by Max Evans
“Just think,” Big Boy said. “I killed the son of a bitch without even firing a shot. Give everybody a drink on that.”
It would be hard to understand his callousness unless you knew Steve Shaw. Jim Ed furnished the money and Steve did the lending. He was a walking bank. Between them they had taken over several small ranches and herds of cattle, as well as innumerable cars, trucks, and houses. Steve had a knack of getting notes signed by property owners who couldn’t make payments.
He had lots of other talents along similar lines. For instance, if a valuable piece of land was involved Steve would make the borrower sign a deed and put it in escrow. If he failed to make payment, there was no long-drawn-out foreclosure battle. Steve merely went to the county courthouse, filed the deed, picked up the sheriff, and took over the land.
There was a dirt road—a short cut from one major highway to another—that passed right by the front gate of Steve Shaw’s place. One day a sign appeared on the turnoff saying simply: Save miles. Take the dirt road to Highway 286. A lot of people did.
The road was rough and rocky most of the way, but the really bad spot was close to Steve’s place. There was always a mudhole there regardless of the weather. Two cars out of three got bogged down to the axle. It was only natural then that they should seek help at Steve’s place, his outfit being the only one in sight. And people often thought how lucky they were to have this misfortune with help so near at hand.
Steve was always willing. He had a good strong team of work horses ready at all times to perform a neighborly deed. Not only that, he had hip boots which he’d obligingly pull on and then tromp right out in the mud like a Christian savior. The team would leap into the traces with a 2,500-pound thrust, and out would come the car.
Naturally the poor boobs would say: “You don’t know how we appreciate this. How much do we owe you?”
They didn’t have to wait long for an answer.
“Five dollars.”
This could add up fast when several cars a day would get stuck. Of course, Steve didn’t get too much sleep during dry spells what with being up most of the night hauling barrel after barrel of water down to the mudhole to keep it ripe.
He and Jim Ed Love made a good team. Jim Ed was going to be awfully upset about Steve dying on him. Now he’d have to come out in the open and collect his money himself. It put a lot of little people in the country in better shape to negotiate.
Jim Ed was the biggest rancher around. His daddy had started putting the land together by selling groceries on credit to Mexican ranchers and sheepmen during the big drought of the early thirties. He had used the same methods Steve and Jim Ed were to use later. The Love ranch grew and expanded into a domain. Then the old man died, and Jim Ed inherited it all, along with the old man’s touch for acquiring other people’s property for nearly nothing. A lot of big ranches were built this way.
Jim Ed once sold a man five hundred head of steers, but only about a hundred head was actually involved in the deal. It was agreed that Jim Ed would gather the cattle and the greenhorn take the count; then the cattle would be turned loose for a few days while the buyers got ready to move them out. Jim Ed drove this one hundred head around the same hill five times. There was a lot of hell raised later, but Jim Ed said he couldn’t help it if the man wasn’t cowboy enough to gather his stock. This happened back in the twenties under his dear old daddy’s direction.
And then the story went around that he had a formula that would constipate cattle for several days. People said that Jim Ed put heavier cattle on the scales than anybody in the country— until they took a crap a day or so later.
I had a feeling Jim Ed was going to make his move against Big Boy soon, and I was right. One way or another he was going to get Big Boy. And it wouldn’t be out in the street with his fists, either.
Levi G6mez tipped me off.
“Pete, Les Birk has moved over to Jim Ed Love’s and gone to work there.”
“Well, I’ll be damned,” I said. “So that’s it. The son of a bitch. I knew he was after Big Boy, but I never dreamed he’d do it that way.”
“Les was in here about a week after they buried Steve,” Levi said. “He was drunk and bragging about how he was working for the biggest outfit around and how he was going to be paid to get Big Boy. And he went on to say there wasn’t a thing anybody could do about it. Jim Ed has enough money and pull to fix anything.”
“Does Big Boy know about this yet?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Well, we’d better tell him, Levi.”
“Yeah, we better.”
