Raintree County

by Ross Lockridge Jr.

  —Garwood isn’t going to like that catfish, Johnny said.

  He had been looking at his reflection in the plateglass window. He was twenty years old and had gained a good deal of weight in the last year. He was six feet tall. His hair was dark and wavy and shot with red. His face had lost its pimply, boyish look. He had on a new suit bought especially for the Graduation Exercises at the Academy. His legs in the tight pants were lithe and long. The knobs of his new shoes shone. A bowtie was poised on his throat like an irrelevant butterfly. It had been two years since anyone had beat Johnny Shawnessy in a race, and his friends had been encouraging him to try his speed against Flash Perkins, Raintree County’s most famous athlete, in the annual Fourth of July Footrace.

  This day, a Saturday, he had come into town to get his picture taken. The Graduation Exercises were only two weeks away, and the graduates had all agreed to exchange images of each other in the carte de visite size.

  Cash unlipped his cigar and tipped the ash. His eyes were soft and visionary.

  —It’s been five years since anyone laid a bet against Flash Perkins. John, if you could beat Flash, we could clean up the biggest pot a money ever bet in Raintree County.

  —I wouldn’t want my friends to lose any money on me, Johnny said.

  —I got a plan, Cash said. You remember the race two years ago when Flash was so drunk they practickly had to carry him to the starting line?

  —He nearly got beat.

  —By a secondrate runner too—a man you could whip with your legs tied in a potato sack.

  —If Flash Perkins is drunk next Fourth, he’s a gone goose, Johnny said. I think I can beat him sober, and I know I can beat him drunk.

  The image of Johnny Shawnessy in the window stood with shoulders well back. The bowtie appeared just ready to wing its way off.

  —I got a plan, Cash Carney said.

  As always when he was dreaming up a good plan, his eyes became soft and christlike.

  —I got a sure-fire plan for getting Flash Perkins to the starting line pig-drunk. Listen to this! About an hour before racetime, you go and find Flash. He’ll be here at the Saloon showing his muscles and bragging. You go up to him, and you say, Perkins, I’ve heard enough of your blow about how you can beat any man in Raintree County drunk or sober. I can beat you drinking or running. Now everybody knows Flash Perkins never turned down a dare in his life. He’ll take you up in a second. You and he’ll walk into the Saloon here and call for raw whiskey, the barkeep fills them up, and to the amazement of the crowd you drink with Perkins glass for glass.

  —Don’t forget, Johnny said, I’m a member of the Cold Water Army. I never touched a——

  Brown eyes upcast, waving his cigar, Cash ignored the interruption.

  —Meanwhile, I and some of the boys will have covered every Perkins bet we can get at odds of two to one. Come racetime, they’ll carry Flash Perkins, the Pride of Raintree County, to the starting line, and you’ll beat him all holler.

  —Who’ll carry me to the post? Johnny said. Besides, T. D. and Mamma would skin me alive if I did such a thing. I won’t touch any alcoholic beverages.

  —Who said anything about you touching any alcoholic beverages? Cash said. Suppose that the bartender pours colored water in your glass and straight stuff in Perkins’.

  —He’d never do it.

  —He might do it, Cash said, before he’d lose his job. If the Boss asked him to, he might.

  —The Boss?

  —I don’t want it generly known, John, Cash said, tipping his ash, so keep it under your hat. But I own this joint now.

  Johnny argued with Cash about it, but Cash pointed out that T. D. wouldn’t have any kick coming if Johnny touched nothing but colored water, and it would be all in favor of the temperance movement if Flash beat himself by drink.

  —Serve him right, Cash said. We’ll take some of our winnings and put them into the next temperance drive.

  Garwood Jones, who also had an appointment at the Photographer’s, joined the two in front of the Saloon. He had just come from the barber’s and stood a moment glancing at himself in the plateglass. Pleased, he opened his coat, extracted a cigar, and put a foot up on the low windowsill.

  —Well, boys, he said, did you see it go by?

  He put the cigar in his face. His handsome blue eyes crossed slightly as he touched matchflame to tip. He puffed, laughed gently. His hair was black and wavy. He palped his newly razored faceskin, soft like a baby’s. His shoulders were bulky and sleek in his dandy coat. He exhaled fragrance of face lotion and hair oil, aroma of success. He reminded Johnny of a well-groomed prize bull.

