. He struck
Speaker 1: a match and lit a cigarette, and the glow of
Speaker 1: his ash reflected in the window, and he saw himself
Speaker 1: years ago, telling the boys these stories, how Frank David
Speaker 1: would sit so still in the woods waiting for poachers,
Speaker 1: that dragonflies would perch on his nose, nats would walk
Speaker 1: over his eyeballs. Nobody knew where he came from, but
Speaker 1: Kirksey had heard that he'd been orphaned as a baby
Speaker 1: in a fire and found half starved in the swamp
Speaker 1: by a Cajun woman. She raised him on the slick
Speaker 1: red clay banks of the tom Bigbie River, among laying
Speaker 1: black poachers and moonshiners. He didn't even know how old
Speaker 1: he was, people said, And they said he was the
Speaker 1: best poacher ever, the craftiest, the meanest. That he'd cut
Speaker 1: a drunklogger's throat and a duke joint knife fight one night.
Speaker 1: That he'd fled south and under age, joined the Marines
Speaker 1: in mobile and wound up in Korea the infantry, where
Speaker 1: because of his shooting ability and his stealth that made
Speaker 1: him a sniper Before he left that country, he'd registered
Speaker 1: over one hundred kills communists half a world away, who
Speaker 1: never saw him coming back home in Alabama, he disappeared
Speaker 1: for a few years, and then showed up at the
Speaker 1: state Game Warden's office demanding a job. Some people had
Speaker 1: heard in the intervening time he'd gotten religion. What makes
Speaker 1: you think I ought to hire you, the head game
Speaker 1: Morden ask him, because I spent ten years of my
Speaker 1: life poaching right under your damn nose. Frank David's The
Speaker 1: Gates Boys pick up was the same old Ford their
Speaker 1: father had shot himself in several years before, heartbroken over
Speaker 1: their mother's death. The bullet hole and the roof had
Speaker 1: rusted out, but was now covered with a strip of
Speaker 1: duct tape from Kirksey's store. Spots of the truck's floor
Speaker 1: were rusted away, too, so things in the road often
Speaker 1: flew up into their laps, rocks and Budweiser cans, and
Speaker 1: a king snake they were trying to run over. The
Speaker 1: truck was older than any of them, only one thin
Speaker 1: prong left of the steering wheel and the holes from
Speaker 1: the missing knobs and the dash. It was a three
Speaker 1: speed a column shifter, the gearstick covered with a bucks
Speaker 1: dried balls sack. A window and windshield busted or shot
Speaker 1: out years before hadn't been replaced because most of the
Speaker 1: driving took them along back roads after dark or in
Speaker 1: the fields, and the things they came upon were easier
Speaker 1: shots without glass. Though he'd never had a license, Kent
Speaker 1: drove had since he was eight. Neil road shot gun tonight.
Speaker 1: Both were drinking, and in the back Dan stood holding
Speaker 1: his rifle, trying to keep his balance below the soles
Speaker 1: of his boots. The floor was soft, a tarry black
Speaker 1: from the blood of all the animals they'd killed. You
Speaker 1: could see spike antlers and forelegs and hoofs of deer,
Speaker 1: teeth and feathers and fur, the brittle beaks and beards
Speaker 1: of turkeys, and the delicate hinge leg bone of something
Speaker 1: molded in the sludge like a fossil, just beyond a
Speaker 1: no trespassing sign, already gnawed up by bullets. Kent swerved
Speaker 1: off the road and they bounced and slid through a
Speaker 1: field in the rain, shooting at rabbits. Then they split up,
Speaker 1: the younger boys checking traps, one on each side of
Speaker 1: the river. Kent in the boat, rebaiting their trotlines the
Speaker 1: way his father had shown him. They met at the
Speaker 1: trug just before midnight, untied the dogs and trumped over
Speaker 1: a steep logging path, down on one end of four
Speaker 1: leashes and the lunging hounds on the other. When they
Speaker 1: got to the bottom land, he unclipped the leashes and
Speaker 1: loosed the dogs, and the brothers followed the bang ahead
Speaker 1: in the dark, aiming their flashlights into the black mesh
Speaker 1: of trees, where the eyes of coons and possums gleamed
Speaker 1: like rubies. The hounds bathed and frothed and clawed at
Speaker 1: the trunks of trees, and leaped into the air and
Speaker 1: landed and leaped again, and their sides pumping and ribs showing.
Speaker 1: When the gates came to the river two hours later,
Speaker 1: the dogs were lapping water and panting. Dan bent and
Speaker 1: rubbed their ears and let them lick his cheeks. His
Speaker 1: brothers rested and drank, belching at the sky, and after
Speaker 1: a time they leased the hounds and staggered downstream to
Speaker 1: the live oak, where their boat was tied. They loaded
Speaker 1: the dog dogs in and shoved off into the fog
Speaker 1: and trolled over the still water in the middle. Neil
Speaker 1: lowered the wire in the chain stolen from a child's
Speaker 1: swing set behind the boat and began cranking the old telephone,
Speaker 1: which he held between his legs. Dan knitted the stunned catfish.
Speaker 1: You couldn't catch him with your hand, or they'd come too,
Speaker 1: and he threw them into the cooler, where in a
Speaker 1: few seconds the waking fish would begin to thrash. And
Speaker 1: in the rear, Kent propped his rifle on his knees
Speaker 1: and watched the bank in case of coyote, wandered down
Speaker 1: hunting bullfrogs. They climbed out of the woods into the
Speaker 1: dirt road in the misty dawn, plying through the muddy
Speaker 1: yards and pissing by someone's front porch and plain sight
Speaker 1: of the face in sight a few houses down. Mor
Speaker 1: Set didn't come to his door, and when Kent tried
Speaker 1: the handle, it was locked. He looked at Neil, then
Speaker 1: put his elbow through the glass and reached in and
Speaker 1: unlocked it. While his brother's searched for liquor, Dan ate
Speaker 1: the biscuits he found wrapped in tinfoil on the stove.
Speaker 1: He found a box of corn flacks in the cabinet,
Speaker 1: and he ate most of them too. He had to
Speaker 1: play the cold fried liver. Neil was in a bedroom
Speaker 1: looking under the bed, and in the closet he was
Speaker 1: going through drawers and his dirty fingers smudged white shirts.
Speaker 1: And in the back of the house Kent found a
Speaker 1: bathroom door locked from in the side he Jimmy had
Speaker 1: opened with his knife, and when he came into the kitchen,
Speaker 1: he had a gallon jar of whiskey under his arm
Speaker 1: and euphraed. He steppdaughter by the wrist. Dan stopped chewing,
Speaker 1: crumbs falling from his mouth. He approached the girl and
Speaker 1: put his hand out to touch her, but Kent pushed
Speaker 1: him hard into the wall. But Dan stayed there, a
Speaker 1: clock ticking beside his head and a string of spit
Speaker 1: linking his open lips, watching as his brother ran his
Speaker 1: rough hands up and down the girl's shivering body. Her
Speaker 1: eyes were closed and lips tr in prayer. Looking down,
Speaker 1: Kent saw the puddles spreading around her bare feet. Dan
Speaker 1: giggled and then put his hand over his mouth shit,
Speaker 1: Kent said, letting her go. She pissed herself. She shrank
Speaker 1: back against the wall behind the door and was still there,
Speaker 1: along with a bag of catfish on the table when
Speaker 1: her stepfather came back half an hour later, ten gallons
Speaker 1: of whiskey under the tarp in his truck. On that
Speaker 1: same Saturday, Kirksey drove to the chicken fights held in
Speaker 1: Heflin Bradford's bulging barn, deep in the woods, cloudy with mosquitoes.
Speaker 1: He passed a hand painted sign that had been there
Speaker 1: forever as long as he could remember, nail to a tree,
Speaker 1: it said, Jesus is coming. Kirksey climbed out of his
Speaker 1: truck and button his collar, his ears full of cotton.
Speaker 1: Heflin's wife work beneath the rented aunting and grilling chicken
Speaker 1: and sausages and selling cokes and beer. Gospel music played
Speaker 1: from a portable radio by her head. Heflin's grandson Nolan,
Speaker 1: took the price of admission at the barn door and
Speaker 1: stamped the backs of white hands and the cracked pink
Speaker 1: palms of black ones. Men in overalls and baseball caps
Speaker 1: that said cat Diesel Power or STP stood at the
Speaker 1: tailgates of their pickup, smoking cigarettes, stooping to peer into
Speaker 1: the cages where the roosters paste the air was filled
Speaker 1: with windy rainspits and the crowing of roosters. The ground
Speaker 1: littered with limp dead birds. A group of loggers was
Speaker 1: discussing Frank David, and Kirksey paused to listen. He's one
Speaker 1: caught that bunch over in Washington County. One man said
Speaker 1: them alligator poachers. Sugar Baby said to of them wound
Speaker 1: up in intensive care. Another one claimed said they pulled
Speaker 1: a gun and old Frank day David went crazy with
Speaker 1: an axe handle. Kirksey moved on and paid the five
Speaker 1: dollars admission. In the barn, there were bleachers along the
Speaker 1: walls and a big circular wooden fence in the center,
Speaker 1: the dome of chicken wire over the top. Kirksey found
Speaker 1: a seat at the bottom, next to the back door,
Speaker 1: near a group of men old farts he'd known for
Speaker 1: forty years. People around them called out bets, and bets
Speaker 1: were accepted. Cans of beer were lifted, and Kirksey produced
Speaker 1: a thermos of coffee and a dented tin cup. He
Speaker 1: poured the coffee, then added whiskey from a bottle that
Speaker 1: went back into his coat pocket. The tin cup warmed
Speaker 1: his fingers as he squinted through his bifocals to see
Speaker 1: which bird to bet on. In separate corners of the barn,
Speaker 1: two bird handlers doused their roosters heads and asses with
Speaker 1: rubbing alcohol to make them fight harder. They tightened the
Speaker 1: long steel curved spurs. When the referee in the center
Speaker 1: of the ring indicated it it was time, the handlers
Speaker 1: entered the pen, each cradling his bird in his arms.
