Sky of Stone

by Homer Hickam

  dollar bills in McDowell County than anywhere in the whole country. But a ten-dollar bill? Rare as a grin on a blue jay.”

  I absorbed her history, sociology, and ornithology lesson and then said, “I hope you don’t lose your money, Floretta.”

  She waved my concern away. “I already won more from John Eye Blevins than he’ll ever win from me. I bet him twenty dollars Cecil Underwood would be governor back in 1956. Just because Cecil was a Republican, the odds were about a hundred to one. I still ain’t got around to spending all the cash money I made!”

  AFTER BREAKFAST, I tried to call Mom but got no answer. In the evening I tried again, still with no luck. Finally, I called her contractor’s office and was lucky to get the secretary just as she was locking up. I had one question I needed answered and begged that the work crew might carry it to Mom. The secretary agreed and wrote it down:

  When did Dad come home the night Tuck got killed?

  Rita didn’t come to supper the next night, nor the next. I finally got up the nerve to go into the kitchen and ask Floretta about her. “She asked if she could have her supper in her room for a while, Sonny,” she told me. “She’s had it with all you men right now.”

  Even though I’d come to a new understanding of Rita, I still found my heart wasn’t satisfied. I wanted her to know how much I cared but I also sensed it wasn’t the time to do anything but wait. That night, I put aside my worrying about Rita, and Dad’s trial, and worked on the time study instead. One thing I could see right off the bat was that Johnny was taking a lot of time measuring levels and making adjustments. Bobby and I were too often idle waiting for him to finish. I doubted the Caretta crew was doing as much measuring, but I also doubted if I could talk Johnny into doing less. He was a stickler for it.

  But I spotted some other things that would help us go faster. We could position the new ties so they’d be ready to go while Johnny was measuring and we could also put the spikes where they were needed in advance, saving us time going back and forth to the kegs. I worked out a few more things—combining work, prepositioning our supplies—all designed to keep us fully occupied with as little slack time as possible. I presented my work to Bobby and Johnny on the man-trip as we rode in to work.

  “First-rate work, Sonny,” Bobby said. He got a stubby pencil out of his shirt pocket and worked on the sheets some more. “How about we get ahead by taking off the fishplates from three tracks at once? That way instead of needing the wrench about twelve times a day, we’d only need it maybe a half dozen.”

  I considered his suggestion. “Yes,” I said, and Bobby lit up like a thousand-watt bulb.

  I handed over my work to Johnny. He studied it. “You college boys,” he said, but the way he said it was almost proud.

  All day, we tried our new efficiencies. They appeared to be working. I sensed we were coming together even more as a team, too. When Bobby was on a pee break, Johnny said, “Your dad would be proud of your work.”

  “I doubt it,” I replied sadly.

  “Why do you say such a thing?”

  I shrugged. “How many times have you ever heard him brag on me, Johnny? But how about Jim?” I mimicked Dad. “My boy is the best football player in this state! I bet a lot of people who know Dad would be surprised to learn he has two sons.”

  Johnny swung his hammer, knocked in a spike with three solid blows. “Bragging don’t measure the way your father feels about you,” he said, flipping the hammer over in his hand with the ease of a majorette tossing a baton.

  “Then what does?”

  Johnny pounded another spike home. “That he gave you to me.”

  “Because he thought you’d run me off!”

  “Is that what you think?”

  “That’s what you said.”

  “I know better now.” The beam of light from his helmet filled my eyes. “He gave you to me because he knew I’d make you work harder than you’d ever worked in your life. He gave you to me, not because he thought you’d quit.” His light flashed away. “But because he knew you wouldn’t.” His hammer fell, driving the spike deep into the tie. “Praise God!”

  After our shift, aboard the man-trip, I kept thinking about what Johnny had said: Because he knew you wouldn’t. I savored those words. And I hoped they were true.

  When we stepped off the man-lift, we looked on the chalkboard and saw the Caretta team had laid eight sections of track that day. Johnny got the chalk, paused dramatically while the other miners pressed around us, then wrote our number down—nine.

  For the first time, we’d beaten Garrett and his football boys.

  “We’re on our way,” Bobby said.

  “Johnny’s team,” I said.