  —What a lovely pair!

  Garwood’s voice was deep, and he had a manner of speaking slowly so that every word told.

  Professor Jerusalem Webster Stiles crossed the street and joined the group in front of the Saloon.

  —Good afternoon, gentlemen. I hope the subject under discussion is sufficiently elevated to engage my interest.

  —The Perfessor knows her too, Garwood said.

  —Are you referring, the Perfessor said, to our charming little visitor from below the Mason and Dixon Line?

  —She just went by the barber shop while I was in the chair, Garwood said. Boy, what a dream!

  —Do you think your tone is strictly avuncular? the Perfessor said.

  —What’s it all about? Johnny said. Let us country boys in on it too.

  —We have a new girl in town, the Perfessor said, affecting a stagey Southern accent, from the great and gran’ old state of Lou’siana—Noo Orleans, Lou’siana, that is. Son, have you evuh visited in Dixie? Well, Ah’m heah to tail you, son, thet those accustomed tew the pinchin’ and penurious weathuh of the Nawth cannot possibly imagine, until they have experienced it, the softness and fragrance of the Southuhn air. Below the Mason and Dixon Lahn, one passes impercetibluh into anothuh——

  The Perfessor broke off and resumed in his normal voice.

  —The new girl has already been closely scrutinized by the local experts and pronounced a very passable specimen of her sex. Just ask Uncle Garwood here, whose protective arm has so far guarded her against all contact with the raucous elements of the County.

  —I’m not her uncle, Garwood said. Just a relative of a relative of hers. When I made that trip to New Orleans recently, I met Susanna, and since some of her relatives call me Uncle, goddamned if she didn’t start calling me Uncle too just for a joke.

  —Susanna who?

  —Susanna Drake, Garwood said.

  —Where’d she get all the money? Cash asked.

  Apparently Cash knew about her too. Only Johnny Shawnessy was unaware of this exciting new arrival in Raintree County.

  —The money, as I understand it, Garwood said, is an independent income which she has received ever since she was a kid and orphaned. Her folks had a big plantation near New Orleans, owned a lot of land and niggers. She was an only child and inherited a pile when they died. Her father’s sister came here to Freehaven and built. She brought Susanna with her. Then Susanna grew up a little and went back South and stayed there. But when Auntie died last year, the house became Susanna’s. It stayed empty for a while, but now Susanna turns up—just why I don’t know.

  —By herself? the Perfessor said.

  —Couple of nigger girls with her, Garwood said. But I’m surprised at you asking me, Perfessor. You ought to know all about her.

  The Perfessor laughed soundlessly and smoothed his already glueslick hair with sidelong glance in the plateglass.

  —The boys are referring to a little fatherly conversation that I had with the young lady last Saturday.

  —Fatherly, hell! Garwood said. A bunch of us went on a swimming party to Lake Paradise and took the Perfessor along for a chaperon. Goddamned if he and Susanna didn’t disappear for hours.

  —Marvellous swimmer, that girl, the Perfessor said.

  —What’s she look like? Johnny asked.

  —Well, Garwood said, studying hi
s cigar, I sure would like to put my head between ’em.

  —Don’t be crude, Uncle, the Perfessor said. But they are lovely.

  —Wish she wouldn’t cover ’em up so with those highnecked dresses, Garwood said. It seems a shame to have all that beauty blush unseen. She has jet black hair, John, big round eyes, olive complexion without a blemish——

  —You’d be surprised, though, the Perfessor said.

  —O, Garwood said, I suppose she showed you her birthmarks and everything on that swim.

  The Perfessor tipped his ash with an appraising eye.

  —It’s a shame, he said. I hate to tell you, boys, but she has a large scarlet scar on her beautiful left breast. It starts right here—

  He drew a line with his finger across his skinny chest.

  —And it ends right here.

  He ended up complacently scratching his left nipple.

  Garwood watched through smilingly skeptic eyes.

  —What’s the diameter of her navel?

  The Perfessor contemplated his cigar.