I could see Jim Ed scheming and putting ideas in Les’ head, and I had a feeling he was going to go to work on Mona. If she didn’t take to his throat cutting, he would start using his money on her. He was zeroing-in on Big Boy where it would hurt the most. Somebody was going to get hurt. Hurt bad. The worst thing was that there was no telling when it might happen. It could be a month from now, or a year—or maybe tomorrow.
Eleven
I was glad to hear that Big Boy had gone over to Ragoon with
some of Hoover Young’s quarter-horses to wind up the racing
season. I went over to see him. I found him back at the stables
shooting craps with a bunch of horse trainers and a little Negro,
one of the damnedest-looking men I ever saw in my life.
Big Boy said, “Pete this here is Whingo.”
“Whingo what?” I asked.
Whingo looked up and pushed a big blue hat (that’s right, blue) back and grinned all the way around under his ears, showing a row of teeth that looked like an adjustable gold watchband.
“Just plain Whingo, man. That’s all.”
It was obvious that Big Boy was winning heavily. He sure had a string of luck going lately with the dice and cards. I got to thinking he might put enough together to run away with Mona yet. As much as I wanted to, it was impossible to wish him that much luck.
Something jumped out into the middle of the game, grabbed the pot, and went squalling off through the paddock. One of the horse trainers jumped up and said, “Whingo, I’m going to kill that goddam monkey!”
“You goin’ to have to kill Whingo first!” he said, standing up about five feet tall. He had on yellow boots to go with the blue hat, and his britches were stuffed down into the tops.
Big Boy said, “Calm down. I’ll make up the pot.”
They all squatted back down, and Big Boy shot for his point. He made it and said, “You want in, Pete?”
“No, I don’t believe so, Big Boy. I don’t want to change your luck.”
It took Big Boy about thirty more minutes to clean them out.
The horse trainer left cussing the monkey as if it were solely responsible for his bad fortune.
Whingo reached down into the top of those yellow boots and pulled out a half pint of whisky. We all took a swallow. “Where’d you get that monkey?” I asked.
“Alabama, boy, that’s where. Stole him from a carnival.”
Big Boy said: “Whingo ain’t goin’ to go hungry with that monkey around. Last week he stole three wrist watches, a diamond ring, and a box of sanitary napkins.”
“Best goddam thief in seven states,” Whingo laughed.
“What kind of monkey is he?” I asked.
“Hell, I don’t know. He cain’t talk. But I’ll tell you one thing. Don’t never get one of them red-ass monkeys.” Whingo took another pull at the bottle, and his teeth nearly blinded me. “My old woman got one of them goddam things. Mean? And bite? Look here.” He pulled up his sleeve. “Just bit the ligament in half right through my wrist. Had to quit jockeying on account of him. Every once in a while I goes home to see the old lady. Have to take a club with me. Seems like all that old woman does is sit on the porch rocking back and forth, back and forth, just waitin’ for me to come home. Then that monkey jumps up and here he comes. It don’t do no good to climb a tree with a red-ass monkey after you. All you can do is bust him ove
r the head with a board and run for the house. I ain’t sure I’m ever goin’ back home again till I know for sure that monkey is dead. Man, I’m tellin’ you, don’t never get you a red-ass monkey.”
“I’m sure glad you warned me, Whingo,” Big Boy said. “A feller was trying to sell me a real keen one the other day. But I told him a friend of mine had advised against it.”
“You was sure usin’ your head there, Big Boy,” Whingo said, emptying the half-pint. “That’s another thing a man’s got to watch is them red-ass monkey peddlers.”
We all decided we would let the race horses take care of themselves for a while, and drive up to Ragoon. Whingo snapped a chain through the monkey’s collar and took him along.
“What do you call that monkey?” I asked.
“Just plain Monkey Shine, man, that’s all. Shine for short.” “Howdy, Shine,” I said. Shine didn’t pay any attention to me but looked snake-eyed down the road.
The first and last place we went before going to jail was the Chief Bar. It was a nice, cozy place and the bartender didn’t seem to mind the monkey. In fact, he saw right away that the monkey was drawing lots of attention and attracting trade.