  Johnny grinned, then ducked his head. “Glory be,” he offered while those men who’d bet on us slapped us on our backs.

  When I got back to the Club House, I found a message tacked to my door. It was written down by Floretta but it was from my mom. At first I didn’t understand it, but then I remembered my question to her. When had Dad come home the night Tuck was killed?

  It was a typical Elsie Hickam answer, short and to the point. In its entirety, it read:

  He didn’t.

  28

  PAYDAY

  MY FIRST payday finally came. Floretta received my pay voucher in the Club House mail and slid it under my door. I eagerly ripped open the envelope and beheld an astonishing number. After subtracting taxes and surcharges for Doc Lassiter and Doc Hale and what I owed the Big Store for clothes and mine equipment and the Club House for rent, laundry, and meals, it read, gloriously, $268.52! I was rich!

  Then I remembered the amount I owed for the repair of the Buick—$135.78. I made a quick mental calculation. After paying it, I would still have $132.74 left over. Then I remembered I hardly had a shirt that I could button, and my pants were getting tight. All my clothes had shrunk. I would soon have to visit Mrs. Anastopoulos at the Big Store and buy some more. It was a lesson in economics, but not one I much appreciated.

  I cashed my check at the Big Store, took out the Buick money, and stowed the rest of my roll in my sock drawer. I didn’t worry about hiding it. Nobody was going to steal it, not in Coalwood. Then I thought of the junior engineers and decided maybe I ought to at least stuff it inside a sock. Then I thought of the junior engineers some more and put the sock in a pillowcase. Then, when I thought of the junior engineers one more time, I found a loose board in the back of my closet and hid the pillowcase behind it, went downstairs to Floretta’s tool closet, and came back with a hammer and nails and nailed the board down.

  After supper, I decided to walk up to the house to pay Dad for the Buick. I had a question for him, too, and I was bound and determined to get it answered.

  As I came outside, I saw Jake and Rita walk out of the engineering office. Jake was talking animatedly, and Rita was listening with her arms crossed and her head down. My face flushed hot. Jealousy is a cruel thing. The green-eyed monster, as Floretta called it. I knew Jake and Rita had been friends when they were children, and it was natural they would have something to talk about. But I still didn’t like it.

  Rita looked up and caught sight of me. I couldn’t turn away. They came up on the porch. “Hello,” I said to her, trying to sound a lot more cheerful than I felt.

  “Hello, Sonny,” she said, and then her head went back down as if she was pondering something pretty hard.

  Jake nodded. “Sonny,” he said formally.

  They kept going, into the Club House. They were just friends, or had been. They were just talking, too. I kept repeating that mantra and also reminding myself of the real Rita I’d observed the night she’d tried to get into the mine. I was still infatuated with her, but now more guardedly so.

  Dad wasn’t home, so I petted Dandy and Poteet, then made my way up to the mine. Dad’s office door was closed, so I handed over the money to Wally, who took it and stuck it in his desk. He wore a little grin that gave him the appearance of a happy toad. “Your dad will
be pleased, Sonny,” he said.

  “I’m glad. When’s he going to be through in there?”

  “Your guess is as good as mine. He’s talking to some of the day shift foremen.”

  “I need to talk to him, too.”

  “I’ll tell him,” he said, shrugging. “Maybe he’ll have some time tomorrow.”

  “I’ll wait.” I sat down in one of the filthy plastic chairs along the far wall of the tiny alcove.

  Wally eyed me. “It could be a while.”

  “I don’t have any appointments.”

  “When he finishes, he may have somewhere else he needs to go.”

  “I’ll take that chance.”

  Wally hummed a tuneless tune. Then he said, “Sonny, here’s some advice for you. Your dad will be happy that you came up here and paid off the Buick. Leave well enough alone.”

  “I’ll wait,” I said stubbornly.

  Wally shook his head and went back to shuffling his papers. I wondered if those papers ever changed or if they were the same ones he’d been shuffling at the beginning of the summer. They were dirty enough to make me suspicious.

