The Fallen

by Ace Atkins

  “I know what you offer inside that barn of yours,” Skinner said. “Not much different from what I saw growing up on a farm with the livestock and such. The real deals happen across the street at the Golden Cherry, where you board those miscreants on motorcycles and rent rooms out by the hour. We’re both adults here. This kind of thing has gone on far too long for any decent Christian to stomach.”

  “Is that what this is about?” she said. “Christian values? Or money?”

  “The way I was raised, everything is about values,” he said. “Decency. People doing hard work for an honest dollar. When I got away from a public life, I had a hard time stomaching what Stagg had done to this county. I tried to fight it but lost. When he finally had to pay for what he done, I thought a new day had arrived.”

  “And then I showed up.”

  “Not too long after,” Skinner said. “But you don’t have the roots that Mr. Stagg had. Heck, you’re not even from around here.”

  “I grew up in Biloxi,” she said. “I paid my dues. And I would expect some folks around here to be grateful for us bringing some life into this little derelict town.”

  Skinner reached for a slice of bacon, crumbling it into the steaming grits, a little pool of butter on top. He dashed in enough hot sauce to choke a mule and stuffed a big spoonful into his mouth. She waited for him to chew, Fannie reaching for her coffee and taking a long sip, trying to control herself.

  “The Skinner family settled this land,” he said. “We cleared out the red man, invested in the land, started businesses that are still thriving today. We all took a hit when folks took their business to Mexico and over there in China. They didn’t leave us with much. This may look like a ‘derelict town’ to a woman of your means, with your silk dresses and thousand-dollar purses. But we got something around here you may not have found on the Coast.”

  “And what’s that, Mr. Skinner?”

  “Old-fashioned values,” he said. “Respect for our country and a Christian way of life. You think I want my little granddaughters to see your girls flashing a big wad of money because they show off their ninnies to some smelly truckers?”

  “Lots of money comes this way,” she said. “You shut us down and you might as well board up most of Jericho.”

  “I don’t see it that way,” he said. “This is a new era in Tibbehah County. I want to see things like they were when I was a boy. You went to church, said your prayers, and saluted the flag. About the most exciting thing that happened was two-for-one day at the soda fountain on the Square.”

  “Maybe I should dress up my girls like bobby-soxers,” Fannie said. “Poodle skirts. Saddle oxford shoes. How would that work for you, sir?”

  “Doesn’t work that way,” Skinner said, reaching for another mouthful, making Fannie wait until he filled his craw with more hot grits. “You got a nice spot here at the Rebel. I’d advise you to put your energies here. Work on bringing back the chicken-fried steak to the menu. I miss it. I don’t have to do a thing but get the sheriff to enforce the laws already on the books and your nasty peep show and the Golden Cherry gets fumigated and burned to the damn ground.”

  “I don’t like bullies,” Fannie said. “And I don’t like threats. Bigger folks than you have threatened me before, running off with their fucking peckers between their legs.”

  Skinner swallowed, working on the eggs now. He chewed and then drank a little coffee, thoughtful and smiling, like a two-bit preacher about to make a point on Easter Sunday.

  “Your crude talk and slick friends down on the Coast don’t mean a thing to me,” Skinner said. “I’m putting y’all on notice.”

  He reached behind him for his wallet and Fannie shook her head, saying it was on the house.

  “Nope,” he said. “Not anymore.” He stood up, reached for his white Stetson, and pulled it down on his bald head. He tossed down five bucks, leaving a nickel tip. Fannie didn’t move, looking up at him before he left.

  “Everyone has a weak spot,” she said.

  “‘My grace is sufficient for thee,’” Skinner said, “‘for my strength is made perfect in weakness.’”

  Fannie studied him as he nodded at her, smug in his perfection. “I think I read that scrawled above a urinal once,” she said. “Thanks for the tip.”

  5

  “Grandma is going to shit her pants when she sees what we got,” said Caddy’s son Jason, who was now nine, as he walked from the woods with Quinn.

