Suttree (1979)

by McCarthy, Cormac

  Suttree groaned.

  Reese smiled. I thought you was somebody I knowed, he said.

  Is that right? Maybe you'd like to come uptown and get a little better aquainted.

  He didnt mean anything by it, officer.

  The deputy eyed Suttree up and down, little joy in the beholding. I'll be the judge of that, he said. Where you two goin?

  Both reckoned one more wrong answer would be all that the law allowed. They looked at each other. Suttree could hear the river beneath them. He saw himself in a swandive, heedless, lost. Under gray swirling waters. He could hear the cruiser's motor idling roughly with its high camshaft. Home, he said.

  The driver had said something to the deputy. The deputy looked them over again. Well, he said, you'd better be gettin on there.

  Yessir, Suttree said.

  Much obliged, your officer, said the old man.

  They pulled away and turned at the end of the bridge and came back. The driver glanced at them in passing but they were both looking at the ground.

  Bastards, Suttree said. I thought for a minute there we were gone.

  I knowed how to handle it, Reese said.

  I told you not to wave, goddamnit. And what the hell is your officer supposed to mean?

  I dont know. Shit, my head hurts.

  He was stumbling along holding the top of his head with both hands. Suttree looked at him in disgust. We'd better get the hell out of here, he said.

  We better not go through town.

  Dont worry, said Suttree. We're not.

  They turned down along the river and Suttree took bearings by the sun and plotted a course crosscountry that should bring them out on the highway on the other side of town. They went wandering mournfully down little dirt tracks and across fields. They went through a shantytown strung out along the edge of a branch, all grass and growing things about the creek and the encampment gone, a land of raw clay strewn with trash, with chickens and scabrous dogs. A cadaverous and darkeyed people watched mutely, furtive and dimly defined in their doorways. Such squalid folk as not even a weed grew among. Reese nodded and howdied to them but they just stared.

  They crossed a pasture where grackles blue and metallic in the sun were turning up dried cowpats for the worms beneath and they went on past the back side of a junklot with the sun wearing hard upon them and upon the tarpaper roof of the parts shack and upon the endless fenders and lids of wrecked cars that lay curing paintlorn in the hot and weedy reeks.

  They ended up lost in a big alfalfa field. On three sides were woods and on the fourth was where they'd come from.

  Which way? Reese said.

  Suttree squatted and held his head. Will some son of a bitch please tell me what I'm doing here?

  I got to get out of this sun fore my old head pops, said Reese. He looked down. Suttree had tilted forward onto his knees. They looked like castaways. Dont lay down, said Reese, or ye never will get up.

  Suttree looked up at him. You would absolutely pull the pope under, he said.

  He probably dont even drink. Which way, do ye reckon?

  Suttree struggled up and looked around and struck out again.

  They crossed into heavy woods and began to climb. The ground was covered with random limestone and there were sinkholes to be fallen into.

  You take poison ivy, Sut?

  No. Do you?

  No. Thank the Lord. I believe this here must be under cultivation.

  They went on. They rested more and more going up the ridge. Just sitting in the undergrowth like apes eyeing one another with little expectation of anything and breathing hard. When they got to the top they looked out and they could see below them through the trees a piece of black highway about two miles away.

  I dont think I can make it without a drink of water, Suttree said.

  Dont drink no water, Sut. It'll make ye drunk all over again.

  Suttree glared at him.

  When they reached the highway they were staggerfooted and crazylooking. As far as you could see in either direction there was not so much as a billboard. Suttree sat down by the edge of the road with his feet spread and began to pick at gravels and little straws and things.

  Here comes a car, Sut.

  Thumb it.

  Well get up. He wont stop with somebody setting down.

  They watched the driver's eyes. He looked like a skittish horse the way he rolled them and the car swerved out as if he'd keep from being leapt upon by these roadside predators who possibly fared on the flesh of motorists in lonely places.

  An hour later they were still standing there. Three cars and one truck had passed. They looked at each other and at themselves. The old man fell to combing his hair with his hands.