Speaker 1: They flashed the roosters at one another until their feathers
Speaker 1: had ruffled with blood lust and rage, and the roosters
Speaker 1: pedaled the air, stretching their necks toward each other. The
Speaker 1: handlers kept them a breath apart for a second, then
Speaker 1: withdrew them to their corners, whispering in their ears. When
Speaker 1: the referee tapped the ground three times with a stick,
Speaker 1: the birds were unleashed. They charged and rose in the
Speaker 1: center of the rain, gouging with spur and beak. The
Speaker 1: handlers circling the fight like crabs, blood on their forearms
Speaker 1: and faces, ready to seize their roosters. At the referee's
Speaker 1: cry of handle, A clown of Louisiana occasions watched, and
Speaker 1: they emerged red eyed from a van in a marijuana cloud.
Speaker 1: Skinny shirtless men with oly ponytails and goates, and tattoos
Speaker 1: of symbols of black magic under their arms. They carried thick,
Speaker 1: white hooded roosters to pit against the reds and blacks
Speaker 1: of the locals. Their women had stumbled out of the
Speaker 1: van behind them, high yellowl like gypsies, big lips and
Speaker 1: big chested girls, and halter tops tied at their bellies,
Speaker 1: and many skirts and moccasins. In the ring, the Cajuns
Speaker 1: kissed their birds on the beaks, and one tall, completely
Speaker 1: bald Cajun, wearing gold earrings in both ears, put his
Speaker 1: bird's whole head in his mouth. His girl, too, came
Speaker 1: barefoot into the ring, tattoo of a snake on her shoulder,
Speaker 1: and took the bird's head into her mouth. Bet on
Speaker 1: them white ones, a friend whispered to Kirksey. These ones
Speaker 1: around here ain't ever seen a white rooster. They don't
Speaker 1: know what they're fighting. That evening, bending to check a
Speaker 1: trap in the woods north of the river, Dan took
Speaker 1: hold of a sapling and yelped when a spray of
Speaker 1: water rained on him. He crouched, dripping and waited while
Speaker 1: the drumming of his heart slowed, forced himself to rise
Speaker 1: and move on so his brothers wouldn't laugh at him
Speaker 1: for being afraid near dark. In the wooden trap next
Speaker 1: to an old fence row, he was surprised to find
Speaker 1: a tiny white fox they'd once seen cross the road
Speaker 1: in front of their truck. He squatted before the trap
Speaker 1: and poked a stick through the wire at the thin snout,
Speaker 1: his hands steady, despite the way the fox snapped at
Speaker 1: the stick and bit off the end. Would a witch
Speaker 1: woman want this alive? Never thought of her. He looked around.
Speaker 1: It felt like she was watching him, as if she
Speaker 1: were hiding in a tree, in the form of some animal,
Speaker 1: a possum, or a swamp rat or a chicken snake.
Speaker 1: He stood and dragged the trap through the mud and
Speaker 1: over the land. While in the trap, the fox jumped
Speaker 1: in circles, growling. A mile up stream, Neil had lost
Speaker 1: a boot to the mud and was hopping back on
Speaker 1: one foot to retrieve it. It stood buried to the ankle.
Speaker 1: He wrenched it free and then sat with his back
Speaker 1: against a sweet gum to scrape off the mud. He'd
Speaker 1: begun to lace the boot when he saw a hollow
Speaker 1: tree stump, something moved inside. With his rifle barrel, he
Speaker 1: rolled the thing out. It was most of the body
Speaker 1: of a dead catfish, and the movement from the maggots
Speaker 1: devouring it. When he kicked it, they spilled from the
Speaker 1: fish like rice pellets and lay throbbing in the mud downstream.
Speaker 1: As night came and the rain fell harder, Kent trolled
Speaker 1: their boat across the river, flashlight in his mouth, using
Speaker 1: a stick to pull up the trot line length by
Speaker 1: link and removing the fish or turtles, and rebating the
Speaker 1: hooks and dropping them back in the water. Near the bank.
Speaker 1: Approaching the last hook, he heard something. He looked up
Speaker 1: with a flashlight in his teeth to see the thing
Speaker 1: untwirling in the air. It wrapped around his neck like
Speaker 1: a rope, and for an instant he thought he was
Speaker 1: being hanged. He grabbed the thing. It flexed and tightened,
Speaker 1: and then his neck burned and went numb, and he
Speaker 1: felt dizzy, his fingertips buzzing, his legs weak. A tree
Speaker 1: on the bank distorting, doubling, trippling into a whole line
Speaker 1: of fuzzy shapes, turning sideways and floating. Kent blinked and
Speaker 1: felt his eyes bulging and his tongue swelling. His head
Speaker 1: was about to explode, and then a bright light. His
Speaker 1: brothers found the boat at dawn, four miles downstream, lodged
Speaker 1: on the far side in a fallen tree. They exchanged
Speaker 1: a glance and then looked back across the river. A
Speaker 1: heavy gray fog hooded the water, and the boat appeared
Speaker 1: and dissolved in the ghostly limbs around it. Neil sat
Speaker 1: on a log and took off his boots and left
Speaker 1: them standing by a log, and he removed his coat
Speaker 1: and laid it over the boots. He had his brother
Speaker 1: his rifle without looking at him, left him watching as
Speaker 1: he climbed down the bank, hands and elbows in the
Speaker 1: air like a believer, waded into the water. Dan propped
Speaker 1: the second rifle against the tree and stood on the
Speaker 1: bank holding his own gun, casting his frightened eyes up
Speaker 1: and down the river. From far away, a woodpecker drummed
Speaker 1: crows began to collect in a pine tree down stream,
Speaker 1: and after a while Dan squatted, thinking of their dogs
Speaker 1: tied to the bumper of their truck. They'd be under
Speaker 1: the tailgate, probably trying to keep dry. Soon Neil had
Speaker 1: trolled the boat back across, and together they pulled it
Speaker 1: out of the water and stood looking at their brother,
Speaker 1: who lay across the floor among the fish and turtles
Speaker 1: that he had caught, one greenish terrapin, still alive, a
Speaker 1: hook in its lip, stared back. They both knew what
Speaker 1: they were supposed to think. The blood, and the sets
Speaker 1: of twin fang marks, and the black bruises and shriveled skin,
Speaker 1: the next swollen like mumps, the purple bulb of a
Speaker 1: tongue between his lips, they were supposed to think cotton mouth.
Speaker 1: Ken's hands were squeezed into fists, and they were hardened
Speaker 1: that way. The skin wrinkled, and his eyes were half open.
Speaker 1: His rifle lay unfired in the boat, and the telephone
Speaker 1: rig seemed untouched, as if indeed a snake had done this.
Speaker 1: But it wasn't the tracks of a snake they found.
Speaker 1: When they went to get the white fox. The fox
Speaker 1: was gone and the trap was empty. Its cat sprung.
Speaker 1: Neil knelt his hand and ran his knuckles along the
Speaker 1: rim of the bootprint in the mud, not a very
Speaker 1: wide track, not very far from the next one. He
Speaker 1: put his finger in the black water that had already
Speaker 1: begun to fill the track, not too deep. He looked
Speaker 1: up at Dan, the print of an average sized man.
Speaker 1: In no hurry, Neil rose and they began above them.
Speaker 1: The sky cracked and flickered silently and quickly, no time
Speaker 1: to get the dogs. They followed the trail back through
Speaker 1: the woods, losing it once and twice, and backtracking and
Speaker 1: working against the rain that fell and fell harder, that
Speaker 1: puddled blackly and crept up their legs until they stood
Speaker 1: in the water to their ankles, rain beating on the
Speaker 1: brims of their caps, and they gazed at the ground
Speaker 1: and the sky, at the rain streaming down each other's
Speaker 1: muddy faces. At the truck, Dan jumped into the driver's
Speaker 1: seat and reached for the keys. Neil appeared in the window,
Speaker 1: shaking his head, and when Dan didn't scoot over, the
Speaker 1: older boy hit him in the jaw through the window,
Speaker 1: and then slung open the door and pulled Dan out,
Speaker 1: sending him rolling over the ground. Neil climbed in and
Speaker 1: had trouble getting the truck choked. By the time he
Speaker 1: had the hang of it, Dan had gotten into the
Speaker 1: back and sat among the wet dogs, staring at his
Speaker 1: dead brother's eyes at their cabin. They carried Kent into
Speaker 1: the woods and they laid him on the ground and
Speaker 1: began digging near where their sister and mother and father
Speaker 1: were buried in their unmarked graves. For three hours they worked,
Speaker 1: the dogs coming from under the porch and sniffing around
Speaker 1: Kent and whining and watching the digging, finally sleeking off
Speaker 1: and crawling back under the porch. An hour later, they
Speaker 1: came out again and stood in a group at the
Speaker 1: edge of the yard bay. The boys paused but saw
Speaker 1: and heard nothing. When the dogs kept making noise, Neil
Speaker 1: got his rifle and fired into the woods several times.
Speaker 1: He nodded to his brother and they went back to digging.
Speaker 1: By the time they finished, it was late afternoon and
Speaker 1: the hole was full of slimy water, and they were
Speaker 1: black with mud. They each took one of Kent's boots,
Speaker 1: and Neil got the things from his pockets. They stripped
Speaker 1: off his shirt and pants and socks and lowered him
Speaker 1: naked into the hole, and when he bobbed to the
Speaker 1: top of the water, they got stones and waited them down,
Speaker 1: and then shoveled mud into the grave. They showed up
Speaker 1: at Esther's blackest tar. Where's kent, she asked, holding her
Speaker 1: robe at her throat. We buried him, Neil said, moving
Speaker 1: past her into the kitchen. She put a hand over
Speaker 1: her mouth, and as Neil told her what they'd found,
Speaker 1: she slumped against the door, looking outside. An owl flew
Speaker 1: past in the floodlights. She thought of calling Kirksey, but
Speaker 1: decided to wait until morning. The old bastard thought that
Speaker 1: she was a slut and a corruption fortnight, she'd just
Speaker 1: keep them safe in her house. Neil went to the den.