  “Nope,” Quinn said. “Your grandmother is going to shit her pants if she hears you talking like that. She already thinks hanging out with me and Miss Lillie is getting you into trouble at school.”

  “Sorry, Uncle Quinn,” Jason said. “But look at this son of a bitch. Four beards. I bet this bastard weights fifty pounds.”

  “If it weighs fifty pounds, you’ll have a world record,” Quinn said. “But it’s big. You made a helluva shot.”

  “He never knew what hit him,” he said, coming out of the path and moving toward Quinn’s farmhouse up on the hill. “What makes them so damn stupid?”

  “He thought we were a mate,” Quinn said. “It’s all how you call him.”

  “Looking for a mate makes you stupid?”

  Quinn pulled Jason’s ball cap down in his eyes, holding the big turkey they’d harvested by its feet, and said, “You bet.”

  As they got closer to his farmhouse, Quinn saw his mother’s car parked out front, not thrilled about it, as he hadn’t seen or spoken to Jean Colson since Christmas. Jean had emptied nearly a box of white zinfandel before letting Quinn know exactly how she felt about him putting up their family farm for collateral on a land deal set in motion by Quinn’s dad, her ex-husband. Jason Colson was a once-famous stuntman who’d leave his family every so often to work with Lee Majors on The Fall Guy in L.A. and on some show in Boston called Spenser: For Hire. Nobody could jump from a second-story window or run down the street on fire like Quinn’s dad. Family life seemed to be the only thing that scared him. He left for good when Quinn was twelve.

  Jean was up on the front porch of the big tin-roofed farmhouse, waiting to take Jason, who was out of school for a teacher workday, for the rest of the day. He’d picked the boy up that morning at The River, thinking they’d have a nice walk in the woods, not expecting to have any luck. But there was that tom, moving straight into the clearing, feathers splayed, beards on full display, thinking that the calls Quinn had made were some beautiful music. Jason pulled the bow, took careful aim, breathing right, and made the shot.

  “About time,” Jean said. “I’ve been waiting almost an hour. And my keys don’t work. Since when did you change the locks?”

  “I changed them last fall when I got home,” Quinn said. “Someone broke in while I was in Afghanistan. Remember?”

  “I remember,” she said. “Probably your daddy. That would be just the thing he’d do while everyone was looking. Didn’t he leave a bunch of crap when he ran off this last time?”

  “He did.”

  “I see you haven’t hauled off his trailer yet,” Jean said. “I wouldn’t think twice about it. The position he put us all in. We’re lucky we got out of that mess or this farm would belong to someone else.”

  “That would never happen.”

  “No,” she said. “Not now.”

  Jason bounded up onto the porch with his bow, pointing at the turkey in Quinn’s hand, “I shot it,” he said. “I got him just like Uncle Quinn and Mr. Boom taught me.”

  “Uncle Quinn sure is fun,” Jean said. “Only when he’s not. He teaching you any more of those dirty words?”

  “No, ma’am,” Jason said. “I promise. Can you cook him for us? Like you did last time.”

  “Uncle Quinn will have to dress him for us,” Jean said. “I don’t care for all that blood, guts, and feathers.”

  Quinn smiled at his mother and finally she smiled back.
Hondo sniffed at the turkey, happy to haul off the bird for a big meal if no one was looking. The cattle dog looked up at Quinn, tilting his head up, staring with those two different colored eyes.

  “You better lock up Hondo,” Jean said. “He’s licking his chops.”

  Quinn opened up the house, everyone following, including Hondo, and left the dead bird on a table on the front porch. They moved into the kitchen, where Jason handed Quinn his bow, and he set it in the homemade rack by the back door beside four of his own. It was a nice one, a Mission Ballistic, easy to carry and draw, nice and fitted to a kid Jason’s size.

  Quinn scooped out some dog food for Hondo and pulled out an old blue pot to make coffee. Jean sat down at the kitchen table, setting down her purse and letting out a lot of breath as she sat. Over the holidays she’d put on a lot of weight, quitting smoking about the time his father had run off again. She was in her mid-sixties now, reminding Quinn more and more of his grandmother, wrinkles around her eyes and mouth, hair now dyed a light brown.

