by James Ross
‘I’m all right,’ I said.
Smut leaned back against the counter and looked down at the floor, like he was studying about something. I finished sweeping under the booths and swept the dirt and trash up in a little pile in the middle of the floor. Dick finished the comic section and threw the paper down on the counter. Smut looked at him.
‘You very busy this morning, Dick?’ Smut asked.
‘Not very,’ Dick said.
‘How about washing the pick-up for me?’
‘All right,’ Dick said. He looked surprised. ‘I been here six months and that pick-up ain’t never been washed that I know of. Ain’t much use in washing a pick-up.’
‘It’s got to be washed,’ Smut said.
‘Okay. Gimme the keys,’ Dick said.
Smut handed him the keys and Dick went out then. As soon as he was out of the door Smut turned toward me.
‘Where’d you stay last night?’ he asked.
‘In the cabin next to yours,’ I said.
Smut took out another cigarette and tapped it on the counter.
‘Listen, Jack,’ he said, ‘the thing for you to do is to get your stuff together and check out.’
‘You don’t think you can use my services any longer?’ I said.
‘No. You got to clear out,’ Smut said. He looked off at the side of the room.
‘I can’t do it,’ I said. ‘I like to hang around here. This place is home to me.’
‘If you don’t get out of here pretty quick you’re liable to find a home in hell,’ Smut said.
‘You don’t have the guts to do it,’ I said.
‘I’ve got the guts, all right,’ Smut said. He looked at me hard as a rock. I was in his way now and he was beginning to hate my soul. It was something he never did to Bert Ford.
‘You can’t do without me,’ I said. ‘I heard you tell the sheriff one day that I was the only one that knew the business.’
Smut stuck his hand under his chin and looked like he was doing a lot of close figuring. ‘You know plenty about my business, all right,’ he said.
He kept on sitting there, with his hand under his chin, and didn’t say anything else. I went to the kitchen to get a dustpan.
When I came back Smut lit another cigarette from the end of the one he’d been smoking. He looked straight at me.
‘All right, Jack,’ he said. ‘You can stay on here at your regular wages.’
I didn’t say anything to that and he went on: ‘Sometime today we’ll go to the cabin and move your stuff over into the one you was in last night. If anybody asks you how come you to move away from me, just tell them I snored so loud it kept you awake.’
‘All right,’ I said.
Smut got up and started toward the door. But before he got to it he turned and walked back to where I was.
‘But no monkey business. If you start any monkey business you’re going out of here feet first. I ain’t forgot what took place last night.’
‘I ain’t either,’ I said.
Smut went outside then, and I swept the trash into the dustpan and dumped it into the can we used for garbage. I went back to the icebox for a bottle of beer, and just then Smut walked back in and sat down at the counter. He seemed restless that morning.
I opened the bottle of beer and was standing back of the counter drinking it when Badeye Honeycutt came in from the kitchen and sat down beside Smut.
‘Who’s that strange nigger in the kitchen with Rufus?’ Badeye asked Smut.
‘Strange nigger?’ Smut said. ‘Oh, that’s Garfield York. He’s gonna work in the kitchen.’ Smut got up from the counter and came back of it. He started rearranging the wine bottles.
‘Didn’t he use to work for Henry Fisher in Corinth?’ Badeye asked.
‘I believe he did,’ Smut said. I could tell that Smut didn’t want to talk that morning.
‘Garfield York,’ Badeye said. ‘Ain’t he Bish York’s boy?’
‘That’s right,’ Smut said. He jerked the cork out of a bottle of sour wine that was about half full, and took a sip out of it.
‘I thought Garfield York was a educated nigger. Ain’t he a university man?’ Badeye said.
Smut took another little sip of the wine, then corked it up and put the bottle back on the shelf.
‘He’s well educated,’ Smut said, ‘otherwise I wouldn’t of hired him. But that ain’t nothing. When I was in California I worked in a tavern with a fellow that had his master’s degree and was a Phi Beta Kappa man. He was the curb service there.’