Speaker 1: He turned on the TV. The reception was bad because
Speaker 1: of the weather. Dan, a bruise on the left cheek,
Speaker 1: climbed the stairs. He went into one of the bedrooms
Speaker 1: and closed the door behind him. He was chilly in
Speaker 1: the room, and he noticed pictures of people on the wall,
Speaker 1: children and a tall man and a younger woman. He
Speaker 1: took to be Esther. She'd been pretty. Then he stood
Speaker 1: dripping on the floor, looking into her black and white face,
Speaker 1: searching for signs of a woman he knew now. Soon
Speaker 1: the door opened behind him and she came in, and
Speaker 1: though he still wore his filthy, wet clothes, she steered
Speaker 1: him to the bed and guided him down onto the
Speaker 1: edge of it. She unbuckled his belt and removed his
Speaker 1: hunting knife and stripped the belt off, and she unbuttoned
Speaker 1: his shirt and rubbed her fingers across his chest, the
Speaker 1: hair just beginning to thicken there. She undid his pants
Speaker 1: and ran the zipper down its track. She worked him
Speaker 1: over his thighs and knees and ankles and draped them
Speaker 1: across the back of the chair. She pulled off his
Speaker 1: boots and socks and pushed him back onto the bed,
Speaker 1: and pried a finger beneath the elastic of his underwear
Speaker 1: and felt what had already happened. He looked at her face,
Speaker 1: his mouth open. Esther touched his chin, the scratch of whiskers,
Speaker 1: his breath on her hand. Hush now, she said, and
Speaker 1: washed him fall asleep downstairs. The TV went off. When
Speaker 1: Goodlow knocked, Esther answered a cold sliver of her face
Speaker 1: and the crack door. The hell you won't good evening
Speaker 1: to you too. The gates is here, No Goodlow glanced
Speaker 1: at him. Believe that's their truck. It's kind of hard
Speaker 1: to mistake, especially for a trained lawman. We're just cruising
Speaker 1: by and seen it. She tried to close the door,
Speaker 1: but Goodlow had his foot in it. He glanced at
Speaker 1: the three deputies who stood importantly by the blazer. They
Speaker 1: dropped their cigarettes and crushed them out. They unsnapped their
Speaker 1: holsters and strode across the yard, standing behind Goodlow with
Speaker 1: their hands on their revolvers and their legs apart like
Speaker 1: TV deputies. Why don't you just leave them alone? Esther said,
Speaker 1: ain't they been through enough? Tell them I'd like to
Speaker 1: see them, good Load said, tell them to get their boots.
Speaker 1: You just walked straight to hell. Mister Dan appeared behind
Speaker 1: her lines from the bed, leaning on his face. Whoa nellie,
Speaker 1: good Load said, boy, you look plumb terrible. Why don't
Speaker 1: you let us carry you on down to the office
Speaker 1: for a little coffee, little cake. He glanced back at
Speaker 1: one of the deputies. We got any of that cinnamon
Speaker 1: roll left day? Do you have a warrant for their rest?
Speaker 1: Esther asked, now, I ain't got a warrant for their arrest.
Speaker 1: They ain't under arrest. They're fixing to get questioned. That's
Speaker 1: all strictly informal. Good Load winked, you reckon, you could
Speaker 1: do without them for a couple of hours. Fuck you,
Speaker 1: sugar baby. The door slammed, The good Load nodded down
Speaker 1: the side of the house, and two deputies went to
Speaker 1: make sure nobody escaped from the back. But in a
Speaker 1: minute Dan came out, dressed his hands in his pockets,
Speaker 1: and followed Goodload down the stairs, the deputies watching him
Speaker 1: closely and watching the house. Where's your brothers, Goodlow asked.
Speaker 1: He looked down. Goodload nodded to the house, and the
Speaker 1: two deputies went in, guns drawn. They came out a
Speaker 1: few minutes later, frowning must have heard us coming, Goodloaf said, well,
Speaker 1: we got this one. We'll find them other too tomorrow.
Speaker 1: They got into the blazer and Goodload looked at Dan
Speaker 1: sitting in the back. Put them cuffs on him, Goodload said,
Speaker 1: holding his rifle. Neil came out of the woods when
Speaker 1: the blazer was gone, and he returned to the house.
Speaker 1: They got Dan. Esther said, why didn't you come tell
Speaker 1: him they was out there? The boy got to learn,
Speaker 1: Neil said. He went to the cabinet where she kept
Speaker 1: the whiskey and took the bottle. She watched him go
Speaker 1: to the sofa and sit down in front of the
Speaker 1: blank TV. Soon she joined him in glasses. He filled both,
Speaker 1: and when they emptied them, he filled them again. They
Speaker 1: spent the night like that, and at dawn they were drunk.
Speaker 1: Wearing her robe. Estra began clipping her fingernails, a cigarette
Speaker 1: smoking in then ashtray beside her. She'd forgotten about a
Speaker 1: calling Kirksey. Neil was telling her about the biggest catfish
Speaker 1: they'd ever called up, one hundred pounds, he swore, one
Speaker 1: hundred and fifty. You could have put your whole head
Speaker 1: in that old cat's mouth, he said, and sipping his
Speaker 1: whiskey backfin long as you damn arm, he stood and
Speaker 1: walked to the front window. There were toads in the yard.
Speaker 1: With the river swelling, they were everywhere. In the evenings,
Speaker 1: there were rain frosts. The yard had turned into a pond,
Speaker 1: and each night the rain frog sang. It was like
Speaker 1: no other sound. Esther said. It kept her up all night.
Speaker 1: That and some other things, she said. Neil heard a
Speaker 1: fingernail land in the a ashtray, and he rubbed his
Speaker 1: hand across his chin and felt the whiskers there. He
Speaker 1: watched the toads as they huddled in the yard, still
Speaker 1: as rocks and bloated and miserable looking. That catfish was green,
Speaker 1: he said, sipping. I swear before God, green is grass.
Speaker 1: Theamn goddamn rain frogs, she said, I just lay there
Speaker 1: at night with my hands over my ears. A clipping
Speaker 1: rang the ashtray. He turned and went to her on
Speaker 1: the sofa. There was moss growing on his nose, he said,
Speaker 1: putting his hand inside her robe on her knee. Go
Speaker 1: find your brother, she said, And she got up and
Speaker 1: walked unsteadily across the floor and went into the bathroom
Speaker 1: and closed the door. And when she came out and
Speaker 1: the bottle were gone. Without kent, Neil felt free to
Speaker 1: do what he wanted, which was to drive very fast.
Speaker 1: He got the truck started and he spun off, aiming
Speaker 1: for every mudhole that he could. He shot past the
Speaker 1: house with a washing machine on the front porch and
Speaker 1: two thin black men butchering a hog hanging from a tree.
Speaker 1: One of the men waved with a knife, drinking. Neil
Speaker 1: drove through the mountains of trash at the dunk and
Speaker 1: turned the truck in circles, kicking up muddy rooster tails.
Speaker 1: He swerved past the Negro church in the graveyard, where
Speaker 1: a group of blacks huddle four wobbling poles over an
Speaker 1: open grave, the wind tearing the preacher's hat out of
Speaker 1: his hands, and a woman's umbrella reversing. When he tired
Speaker 1: of driving, he left the truck in their hiding place, and,
Speaker 1: using the trees for balance, stumbled down the hill to
Speaker 1: their boat. He carried Kent's rifle, which he had always admired,
Speaker 1: and he wore Kent's jacket. On the river, he fired
Speaker 1: up the outboard and accelebrated the boat, prowl lifting and
Speaker 1: leveling out, the buzz of the motor rising in the trees.
Speaker 1: The water was nearly orange from the mud, and the
Speaker 1: cypress sneeze nothing but knobs and tips because of the floods.
Speaker 1: A cotton mouthwa around most every one of them. During
Speaker 1: the old train trestle, he cut the motor and coasted
Speaker 1: to a stop. He sat listening to the rain, to
Speaker 1: the distant barking of a dog a half a mile away,
Speaker 1: chasing something, maybe a deer. As the dog charged through
Speaker 1: the woods, Neil closed his eyes and imagined the terrain,
Speaker 1: marking where he thought the dog was now and where
Speaker 1: he thought it was now, then the barking stopped suddenly,
Speaker 1: as if the dog had run smack into a tree.
Speaker 1: Neil clicked on the trolling motor and moved the boat
Speaker 1: close to the edge of the river, the rifle across
Speaker 1: his knees. He scanned the banks, and when the rain
Speaker 1: started to fall harder, he accelerated toward the trustle from
Speaker 1: beneath the cross ties. He smelled Chris soak and watched
Speaker 1: the rain as it stirred the river. He looked into
Speaker 1: the gray trees and thought he would drive into town
Speaker 1: later see about getting Daan Kent had never wanted to
Speaker 1: go to Grove Hill, and their father had warn them
Speaker 1: of the police of jail and telling your truck needed
Speaker 1: to have a tag in tail lights. A worked Neil
Speaker 1: picked up one of the catfish from the night before.
Speaker 1: It was cold and stiff, as if carved out of wood.
Speaker 1: He stared at it, watching the green belowflies hover over
Speaker 1: his fist, and then threw it over into the weeds
Speaker 1: along the bank. The telephone rig was under the seat.
Speaker 1: He lifted the chain quietly, considering what giant catfish might
Speaker 1: be passing beneath the boat this very second. I think
Speaker 1: as large as a man's thigh, with eyes the shape
Speaker 1: of right plums and skin the color of mud. Catfish
Speaker 1: their father had taught them, have long whiskers that make
Speaker 1: them the only fish that you can call. Kirksey had
Speaker 1: told Neil and his brothers that if the game warden
Speaker 1: caught you telephoning, all you needed to do was dump
Speaker 1: your box overboard. But Kirksey warn Frank David would handcuff
Speaker 1: you and jump overboard and swim around the bottom of
Speaker 1: the river until he found your rig. Neil spat a
Speaker 1: stream of tobacco juice into the water, and minnos appeared
Speaker 1: and began to investigate, nibbling at the dark yoke of
Speaker 1: spit as he elongated and dissolved. With the rifle safety off,
Speaker 1: he lowered the chain into the water, then the wire,
Speaker 1: and a good distance apart, he checked the connections, and
Speaker 1: then lifted the phone and began to crank Hello. He
Speaker 1: whispered the thing his father had always said, grinning in
Speaker 1: the dark. The wind picked up a bit, and he
Speaker 1: heard a rattling in the trees, and he dialed faster.
Speaker 1: Had just seen the first silver body appear behind him,
Speaker 1: when something landed with a clatter in the boat. And
Speaker 1: he glanced over a bottle of dynamite, sparks hissing off
Speaker 1: the end, fuse already gone. He looked above him and
Speaker 1: the trestle, but nobody was there. He moved to grab
Speaker 1: the dynamite, but his cheeks ballooned with a hot red wind,
Speaker 1: and his hands caught fire. And when the smoke cleared
Speaker 1: and the water stopped boiling, silver bodies began to bob
Speaker 1: to the surface, large mouth bass and brim and guar,
Speaker 1: and suckers and white perch, and polly wogs and catfish.