  —There is no excellent beauty, gentlemen, he said, that hath not some strangeness in the proportion.

  —She isn’t as fast as she acts, Cash said. Rob Peters, that has the big gray and the new spring buggy, took her over to Middletown two nights ago, and when he took her home, he tried to get fresh with her, and she slapped his hat off. He said he never saw anything like her to lead a man on and then give ’im the back of her hand.

  —It might interest you guys to know, Garwood said, that it’s Uncle Garwood who’s taking her to the Decoration Day Program next week.

  Garwood paid a sly glance to himself in the plateglass mirror and caressed his backward-flowing mane.

  —Boys, he said, that little lady is a fast filly, a high-steppin’ little thoroughbred, and Uncle Garwood is just the boy that can ride ’em. You fellas wouldn’t believe it if I told you the truth about her. I heard some stories about her down in New Orleans that’d make this County stand up and take note. I’m telling you right now, boys, we’re kinda slow stuff around here compared to the set she’s been——

  —Here’s the boy now!

  A hoarse, high voice stung Johnny like a slap in the face. Advancing up the street, the first of a throng, came Flash Perkins, Raintree County’s greatest athlete.

  By this time whenever Flash Perkins walked through the Square, small boys followed at a reverent distance pointing. He was generally in the middle of a gang of secondrate imitators who enjoyed moving in the reflected glory of the man who could outrun, outdrink, outfight, outlove, and outcuss any other man in the County.

  It seemed to Johnny that if anyone had found the secret of pure expression, it was Flash Perkins. Everything Flash did was sheer affirmation. He never analyzed, worried, debated. He fought, worked, drank, and talked with the same sublime physical gusto. Johnny had never seen Flash angry. Flash never took the trouble. His motto was, Hit fust and argeefy after. He was a born clown and played to every crowd like a gallery. His blue eyes were those of an excited child, and one had the feeling that if a single moment of tranquillity were to set in, they would become naïve and baffled. He acted always from sheer impulse, but his impulses were predictable, for he had a code.

  It was because of this code that everyone in Raintree County, including Johnny Shawnessy, understood and, after a fashion, adulated Flash Perkins. It was the code of the early Hoosier, the backwoodsman or river man, a type already becoming extinct in Indiana. The code of Flash Perkins was the code of a people who had become great fighters and talkers in a wilderness where there was not much else a man could do for diversion except fight and talk. It was the code of the tellers of tall tales who tried to live up to their tales. It was the code of a competitive people, who had fought the Indian and a still greater antagonist, the wilderness itself, the stubborn, root-filled pioneer earth, the beautiful and deadly river, the sheer space of the West. It was the code of breezy, cocky men, who had no fear in heaven or earth they would admit to. The code involved never hitting a man who was down, never turning down a drink, never refusing to take a dare, never backing out of a fight—except with a woman. The code involved contempt for city folks, redskins, varmints of all kinds, atheists, scholars, aristocrats, and the enemies of the United States of America.

  Actually, every Raintree County man had a little of the code in him. It was simply the Code of the West, and though the West had already passed over Raintree County and left it far behind, nevertheless the County had once been and would always be a part of the West. As Professor Jerusalem Webster Stiles was wont to say,

  —To the true Easterner, everything on the other side of the Alleghenies is the West. And in a way that’s right.

  Now as Flash Perkins walked toward the Saloon, chest thrust out, arms swung wide from his hips, feet flung strongly forward, teeth bared in the insolent smile that always preceded the fight, the tall tale, or the dare, Johnny Shawnessy realized that he had arrived at one of the mythical encounters of his life. He had always known that one day he would stand chest to chest with Flash Perkins in the Court House Square, and Flash would suddenly take notice of him. For years he had watched Flash win the applause of the County by swiftness and strength, the all-conquering beauty of execution. He, too, Johnny Shawnessy, a child of the word and the dream, had always secretly intended to excel as an athlete. Only so, he felt, did one wholly win the applause of Raintree County and its most beautiful women. Only so did one become the completely affirmative man.