We’d been there guzzling for about an hour when a good- looking redheaded woman came over and began petting Shine. She had left a table of four men and two other women. They were watching us with looks on their faces that didn’t leave any doubt about their feelings. But what started things popping was the necklace this gal wore that dropped down inside her low-cut blouse. All of a sudden Shine plunged an arm down in there to the elbow and jerked off the necklace. She screamed and ran backward with both hands on her breasts. I suppose it looked like somebody had gotten a little fresh.
Up out of their chairs came the four men and after us they sailed. The fight was on. One of them hit Big Boy on the side of the head, and when it didn’t jar him much the man took after me. I was so busy with him for a while, and there was so much noise, that I can’t remember it all any too clearly.
I finally got my boy off balance, knocked him down over by the jukebox, and whammed him a few in the face. He was peaceable then, so I looked to see if Big Boy needed any help. He had knocked one under a table and had another by the throat, choking the brains out of his ears. But Number Four was jumping up and down behind him, hitting him in the back of the head. I picked up a big glass ash tray and fitted him with a glass cap. This relieved the pressure some on Big Boy, and he started for the door with the other one.
In the meantime the women were screaming and raising hell and Whingo was chasing the monkey up and down the bar. Shine had knocked at least half the bottles off the back bar, and whisky was running out under the bar, making it a bit slippery underfoot. Whingo was skidding all over the place. This gave Shine a great advantage.
Big Boy had evidently disposed of his opponent, because he came back inside by himself, looking for his hat. About the time the others were getting up and Big Boy was pulling his hat down over his head, the bartender ran around from behind the bar screaming and waving a baseball bat at Shine. He chased him over to the front window. Shine was hanging from the curtains, chattering to beat hell and waving the girl’s necklace. The bartender swung at him with the bat and knocked out the plate-glass window. Whingo ran over and started biting the bartender on the leg with his gold teeth. The monkey jumped on top of the bartender’s head. The bartender dropped the bat and started to cry. Big Boy found a half-empty bottle of whisky, took a good slug, then handed it to me. “Come on,” he yelled to everybody, “it’s on the house. Were going to have to buy this place anyway.”
They all came over and joined us. Big Boy said: “Let’s be friends. A good fight now and then among friends just cements their loyalty.”
Well, we found out a whole lot more about cement in a few minutes. The bartender had broken loose and gone out for the cops. Whingo ran around behind the bar and shoved a couple of pints down each boot top. We should have left that place while the bartender was gone, but all that free whisky land of went to our heads.
Sure enough, here they came, filling up the door with their big dark blue uniforms and brass buttons.
The bartender pointed to me, Big Boy, and Whingo, who now had his monkey under control. “They’re the ones! They started it!” he shouted.
Well, they hauled us around the block to the jail and threw us in the drunk tank. It was just after sundown, and we didn’t have much company. They were puzzled for a while about what to do with the monkey, but finally one of them said, “Hell, they all look alike to me,” and they threw Shine in with us.
It wasn’t too bad, though that cement floor was kind of hard to sit on. But those bottles Whingo served up like magic out of his yellow boots kind of cushioned the shock.
We drank it down, and the next thing I knew I heard singing. At first I thought I’d died and gone to Heaven: it was “Nearer My God to Thee.” And then a lot of voices burst into “The Saints Come Marching In.” I decided they were having my funeral and burying me half alive. I sat up, and what I saw made me want to lie right back down again. Big Boy was standing out in front of about fifteen drunks. He had them all lined up in rows and was leading a community sing.
Then Whingo, with Shine perched on his shoulder, got up and said, “Deacon Matson has done lifted your spirits to the glorious heavens with his singin’, and now I am goin to say a prayer for all you lost sinners.” Whereupon he took off his hat and bowed his head. Before I thought I had bowed mine too.