Speaker 1: Some only stunned, but others did, and pieces of pink
Speaker 1: fruit like things, the water blooming darkly with mud. Kirksey's
Speaker 1: telephone rang for the second time in one day, a
Speaker 1: rarity that proved that his wife had always said, bad
Speaker 1: news comes over the phone. The first call had been Esther,
Speaker 1: telling him of Kent's death, Dan's arrest, and Neil's disappearance.
Speaker 1: This time Kirksey heard Goodlow's voice tell him that somebody,
Speaker 1: or maybe a couple of somebody's, had been blown up
Speaker 1: on the trustle. Neil Kirksey said, sitting He arrived at
Speaker 1: at the trestle and with his cane hobbled over the
Speaker 1: uneven tracks. Goodload's deputies and three ambulance drivers and rubber
Speaker 1: gloves and waiters were scraping pieces off the cross ties
Speaker 1: with spoons and dropping the parts and zip lock bags
Speaker 1: the boat. Two flattened shreds of aluminum lay on the bank,
Speaker 1: and none of the water minnows darted about, nibbling christ
Speaker 1: Kirksey said. He brought a handkerchief to his lips. Then
Speaker 1: he went to where Goodlow stood on the bank, writing
Speaker 1: in his notebook. What do you aim to do about this,
Speaker 1: Kirksey demanded, We'll try to figure out who it was first,
Speaker 1: you know, goddamn well who it was? Well, I expect,
Speaker 1: judging from that boat over Yonder, it's either Neil or
Speaker 1: Kent Gates, it's Neil. Kirksey said, Well, why do you
Speaker 1: know that? Kirksey told him that Kent was dead. Goodlaw
Speaker 1: studied the storekeeper. I ain't seen the body, have you.
Speaker 1: Kirksey's blood pressure was going up. Fuck, sugar baby, are
Speaker 1: you one bit of ware of what's going on here? Well,
Speaker 1: it's fishing accident, Goodload said. His bait exploded from the bank.
Speaker 1: A deputy call that he'd found most of a boot
Speaker 1: foot still in it, he said, holding it up by
Speaker 1: the lace. The deputy behind him gagged and turned away.
Speaker 1: Tag it, Goodload said, writing something down and keep looking.
Speaker 1: Puke on your own time. Kirksey poked Goodlow in the
Speaker 1: shoulder with his cane. You really think Neil would blow
Speaker 1: himself up? Goodload looked at his shoulder, the muddy cane print,
Speaker 1: and then at the storekeeper. Not on purpose, I don't,
Speaker 1: and he paused, of course, suicide does run in their family,
Speaker 1: you half wit son of a bitch. What about Kent Well,
Speaker 1: what about Kent christ sugar Baby? Goodlow held up his hand.
Speaker 1: Just show me, Kirksey. They left the ambulsce drivers and
Speaker 1: the deputies had walked the other way without talking, and
Speaker 1: when they came to Goodlaw's blazer, they got in and
Speaker 1: drove without talking. Soon they stopped in front of the
Speaker 1: gates cabin, and instantly hounds surrounded the truck, barking viciously
Speaker 1: and jumping with muddy paws against the glass. Goodload blew
Speaker 1: the horn until the hounds slunk away, heads Low and
Speaker 1: fang spared. The sheriff opened his window and fired several
Speaker 1: times in the air, backing the dogs up before he
Speaker 1: and Kirksey got out, Goodlow reloaded. The hounds kept to
Speaker 1: the edge of the woods, watching while Kirksey led Goodlow
Speaker 1: behind the decrepit cabin. Rusty screens covered some windows, and
Speaker 1: rags of drapes others. Beneath the house. The dogs paced
Speaker 1: them back here, Kirksey said, heading into the trees. Esther
Speaker 1: had said that they'd buried Kent, and this was the
Speaker 1: logical place. He went slow, already out of breath, stopping
Speaker 1: to cough once, and sure enough there lay the grave.
Speaker 1: You could see where the dogs have been scratching around it.
Speaker 1: Goodlow went over and towed the dirt. You know the
Speaker 1: cause of death, you dumb ass. I know the cause
Speaker 1: of death. His name is Frank fucking David. I mean
Speaker 1: how he was killed, said Goodlow. The boy said, snake
Speaker 1: back three times in the neck. But I'd do an autopsy,
Speaker 1: oh you would, good Low excelled. Okay, I'll send Roy
Speaker 1: and Avery over here to dig his ass up, maybe
Speaker 1: shoot these damn dogs. I'll tell you what you better do. First,
Speaker 1: you better keep Dan locked up safe. I can't hold
Speaker 1: him much longer, Goodload said, unless he confesses. Kirksey swung
Speaker 1: at him with his cane and nearly lost his balance
Speaker 1: at the edge of the woods. The dogs tensed, and
Speaker 1: Goodload backed away, raising his pistol the grave between them.
Speaker 1: Are you crazy, Kirksey, You've been locking that store too long,
Speaker 1: good Low, Kirksey gasped. The cotton in his left ear
Speaker 1: had come out, and the air was roaring through his head.
Speaker 1: Even you can't be this stupid. You let that boy out,
Speaker 1: and he's that cold blooded fucker's next target target, Kirksey.
Speaker 1: Shit ain't nothing to prove anybody to kill them damn boys.
Speaker 1: This one a snake bit. You said so yourself. That
Speaker 1: other one blowing hisself up them durned gates is had
Speaker 1: fished with dynamite their whole lives. You ought to know
Speaker 1: that you the one gets it for him. He narrowed
Speaker 1: his eyes. You're about neck deep in this damn thing,
Speaker 1: you know that. And I don't mean just lying to
Speaker 1: protect them boys, neither I mean selling explosives illegally to miners. Kirksey.
Speaker 1: I don't give a shit if I am. Kirksey yelled.
Speaker 1: Two dead boys in two days, and you're worried about dynamite.
Speaker 1: You ought to be out there looking for Frank David.
Speaker 1: He's supposed to be here for another week, week or two,
Speaker 1: Goodloaf said, paperwork, He fired his pistol. Kirksey jumped and
Speaker 1: looked down at his chest to see the blood, but
Speaker 1: the sheriff was aiming passed him, and when Kirksey followed
Speaker 1: his eyes, he saw the three legged dog that had
Speaker 1: been creeping in it lay slumped in the mud, a
Speaker 1: hind leg kicking, and blood coloring the water around it.
Speaker 1: Good Load backed up a step and smoke curling from
Speaker 1: the barrel of his pistol around then the other dog circled,
Speaker 1: heads low, moving sideways, and the hair on their spines
Speaker 1: sticking up. Let's argue about this in the truck, good
Speaker 1: Loaf said. At the store, Kirksey put out the open sign.
Speaker 1: He sat in his chair with his coffee and a novel.
Speaker 1: He read the same page three times when it occurred
Speaker 1: to him to phone Montgomery and get Frank David's office
Speaker 1: on the line. It took a few calls, but he
Speaker 1: soon got the number and dialed it. The snippy young
Speaker 1: woman who answered told Kirksey that yes, mister David was
Speaker 1: supposed to take over the Lower Peachtree district, but that
Speaker 1: he wasn't starting until next week. She thought, well, where
Speaker 1: is he now? Kirksey wanted to know, Florida. She said, no, Louisiana.
Speaker 1: He's fishing. No, sir, he couldn't be reached. He preferred
Speaker 1: his vacation's private. Kirksey slammed down the phone. He lit
Speaker 1: a cigarette and tried to think it was just a matter.
Speaker 1: He decided of keeping Dan alive until Frank David officially
Speaker 1: took over the district. There were probably other game wardens
Speaker 1: who testify that Frank David was indeed over in Louisiana
Speaker 1: fishing right now, But once a son of a bitch
Speaker 1: officially moved here, he'd have a motive because he'd known
Speaker 1: the dead game warden, and his alibi wouldn't be as
Speaker 1: strong if Dan turned up dead and Frank David would
Speaker 1: be the chief suspect. Even Goodlow would be able to
Speaker 1: see that. Kirksey in Hell smoked deeply and tried to
Speaker 1: imagine how Frank David would think, how he would act,
Speaker 1: the noise he would make or not make as he
Speaker 1: went through the woods, What he would say if you
Speaker 1: happened upon him or he upon you, What he would
Speaker 1: do if he came into the store. Certainly, he wasn't
Speaker 1: a creature that Kirksey had created to scare the boys,
Speaker 1: not some wild, ghostly thing. He was just a man
Speaker 1: who had had a hard life and who'd grown bitter
Speaker 1: and angry. A man who chose to uphold the law
Speaker 1: because breaking it was no challenge, A man with no
Speaker 1: obligation to any other men or a family, just to
Speaker 1: himself and his job to some damn unwritten game Warden code.
Speaker 1: His job was to protect the wild things the law
Speaker 1: had deemed worthy, deer and turkeys, alligators. But how did
Speaker 1: the Gates Boys fall into the category of trash animal?
Speaker 1: Wildcats or possums or armatie villas, snapping turtles, snakes? Things
Speaker 1: you could kill any time, run over in your truck
Speaker 1: and not even look in your mirror to see it
Speaker 1: dying behind you. Why couldn't Frank David see that he,
Speaker 1: more than a match for the boys, was exactly the
Speaker 1: same as them. Kirksey drove to the highway. The big
Speaker 1: thirty six he hadn't touched in years, was on the
Speaker 1: seat next to him, and as he steered, he pushed
Speaker 1: the cartridges into the clip and then shoved the clip
Speaker 1: into the guns underbelly. He pulled the lever that injected
Speaker 1: a cartridge into the chamber, and took a long drink
Speaker 1: of whiskey to watch down the three pills that helped
Speaker 1: all the ache in his knees and the one in
Speaker 1: his gut. It was almost dark when he arrived at
Speaker 1: the edge of the large field near park, facing the grass.
Speaker 1: This was a place a few hundred yards from a
Speaker 1: fairly well traveled blacktop, a spot no sane poacher would
Speaker 1: dare use. There were already two or three deer creeping
Speaker 1: in the open from the woods across the field that
Speaker 1: came to eat the tall grass, looking up only when
Speaker 1: a car passed, their ears swiveling, jaws frozen, and sprigs
Speaker 1: of grass twitching in their lips like the legs of
Speaker 1: an insect. Kirksey sat watching. He sipped his whiskey and
Speaker 1: lit a cigarette with a trembling hand. Both truck doors
Speaker 1: were locked, and he knew this was a very stupid
Speaker 1: thing that he was doing. Several times he told himself
Speaker 1: to just go home and let things unfold as they would.