  “Everyone in town is talking about the bank,” Jean said. “It gave Mr. Berryhill a real scare. He said one of those robbers put a gun right between his eyes.”

  “It was actually pointed somewhere else,” Quinn said.

  “Have they been caught?”

  “Nope.”

  “You expect they will?”

  “We’re working on it,” Quinn said. “We hoped to find the van they used. No one saw them after they left Jericho. They pretty much disappeared.”

  “I do business there,” Jean said. “I’ve been banking there for more than twenty years. Your uncle, too. They held the note on this farm at one time.”

  Quinn added some coffee to the percolator and sat it on the gas stove flame. He leaned back against the farm sink and reached for the half-finished cigar in his pocket. Quinn pulled out his Zippo and started to light it.

  “Do you mind?” Jean said.

  Quinn placed the cigar back in his pocket.

  “I expected you’d be working today,” Jean said. “On account of the robbery and all.”

  “We patrolled until late last night,” Quinn said. “Reviewed evidence and searched for the getaway vehicle. I had a meeting with a federal agent I know this morning. There isn’t a hell of a lot we can do besides interview witnesses and watch surveillance tape. These guys were good.”

  “Jason,” Jean said. “Would you go outside and bring in a grocery bag I left in the backseat?”

  “You brought me supper?” Quinn asked.

  “You can’t live on the damn Fillin’ Station and Sonic.”

  “Boom and I were coming over Sunday night.”

  “So you can’t eat good today?”

  The coffee started to percolate, and Quinn sat down as Jason left the room. He was a tall, strong kid with the handsome features of his grandfather and the light brown skin of a father he’d never known or Caddy had ever mentioned. He had on some Carhartt pants and farm-and-ranch boots, with a Memphis Redbirds cap.

  “Let’s not fight anymore,” Jean said.

  “I’m not fighting.”

  “I’m not mad.”

  “Could have fooled me.”

  “It’s just your daddy,” Jean said. “Well, you know, it’s just your daddy. That man loves taking risks, especially when it involves other folks.”

  Quinn nodded. The kitchen taking on a nice, pleasant smell of coffee and the faint odor of cigars and bacon. Skillets hung on the wall, along with framed movie posters of Seven Men From Now, Track of the Cat, and Support Your Local Sheriff, this last one given to him by Lillie as a little joke between them.

  “I saw Ophelia yesterday at Ms. Vaughn’s service,” she said. “She did a beautiful job. Ms. Vaughn looked better than she did when she was alive. She really made her cheekbones stand out and tucked up that saggy neck of hers.”

  “She has a way with dead people,” Quinn said. “She just has some issues with the living.”

  “You sound like your sister.”

  “Ophelia is a strange woman,” Quinn said. “We shouldn’t have tried to make it work again.”

  “I invited her to Sunday dinner.”

  “Shit, Mom.”

  Jean held up the flat of her hand and told him to please be quiet for one goddamn second.

  “And where does Jason learn his language?”

  “This is a big empty house,” Jean said. “And I’m tired of bringing you casseroles, washing your socks. You been out of the service now for more than five years.”

  “I wash my own socks,” Quinn said. “And I’m not big on casseroles. I have a freezer filled with enough meat to last me two years.”

  “Cigars, whiskey, and game,” Jean said. “That’s how you like to live? Like some kind of Mississippi river rat?”

  “Exactly.”

  “And never get married?” she said. “I’ve been alone for a good long while and there is absolutely no pleasure in it. Don’t be like your Uncle Hamp. You see what happened to him?”

  “Maybe I prefer to be alone.”

  Jean didn’t answer. She stood up, took two mugs from the cupboard, and set them down on the table. As she poured the coffee, she looked directly at her son and said, “Dinner’s at six. Don’t be late.”

  • • •

  Mingo poured a drink for Fannie at the grand old bar right before the rush started, all those truckers headed back from Mobile, frat boys from State and Ole Miss, and the horny creeps from the surrounding five counties. Fannie rested her head against her hand, stirring the ice with the other and thinking on her conversation with Skinner. Mingo had been with her so long, he saw there was some kind of distress and asked if everything was OK.