  For Johnny Shawnessy too had the West in him, the amiably pugnacious West, where a man wanted and meant to get everything the best he could have, where a man meant to be first if he could in everything—from shucking corn to catching the loveliest girl. And because of his great speed of foot, Johnny Shawnessy had long had a special vision of achievement. One day in the Court House Square he would defeat Flash Perkins, and a beautiful girl would fit the crown of oakleaves on his own suncolored locks.

  —Are you Jack Shawnessy? Flash said, coming up and standing hands on hips and feet wide apart.

  Johnny continued to lean against the plateglass window with a pretense of unconcern. No one had ever called him Jack before.

  —I might be, he said. Who wants to know?

  —Hear that, boys? Flash said to his crowd. Shall I tell this here kid who I am?

  —Go on and tell ’im, Flash.

  —Son, Flash said, it gives me great and pecoolyar satisfication and gratifaction to interduce to you and this handsome and intellygent company that emminunt gentleman, Mister Orville—better known as Flash—Perkins, the fastest runner in Raintree County.

  —Never heard of him, Johnny said. Who is he?

  —Son, Flash said, I’m the originiffical yellin’ Yahoo from the banks of Clay Crick. I’m half horse and half alligator, and rastle bulls in my spare time. I’ve smashed more skulls, drank more corn pisen, and raped more virgins than any other janejumper on the phiz of the arth. I can run like a horse, fight like a barl of wildcats, yell like a skun cattymount, and make love like a bull. I chaw little boys like you up with my terbaccer and I spit holes in walls. Who’re you?

  —Son, Johnny said, I’m the cer-tee-fied, gen-u-ine, ripsnortin’, ragtearin,’ ringtailed, headbustin’ mankiller from the banks of the Shawmucky. I fight all the time exceptin’ when I’m eatin’, and I eat all the time exceptin’ when I’m fightin’. I strangle bars with my bar hands fer a livin’, I chaw wildcat tails instidder terbaccer, I’ve slept with ever widder under forty in the County and some of ’em twicet, and I kin run like a colt with a redhot cob under his tail. I use minners like you to bait muh hook with when I go fishin’.

  For answer, Flash Perkins jerked off coat and shirt. He threw his hat on the ground. It looked as though he was going to hit Johnny.

  —Fight! Fight! someone yelled.

  A big crowd had already gathered. But smiling all the time, Flash sat down on the sidewalk and pulled off his shoes.

  —Come o
n, Jack, he said. No use waitin’ till Fourth of July. I’ll race you right now from here to the Baptist Church, or anywheres else you wanna run to.

  —Make it the church, Johnny said.

  He pulled off coat, tie, and shirt. He sat down on the ground and pulled off shoes and socks. Bare to the waist, he shoved through the crowd to Flash Perkins.

  In the saloon window, the reflections of two young men leaned slightly forward. The sun shone on the hard, broadshouldered body of Flash Perkins, who stood in stocking feet a trifle shorter than Johnny, shone on the shag of his brown hair, his curly beard, his smiling teeth, shone on the lean ribs and sinewy shoulders of Johnny Shawnessy, shone on his massy chestnutcolored hair. There was a faint prismatic light around both figures.

  —Sot us off, Fred, Flash said.

  —Just a minute, Cash Carney said, stepping up. Put your duds on, John.

  —What fer? Flash said.

  —This boy ain’t racing today, Cash said. He’s under contract to me, and he don’t race for any but big stakes.

  —If he don’t race me now, he’s a yallerbellied coward.

  —He’s not racing, Cash said. That’s final. You’re afraid to run him regular and official, Perkins, because you’re afraid of losing money.

  —Get a hat! Flash Perkins yelled.

  —Here’s a hat! somebody yelled.

  —I’ll give ’im odds of two to one, Flash said.

  —You just say that, Perkins, Cash said, because you know nobody’ll bet you. If someone came along with a little hard coin, you’d try to weasel out of them odds, and you know it.

  —Try me and see, Flash said.

  Cash Carney reached in a back pocket and coolly took out a leather snap-purse. The crowd became reverently silent as Cash took five gold coins out of the purse and held them in the cup of his hand.

  —That thar’s gold, a citizen said.

  —It ain’t horse manure, a second citizen said.

  —Here’s fifty dollars says you’re a liar, Perkins, Cash said.