Speaker 1: But then he saw the faces of the two dead boys,
Speaker 1: and the face of the live one when Boo had
Speaker 1: killed himself. The oldest two had barely been teenagers, but
Speaker 1: it was twelve year old Dan who'd found him. That
Speaker 1: truck still had window glass then, and half the back
Speaker 1: window shield had been sprayed red with blood. Flies had
Speaker 1: gathered at the top of the truck around what Dan
Speaker 1: discovered to be a bullet hole, the pistol still clenched
Speaker 1: in his father's hand, the rim of Boo's hat still
Speaker 1: on his head. The top blown out, and Kirksey frowned
Speaker 1: thinking of it. The back of the truck was full
Speaker 1: of wood Boo had been cutting, and the three boys
Speaker 1: had unloaded the wood and stacked it neatly beside the road.
Speaker 1: Kirksey shifted in his seat, imagining the boys pushing that
Speaker 1: truck for two miles over dirt roads, somehow finding the
Speaker 1: leverage or whatever the goddamn strength to get it home,
Speaker 1: to pull their father from inside and bury him, to
Speaker 1: clean out the truck. Kirksey shuddered and thought of Frank David,
Speaker 1: and then made himself think of his wife instead. He
Speaker 1: rubbed his biceps and watched the shadows creep across the field,
Speaker 1: the tree line dimming beginning to disappear. Soon it was
Speaker 1: full dark. He unscrewed the interior light bulb from the
Speaker 1: ceiling and rolled down the window and pull the door
Speaker 1: lock up. Quietly, holding his breath, he opened the door
Speaker 1: and outside, he propped the rifle on the side mirror,
Speaker 1: flicked the safety off, and he reached through the window
Speaker 1: and felt alongside the dash for the headlights switch and
Speaker 1: pulled it. The field blazed with the eyes of deer,
Speaker 1: red hovering dots staring back at him. Kirksey aimed and
Speaker 1: squeezed the trigger at the first pair of eyes, Not
Speaker 1: wanting to see if he'd hit the deer, he moved
Speaker 1: the gun to another pair. He'd gotten off seven shots
Speaker 1: before the eyes began to vanish. When the last echo
Speaker 1: from the gun faded, at least three deer lay dead
Speaker 1: or wounded in the glow of the headlights. One dough
Speaker 1: bleeded weakly and bleeded again, and Kirksey coughed and took
Speaker 1: the gun back into the truck and closed the door
Speaker 1: and reloaded in the dark. Then he waited. The doe
Speaker 1: kept bleeding, and things in the woods took shape, detached
Speaker 1: and whisked toward Kirksey over the grass like spoon ukes,
Speaker 1: and the little noises, things like footsteps, and the stories
Speaker 1: Frank David appearing in the bed of someone's moving truck
Speaker 1: and punching through the back glass, grabbing and breaking the
Speaker 1: driver's arm, leaping from the truck and watching while it wrecked.
Speaker 1: Quit it. Kirksey croaked, you damn school girl several more
Speaker 1: times that night. He summoned his nerve and flicked on
Speaker 1: the headlights, firing at any eyes he saw or thought
Speaker 1: he saw, or firing at nothing. And when he finally
Speaker 1: fell asleep at two am, his body numb with painkillers
Speaker 1: and whiskey, he dreamed of his wife on the day
Speaker 1: of her first miscarriage, the way the nurses couldn't find
Speaker 1: the vein in her arm, and how they'd kept trying
Speaker 1: with the needle, and the way she'd cried and held
Speaker 1: his fingers tightly like a woman giving birth. He started
Speaker 1: to wake, terrified, as if he'd fallen asleep. Driving Caring
Speaker 1: less for silence, he stumbled from the truck and flicked
Speaker 1: on the lights and fired, though now there were no eyes.
Speaker 1: He lowered the gun and for no reason found himself
Speaker 1: thinking of a time when he'd tried fly fishing, standing
Speaker 1: in his yard, with his wife watching from the porch,
Speaker 1: tarzan of the apes in her lap, and him whipping
Speaker 1: the line in the air, showing off, and then the
Speaker 1: strange pulling you get when you catch a fish, and
Speaker 1: Betty jumping to her feet, the book falling, and her
Speaker 1: yelling that he'd caught a bat. For Heaven's sakes, a bat.
Speaker 1: He climbed back into the truck, his hands shook so
Speaker 1: hard that he had trouble getting the door locked. He
Speaker 1: bowed his head and missing her so much that he
Speaker 1: cried softly for a long time. Dawn found him staring
Speaker 1: at a field littered with dead doughs and yearlings and fawns,
Speaker 1: and one of the deer, only wounded, was trying to
Speaker 1: crawl toward the safety of the trees. Kirksey got out
Speaker 1: of the truck and vomited colorless water, and then stood
Speaker 1: looking around the foggy morning. He lifted his rifle and
Speaker 1: limped into the grass in the drizzle, and a quick
Speaker 1: hip shot put the live deer out of its misery.
Speaker 1: He was sitting on the open tailgate trying to light
Speaker 1: a cigarette when Goodlow and a deputy passed in their
Speaker 1: blazer and stopped. The sheriff stepped out, signaling for the
Speaker 1: deputy to stay put. He sat beside Kirksey on the
Speaker 1: tailgate the truck, dipping with his weight. His stomach was growling,
Speaker 1: You old fool, good Loaf said, staring at Kirksey and
Speaker 1: then behind them at the field. You figured to make
Speaker 1: Frank David show himself. He shook his head. Good Lord,
Speaker 1: almighty Kirksey, what'll it take to prove to you that
Speaker 1: there ain't no durned vigilanti game warden out there? Kirksey
Speaker 1: didn't answer. Goodlaw went to the blazer and told the
Speaker 1: deputy to pick him up at the old man's store.
Speaker 1: Get Dave over here to load up them deer quick,
Speaker 1: he said, Tell him to gut them and drop them
Speaker 1: off at my place in the barn. The deputy put
Speaker 1: the blazer into gear. Can I have some of the tenderloin's?
Speaker 1: Boss good Load slammed the door at Kirksey's truck. He
Speaker 1: helped the old man into the passenger's seat and went
Speaker 1: around and got in the driver's seat. He took the
Speaker 1: rifle and unloaded it and put his clip in his pocket.
Speaker 1: We'll talk about them dear later, he said, now I
Speaker 1: better get you back. They gone a silent mile. When
Speaker 1: Kirksey said, would you mind running me by Ester's Goodload
Speaker 1: shrugged and turned that way. His stomach made a strangling
Speaker 1: noise and he patted it absently. The rain and the
Speaker 1: wind were picking up rocking the truck, and the sheriff
Speaker 1: took a bottle of bourbon from his pocket. It's medicinal,
Speaker 1: he said, handing it to Kirksey. It's just been two
Speaker 1: freak accidents, that's all, Kirksey. I seen some strange shit
Speaker 1: in my life, stranger in this. I seen a nigger
Speaker 1: had rabies one time off foaming at the mouth, bit
Speaker 1: his terrned wife on her teddy before she shot him.
Speaker 1: It's a hell of a thing, buddy boy, and he
Speaker 1: took the bottle back them gates. Is is just an
Speaker 1: unlucky bunch period. I ain't one to go believe it
Speaker 1: in curses, Kirksey, but I swear to God if they
Speaker 1: ain't just down right snake bit. Soon Goodload parked in
Speaker 1: front of Esther's and they sat waiting for the rain
Speaker 1: to slick, and Kirksey rubbed his knees and looked out
Speaker 1: the windows where the bottoms of the trees were submerged
Speaker 1: in the rising floodwaters. They say old esther has a
Speaker 1: root seller, good Load said, taking a sip she had.
Speaker 1: I expect it's full of water this time of year,
Speaker 1: ain't it. She's probably got cotton mouse wrapped around her plumbing.
Speaker 1: He shuddered and offered the bottle, and Kirksey took it
Speaker 1: and sipped. He gave it back, and then Goodload drank
Speaker 1: and drank again. That they don't hit the spot. When
Speaker 1: I was in the service, good Low went on over
Speaker 1: in tie Land. They had them little bitty snakes, then
Speaker 1: banded crates. They call them poison his cobras, what they
Speaker 1: told us used to hide up under the commode lid.
Speaker 1: Every time you took a shit, you'd have to lift
Speaker 1: the lid up. See was one there? He drank? Yep,
Speaker 1: it was many a time I kicked one off in
Speaker 1: the water and flushed it down the commode. Wait here,
Speaker 1: Kirksey said, and he opened the door, and his pants
Speaker 1: legged darkened as the rain poured in, cold as needles.
Speaker 1: He set his knee out deliberately and planted his cane
Speaker 1: in the mud and pulled himself up. Stood in the
Speaker 1: water to his ankles. He leaped across the yard with
Speaker 1: his hand before his face, blocking the rain, and there
Speaker 1: were two chickens on the front porch, their feathers fluffed
Speaker 1: out so that they looked strange and menacing. Kirksey climbed
Speaker 1: the porch steps with the pain so strong in his
Speaker 1: knees that stars were popping near his face. By the
Speaker 1: time he reached the top. He leaned against the house,
Speaker 1: breathing hard, touching himself at the throat where a tie
Speaker 1: might have gone, and then he rapped gently on the
Speaker 1: hook of the cane and the door opened immediately. It
Speaker 1: was dark inside, and she stood there looking at him.
Speaker 1: How come you don't ever stop by the store anymore? Well,
Speaker 1: she folded her arms. Neil's dead, he said, I heard
Speaker 1: esther said, now I'm leaving. Fuck this place and every
Speaker 1: one of y'all. She closed the door, and Kirksey would
Speaker 1: never see her again. At the store. Goodload nodded for
Speaker 1: the deputy to stay in the blazer, and then he
Speaker 1: took Kirksey by the elbow and helped him up the steps.
Speaker 1: He unlocked the door for the old man and held
Speaker 1: his icy hand as he sank in his chair. He
Speaker 1: want those boots off. Good Low ass spreading a blanket
Speaker 1: over Kirksey's lap and unlaced the left and then the right.