  “It’s worse than I thought,” she said. “Skinner doesn’t want a cut. He wants us gone.”

  “He can’t do that.”

  “He sure as shit can try,” Fannie said. “He says Tibbehah already has laws against this place, but no one thought to enforce them with Stagg running the county. Skinner can start making the girls dance with fucking cancan skirts and lace-up boots. Far as I can tell, he doesn’t drink, screw, or cheat.”

  “What does he do?”

  “He says he likes to go to church and fish,” Fannie said. “Said his grandkids call him Pop Pop.”

  “Pop Pop?”

  “I know,” Fannie said. “Isn’t that the most country as cornbread shit you ever heard? Real Hee Haw crap. I bet his brats are just as ugly as him.”

  “That man wants, or needs, something.”

  Fannie nodded, taking a sip of her drink, half grenadine and half gin, with crushed cherries, lime, and an orange slice.

  “Back on the Rez,” Mingo said, “when I was a kid, you used to tell me that men only wanted three things.”

  “Damn straight,” Fannie said. “That’s all the holes available to them.”

  “Not that,” Mingo said. “What motivates them.”

  “Money, sex, power?”

  “You said, ‘Accomplishment, association, or power.’”

  “Did I say that?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “I must have read that garbage in Cosmo,” Fannie said, tasting the cocktail. “I don’t think Skinner is big on personal achievement outside the confines of this shithole. So it’s either association or power?”

  “Or association as a means to get power.”

  “Damn, you do listen to me, kid,” Fannie said. “I’m impressed. But I don’t think that bastard came out from the retirement home to build something. I think he’s working for someone. He’s a goddamn tool. Man wouldn’t have an original thought if I struck him in the forehead with my hammer.”

  “Maybe fronting for Johnny Stagg while he’s in prison?” Mingo said, leaning into the bar, resting his elbows on that polished onyx. “You ever think about th
at?”

  “No,” Fannie said. “He genuinely hates that crooked son of a bitch. Skinner espouses morality. He started quoting Bible verses, talking about the good old days when an ice cream float tasted better than a shot of jack and pussy pie.”

  “Was there ever a time like that?”

  Fannie smiled and plucked a cherry from the ice. “Not since Eve ate that apple.”

  Mingo looked down at her glass. “Want another?”

  Fannie looked at her watch, a thin silver art deco Hamilton that belonged to her grandmother, the original and true Vienna. “You know I do, kid,” Fannie said. “Since when do I like to run this place sober?”

  • • •

  “Thanks for taking Jason hunting this morning,” Caddy said. “He’s so proud of himself he’s about to burst.”

  “He should be,” Quinn said. “That’s one hell of a bird. Did you see it?”

  “What do you think?” Caddy said. “Momma took pictures. And Jason’s been wearing a turkey feather in his ball cap all day. He’s telling his buddies it weighed fifty pounds and flew into the sky like a damn dragon.”

  “He’s a good hunter,” Quinn said. “I helped call in that tom, but Jason did everything else. He can quiet himself as well as any adult, steadying the breath before the shot. I’ve never seen anything like it.”

  “Well,” Caddy said, “you’re a good uncle. I was worried what things were going to be like when Dad left. You know how close those two got? But I’ll be honest, I don’t think Jason misses him a bit. All that bullshit about how much he loved his grandson. Why the hell do we fall for it every damn time?”

  “Because he’s our dad and we love him despite him being a professional fuckup.”

  Caddy nodded at the naked truth of it all. She looked around Quinn’s office at all his unpacked boxes and bare walls, not doing much of an update since he took over again at the first of the year. The only bit of decorating he’d done is tack an American flag he’d brought home from his last tour with the Ranger Regiment behind his desk. He’d been meaning to put up a few pictures of him and his Uncle Hamp when Hamp had been sheriff. Maybe a picture of him and Jason on their first big deer hunt. All the photos of him and Anna Lee Stevens could stay in the damn box.