The Man With the Barbed-Wire Fists

by Norman Partridge

  “If you’ve a mind to, you can go ahead and kiss her now,” the preacher said.

  Quincey bent low. His lips brushed hers, ever so gently. He caught a faint whiff of Mrs. Murphy’s soap, no trace of garlic at all.

  With some effort, he straightened. It seemed some time had passed, because the preacher was gone, and the evening sky was veined with blue-pink streaks.

  The piano player just sat there, his eyes closed tight, his hands fisted in his lap. “You can play it now,” Quincey said, and the man got right to it, fingers light and shaky on the keys, voice no more than a whisper:

  Come and sit by my side if you love me,

  Do not hasten to bid me adieu,

  But remember the Red River Valley,

  And the cowboy who loved you so true.

  Quincey listened to the words, holding Lucy’s hand, watching the night. The sky was going black now, blacker every second. There was no blood left in it at all.

  Just like you, you damn fool, he thought.

  He pulled his bowie from its sheath. Seward’s words rang in his ears: “One moment’s courage, and it is done.”

  But Seward hadn’t been talking to Quincey when he’d said those words. Those words were for Holmwood. And Quincey had heard them, but he’d been about ten steps short of doing something about them. If he hadn’t taken the time to discuss philosophy with Count Dracula, that might have been different. As it was, Holmwood had had plenty of time to use the stake, while Seward had done his business with a scalpel.

  For too many moments, Quincey had watched them, too stunned to move. But when he did move, there was no stopping him.

  He used the bowie, and he left Whitby that night.

  He ran out. He wasn’t proud of that. And all the time he was running, he’d thought, So much blood, all spilled for no good reason. Dracula, with the needs of a tick. Holmwood and Seward, who wanted to be masters or nothing at all.

  He ran out. Sure. But he came back. Because he knew that there was more to the blood, more than just the taking.

  One moment’s courage…

  Quincey stared down at the stake jammed through his beloved’s heart, the cold shaft spearing the blue-pink muscle that had thundered at the touch of his fingers. The bowie shook in his hand. The piano man sang:

  There never could be such a longing,

  In the heart of a poor cowboy’s breast,

  As dwells in this heart you are breaking,

  While I wait in my home in the West.

  Outside, the sky was black. Every square in the quilt. No moon tonight.

  Thunder rumbled, rattling the windows.

  Quincey put the bowie to his neck. Lightning flashed, and white spiderwebs of brightness danced on Lucy’s flesh. The shadows receded for the briefest moment, then flooded the parlor once more, and Quincey was lost in them. Lost in shadows he’d brought home from Whitby.

  One moment’s courage…

  He sliced his neck, praying that there was some red left in him. A thin line of blood welled from the wound, overflowing the spot where Lucy had branded him with eager kisses.

  He sagged against the box. Pressed his neck to her lips.

  He dropped the bowie. His hand closed around the stake.

  One moment’s courage …

  He tore the wooden shaft from her heart, and waited.

  Minutes passed. He closed his eyes. Buried his face in her dark hair. His hands were scorpions, scurrying everywhere, dancing to the music of her tender thighs.

  Her breast did not rise, did not fall. She did not breathe.

  She would never breathe again.

  But her lips parted. Her fangs gleamed. And she drank.

  Together, they welcomed the night.

  THE MAN WITH THE BARBED WIRE FISTS

  She said we should bring that stuff down to her shack by the creek cause we had to give her that stuff if she was gonna do what Jimmy Tibbs wanted her to do. And we didn’t know then that she was a witch so we brought that stuff down there. Us kids did. That was before the aqua duck when there was still a creek there. And Jimmy made me tote the big spool of barbed wire cause I was stronger than he was and cause I was a nigger and he said that niggers was like Ygor in the picture and did what they was told. He was littler than me but back then I figured he was right bout that Ygor stuff so I didn’t bellyache.