Speaker 1: Pick up your foot, now the other one. He set
Speaker 1: the wet boots by the stove. It's a little damp
Speaker 1: in here. I like this thing. He found a box
Speaker 1: of kitchen matches on the shelf under the counter, among
Speaker 1: the glass figure ings Kirksey's wife had collected, the little Deer,
Speaker 1: the figure skater, the unicorn. Goodlow got a fire going
Speaker 1: in the stove and stood, warming the backs of his legs.
Speaker 1: I'll bring Dan by a little later, he said, But
Speaker 1: Kirksey didn't seem to hear. Goodlaw sat in his office
Speaker 1: with his feet on his desk, rolling a cartridge between
Speaker 1: his fingers. A plate of ribs sat untouched before him.
Speaker 1: Despite himself, he was beginning to wonder if Kirksey might
Speaker 1: be right. Maybe Frank David was out there on the prowl.
Speaker 1: Good Lawman would at least cons the possibility. He stood
Speaker 1: and took off his pistol belt and walked to the
Speaker 1: back and pushed open the swinging door and had Roy
Speaker 1: buzzhm through. So far he'd had zero luck getting anything
Speaker 1: out of Dan. The boy just sat in a cell,
Speaker 1: wrapped in a blanket, his head shaved for lice, not
Speaker 1: talking to anybody, and not eating. Goodlow had told him
Speaker 1: about his brother's death, and he'd seen no emotion across
Speaker 1: the boy's face. Goodlow figured that it wasn't this youngest
Speaker 1: one who'd killed that game warden. It'd probably been the
Speaker 1: other two. He knew that this boy wasn't carrying a
Speaker 1: full cylinder by the way he never talked, but most
Speaker 1: likely he had been a witness. Goodlow had even considered
Speaker 1: calling a psychologist from the Searsing Mental Hospital to give
Speaker 1: the boy an evaluation. Come on, said Goodlow, stopping by
Speaker 1: Dan's sell and jingling the keys. I'm fixing to put
Speaker 1: your talent to some good use. Up the boy cuffed
Speaker 1: as the deputy drove them toward the Trustle. Turn your head, Dave,
Speaker 1: Goodloaf said, handing Dan a pint of old crow. The
Speaker 1: boy took it in both hands and unscrewed the lid
Speaker 1: and began to drink too fast. Slow down, their partner,
Speaker 1: good Loaf said, taking back the bottle. You need to
Speaker 1: be a bit of alert. Soon they stood near the trustle,
Speaker 1: gazing at the flat shape of the boat on the bank.
Speaker 1: Dan knelt and examined the ground. The deputy came up
Speaker 1: and started to say something, but good Low motion for quiet,
Speaker 1: just like a bloodhound, he whispered. Maybe I ought to
Speaker 1: give him your job. Reckon what he's after, the deputy asked.
Speaker 1: Dan scrambled up the trustle and the two men followed,
Speaker 1: and the boy walked slowly over the rails, first staring
Speaker 1: into the trees and then examining the spaces between the crossties.
Speaker 1: He stopped and bent down and peered at something, and
Speaker 1: he picked it up. Well you got there, boy, good
Speaker 1: Low call, going and squatting beside him. He took a
Speaker 1: sip of old crow. When Dan hit him two handed.
Speaker 1: The bottle flew one way and Goodlow flew the other.
Speaker 1: Both landed in the river, and Goodlow, with his hand
Speaker 1: clapped to his head to keep his hat on, He
Speaker 1: came up immediately, bobbing and sputtering, and on the trestle.
Speaker 1: The deputy tackled Dan. When they went down, fighting on
Speaker 1: the crossties below. Goodload dredged himself out of the water,
Speaker 1: and he came ashore, dripping and tugged his pistol from
Speaker 1: its holster. He held it up so that a trickle
Speaker 1: of orange water fell, and he took off his hat
Speaker 1: and looked up to see the deputy disappear, belly first
Speaker 1: into the face of the river. Dan sprinted back down
Speaker 1: the track toward the swamp. The deputy came bowling ashore.
Speaker 1: He had his own pistol drawn and was looking around vengefully.
Speaker 1: Good Low climbed the trestle in time to see Dan
Speaker 1: disappear in the woods. The sheriff chased him for a while,
Speaker 1: all ducking limbs and vines, but stopped and breathing hard,
Speaker 1: his hands on his side and his cheeks red. Dan
Speaker 1: circled back through the woods and went quickly over to
Speaker 1: the soft ground, scrambling up the sides of hills and
Speaker 1: sliding down the other sides. Two haulers over, he heard
Speaker 1: the deputy heading in the wrong direction. Dan slowed a
Speaker 1: little and trotted for a long time in the rain,
Speaker 1: the cuffs rubbing his wrists raw. He stopped and looked
Speaker 1: at what he'd been carrying in one hand, a match
Speaker 1: limp and black. Now with water nearly dissolved, he stood
Speaker 1: looking at the trees around him. The hanging Spanish moss,
Speaker 1: and the cypress sneeze rising from the stagnant creek to
Speaker 1: his left. The hair on the back of his neck rose,
Speaker 1: and he knelt, tilting his head and closing his eyes,
Speaker 1: and he listened. He heard the rain, heard it hit
Speaker 1: the leaves and wood, and heard the puddles lapping at
Speaker 1: their tiny banks. But beyond those sounds there were other sounds.
Speaker 1: A walking bird walking, a blue jay, a squirrel barking,
Speaker 1: another answering, and the deputy falling a quarter mile away.
Speaker 1: Then another sound, this one close, a match striking. Dan
Speaker 1: began to run before opening his eyes, and crashed into
Speaker 1: a tree. He rolled to his feet, ran again, tearing
Speaker 1: through limbs and briers and spider whips. He leapt small
Speaker 1: creeks and slipped and got up. And he kept running,
Speaker 1: and at every turn he expected Frank David. And he
Speaker 1: was near tears when he finally stumbled into his family's graveyard.
Speaker 1: The first thing he saw was that kent had been
Speaker 1: dug up. Wooden steak surrounded the hole and fenced it
Speaker 1: with yellow tape that had words on it. Dan approached slowly,
Speaker 1: his fists under his chin. Something floated in the grave.
Speaker 1: With his heart pounding, he peered inside. It was the
Speaker 1: big three legged, wary of the trees behind him. He
Speaker 1: crept toward their backyard, stopping at the edge, and he
Speaker 1: crouched and blew into his hands to warm his cheeks,
Speaker 1: and gazed at the dark windows of their cabin, and
Speaker 1: then circle the house, keeping to the woods. He saw
Speaker 1: the pine tree with the low limb they used for
Speaker 1: stringing up larger animals to clean, and the rusty chain hanging,
Speaker 1: and the iron pipe they struck through the back legs
Speaker 1: of a deer or the rare wild pig. Kent and
Speaker 1: Neil had usually done the cleaning, while Dan fed the
Speaker 1: guts to their dogs and tried to keep them from fighting.
Speaker 1: And there past the tree scattered and laid the rest
Speaker 1: of the dogs, all shot dead, partially eaten, buzzards standing
Speaker 1: in the mud, staring boldly at him, with their heads
Speaker 1: bloody and their beaks open. It was dark when Kirksey
Speaker 1: woke in his chair. He'd heard the door creak. Someone
Speaker 1: stood there, and the storekeeper was afraid until he smelled
Speaker 1: the river. Hey boy, he said, Dan ate two cans
Speaker 1: of potted meat with his fingers, and a candy bar
Speaker 1: and a box of saltines. Kirksey gave him a coat
Speaker 1: from the red cooler and he drank it, took another
Speaker 1: one while Kirksey got a hike saw from the rack
Speaker 1: of tools behind the counter. He slipped the cardboard wrapping
Speaker 1: off and nodded for Dan to sit. The storekeeper pulled
Speaker 1: up another chair and faced the boy and began sawing
Speaker 1: the handcuff chain. The match dropped out of Dan's hand,
Speaker 1: but neither saw it. Dan sat with his head down
Speaker 1: and his palms up and his wrists on his knees,
Speaker 1: breathing heavily while Kirksey worked, and silver shavings had accumulated
Speaker 1: in a pile between their boots. The boy didn't lift
Speaker 1: his head the entire time, and he'd been asleep for
Speaker 1: quite a while. When Kirksey found he saw it through.
Speaker 1: The old man rose, flexing his sore hands, and he
Speaker 1: got a blanket from a shelf, and he unfolded it,
Speaker 1: shook out the dust, and spread it over Dan. He
Speaker 1: went to the door and turned the dead bolt. The
Speaker 1: phone rang later. It was good Low, asking about the
Speaker 1: boy and telling what had happened. Kirksey nearly smiled, You've
Speaker 1: been lost all this time? Sugar baby reckon, I have good, Low, admitted,
Speaker 1: and we still ain't found Deputy Dave yet. For a
Speaker 1: week they stayed in the store together. At times Kirksey
Speaker 1: could barely walk, and other times the pain in his
Speaker 1: side was worse than ever. He gave the boy a
Speaker 1: stocking cap to cover his skinned head and put him
Speaker 1: to work sweeping and dusting and scrubbing the shelves. He
Speaker 1: had Dan pull a table next to his chair, and
Speaker 1: Kirksey did something he hadn't done in years. He took inventory.
Speaker 1: With the boy's help, he counted and ledgered each item,
Speaker 1: marking it in his life Green book. The backshelf contained
Speaker 1: canned soups, vegetables, sardines, and tins of meat. Many of
Speaker 1: the cans were so old that the labels fleked off
Speaker 1: in Kirksey's hand, and so they were unmarked when Dan
Speaker 1: replaced them in the rings. They'd made not only in
Speaker 1: the dust, but on the wood itself. In the back
Speaker 1: of that last shelf, Dan discovered four tens of underwood
Speaker 1: deviled ham and as their labels fell away at Kirksey's touch,
Speaker 1: he remembered a time when he'd purposely unwrapped the paper
Speaker 1: from these cans because each label showed several red dancing devils,
Speaker 1: and some of his colored customers had refused to buy them.