“Dear Lord, forgive these poor stupid sinners for they know not what they do. They are weak and you have put the temptation of these heavenly spirits before them. Yeah, Lord.” His voice, booming out of his tiny body, was like the sound of a cannon coming from a single-shot twenty-two pistol. “With all the troubles of your world upon their backs, can these poor unhappy souls be expected to do otherwise? Now, I ask you, Lord, can they? I hear you, Lord, and I know you are knowin’ and forgivin’ and I know you are goin’ to help us get out of here and live in the light of righteousness. That’s right, Lord, I hear you talkin’. I’ll take care of that part, Lord. I’ll deliver it myself. Praise the Lord and Jesus wept, Moses crept, and Peter come a-crawlin’. Amen.” Whingo solemnly held his blue hat out in front of him, top down. “Get the other edge of the brim, Deacon Matson,” he said. “The Lord done told me these poor lost souls is goin’ to redeem themselves by contributin’ to our cause.” “Get it up,” Big Boy said, throwing one mighty arm in the air like Samson himself. The drunks muttered resentfully but shoved their hands in their pockets just the same. The bottom of the hat filled.
One wine-soaked old man said, “I had eight dollars and a pocket knife.”
“Never mind the pocket knife,” said Big Boy.
“But now I can’t find it,” he whined. “It’s been stole. It’s all gone, I swear it!”
Big Boy stuffed all the money he’d collected in his pocket and said, “Now, I’m going to try and make a deal with the judge for all you folks.”
I went over to the door and yelled out through the slot, “Guard! Guard!”
In a minute somebody yelled back: ‘The judge won’t be here till nine o’clock in the morning. Shut up or you’ll spend a week in here.”
It was a long night.
Nine o’clock finally came, and they took our bunch down first. Big Boy paid our fines; then he pitched all the rest out on the judge’s desk and said, “Judge, please be light on those poor sinners and apply this to their cost through the courtesy of Deacon Whingo.”
The judge blinked unhappily, spotted Shine, and said, “Get the hell out of here!”
We went.
They don’t feed you in the drunk tank at the Ragoon jail, so we hunted up a place to eat. We got settled down in a restaurant, and Whingo pulled out eight wrinkled one dollar bills and a pocket knife. He patted Shine on the head and said: “This old monkey ain’t never asleep, boys. The breakfast is on me.” So we all ordered ham and eggs and hot black coffee.
/>
Big Boy said to me: “Whingo is the only absolutely happy man I’ve ever known. He don’t give a damn for nothing. He ain’t afraid of being a fool or being wrong. That’s what troubles the world, Pete. Everybody is afraid of being wrong.” Then, as though there were a connection, he said, “Mona’s coming in today. Ain’t that keen?” and grinned.
I was hungry, but somehow I couldn’t eat. Big Boy ate his and mine too.
Twelve
Big Boy had neglected the ponies the afternoon before, so he had to ask me to take care of Mona. I got her a room at the same motel I was in. Then I went to meet her at the bus depot. She had driven in, but she’d written Big Boy to meet her there.
“Hello, Mona,” I said.
“Hello, Pete, its nice to see you.”
I could hear the question in her voice, so I said: “Big Boy’s stuck with Hoover’s race horses. Said to tell you he was sorry and would be in later. Where’s your car?”
“Just down the street.”
“Would you like some lunch before you go to your room?”
“That would be nice,” she said. She smiled and took my arm in her strong, soft hand.
I don’t know how I felt walking along the street with her and I didn’t come to myself until after we had ordered our lunch. Then I got up nerve enough to look at her. I think I hid how I felt, but she was used to men staring at her anyway and probably didn’t give it much notice. She had a way of gazing off into the distance until you asked her something; then she looked straight at you. And then she made you feel there was no one else in the world, and whatever you said was of the greatest importance. There was no half-attention from this woman. There couldn’t be; she was so much woman that everything she did had to be whole. I thought it was pretty clear where this left me. She had had a rough time, kicking around from one cow camp to another with Les, living just any way that came along and on a salary that barely paid the minimum bills. That was the strange part. The black dress looked Nieman-Marcus, and she could just as well have been the mistress of the richest man in Texas.