Lightning Bug

by Donald Harington

  “I thought the Lord had already told you to stop preaching,” she will say.

  He will not say anything to that. He will turn and resume walking.

  She will catch up with him again. “Is that more important than me?” she will ask. “If you really love me, or even care for me at all, can you just walk out on me like this?”

  “If you cared for me at all,” he will answer, “you would never have done that to me!”

  “I never dreamed you’d be seen,” she will say. “How was I to know that Rosie would be prowling around at six o’clock in the morning?”

  “What if anybody had seen me?” he will say. “What if Sonora had seen me? What if the mail truck came, and everybody came to get their darn mail and saw me?”

  “The mail doesn’t come on Sundays,” she will point out.

  “It was just downright shameful of you!” he will say. “Your conduct has been astonishing me from the first moment I came back, and it got worse and worse until that was just the last straw! You might think it’s a big joke, but it don’t strike me as the least bit funny!”

  “You’ll get over it,” she will say.

  “Naw, I could never live it down!” he will maintain.

  “Maybe Frank and Rosie won’t spread it.”

  “Likely chance! It’ll be all over town before noon!”

  “Well,” she will say, “so what if it is? Folks will just think that you and I were fooling around, and I don’t mind them thinking that.”

  “That’s your whole trouble, you don’t give a thought to what folks think of your conduct. I just don’t care for that kind of wife.”

  She will sigh. “Well,” she will say, “I don’t suppose we could ever have got married anyway, because you wouldn’t make love to me before marrying me, and I wouldn’t marry you before making love with you. So you’re going to walk right on out of my life, just after walking right on into it again for the first time in years.” She will sigh again. “I guess I’ll marry Dolph Rivett.”

  “He’s your type,” he will retort.

  “And you’re not?” she will ask, sadly. “Weren’t you ever?”

  “Latha,” he will say gently, “come with me if you want to, but I’m not ever going back to Stay More.”

  “And I’m never leaving it,” she will declare.

  “Well, then, I guess it’s goodbye,” he will say.

  She will say, “I think you’re being a dirty bastard to run off like this when Dawny’s lost.”

  “The whole town’s out looking for him. One less won’t matter.”

  “Then good riddance,” she will say. “I’m wasting my time arguing with you when I ought to be out looking for him.”

  “Well, so long, then,” he will say.

  “Goodbye,” she will say.

  But neither of them will move.

  “Get on back and look for him,” he will say.

  “Get on up the road,” she will say.

  “I am,” he will say.

  “I don’t see you doing it,” she will say.

  “I don’t see you doing anything either,” he will say.

  “I’m waiting to watch you walk out of sight,” she will say.

  “Why do you have to do that?” he will ask.

  “It means,” she will say, “if you watch somebody walk out of sight, it means they will die.”

  “You want me to die?” he will ask.

  “You’re as good as dead to me if you leave Stay More.”

  “Well, I’m not superstitious like you,” he will say. “I don’t believe it will work.”

  “Go on, then,” she will say.

  “All right then, I will,” he will say.

  But he will not move.

  “Well?” she will say.

  “Latha, you don’t really have to do that, do you?”

  “Do what?”

  “Watch me walk out of sight.”

  “Why not?” she will say. “What’s the matter, are you scared? I thought you didn’t believe in superstitions.”

  “But it’s not going to be easy for me to walk out of sight, knowing that.”

  “It’s not going to be easy for me, either.”

  “Then don’t do it. Go on and get back to town.”

  “You come with me,” she will say.

  “No.”

  “Then get on up the road.”

  “Okay, but don’t watch me.”

  “Why not, if you’re not superstitious?”

  “It’ll just seem kind of spooky and make me nervous.”

  “Then you are superstitious,” she will say.

  “No, I’m not, neither.”

  “Then go. I dare you.”

  “All right” he will say. “I’m going. Goodbye, Latha.”

  “Farewell,” she will say.

  He will turn and begin walking away, walking slowly, swinging his suitcase by its handle in his hand. I will watch him, she will tell herself, all of the way out of sight. She will not think that is cruel of her. It is cruel of him to leave. It is cruel, and childish, and thoughtless, and sanctimonious, high and mighty, and downright mean. Let him die.