  The electric clock on the wall hummed the minutes past. Outside, men clumped by, evening shift stragglers. There were always a few on any shift. They’d get their pay docked unless they had a good reason. Doc Lassiter could sign their chits if their delay was caused by an illness in the family. Not much else counted. Even the union wouldn’t back them up. Late work meant less pay.

  An hour passed and the clock hummed on. Wally had shuffled the papers on his desk at least four times. I just sat there, musing and occasionally resting my eyes on the Mining Machine Parts, Inc., calendar with a sketch of a bathing beauty on it. Wally turned to see where I was looking and frowned as if I were admiring his personal girlfriend. For some reason, I was happy to irritate him. Wally considered himself the gatekeeper of the most important man at the mine, and that, at least as far as he was concerned, gave him the right to occasionally give everybody who tried to see Dad a hard time, including me. Wally was close to getting above himself.

  Finally, the office door opened and I heard a rumble of voices and laughter, too. That surprised me. I always figured Dad’s meetings with his foremen were grim

  affairs.

  Mr. Marshall greeted me as he came out. “There’s that track-laying man!” He punched me so hard in the shoulder that he nearly knocked me off my feet. Such a blow was tantamount to a hug in Coalwood, so I gratefully accepted it. He kept going.

  Other foremen came out and did the same. My shoulder got sore in a hurry. “Got twenty bucks on you,” Mr. Nick Paul said. He was a Caretta foreman, and the fact he’d bet on me made me proud.

  Dad ushered the last of his men out of his office. “Sonny, come on in,” he said when he spotted me. I advanced cautiously, closing the door behind me while Dad settled in behind his huge desk. “So what brings you here?” he asked.

  “To pay off the Buick. Wally has the money.”

  “Thank you.” He looked amused.

  “And I have a question.”

  “Let’s hear it.”

  “Where did you go the night Tuck got killed?”

  His chair squawked like a mad crow as he leaned forward. “What do you mean?”

  “Mr. Caulder said both you and Tuck were gone when he came out of the hoisthouse, so he assumed you had gone down in the mine. But Mom said you didn’t come home at all that night. I was just wondering where you went.”

  Dad shook his head. “This is Coalwood business, Sonny.”

  “I was raised in Coalwood,” I pointed out. “I’m a product of the Coalwood School, I’m a Coalwood miner, and I’m a member of the Coalwood union. I think I’m eligible to know Coalwood business, too.”

  “Then let’s say it’s my business. You’re not eligible for that.”

  I persisted. “There had to be a good reason why you didn’t go inside with Tuck.”

  “There was a very good reason,” he said. “Tuck was a competent foreman. It’s not against the regulations for a foreman to fireboss his section alone. I let him do it.”

  “Dad, I was there at the testimony. Mr. Fuller made a good case. Maybe you didn’t break the law or even a regulation, but you put Tuck in danger by not going inside with him. Mr. Fuller is going to say it fits a pattern. What are you going to say to that?”

  Dad sat back, a startled look on his face. “You have no right to come up here and badger me like this,” he said. “Who do you think you are?”

  My answer crackled out of my mouth like lightning. “I’m your second son.”

  Dad’s good eye blazed, then seemed to subside. I could feel him gathering control. He waved a hand in dismissal. “Sonny, I’m done talking about this with you. Thank you for paying for the Buick. Good night.”

  I stood my ground. “Why won’t you defend yourself?”

  “Good night!”

  As I went by his desk on my way out, Wally sang, “I tried to tell you.”

  I thought about saying something smart-alecky back, but decided to keep my peace. For one thing, he was right.

  29

  DOC HALE

  ON THE walk back to the Club House, one part of my mind kept asking where Dad had gone the night of Tuck’s death. The other part wondered why nearly every time we talked, it turned into an argument. I might have thought some more about it, but I found Doc Hale, Coalwood’s dentist, sitting on the porch, enjoying a cigar and the evening. He seemed delighted to see me. “You’re keeping late hours, aren’t you, Sonny? I’ve bet a hundred dollars on you. If you want to catch up with those Caretta boys, you need your rest.”

  “I’m heading to bed right now, sir,” I reported.