Speaker 1: Kirksey now understood that his store was dead, that it
Speaker 1: no longer provided a service. His colored customers had stopped
Speaker 1: coming for years, the same with Esther. For the past
Speaker 1: few years, except for an occasional hunter or logger, he'd
Speaker 1: been in business for the Gates boys alone. He looked
Speaker 1: across the room at Dan sprang a window with winds
Speaker 1: and wiping it absently. Gazing outside, The boy wore the
Speaker 1: last of the new denim overalls Kirksey had in stock,
Speaker 1: and they were too short by an inch or two. Once,
Speaker 1: when the store had thrived, he'd had many sizes, but
Speaker 1: for the longest time now the only ones he'd stok
Speaker 1: were the boys sizes. That night, beneath his standing lamp,
Speaker 1: Kirksey began again to read his wife's copy of Tarzan
Speaker 1: of the Apes to Dan. He sipped his whiskey and
Speaker 1: spoke clearly to be heard over the rain, and when
Speaker 1: he paused to turn a page, he saw that the
Speaker 1: boy lay asleep across the row of chairs they'd arranged
Speaker 1: in the shape of a bed. Looking down through his bifocals,
Speaker 1: Kirksey flipped to the front of the book and saw
Speaker 1: his wife's name written in her neat script. He moved
Speaker 1: his thumb over to it, and he read it to himself,
Speaker 1: and then he turned to the back of the book
Speaker 1: to the list of other Tarzan novels, twenty four in all,
Speaker 1: and he decided to order them through the mail so
Speaker 1: that he and Dan would know the complete adventures of
Speaker 1: Tarzan of the Apes. In the morning, Goodlow called and
Speaker 1: said that Frank David had officially arrived. The sheriff himself
Speaker 1: had witnessed the swearing inn, and he was now this
Speaker 1: district's new game warden. Pretty nice fellow, good Loaf said,
Speaker 1: kind of quiet and polite. Asked me how the fishing was.
Speaker 1: Then it's over, Kirksey thought. A week later, Kirksey told
Speaker 1: Dan that he had business in Grove Hill. He'd spent
Speaker 1: the night before trying to decide whether to take the
Speaker 1: boy with him, but had decided not to that he
Speaker 1: couldn't watch him forever. Besides, town wasn't the best place
Speaker 1: for a gates. Before he left, he gave Dan his
Speaker 1: thirty all six and told him to stay put not
Speaker 1: to leave for anything and for himself. Kirksey took an
Speaker 1: old twenty two bolt action and placed it in the
Speaker 1: back window rack of his truck, and he waved to
Speaker 1: Dan and he drove off. He thought that if the
Speaker 1: boy wanted to run away, it was his own choice.
Speaker 1: Kirksey owed him the chance, at least. At the doctor's office,
Speaker 1: the tired looking young surgeon frowned and removed his glasses
Speaker 1: when he told Kirksey that the cancer was advancing, that
Speaker 1: he'd need to check into the hospital and mobile immediately.
Speaker 1: It was way past time. Just look at your color,
Speaker 1: the surgeon said, and Kirksey stood and thanked the man,
Speaker 1: put on his hat and he leaped outside. He went
Speaker 1: by the post office and placed his order for the
Speaker 1: Tarzan books, and he shot for the supplies in the
Speaker 1: dollar store, using the buggy for support, and then the
Speaker 1: pigloo wiggily and had the checkout boys put the boxes
Speaker 1: in the front seat beside him. Coming out of the
Speaker 1: drug store, he remembered that it was Saturday, that there'd
Speaker 1: be chicken fights to day. Impossible news about Frank David.
Speaker 1: At Heflin's, Kirksey paid his five dollars admission and let
Speaker 1: heflin help him to a seat in the bottom of
Speaker 1: the stands. He poured some whiskey into his coffee and
Speaker 1: sat studying the crowd. Nobody had mentioned Frank David, but
Speaker 1: a few old timers had offered their sympathies for the
Speaker 1: deaths of Kent and Neil down in the Pith. The
Speaker 1: Cajuns were back, and during the eighth match, one of
Speaker 1: the Cajun whites versus the local red the tall ball
Speaker 1: Cajuns stooping and circling the tangle birds and licking his
Speaker 1: lips as his rooster swarmed the other and hooked it.
Speaker 1: The barn smoky and dark, and rain splattering on the
Speaker 1: tin roof, and the door swung open instantly. The crowd
Speaker 1: was hushed, feathers subtle to the ground. Even the Cajuns
Speaker 1: knew who he was. He stood at the door, unarmed,
Speaker 1: his hands on his hips. He was a wiry man,
Speaker 1: lifted his chin and people tried to hide their drinks.
Speaker 1: His giant ears that hook nose the eyes. The bird
Speaker 1: handlers reached over their shoulders, clawing at the numbered pieces
Speaker 1: of masking tape on their backs. The two handlers and
Speaker 1: the referee in the rings sidled out, leaving the roosters
Speaker 1: for a full minute. Frank David stood staring, and people
Speaker 1: stepped out the back door and climbed out the windows.
Speaker 1: Half naked boys in the rafters were frozen like monkeys
Speaker 1: and hypnotized by a snake. Frank David's gaze did not
Speaker 1: stop on Kirksey, but settled instead on the roosters, the
Speaker 1: white one pecking at the red's eyes. Outside, trucks roared
Speaker 1: to life, backfiring like gunshots. Kirksey placed his hands on
Speaker 1: his knees. He rose and turned up his coat collar
Speaker 1: and flung his coffee out, and Frank David still hadn't
Speaker 1: looked at him. Kirksey planted his cane and made made
Speaker 1: his way painfully out the back door and through the mud,
Speaker 1: not a person in sight, just clattering tailgates vanishing into
Speaker 1: the woods. From inside his truck, Kirksey watched Frank David
Speaker 1: walk away from the barn and head toward the trees.
Speaker 1: He watched him step around a mud puddle. Now he
Speaker 1: was just a bury bowlegging man with white hair. Kirksey
Speaker 1: felt behind him for the twenty two rifle with one
Speaker 1: hand while rolling down the window with the other he
Speaker 1: had a little trouble aiming the gun with the shaky arms.
Speaker 1: He pulled back the boat. He flicked the safety off.
Speaker 1: The sight of the rifle wavered between Frank David's shoulders
Speaker 1: as the game warden walked as if an old storekeeper
Speaker 1: were nothing to fear. Closing one eye, Kirksey pulled the trigger.
Speaker 1: He didn't hear the shot, though later he would notice
Speaker 1: his ears ringing. Frank David's coat bloomed out to the side,
Speaker 1: and he missed a step, and he stopped and put
Speaker 1: his hand to his lower right side and looked over
Speaker 1: his shoulder at Kirksey, who was fumbling with the rifle's
Speaker 1: bolt action. And then Frank David was gone, Just wasn't there.
Speaker 1: There were only the trees bent in the rain and
Speaker 1: shreds a fog in the air. For a moment, Kirksey
Speaker 1: wondered if he'd seen a man at all, or if
Speaker 1: he'd shot at something out of his own imagination, if
Speaker 1: the cancer that had started in his pancreas had spread
Speaker 1: up along his spine and into his brain and was
Speaker 1: deceiving him, forming men out of air and walking them
Speaker 1: across fields, giving them hands and eyes and the power
Speaker 1: to disappear from inside the barn Aroosto Crode, Kirksey remembered Dan.
Speaker 1: He hung the rifle in the rack and started his
Speaker 1: truck and gunned the engine. He banged over the field
Speaker 1: and flattened saplings in a fence, and though he couldn't
Speaker 1: feel his feet, he drove very fast. Not until two
Speaker 1: days later in the VA hospital and mobile with Kirksey
Speaker 1: finally began to piece it all together. Parts of that
Speaker 1: afternoon were patchy and hard to remember. Shooting at Frank David,
Speaker 1: going to the store and finding it empty, no sign
Speaker 1: of a struggle, and the thirty six gone, as if
Speaker 1: Dan had walked out on his own and taken the gun.
Speaker 1: Kirksey could remember getting back into his truck. He planned
Speaker 1: to drive to Grove Hill in the courthouse, the game
Speaker 1: Warden's office and find Frank David finished the job, but
Speaker 1: somewhere along the way he blacked out behind the wheel
Speaker 1: and veered off the road into a ditch. He barely
Speaker 1: remembered the rescue workers and the lights and the sirens.
Speaker 1: Goodlow himself pulling Kirksey out. Later that night, two coon
Speaker 1: hunters had stumbled across Dan wandering along the river, his
Speaker 1: face and shirt covered in blood, the thirty six nowhere
Speaker 1: to be found. When Goodlow told the semi conscious Kirksey
Speaker 1: what happened, the storekeeper turned silently to the window, where
Speaker 1: he saw only the reflected face of an old, dang
Speaker 1: failed man, and later, still in the warm haze of morphine,
Speaker 1: Kirksey lowered his eyelids and let his imagination unravel and
Speaker 1: retwine the mystery of Frank David. It was as if
Speaker 1: Frank David himself appeared in the chair where Goodlow had sat,
Speaker 1: As if the game warden broke the seal on a
Speaker 1: bottle of jim Beam and leaned forward on his elbows
Speaker 1: and touched the bottle to Kirksey's cracked lips, and whispered
Speaker 1: to him a story about boots going over land, and
Speaker 1: then gun shot and rain washing the blood trail away
Speaker 1: even as the boots passed, about a tired old game
Speaker 1: warden taking his hand out of his coat and seeing
Speaker 1: the blood there and feeling it trickle along his side
Speaker 1: and down the back of his leg, And about the
Speaker 1: boy in the game warden's truck, handcuffed and gagged and blindfolded,
Speaker 1: about driving carefully through the deep ruts in the road,
Speaker 1: stopping behind Esther's empty house and carrying the kicking wet
Speaker 1: boy inside on his shoulder. When the blindfold is removed,
Speaker 1: Dan has trouble focusing, but knows where he is because
Speaker 1: of her smell bacon and soap and cigarettes and dust,
Speaker 1: and Frank David holds what looks like a pillow case.
Speaker 1: He comes across the room and puts the pillow case down.
Speaker 1: He rubs his eyes and sits on the bed beside Dan.
Speaker 1: He puts on a pair of reading glasses and opens
Speaker 1: a book of matches and lights a cigarette, holds the
Speaker 1: filtered into Dan's lips, but the boy doesn't inhale, and
Speaker 1: Frank David puts a cigarette in his own lips and
Speaker 1: the embers glow. Then he drops it on the floor
Speaker 1: and crushes it out with his boot and picks up
Speaker 1: the butt, slips it into his shirt pocket. He puts
Speaker 1: his hand over the boy's watery eyes, the skin of
Speaker 1: his palm dry and hard, cool, and the faint smell
Speaker 1: of blood, and he moves his fingers over Dan's nose
Speaker 1: and lips and chin. He stops at his throat and
Speaker 1: holds the boy tightly, but not painfully, in a strange way.