  There will be a turning in the road ahead, and he will be near it. In a moment he will have been gone. Steadfastly she will watch him, her eyes burning holes into his back. Oh, how could he do that!

  He will arrive at the turning. In an instant the trees will have hidden him from sight. He will seem to sense that he will have been immediately hidden from sight, for he will stop. He will stop and turn and look back at her. He will stand there for a moment, looking back at her.

  Come back, Every! Oh, come back or you’ll die!

  He will come back, walking slowly, hanging his head.

  When he reaches her, he will lift his head and smile sort of sheepishly and say, “You know, maybe if I was just out in the woods looking for Dawny I wouldn’t have to show my face to a soul anyhow.”

  So then, yes. He will stay. He would never, he will never, leave her again. So that is settled, done. He will rejoin the search, and, good as he is at searching, having searched for her three times and found her three times and lost her only twice, he will be the most apt to find Dawny. It will become like a kind of competition: Tull Ingledew, who can fling a flintrock straight up and tell by the direction it falls which way the lost boy is, Doc Swain who not only can organize and direct the other 112 people in their search operation but can also use his car to patrol every road and byroad in town and be ready with his gladstone bag to treat the boy in case he has suffered from exposure or any injury, Dolph Rivett who can go all the way home to Spunkwater to fetch a bloodhound [not realizing, however, that the heavy rain of the night before would have washed any scent away], and Every Dill who will throw his heart and his wits into the search because the lost boy is dear to her who is dear to him, and will be the most apt to find the boy, if anybody does, because he is most experienced at searching and finding and also because he as a lad of five-going-on-six was the spitting image of Dawny and had a mind just like his, and will even be able to guess where the boy might be hiding or lost, and who, in search of him, maybe is the one who most needs to find him.

  [My intelligent friend from Andover, Mass., who was last heard from in the prelude with his view that the proper name for lightning bug is firefly, has now interrupted with the comment that “The allusion to Pirandello is too obvious.” Well, yes, my friend, maybe if you’ve read Pirandello. But I never did. And I doubt that Latha ever did. Or Every.]

  Every will interrupt the search, just once briefly, during the late afternoon, at the request of Luther Chism, to perform what will be his next-to-last act as a minister of gospel: to officiate the quick nuptials of Lucy Chism and an agent of the U.S. Revenue Department, who has agreed, on condition that he be untied, freed and then hitched to Lucy for life, that he will never divulge the location of Luther’s still, or of Luther, to his employers.

  Luther, losing Lucy, will gain permanent amnesty or immunity or a
t least franchise, to pursue his trade to the end of his days. “Great Gawd!” he will never tire of exclaiming to all his friends, “Thet thar was the best swop I ever made.”

  Dolph Rivett will not fare so well. He will return with his bloodhound, to the admiring comments of other searchers—“Lookit the nose on thet dawg!” “He ort to do the trick.” “Thet’s a right fine snoop-dawg ye got, mister”—and will self-importantly begin to put the hound on Dawny’s trail, using for the scent a snotrag (hand-kerchief) thought to belong to Dawny, but which, as it will turn out, did not belong to Dawny but to his uncle Frank. After a spirited chase, Dolph’s bloodhound will lead Dolph and a dozen odd others to the Stay More schoolhouse, where Frank Murrison will be found in a compromising position atop Miss Estalee Jerram, schoolmistress. Frank, oblivious to the grins and leers and smirks around him as he hastily buttons his pants, will declare, “me and Esty figgered maybe Dawny was over here to the schoolhouse maybe.” “He aint,” somebody will observe.

  Frank will be heard at various other times of that day remarking, to no one in particular, “Well, heck, aint none of us perfect.”

  [And Frank will have said it. None of us are. Nor is it likely that the pot will be so inclined to remark upon the color of the kettle, that is, I doubt that Frank will be spreading any gossip about Every.]

  As for Dolph, at just about the same instant he discovers the uselessness of the bloodhound, he will discover, with mingled anger and fear, a young man sitting upon a horse and pointing a shotgun at him.