  Doc Hale dropped his cigar in the coffee can that had been left on the porch for that purpose and walked me into the foyer. He was always a snappy dresser and tonight was no exception. He was wearing white slacks and a long-sleeved light blue shirt, a pale yellow sweater draped over his shoulders, its arms tied around his neck. Sporting brown leather shoes with white trim, he walked with an athletic grace. In fact, he resembled Fred Astaire so much, he could have broken out into a tap dance and I wouldn’t have been much surprised.

  “So, how are you, my boy?” he asked. “I’ve been remiss. I should have dropped by your room, told you hello, and welcomed you back to Coalwood.” His voice was soft and mellow. Mom had always said there was no one smoother in Coalwood than Eddie Hale.

  “It’s okay, Doc. I know you keep pretty busy.”

  He cocked his head. “Floretta tells me you’re turning into quite the coal miner.”

  “I’m learning a lot.”

  “Your capacity to learn is something I’ve always admired about you,” he said. “And how are your parents?”

  “Mom’s pretty much on top of the world, I guess,” I said. “You know about Dad.”

  “Yes.” He contemplated me. “Does it worry you? About your dad, I mean? I only caught the tail end of the testimony but it sounded pretty rough.”

  Sometimes I can be a blurter. It’s as if everything builds up inside me, and then somebody asks me a question, and it all comes bubbling out. This was one of those times. “They’re going to get him, Doc, and it’s going to be awful.”

  Doc Hale raised his eyebrows at my torrent of misery. “Tell you what,” he said. “Why don’t you stop by my apartment for a nightcap?”

  “Sir?”

  “A drink and a talk. Maybe I can help you.”

  I followed Doc Hale down the hall, past the staircase, to his apartment. “If you don’t mind,” he said, pointing at some sandals beside the door, “I’d appreciate if you wore those. I believe the Japanese are correct in never wearing street shoes into their homes. The home should be considered distinctly sacred, unsullied by the dirt of the outside world.”

  That made sense to me. I pulled off my boots and put on the sandals. Just inside the door was a zebra-skin rug. I hesitated before walking across it. “It’s okay, Son
ny,” Doc Hale said. “It’s dead.”

  Doc Hale’s apartment resembled a Hollywood movie set. Potted plants bloomed everywhere, including a huge fern that looked like it belonged in a prehistoric forest. Here and there were marble sculptures, busts of what appeared to be ancient warriors—Greeks and Romans, I thought. Framed paintings on the walls didn’t look like ones a person would buy in the company store.

  A big elephant tusk leaning against one of the bookcases got my attention. I ran my hand over it. It felt like a huge piano key. “He was a rogue, that one,” Doc Hale said, nodding at the tusk. “It came down to him or me.”

  A lion-skin rug, its mouth open and fangs bared, lay beside a white baby grand piano. The lion had a surprised look on its face. “A long shot,” he said. “She never knew what hit her.”

  I looked at the diplomas and testimonials he’d packed on one wall. Doc Hale was a member of the Pittsburgh Masonic Blue Lodge, the International Brotherhood of Magicians, and the Episcopal Church. The latter membership, I supposed, explained why he was usually playing tennis on the court opposite the Community Church while the Methodists were singing Sunday-morning hymns.

  “What’ll it be, Sonny?” Doc Hale asked from behind the bar. “Coca-Cola, Pepsi, Royal Crown, Dr Pepper, or something stronger?”

  “Do you have a Canada Dry?”

  For some reason, my answer made him laugh. “Oh, yes, we have plenty of that,” he said, and produced a bottle from a little refrigerator.

  My eyes strayed to an ink drawing of several nearly naked ladies. “Do you like it?” he asked, noting my gaze. “It’s a print of an etching by William Hogarth titled Strolling Actresses Dressing in a Barn. If you look close, I think you’ll see Hogarth was quite expressive utilizing the comedy and eroticism that was prevalent during the rococo period.”

  The women in the print seemed kind of plump to me, but nearly naked ladies were nearly naked ladies, so I admired them a little longer. “Very nice,” I said, but I would have called it the rotundo period if anyone had asked me.

  Doc Hale hauled out a bottle of clear liquid. It could have been some of John Eye’s best, but the little V-shaped glass he poured it in was entirely too delicate for that rough stuff. “I’ll be drinking a martini,” he reported as he plopped in an olive.