The bottle of beer roused my appetite and I went back to the kitchen then, for a little breakfast. Rufus fixed me up a plate and I sat down at the table that was beside the refrigerator. The new nigger was mopping the floor.
He was a long, thin nigger, with a big head and big hands. He was wooly-headed, but was beginning to be a little bald. Niggers don’t get bald as often as white folks and it made him look strange. He had on a pair of pants that were about six inches too short for him, but it worked out to his advantage when he was slopping around, scouring the floor.
‘How you been getting along, Garfield?’ I said to him.
He looked up from his mopping like he was surprised that I knew his name. I doubt if he knew mine.
‘Good morning,’ he said. ‘I been making out very well, thank you.’
‘I thought you were going to college,’ I said. ‘Or did you finish last spring?’
‘No, sir, I didn’t get through,’ he said. ‘Just went two years and the first term this year. My money give out at Christmas and I had to come home.’
‘Let’s see, you went to Culpepper University, didn’t you?’ I said.
‘No, sir. I went to Cool Springs College,’ he said, and went back to mopping the floor.
I was hungry as a dog and went on and finished eating what was on my plate. Then I lit a cigarette and examined the new nigger a little more.
‘You used to work for Mr. Henry Fisher in Corinth, didn’t you, Garfield?’ I asked him.
Garfield stopped working and leaned on the mop handle. Rufus was making out a batch of rolls and he looked over at Garfield like he thought he ought to keep on working.
‘I ain’t—I haven’t worked for Mr. Henry Fisher in over two years,’ Garfield said. ‘When he heard I was going to college he wouldn’t let me work for him no more in the summer-time. He don’t believe in colored people getting an education.’
Rufus looked around at me, then at Garfield.
‘You don’t know that, Gar,’ he said. ‘That’s just your magination. You better finish moppin the floor.’
Garfield commenced working again, but he took his time.
‘I haven’t been able to get much work here the last couple years,’ he said. ‘I worked some this past summer, though, for Mr. Charles.’
‘Charles Fisher?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘How’d you like working for him?’
‘I liked it fine. I liked to work for him better than for Mr. Henry. But I just worked now and then, on the yard. Mr. Charles was having his yard fixed up and was making him a rock garden. When we got that done this fall it was time for me to go back to college, and when I had to come home Christmas Mr. Charles say he can’t use me now.’
‘How come you liked him better than his daddy? Pay you more?’
Garfield stopped work again and sat down on the top of the table that was beside mine.
‘He pay more. Then he don’t cuss like Mr. Henry, nor abuse you.’
‘How’d you like his wife?’ I said.
Rufus looked over at Garfield. But Garfield wasn’t paying him any attention.
‘She’s a mighty fine woman,’ Garfield said, ‘but I don’t think they got along so well. She don’t love him.’
‘Is that a fact?’ I said.
‘That what Mozelle say.’
‘Who’s Mozelle?’
‘Mozelle Turner. She the Fisher’s maid. Mozelle use to talk to me about how things would
be. She say Mizriz Fisher don’t care nothing for her husband, and Mozelle say he know it.’
‘You ought to be moppin that floor, Gar,’ Rufus said.
Garfield went back to mopping the floor, but he was hitting a true nigger lick. About a square foot an hour.
‘You think she just married him for his money?’ I said.
‘All I know is what Mozelle say. Mozelle say that one morning last summer, when they was eating breakfast—they always had breakfast mighty late, sometimes it would be after nine o’clock before they’d eat breakfast—Mr. Charles throw it up to her that she just married him for his money. Mozelle say that Mizriz Fisher won’t quoil with him. That morning she just twist her shoulders and drink another cup of coffee.’
‘I guess that burned him up,’ I said.
Garfield pushed his mop about half an inch down the floor. ‘Mozelle say he got up and left the breakfast table. She say in a little while after that when she go into the bedroom to clean up, he was lying across the bed. She say Mr. Charles was crying.’