  “You, Purdy,” Dolph will say. “What you pointin that arn at me fer? Whut you doin here anyhow?”

  The youth will reply, “I follered ye over, Paw, when I seen ye come and git ole Gloomy. Whut ye doin with old Gloomy, Paw?”

  “Sheeut far,” Dolph will grumble, spreading his hands apologetically, “I jest taken him for to help find a pore tyke what’s lost from these good people. You aint aimin to use him today, nohow.”

  “How you know I aint?” the one called Purdy will challenge. “You never ast me. You been comin and goin’ thout ary word to me or Duke or Mom even. I done stood for all I aim to stand. Now you jest fetch yore hoss, Paw, and let’s us jest git on back home.”

  “Don’t ye be a-bossin me, Purdy Rivett!” Dolph will say. “You stop pointin that there arn at me, too! I’ll take ye to the woodshed! I’ll whale the tar outen ye! I’ll whop the soup outen ye!”

  “Naw, Paw,” Purdy will say, noisily cocking the hammer of his shooting iron, “I don’t reckon I’d stand for that neither. I’d as soon shoot ye, you dawg-stealer.”

  “I never stole no dawg, dammit,” Dolph will protest. “He’s a fambly dawg. Old Gloomy don’t belong to you, he sort of belongs to the whole fambly.”

  “Lak hell,” Purdy will say, and will spit. “The whole fambly never paid fer im, nor fed im nor trained im neither.”

  “Well sheeut,” Dolph will protest. “I never stole im nohow. I was just a-borryin him to help these good folks find that there boy lost. That’s a good cause, aint it? Besides, ole Gloomy aint been no good anyhow. You aint trained him right, maybe.”

  “I aint?” the youth will challenge, and then he will turn to the dog and will make a noise, “Fftt!” and then will command the dog, “Sic im, Old Gloom!” and will point at Dolph, and the dog will leap at Dolph, striking him a blow with his forepaws that will topple Dolph backwards into the dust, and then the dog will aim his fangs at Dolph’s face and will have bitten off his nose if Purdy will not have snapped “Hold!” in the nick of time, and then “Back!” and then “Sit!” and then to his father “See?”

  “Yeah, yeah, okay, yeah,” Dolph will say, getting up amidst the howling laughter of the spectators. “But, boy, you jest wait till I git you alone by yorse’f. I’ll settle your hash! I’ll mop up the hills with ye!”

  “You aint never gonna git me alone, Paw,” Purdy will return. “I aint gonna let ole Gloomy out a my sight again. You wouldn’t a got him offen me this mornin if I wudn’t out a doin your work fer ye. Me’n Duke are plum tard a doin yore work fer ye, Paw. So’s Maw. Now git on yore goddamn hoss, afore I sic ole Gloomy on ye again!”

  “You son, now you jest lissen a me…”

  “I’ll lissen on the way home, Paw. Git yore hoss, and git her now!”

  Dolph will mutter a string of profanities under his breath, then turn and look at the folks gathered around, and will say to them, “I don’t aim to ’low this kid the upper hand fer long. So any of you folks happen to see Latha Bourne, you jest tell her Dolph Rivett will be back again jest as soon as he straightens out his brash young uns.”

  Purdy will comment on that, “You aint never comin back over here to fool around any more, Paw. Not as long as me’n Duke are still alive.”

  And Purdy will be right. By whatever coercion or debate or plea that he and his brother and his mother will employ, Dolph Rivett will stay home and be a semblance at least of a dutiful father and husband, and will resume, at whatever great effort, the life he had led before Latha reminded him what a man is. He will never find the lost boy.

  [We should not miss him. We should feel as Latha will feel when somebody will happen to mention to her the circumstances of his forcible removal from Stay More by his own son—that he was, after all, for all his rampant virility, rather coarse, less than couth; Latha could never have married him, even if Every had never come.]