  We better start walking, Suttree said.

  How far from home you reckon we are?

  I dont know. Twenty miles. Thirty maybe. Suttree's eyes looked burnt and a crusty paste had formed over his lips.

  What time do you reckon it is?

  Suttree looked at the sky. Gently quaking like a vat of molten cobalt. Past noon. Maybe two oclock. Let's walk on down around this next curve. Maybe there's a store or something.

  The old man shaded his eyes and looked down the hot and smoking road to where it dissolved in a distant haze. The landscape subsequent seemed to shift and veer so that he batted his eyes and made little gestures with his hands as if to shape things right again. I reckon we can try for it, he said.

  They set off, stumbling along the roadway with their eyes down. If you keep from looking up for a long time you can surprise yourself with how far you've come. Suttree fell to counting the bottlecaps in the dusty roadside gravel. Then he began to divide them into the rightside ups and the upside downs. Before they reached the curve he called for them to stop.

  Reese when he looked at him seemed almost in tears. We nearly to the curve, Sut, he said.

  I know. I just want to get rested a minute so that when we look down that next stretch of road and there's nothing there I wont faint.

  How long you reckon a feller can sweat like this and nothin to drink without dryin up?

  Suttree didnt answer. He was looking back up the road, the accrued flat of the surface making mirages of standing water on the heat-bleared black macadam. A truck was coming down. A phantom truck that augmented itself out of the boiling heat by segments and planes, an old black truck that rode down out of a funhouse mirror, coalesced slowly in the middle distance and pulled to a stop alongside them.

  Shithouse mouse, cried Reese, staggering toward the truck.

  Suttree thought that if he reached for the vehicle it would resolve itself back into the cooking lobes of his skull from whence it came. But the old man was climbing up, jabbering mindlessly to the driver. Suttree followed. He pulled the door shut after them and it bounced open again.

  Raise up on it, said the driver.

  He raised up on it and it shut and they pulled away. As bad as they looked, bad as they smelled, this saint seemed not to notice.

  How far are you going? Suttree asked.

  Sevierville. How far you all?

  He was a young boy, hair almost white, a light down at his chin and side jaws. We'll ride on in with you if you dont mind, Suttree said.

  You more'n welcome.

  Whew, said Reese. We was about give out.

  Around the bend of the road was a store. An orange gaspump standing atilt. Suttree almost croaked out for a brief halt and Reese watched the building go past with sadder eyes yet.

  Where you all from? the boy said.

  Down around Knoxville. You from up here?

  Naw, the boy said. I'm from down around Sevierville. He looked them over. I just come up here to mess around some last night, he said.

  They watched the road in silence. Reese looked at the boy. He was wearing clean overall pants and he was leaning up over the wheel and he was chewing tobacco. You ever been to that there Green Room? said Reese.

  The boy looked at him sidelong slyly. Shit, he
said. Aint that the dangdest place?

  You wasnt in there last night was you?

  We come in there about three oclock this mornin.

  Reese looked at him again. He shook his head. Well, he said. Be proud you wasnt there no earlier. That first shift is pure hell. Aint it Sut?

  When they stumbled back into the camp on the river the four women and the boy were waiting for them with grim set mouths.

  Boy if you aint a couple of good'ns, she said. Where's them groceries you was goin to bring?

  I can explain everthing, Reese said.

  Where they at? Hey? Boy if you aint a couple of good'ns.

  Reese turned to Suttree. I told you she'd say that. What'd I tell ye?

  Standing there with her hands on her hips and that stringy hair and her face a mask of bitterness she looked fearful and Suttree turned away. Reese tried to detain him to verify various lies but he went on toward the lean-to and got his bedding and slouched off toward the river with it. He could hear the debate rising behind him. Suttree'll tell ye. Ast him if you wont believe me.