Speaker 1: Dan can't understand, and he finds it reassuring. His studying
Speaker 1: heart slows. Something is struggling beside his shoulder, and Frank
Speaker 1: David takes the thing from the back. Now the smell
Speaker 1: of the room changes and Dan begins to thrash and
Speaker 1: whip his head from side to side. My damn son,
Speaker 1: Frank David whispers, I hate to civilize you. Good Low
Speaker 1: began going to the Veterans Hospital and mobile once a week.
Speaker 1: He brought Kirksey cigarettes from a store. There weren't any
Speaker 1: private rooms available in the hospital, and the beds around
Speaker 1: the storekeeper were filled with dying ex soldiers who never talked.
Speaker 1: But Kirksey was beside a window and Goodload would raise
Speaker 1: the glass and prop it open with a novel. They
Speaker 1: smoked together and drank whiskey from paper cups, listening for nurses.
Speaker 1: It was the tall, mean one. One more time, God
Speaker 1: damn it, she said, coming out of nowhere and plucking
Speaker 1: the cigarettes from their lips so quickly that they were
Speaker 1: still puckered. Sometimes Goodlow would push Kirksey down the hall.
Speaker 1: When they would get a good wheelchair. The IV rack
Speaker 1: attached by a stainless steel contraption with a black handle
Speaker 1: the shape of a flower, and they would go to
Speaker 1: the elevator and ride down three floors to the covered
Speaker 1: area where people smoked and talked about the weather. There
Speaker 1: were nurses and black cafeteria workers in white uniforms and hairnets,
Speaker 1: and people visiting other people, and a few patients. A
Speaker 1: in the halls, they'd see some mean old fart Kirksey knew,
Speaker 1: and they'd talk about hospital food or chicken fighting, or
Speaker 1: the fact that Frank David had surprised everyone by deciding
Speaker 1: to retire after only a month of quiet duty, that
Speaker 1: the new game warden was from Texas and a nigger
Speaker 1: to boot. Then Goodlow would wheel Kirksey back along the
Speaker 1: long window, out of which they could see the tops
Speaker 1: of oak trees. On one visit, Goodlow told Kirksey they'd
Speaker 1: taken Dan out of intensive care three weeks later. He said,
Speaker 1: the boy had been discharged. I give him a ride
Speaker 1: to the store. Good Load said. This was in late May,
Speaker 1: and Kirksey was a yellow skeleton with hands that shook.
Speaker 1: I'll stop buying check on him every evening, good Loa
Speaker 1: went on, It'll be okay, The doctor says, he just
Speaker 1: needs to keep them bandages changed. I can do that,
Speaker 1: I reckon. They were quiet then for a time, just
Speaker 1: the costs of the dying men, and the soft swishing
Speaker 1: of nurses thighs, and the hum of ivy machines. Goodlaw,
Speaker 1: Kirksey whispered, I'd like you to help me with some
Speaker 1: The sheriff leaned in to hear, an unlit cigarette behind
Speaker 1: his ear like a pencil. Kirksey's tongue was white and cracked,
Speaker 1: and his breath was awful. I'd like to change my will,
Speaker 1: he said, make the boy the beneficiary, all right, said Goodlow.
Speaker 1: I'm obliged, whispered Kirksey, and he closed his eyes. Near
Speaker 1: the end, he was delirious. He said he saw a
Speaker 1: tiny black creature at the foot of his bed. He
Speaker 1: said it had him by the toe. In surprising fits
Speaker 1: of strength, he would throw his water pitcher at it,
Speaker 1: or his box of tissues, or the reader's digest. Restraints
Speaker 1: were called for, and his coma was a relief to everyone,
Speaker 1: and he died quietly in the night in Kirksey's chair
Speaker 1: in the store. Dan hadn't seemed to hear Goodload's questions.
Speaker 1: The sheriff had done some looking into the Grove Hill
Speaker 1: Public Library, research was the modern word, and discovered that
Speaker 1: one species of cobra spat venom at its victim's eyes,
Speaker 1: but there weren't such snakes in southern Alabama anyway. The
Speaker 1: hospital lab had confirmed that it was the poison of
Speaker 1: a cotton mouth that had blinded Dan. The question, of course,
Speaker 1: was who had put the venom in his eyes. Goodloads
Speaker 1: shuddered to think of it. How they'd found Dan staggering about,
Speaker 1: howling in pain and bleeding from his tear ducts, the
Speaker 1: skin around his eye sockets dissolving, exposing the white ridges
Speaker 1: of his skull. In the investigation, several local blacks, including
Speaker 1: Euphrates more Sets, stated to Goodload that the youngest Gates
Speaker 1: boy and his two dead brothers had tested euphrates stepdaughter
Speaker 1: in their own home. There was a rumor that several
Speaker 1: black men dressed in white sheets with a pillowcases for hoods,
Speaker 1: had caught and punished Dan as he alurked along the river,
Speaker 1: peeping in folks windows and doing unwholesome things to himself.
Speaker 1: Others suggested that the conjured woman had cast a spell
Speaker 1: on the gateses that she summoned a swamp demon to
Speaker 1: chase them to hell, and still others attributed the happenings
Speaker 1: to Frank David. There were a few occurrences of violence
Speaker 1: between the local whites and the Blacks, and some fires
Speaker 1: and a broken jaw, but soon it died down. In
Speaker 1: good Low file the deaths of Kent and Neil Gates
Speaker 1: as accidental, but he listed Dan's blinding as unsolved. The
Speaker 1: snake venom had bleached the boy's pupils white, and the
Speaker 1: skin around the eye socket had required grafts. The surgeons
Speaker 1: had had to use skin from his buttocks, and because
Speaker 1: his buttock were hairy, the skin around his eyes began
Speaker 1: to grow hair too. In the years to calm, the
Speaker 1: loggers who clear cut the land along the river would
Speaker 1: occasionally stop in the store, less from a need to
Speaker 1: buy something, and more from a curiosity to see the
Speaker 1: hermit with the milky, hairy eyes. The store smelled horrible,
Speaker 1: like the inside of a bear's mouth, and dust lay
Speaker 1: thick and soft on the shelves. Because they had come in,
Speaker 1: the loggers felt obligated to buy something, but every item
Speaker 1: was moldy or stale beyond belief, except for the things
Speaker 1: in the cans, which were unlabeled, so they never knew
Speaker 1: what they'd get. Nothing was marked as to price either,
Speaker 1: and the blind man wouldn't talk. He just sat by
Speaker 1: the stove. So the loggers paid more, some less than
Speaker 1: what they thought a can was worth, leaving the money
Speaker 1: on the counter by the telephone, which hadn't been connected
Speaker 1: in years. When Plumper Gray or Goodlow came by on
Speaker 1: the occasional evening, smelling of booze, he'd take the bills
Speaker 1: in coins and puts them in Kirksey's cash shower and
Speaker 1: the rest in his pocket. He was no longer sheriff,
Speaker 1: having lost several elections back to one of his deputies,
Speaker 1: roy Or Dave. He still wore the same khaki uniform,
Speaker 1: but now he drove a lance truck, and his route
Speaker 1: included the hospitals and the county, and every other month
Speaker 1: the prison. Damn boy, he once cracked to Dan, this
Speaker 1: store's doing better business now than it ever has. You
Speaker 1: sure you don't want a cookie rack? When Goodlow left,
Speaker 1: Dan listened to the rattle of the truck as it faded.
Speaker 1: Sugar Baby, he whispered, and many a night for years
Speaker 1: after until his own death. In his sleep, Dan would
Speaker 1: rise from the chair and move across the floor, taking
Speaker 1: Kirksey's cane from where it stood by the coat rack,
Speaker 1: and he would go outside and down the stairs like
Speaker 1: a man who could see, and his beard nearly to
Speaker 1: his belly, and he would walk soundlessly the length of
Speaker 1: the building, knowing the woods even butter now as he
Speaker 1: crept down the rain rutted gully toward the river, whose
Speaker 1: smell never left the caves of his nostrils in the
Speaker 1: roof of his mouth. At the river bank, he would
Speaker 1: stop and sit with his back against a small pine,
Speaker 1: and lifting his white eyes to the sky, he would
Speaker 1: listen to the clicks and hum and thrattle of the woods,
Speaker 1: seeking out each noise at its source, and imagining it
Speaker 1: an acorn nodding and detaching its thin ricochet, and the
Speaker 1: way it settled into the leaves, a bullfrog's bubbling throat,
Speaker 1: and the things it said, And the trickle of the
Speaker 1: river over rocks, around the bases of cattails and cypress sneeze,
Speaker 1: and through the wet hanging roots of trees. And then
Speaker 1: another sound familiar, the soft, precise footsteps of Frank David
Speaker 1: down Wind, coming closer, not going away, circling, the striking
Speaker 1: of a match, and the sizzle of ember and fall
Speaker 1: of ash, the ascent of smoke, strange and terrifying comfort
Speaker 1: for the rest of Dan Gates life. I hope you
Speaker 1: all enjoyed that story. Poachers is a short story by
Speaker 1: Tom Franklin. It is a story from a collection of
Speaker 1: short stories by the same name, Poachers. I think the
Speaker 1: book won an award. I think it's the Edgar Award.
Speaker 1: I'm not sure. I saw an interview with Tom Tom Franklin,
Speaker 1: and he said it won an award, and he didn't
Speaker 1: even know what the award was. He had to ask
Speaker 1: his agent. He goes, what award is this? I'm sure
Speaker 1: he knows now. Anyway. I sent an email to Tom
Speaker 1: about a month ago and I asked him if I
Speaker 1: could read a story or two from this book, and
Speaker 1: his answer back to me was hell, yes, that's all
Speaker 1: he sent back. And so he's probably a He's probably
Speaker 1: a pretty good guy if he hears this. I certainly
Speaker 1: do appreciate him giving me permission to read this great story.
Speaker 1: I love this style of writing. It's so easy for
Speaker 1: me to follow especially when it's set in a region
Speaker 1: where I'm familiar with and I can relate to the characters,
Speaker 1: and so I love this story. Tom has several novels available,
Speaker 1: plus this book of short stories. I'll put his author
Speaker 1: page linked in Amazon in the description, and you guys
Speaker 1: can look him up and buy his books and you
Speaker 1: will not be disappointed. If you like good literature, good
Speaker 1: modern literature, you'll enjoy this stuff. So thank you all
Speaker 1: for listening, and we will see you on the next podcast.
Speaker 1: Thanks