  So those two, the revenuer and Dolph, will be eliminated. Who else? Well, although they were never here at Stay More to begin with, Mandy and Vaughn Twichell will be eliminated, when they come. They will come, later in the week, and find that Sonora refuses to go. They will create a scene; they will attempt force, as Purdy Rivett had in removing his father, but they will not be armed, except with words, angry words, and these words will be successfully countered by Sonora, and Latha, and Every too, who will give them pure hell. They will make threats, which, however, will never be carried out.

  Sonora will not be eliminated. Upon graduation from Jasper High School, she will give her hand to John Henry Ingledew, although Every will not accede to her request that he momentarily re-enter the ministry long enough, just long enough to perform the ceremony. “No, honey,” he will say. “I guess if I was to do it, it wouldn’t somehow be official.”

  “But you did it for your own self and Mother,” she will point out. “Do you call that official?”

  “Back then,” he will explain, “I still had just enough of the preacher left in me; he hadn’t all got out; there was enough left over and I used up the last of it doing it. I spent the last and there wasn’t any more. But anyhow, I want to walk you down the aisle and give you away.”

  John Henry and his bride will have a large family, interrupted by the war, in which he will serve with distinction and come home a captain.

  After the war, they, like so many others, will move to California, and live for several years on John Henry’s high earnings as an electronics technician, but they, unlike so many others, will get homesick and come back, and John Henry will build a house on the side of Ingledew Mountain, and commute to Jasper, where he will service radios and will install the first television set in Newton County, and, eventually, all of the television sets in Newton County.

  But these will be eliminated: Gerald Coe, who will die a hero with the Marines at Iwo Jima in 1945, and have a bronze plaque in his memory in a hallway at Jasper High School; his brother Earl, who will die, some will say, of grief; and the survivor of the triplets, Burl, who will never come back from California.

  These also will never come back from California: Junior Duckworth and his brother Chester, Merle Kimber and the other W.P.A. boys who built the bridge (year by year the floods of Banty Creek will wash logs against the sides of that cement bridge, and to break the jam the cement crenellation of the sides of the bridge will be sledge-hammered away, so that eventually, when Stay More will become nearly a ghost town, only the roadway of the bridge will remain with one pier of the crenellation with its cem
ent stamped like a tombstone forever: “Built by W.P.A. 1939”). Forty-seven other Stay More residents will make a kind of Stay-More-in-exile colony in Fullerton and Anaheim, California, and never come back.

  Many people will simply grow old and die, without issue, or with their issue scattered. Doc Swain and Doc Plowright will die; Luther Chism will die; all of the brothers Ingledew will die, first E.H., then Odell, then Bevis, then Stanfield, and finally Tull will die—but he will live the longest, spending out the days of his seventies loafing at Every’s garage and chatting with Every while Every repairs cars and trucks, but the day the “Dill’s Gas and Service” sign is taken down for lack of business and because Every is working then for the Ford agency in Jasper, Tull will silently expire, sitting upright in an abandoned Ford pick-up behind Every’s shop, with, in his pocket, the very last installment of his share of the bank’s money that Every had finally managed to repay.

  The “Dill’s Gas and Service” sign will be the last to go; before, sometimes long before, these signs will go: “U.S. Post Office,” “Stay More Public School,” “Ingledew’s General Store,” “Duckworth & Sons, Tomato Processing,” “Lawlor Coe, Blacksmith.” Every will train Lawlor to fix car engines, but will have to lay him off when business drops, and Lawlor will move to the city of Harrison.

  There will be no signs in Stay More.

  A traveler passing through will never know a town was there.

  If they will have found me, they will have made a day-long project out of it, for with the coming of sunrise I will have risen up off the ground and sought to find my way home, only to have been lost deeper and deeper into the woods. Of course, the daylong search will have kept Every from beginning his revival meeting, even if he will have wanted to, after Latha had so shaken his faith, not in God nor Christ but in his calling as a preacher. So there will have been no services. The whole town will have gone out to look for me.

  Sonora will have prepared and served a mass breakfast, serving it to the searchers from the front porch of Latha’s store, and later have acted as dispatcher at what Doc Swain will have referred to as “our rondy-voo point.” Doc Swain will have directed most of the search, although Oren Duckworth will have felt that he should have had this privilege.