  He lay down in his blankets. It was growing dark, long late midsummer twilight in the woods. He wanted to go down to the river to bathe but he felt too bad. He turned over and looked at the small plot of ground in the crook of his arm. My life is ghastly, he told the grass.

  The girl woke him, shaking him by the shoulder. He'd heard his name called and he rose up wondering. The boy was coming up out of the darkness downriver with a load of pale and misshapen driftwood like scoured bones from a saint's barrow. At the fire the woman bent and stooped and placed the blackened pots about and the old man squatted on his haunches and rolled one of his limp wet cigarettes and lit it deftly with a coal and watched. All this with a quality of dark ceremony. Suttree walked with the girl to the fire. One of the younger girls came up from the river with the coffeepot dripping riverwater and set it on the stones. She gave him a slow look sideways and arranged the pot with a studied domesticity which in this outlandish setting caused Suttree to smile.

  They ate almost in silence, a light smacking of chops, eyes furtive in the light of the lantern. The meal consisted of the whitebeans and cornbread and the boiled chicory coffee. There was about them something subdued beyond their normal reticence. As if order had been forced upon them from without. From time to time the woman awarded to the round dark a look of grim apprehension like a fugitive. When Suttree had finished he thanked her and rose from the table and she nodded and he went off toward the river.

  He woke once in the night to the sound of voices, a faint lamentation that might have been hounds beyond the wind but which to him as he lay watching the slow procession of lights on a highway far across the river like the candles of acolytes seemed more the thin clamor of some company transgressed from a dream or children who had died going along a road in the dark with lanterns and crying on their way from the world.

  It was the boy came down with poison ivy. First between his fingers, then up his arms and on his face. He'd rub himself with mud, with anything. I seen dogs like that, said the old man. Couldnt get no relief.

  His eyes is swoll shut, the woman said at breakfast next morning. The boy came to the fire like a sleepwalker. His arms puffed like adders. He tilted his head a bit to one side to favor the eye he could still see from. The skin of his upper arms had cracked in little fissures from which a clear yellow liquid seeped.

  The old man shook his head in disgust. I aint never seen a feller swell up thataway with poison ivy. What all do you reckon's the matter with him?

  Just keep him away from me, said Suttree.

  I thought you didnt take it, Sut.

  I think he's found a new kind.

  Shoo, said Wanda. You're a mess.

  He came toward her, arms flailing stiffly in a fiend's mime, and she ran screaming.

  Well, the old man said. You wont get it just bein in the same boat with him.

  I aint goin in no boat, the boy said.

  You aint, aint ye?

  I caint bend my arms.

  Reese had a knife and spoon up in his hands, holding them like candles, waiting for the food. The boy was standing rigidly at the end of the table. You what? Said Reese.

  Caint bend my arms, said the boy loftily.

  The old man laid down his silver quietly. Well hell's bells, he said. He looked at Suttree. I reckon you and Wanda will have to take it today.

  I've got a better idea, Suttree said.

  What's that?

  You and Wanda.

  Well, I thought I'd make the downstream run by myself. I thought I'd let you take the upstream with Wanda on account of she knows it.

  The woman swung a bucketful of oatmeal onto the table and the old man seized the ladle and loaded his bowl. Suttree looked downtable at the boy. He was still standing with his arms out at his sides. Wanda was sitting at the table across from him. She did not look up. She seemed to be at grace. Suttree took the ladle and dolloped out the oatmeal. Reese was blowing on his, holding the bowl in both hands and watching Suttree across the rim. Pass the milk, said Suttree.

  She sat with her knees together in the stern facing him as he rowed, her hands in her lap, the brail drops swinging behind her from the poles. Suttree seeing new country and asking about things along the shore, which side of an island to take. Her pointing, her young breasts swinging in the light cloth of her dress, turning in the boat, caught up in a childlike enthusiasm, a long flash of white thighs appearing and hiding again. Her bare feet on the silty boards of the skiffs floor crossed one over the top of the other.

  She said: Holler when you get tired and I'll spell ye.

  That's all right.