  That particular year it was a dusty summer. Hot and dry and miserable dusty. The creek bed was all buzzin with gnats and the rocks that was used to bein underwater was hot like little fryin pans and my socks was all itchy with brambles. And on top of that I was sick of the whole thing cause Jimmy had done had me runnin back and forth along that dry creek-bed with notes for the witch all week long. Anyhow, now everythin was settled and us kids was all finally gonna go and get turned into growed ups. Jimmy was way ahead of me cause all he was carryin was his daddy’s RCA radio and the plug cord draggin tween his legs was like Satan’s tail. Mary Hannah wasn’t too far behind Jimmy. The poke with lipsticks and powders she stoled from her daddy’s five-and-dime was scissored tween her arm and her chest and her cheeks was all shiny with lipstick in thick stripes like she was an Injun chief. And she was real eager to come with us fellas cause she said that since her daddy took sick he had to live upstairs all the time and her mama sometimes did that stuff with the truck drivers who brung goods to the store so she wanted to know how to do that stuff too cause now the truck drivers was startin to look at her sometimes too. And after Mary Hannah come Rusty and all he had was the keys to his daddy’s Ford but Rusty was lazy so he was slow and I knowed he was frettin on account of all the trouble he could get into bout them keys if his Daddy found out that he stoled them. And b’sides, he was sneezin on account of the dust from the itchy brambles us kids was kickin up.

  And Jimmy laughed, singin, “Sickly child, sickly child… ”

  I was last. The spool of wire was heavy and I was wearin gloves and two coats to keep from gettin scratched and I didn’t like to think what Pap was gonna do when he found out the barbed wire wasn’t in the barn no more like it was supposed to be. But Jimmy said to me, “Little Pete, your daddy is just a stupid nigger so he ain’t even gonna know it’s gone, and even if he does know it he’s gonna know better than to holler that someone stoled it, cause God knows where that kinda yellin gets a nigger round here, Little Pete.”

  Little Pete. That’s what they call me cause I’m hunched up like Ygor. But I wish they would call me like they did the little boy in the picture. Peter. That’s what Mama used to call me before she went off to the sportin life. And I wished I was like Peter in the picture too, all brave like nobody’s business and off huntin rhinocerasses and alligators and havin adventures bout the giant who stoled my storybook and that soldierman with the rubber arm who rescued me.

  But this wasn’t no adventure like that. Like I said, it was hot. Not cold and rainy and gloomy like in the picture. The witch’s shack was a teeny bit of a place out behind the big house and it was all leanin sideways and ready to fall over like the big house was too and like the houses in the picture. Jimmy said that she wrote him in a note that we had to meet her in that shack cause the big house was too grand for the likes of us little folks and little folks got to meet her in a little place. So we climbed up from the creek bed over the hot fryin pan rocks that was real smooth even though, like I said, there wasn’t no water in the creek. This was before the aqua duck, cause since we got that there is always water there and you can’t walk down that way no more and there ain’t even no stones in the bottom of it accordin to what people say and now there ain’t no grand house or even little house there no more, either, cause I guess them houses finally leaned over too far and just fell down and somebody hauled them away. But back then there was still a creek and two houses and when us kids come up through all that manzanita and then through the rusty barbed-wire fence what was all tangled-busted and needin fixin bad we was practically on the little porch which belonged to the shack. It was pretty rickety with a hol
e in the roof and I thought bout the picture and the hole in the labboratoree roof where Ygor pushed a boulder through and almost hit Jimmy.

  But it wasn’t Jimmy he almost hit it was the doctor in the two-tone coat. Jimmy said the man was Frankenstein’s son, like the picture’s called. I said that Peter was Frankenstein’s son but Jimmy just said I was stupid cause Peter was the grandson. But then when I asked him how come the picture wasn’t called Grandson of Frankenstein he couldn’t even give me a right answer. It’s the same way as when he tried to tell me that Ygor was the same fella as Dracula and that the Frankenstein Monster was really the Mummy.

  Anyway, “You bring it all?” was what the witch asked and Jimmy allowed how we had. “Boy, you better not be lyin,” was the next thing she said.

  “I ain’t lyin,” was what Jimmy said.

  Jimmy lied all the time, though. He always said we should go to the picture together but then he wouldn’t sit with me when we did go even though we went plenty of times cause it was the only picture they showed for weeks and weeks. He told me he was my friend plenty of times and then throwed rocks at me when he seen me walkin by myself while he was with Rusty and the other fellas. I knowed he did it cause I was a nigger and I was always gonna be small like Ygor, anyhow. Even though back then I used to pray it wouldn’t be so, specially when Jimmy and Rusty called me a nigger dwarf circus clown.