‘He must be nuts about her,’ I said.
Garfield leaned on his mop. ‘He was crazy about her; he was jealous of her as the day is long. Mozelle say he use to quoil with her because she didn’t want to go with him when he went off on a trip.’
‘Garfield, you ain’t gettin along so good moppin this floor,’ Rufus said.
Garfield commenced mopping under the stove.
‘She tell Mozelle she was glad to see him leave. She say it was kind of a vacation for him to leave. She say she can have more fun in Corinth with him gone than she can have in New York with him along.’
‘She’s a cold customer,’ I said.
‘She always treat me fine, but she got ice water for blood,’ Garfield said.
Rufus took his hands out of the dough and shook them. He shook his apron and a little floury dust rose toward his face. He had had enough gossip for that day.
‘Garfield York, this floor has got to be mopped!’ Rufus bellowed.
I went back out front then and sat there chewing the rag with Badeye. But I hadn’t been there more than a couple of minutes when Catfish came in from the back. He had brought up a load of corn liquor that day and I reckon he’d just finished unloading it. He was smoking a cigarette, but when he came up to us he took the cigarette out of his mouth and threw it on the floor as hard as he could, like he was throwing a rock at a snake.
‘I done smoked so much of this here cheap tobacco that I can’t stand no more of it,’ he said. ‘This stuffs done bit my tongue till I got the acid tongue. I wants some Quince Ilvert.’
‘You want some what?’ Badeye asked him
‘Gimme a can of Quince Ilvert.’
‘What in the hell you talkin about?’ Badeye said.
‘He wants a can of Prince Albert,’ I said.
‘Why in the hell don’t he say so?’ Badeye said.
‘That was what I told you,’ Catfish said.
‘Why don’t you learn how to speak English?’ Badeye asked him. ‘English is spoke in this country. You ought to quit using them dialects.’
Badeye got the can of tobacco and gave it to Catfish. ‘Why don’t you take a few lessons in grammar from that new nigger we got in the kitchen? They tell me he’s a college nigger,’ Badeye said.
‘Aw, Gar’s all right,’ Catfish said. ‘He may not be nothin but a nigger, but he’s got plenty education. That boy’s well read.’ He looked over at me, like he wanted me to put in a good word for Garfield.
‘He’s got a lot of information,’ I said.
19
JUST BEFORE NOON SMUT came back to the roadhouse and had a conference with Catfish about something. They were sitting over in one of the booths on the other side of the room, and since I was sitting in the door I couldn’t hear what they said. Probably something about the liquor-making, or how much in debt Catfish was to Smut. In a few minutes Catfish went out to his car and drove off. Smut came over to me.
‘Let’s go to the cabin,’ he said.
I got up and we went down to the cabin. When we got there I noticed that Smut had put a lock on the front door. It looked like the one he’d had on the car shed. He took out his key ring, got the right key, and opened the door.
‘Get your stuff together and take it over to the other cabin,’ Smut said.
Most of my things were already in my trunk, and I soon rounded up my other possessions and stuffed them in it too. I snapped the stays shut and hoisted the trunk onto my shoulders and walked out the door. Smut followed after me. As soon as we were out of the door he locked it again.
‘Remember, Jack,’ he said, ‘no more of this detective work around here. If you want to live and do well forget about that money. I’ve got it hid now where you couldn’t find it in a hundred years.’
I turned around and looked at him, but didn’t make any comment. He juggled the key ring in his hands, then put it in his pocket.
‘It’s a waste of time for you to look for it any more. From now on it’s going to be dangerous too,’ Smut said. He started toward the roadhouse. I went inside the other cabin.
A little after noon I went up to the roadhouse again. There was a dusty gray Plymouth parked in front of the gas tanks. It was the sheriffs car and Smut Milligan was sitting in there with him. I wondered what their conversation was about, but they were situated so it was impossible for me to do any eavesdropping.