  I row for Daddy all the time. I can row good.

  Okay.

  You like to work with Willard?

  He's all right.

  I dont. I worked with him last summer some. He's a smart aleck.

  I guess you got to practice up on your rowing with him.

  Shoot. That thing wont do nothin. You know he tried to get me to hide out what pearls we found cleanin shells and we'd slip off and sell em and keep the money?

  Suttree grinned. Well, he said. I'd guess old Willard probably doesnt have much luck finding pearls. I'd say that everybody else would find about five to his one.

  Shoot, I bet he keeps what good ones he does find and hides em somewheres. Looky yonder at that old snake.

  A watersnake was weaving his way upriver by the shore reeds, his sleek chin flat on the water.

  I just despise them things, she said.

  They wont hurt you.

  Shoot, What if one was to bite ye?

  They wont bite. They're not poison anyway.

  She watched the snake, the tip of her thumb between her teeth.

  Let's just row over there and get him and I'll show you, said Suttree, taking a hard turn on the larboard oar.

  She squealed and jumped, grabbing at the oars. Suttree could see down the front of her dress all the way to her belly, the skin so smooth, the nipples so round and swollen. Buddy! she said, high and breathless and laughing. She was almost in his lap. You stay away from that thing.

  The boat rocked. She steadied herself with a hand on his shoulder, she touched the gunwale and sat down, a shy smile. They looked toward the shore for the snake but the snake was gone. The sun was warm on Suttree's back. He let one oar trail and wet his hand in the river and put it against the back of his neck. You scared the snake off, he said.

  You scared me.

  Maybe we'll see another one.

  You stay away from them things. What if one was to climb in the boat?

  I guess you'd be climbing out. Suttree suddenly looked down over the side. Why here he is, he said. Right alongside the boat.

  She squealed and stood up, holding her wrists together in front of her, her hands at her mouth.

  Suttree shook and jostled the oar. He's coming up the oar, he said.

  Buddeee! she wailed, climbing onto the seat in the trans
om. She peered down into the water. Where? she said.

  Suttree had let go the oar and was laughing like a simpleton.

  You quit that, she said. You hear? Buddy?

  Yes? he said.

  You promise me. You hear? Dont do that no more.

  Okay, he said. You better sit down before you fall in.

  She stepped down and sat, holding the gunwales at either side as if to be ready for rough water. He stood his feet against the struts in the skiffs side and pulled into the current.

  They ate their lunch on a grassy knoll above the river. A cool wind that bore an odor of damp moss coming off the water. Reese had gotten credit at the store and there were baloney sandwiches on white bread with mayonnaise and little oatmeal cakes. She sat with her bare feet tucked beneath her and brought these things from a paper grocery sack and laid them out. When they'd eaten he lay back in the grass with his hands behind his head. He watched the clouds. He closed his eyes.

  She took the oars as they went back down and Suttree handled the brail bars. She would help him haul the filled brails in, smelling of soap and sweat, her body soft and naked under the dress touching him, the mussels dripping and swinging from the lines and clacking like castanets.

  They coaxed the loaded boat through the shallows, walking alongside it on the gravel floor of the river. Suttree raised the front of it by the ring in the prow and ran the water to the rear and grounded the bow of the skiff on a rock. Them leaning over the boat from either side, their heads almost touching, scooping out the water with bailing cans.

  Drifting downriver in the lovely dusk, the river chattering in the rips and bats going to and back over the darkening water. Rocking down black glides and slicks, the gravel bars going past and little islands of rock and tufted grass.

  When they reached the camp there was no one about. Suttree took the axe and went for wood while she built the fire back.

  He came up dragging some dead stumps and found her sitting in front of the fire on a tarpaulin she had spread there. She looked up quickly and smiled. He set one of the stumps in the flames. Hot sparks rose and drifted downwind in the dark. Where is everybody? he said.

  I reckon they're at church.

  You think Willard went with them?

  Mama makes him go. She puts him to work if he tries to lay out.