  And for sure Jimmy lied bout that stuff with Mary Hannah too, even though he said that he really didn’t hate her cause of what happened though after it happened he said she was just like the witch.

  “I had to say it,” was what he said bout that back when I was still talkin to him. “I had to make up that story bout us kids runnin into that barbed-wire fence that was covered up with weeds and manzanita. You don’t want folks to know what really happened out there, now do you, Little Pete? You don’t want that man comin after us, or talkin to your pap, do ya?”

  “No.”

  “Well that’s thinkin straight. Cause you and me know we got to keep that a secret tween us, just like Ygor and the Doctor kept their secret bout the Monster in the picture.”

  I didn’t say nothin to that even though I wanted to say that Ygor and the Doctor didn’t keep their secret too good. But I didn’t say it cause I knowed that Jimmy didn’t understand bout that witch and her barbed-wire man and it wouldn’t do no good to argue bout them if he didn’t even understand bout Ygor and the Doctor.

  Anyhow, us kids was in the shack with the witch and Rusty was still coughin and snifflin because of the itchy dusty brambles and the witch asked, “He ain’t got TB, does he?” and Jimmy just laughed and said bout the brambles. So she forgot bout that and then she started lookin over our stuff, checkin the tubes in Jimmy’s daddy’s radio and twistin up Mary Hannah’s stoled lipsticks to make sure them lipsticks wasn’t empty Next she got hold of Rusty’s belt and pulled him up close right tween her legs with her red dress all wrinklin up round him. “These keys go to a car now, don’t they, little man?”

  Rusty nodded quick and she just laughed and laughed with her rosy lips a big circle and then a big man stepped out of the shadows and he was laughin too. He looked like a nigger but he looked just like the Monster too — I mean to tell you he looked like Frankenstein but Jimmy always said that ain’t right cause the Doctor is the one who’s Frankenstein and the Monster ain’t got a name at’all cause he’s dead and nobody gives a name to things that is dead— and the Monster Man was grinnin at the way the witch had a hold of Rusty’s belt and the way he was squirmin. And then he stepped up to us kids and said over his shoulder “Hey now Viletta this un ain’t even no boy” while he ran a big thumb over Mary Hannah’s war paint.

  Jimmy piped up, “She’s as good as a fella. She does everything that us fellas do.”

  The Monster Man just laughed some more when he heard that. Real hearty, he laughed. He pulled Mary Hannah toward him by her overalls and then commenced to smearin her war paint into two rosy circles.

  “No,” I said, and I grabbed hold of his arm just like Ygor did in the picture and it was a hard arm like a fence post. “She’s my friend and you ain’t gonna make her a circus clown.”

  He looked at me sort of puzzled and then he made questionin eyes at the witch and shrugged his big shoulders. She said, “Leave the little gal be. When I was young I used to like to run with the fellas too.” She winked. “And you see how good I turned out.”

  He allowed how she had turned out pretty good. She said that as everythin seemed right we might as well get down to brass tacks and me and him should run along and might as well take the radio up to the big house and enjoy it for a spell. And then later we could come back cause she didn’t spect Jimmy or Rusty to last very long and then it would be my turn since I didn’t bring nothin that was so grand as a radio or keys to a car, but I already done that thing that Jimmy and Rusty wanted to do anyway even though they didn’t know bout it so I didn’t mind even though I still didn’t feel growed up like a man. But still I couldn’t figure out why the witch said that bout comin back since she knowed I already done it cause I done it with her.

  Anyway, the Monster Man said okay and bent down and the witch kissed him with them rosy lips of hers and even her tongue. Later on Jimmy said that was the worst part of it. Seeing that a white woman was in love with a nigger. I said that maybe the Monster Man wasn’t really a nigger cause his skin just happen to be black like the Monster’s skin just happen to be green (you can tell that from the poster at the picture show). Maybe he was part nigger and part Monster, I said. Like Ygor was part Dracula and the Monster was part the Mummy. But Jimmy just wrinkled his nose at that and said, “jumpin Jesus Christ, Little Pete, that fella wasn’t nothin but a big dumb buck nigger. Next you’ll be tellin me that you seen a coupla bolts stickin out of that dumb coon’s neck.”