I went inside the joint. When he saw me come in Badeye went back to the kitchen to get his lunch. I sat beside the window where I could look out at the sheriff and Smut. The sheriff seemed to be doing most of the talking. Every couple of minutes he would stick his head out the window on his side of the car and spit out a sluice of tobacco juice. Smut sat on the other side, smoking cigarettes.
I hoped the sheriff would tell Smut something that would make him leave the place for a while that afternoon. I was getting desperate enough by then to try anything. If Smut would just get in the pick-up and drive out of sight I aimed to break into his cabin and have another look there. The only way I could get in would be to smash a window, but it wouldn’t take long to do that. Still, I thought, maybe he just put the lock on the cabin door to lead me off the track. There weren’t many places in the cabin where he could hide it, and he wasn’t a fellow that had too much imagination about such things.
Finally the sheriff opened the door on his side and got out of the car. He took a couple of steps toward the gas tanks and stretched his legs, like he was tired of sitting. Smut got out on the other side and walked around the car. He came around to where the sheriff was standing and said something. The sheriff nodded his head and got back in the car. He started it up and drove off toward Corinth. Smut Milligan came back inside the roadhouse.
Smut was restless. He sat down at the counter, then got up and went to the kitchen. I went outside and sat on the bench that was on the left side of the door. In a few minutes Smut came out too, and sat on the bench on the other side of the door. He was eating a sandwich.
Smut and I sat there the better part of an hour and there was very little conversation passed between us. We just sat on the benches with our legs crossed, looking off into the woods on the other side of Lover’s Lane.
I was just wishing that Smut would go to a ball game in Corinth, or would go shoot a few games of pool, when a car that looked like Lola Fisher’s came around the bend above the cabins.
It was Lola, all right. She drove past the roadhouse and tooted the horn and waved her hand at Smut. He waved back and grinned.
It wasn’t anything out of the ordinary for her to do that, and I didn’t think anything about it then. But it wasn’t ten minutes till she came back up the highway and waved again. This time Smut held up his hand and nodded. Lola had sort of slowed the car down, but when Smut nodded she stepped on it again and hit the trail toward Corinth. I guess she was hitting seventy-five by the time she got out of sight.
Smut got up then and went down to his cabin, but I stayed out f
ront most of the afternoon.
I was pleased that Lola had driven by. I thought it might be a signal from her that the husband was out of town. I didn’t have the slightest proof that she’d ever had anything to do with Smut since she had married Fisher. All I had was a good hunch. If her waving had been a signal, then it was a lead-pipe cinch that Smut would be out most of the night. When he came back from his date, I aimed for him to be twelve thousand dollars in the hole.
While I was sitting there thinking the situation over, I got to wondering about the old sedan where Smut stored the corn liquor.
He had bought the sedan from the junk man in Corinth. I think he paid ten dollars for it. It didn’t have any wheels on it, but nobody wanted to ride in it anyway. None of the glass in the windows was broken and the doors could be locked. Smut usually kept the back end of it stuffed with corn liquor. He had to be more careful about handling corn liquor than tax-paid government liquor. Nobody could touch him about the tax-paid liquor except the county officers, and he had them fixed. He could fix them about the corn too, but not the Federals. That was why he bought the old sedan. It was a nineteen-twenty-four Studebaker, and no doubt was a hot number in its day. But it was pretty battered-looking now, and stood down behind the woodpile in the middle of a lot of empty oil cans, old shoes, and broken bottles.
Smut Milligan had the name around Corinth of being a smart fellow. But I was beginning to have my doubts. He was a fellow that would dash in where nobody else had the nerve, and that was the main reason he was successful. It was brass rather than brains that had got Smut where he was. It struck my mind that he would probably figure the sedan was a good place to hide the money.
I planned everything that afternoon. The first bus from Salisbury to Blytheville passed the river bridge about seven-thirty in the morning. I would flag that at the bridge and go on to Blytheville. That bus made direct connections in Blytheville for Charlotte. When I got to Charlotte I could take my pick. But it was Chicago I had in mind. I thought I would be safe there from Smut.