  But he didn’t have no bolts. And since I knowed that from then on I knowed that Jimmy Tibbs was a pretty stupid fella. I told him so right then, and I told him there wasn’t nothin bad bout bein a nigger cause I knowed after what happened at that witch’s place that Jimmy was deep-down scared of niggers. And that was the last time I wasted my time talkin to Jimmy Tibbs who thought he was a big man right then but sure enough found out he wasn’t as the years went by.

  So back we went into the heat. Me and the Monster Man. He was takin long strides and it was hard for me to keep up cause I could hardly see over the radio and I almost tripped in a coupla postholes that was by the front steps. He said “Just watch it now” and I did while I hopped round them holes and them holes was wet at the bottom and the ground down there was black-red like an old sore that ain’t healed over after a long time and them holes was crawlin with worms and all of a sudden I didn’t want to look at them holes no more cause they stunk and they made me think of what that boilin pit must have smelled like in the picture cause it was full of sulphur. So we got up to the porch of the big house and there was a big patch of shade up there so I set down my burden in the middle of it. We both happened to wipe our brow at the same time and that made the Monster Man chuckle. “Hey shortcake,” he said, “how bout some lemonade fore we go back?”

  I allowed how I’d like that. So he got us some and I seen that his was a touch darker than mine and I was gonna trouble him bout it but before I could he asked, “What’s wrong with you, anyhow?”

  “I can’t say as I know,” I said soundin kinda puzzled and quiet like Pap always does when folks ask him bout me. “I was just born this way.”

  “Uh-huh,” he says. “I heard bout stuff like that. Your ma took a bad scare while she was carryin you, I spect.”

  I didn’t say nothin cause I didn’t know bout that. Maybe it had somethin to do with the lightnin was what I thought that summer, cause I recollect in the picture where Ygor said the Monster’s mother was the lightnin. And I wanted to know if the big man was the Monster and knowed bout that, so I asked him straight out. “Naw,” he said. “I seen that picture too. That man ain’t really big, like
me. He ain’t really a monster. He’s wearin elevator shoes and a jacket stuff full with pillows. That Frankenstein is a scrawny little white man, just like everybody else in that picture. It ain’t nothin but make-believe.”

  I was gonna tell him bout the difference tween Frankenstein the Doctor and the Frankenstein Monster but I didn’t want to get him riled. So I just asked him what his name was and he jingled Rusty’s daddy’s keys in front of my face and said, “Today my name is Jesse James, shortcake, but you can call me Jess.”

  “Okay, Jess,” I said. And then he asked me what they call me and I said “Peter” cause I like that boy in the picture. His name is Peter and he wears sailor suits and hunts all manner of stuff. And when he gets in a fix someone comes right quick and helps him out of it like the soldierman with the rubber arm helped him and his daddy helped him too.

  I took to lookin at them postholes while I drank my lemonade, waitin to see if a worm dared to poke its head out in the sun and what Jess would do to a worm that dared. But that didn’t happen. Nothin happened ceptin Jess drank some more lemonade and patted the top of the RCA. He said, “I sure am sold on radios, yes sir.”

  “Me too,” I said. “And this radio is awful grand. I wish my Pap had one like it. I bet Amos and Andy sounds awful grand on a radio like this one.”

  Jess wrinkled up his nose. “That’s just a couple of white men on that show, Peter,” he said. “You know, the only kinda white folks you should mix with is the ladies.” And then Jess seen Jimmy come out of the shack all puffed up like a rooster and he patted the radio once more and chuckled in a way that made me know he thought that RCA was awful grand too. “Hey now, Peter, you come and watch how to mix with white folks.”

  Jess drank down his lemonade in one big gulp then stepped off the porch and dust puffed up all round his boot just like a bomb goin off in a war picture. My, he was big and his stride was long. Long as the space tween them postholes with the scabby dirt and worms, which was a good bit long. “Hey, boy,” he hollered to Jimmy. ‘You come here.”