Copper Kettle

by Frederick Ramsay

  “Why? Well, for one reason, he didn’t have a blessed thing to do with shooting Solomon. At least there wasn’t no evidence he did. Second, I wanted to keep you all’s necks out of a noose. No matter what foolishness Anse might have told you, if you’d strung Jake up, you would go down for murder. That is, if the sheriff got wind of it. Do you realize that the folks down there in Floyd and them other towns think us up here on the mountain are not much better’n than a chicken hawk? They might go easy on one of their own, but us?…Us, they will hang every damned time whether we done the murder or not. And if the sheriff didn’t send you up, the Lebruns would have. You count your blessings I stopped the five of you, friend.”

  Sam’s brow furrowed into deep thought. The concept that there was a world other than the one he knew, and that it did not share his particular way of thinking and living, seemed to be entirely new to him and a notion he would have to turn over in his mind for a while before it sank in as real.

  “Also, Sam, unless you are happy with getting a thrashing from your Pa, I think you should get that mule of yours in hand and do some plowing.”

  Sam turned, not too steadily, and set off across the field toward the mule. It, in turn, sensing the end to its prolonged feed, started to move away. When Sam increased his pace, so did the mule. The last Jesse saw of the both of them, the mule was at a near gallop and the plow had broken free of its hitch and sat upside down in the grass. Sam had tripped over a hummock and sat cursing at the retreating animal. He believed about half of what Sam said. Jake Baker didn’t, couldn’t, have just come along like Sam said. He had to be on the wrong side of the mountain for a reason.

  Chapter Thirty-two

  Jesse parked the Model T down the road ten yards or so and in the shade of an old oak. He wanted to be in a position where he could watch the sawmill’s main gate but not be seen from the office. He hoped to catch Serena before anyone had a chance to tell her he was there. The whistle sounded and activity at the mill ground to a halt. Minutes later men carrying their lunch pails straggled through the gate. Ten minutes after that, R.G. walked over and waited until Serena slipped through and then he fastened a big brass padlock to it. He and Serena exchanged words which ended with her shaking her head. He boarded his new car and drove off. Serena headed for the road that led toward the east side of the mountain. Jesse hopped out, cranked the old Ford to life. He climbed in and overtook her before she could react to the fact he was there.

  “I can offer you a ride, Serena. Hop up.”

  “Are you sure, Jesse? We don’t seem to see eye-to-eye anymore.”

  “That’s not necessarily a bad thing, I think. Life might become a mite dull if there wasn’t no disagreements, don’t you know?”

  “That is your recipe for easy living? Fussing and fighting makes for a good fit?”

  “That is not exactly what I am saying. I meant that good decisions come when they are hashed out first. ’Course, there has to be some respect in there on both sides.”

  “I will accept that for now, but I keep hold of my right to disagree with it at any time I want to in the future. In my experience, men don’t always play fair when it comes to discussing a thing or two.”

  “If you say so.”

  “I do say so.”

  Serena clambered up into the seat beside Jesse, putting her hand on her hat expecting it to be blown off by the speed the car would achieve. She needn’t have bothered. They were headed uphill and the twenty-horsepower engine with its gravity-fed fuel tank under the seat meant that Jesse might have to back it up if the fuel level happened to be too low. Either way, there wouldn’t be enough wind in her face to tilt a daisy. As it happened, he’d filled the tank the day he was sent home and except for a run down to Floyd, he’d not used much gasoline. In a pinch, he had a gallon he kept as a spare strapped to the running board just in case. He could always dump it in. He thought at the time it would have been nice if Mister Ford had included a gauge of some sort that would tell him if he needed to fill up the tank. A dip stick was just fine if you weren’t moving, but not of much use otherwise. He eased the clutch in. The motor coughed, caught, and they putted away. The grade was steep, but with some expert gear shifting, Jesse managed to take the car up.

  Jesse had to raise his voice to be heard over the motor.

  “Serena, there’s a thing or two I can’t get straight in my head and I need to ask you some questions.”

  “Questions for me? Ask away.”

  “What does Jake do?”

  “Jake, my brother, Jake? You want to know what he does? Why is that important?”

  “Well, yeah. It ain’t clear to me. Does he have a job somewhere like you do? I saw your field and it ain’t plowed or showing a crop, which tells me he ain’t doing no farming. You all have a nice vegetable patch, but it is surrounded with flowers which makes me think you’re the one tending it. So, that leaves me wondering what he does with himself all day.”

  “They are marigold flowers and as everybody, except maybe you know they keep the rabbits out.”

  “I do know that. That’s not my point. I think the vegetable garden is yours, not Jake’s, to plant and keep hoed. So, what does he do?”

  “Why do you need to know?”

  “Come on, Serena, don’t get all mulish on me here. Jake like to got himself hanged back last week. One of the boys who was part of that told me Jake just wandered in on them. It was late evening. He was over on the McAdoo side. I just wondered how come he was there. It ain’t natural. I figured it must have something to do with what he does, that’s all.”

  “He hires out, Jesse. He picks up some money here and there working for farmers down in the valley. Before you ask, I can’t say why he was over on the wrong side of the mountain after dark.”

  “Can’t or won’t?”

  “Don’t press me on this, Jesse. He’s my brother. He’s kin. You know about kinfolk better’n I do. Please let it go.”

  “Well, here’s my problem with that. The boy who told me about Jake being over on the west side is not exactly deep in the brain department, if you know what I mean. The fact is, he don’t have the brains of a dead possum. When he lies, everybody ’cept a newborn baby will know it. That being the case, the likelihood he’d made something up is pretty slim. He said Jake rode over on his horse big as life. He was purposeful, if you follow. His being there wasn’t no chance thing. I just want to know why, is all.”

  “Jesse, you can put me down on the road right this very minute, you hear?”

  “I aim to see you all the way home, Serena. If me asking questions is too much, I will stop. Only thing is, on Saturday, unless I get me some answers to some important questions, I will have to fight with John Henry Lebrun. Before that happens, I aim to have a chat. Jake and his near-lynching has got to come up. That could lead to some difficulties for him, maybe worse. No matter what happens there, nobody wins, everybody loses. That is an iron-clad guarantee.”

  Serena sat staring straight ahead and not saying a word as the little car chuffed its way upward. Jesse pulled into her yard and braked to a halt. They both sat stock still not looking at one another. Jesse turned toward her. She faced him.

  “He poaches, Jesse.”

  “He what? There ain’t no laws about hunting here. At least there’s none anybody cares about.”

  “Not rabbits or deer, he poaches whiskey.”

  “Whiskey?”

  “He slips into other folks whiskey stills, mostly at night, but sometimes in the daytime, if he’s in need of cash money, which is mostly all the time, and poaches a jug or two. He figures people won’t notice if he doesn’t get too greedy. There are times when he might have anywhere from a couple of quarts to two, maybe even three gallons in a night’s work.”

  “And then he sells it along?”

  Serena nodded. “I’m sorry, Jesse, he’s my brother, you know?”


  “So that evening, he was over on the west side looking for a still to poach. Wait, how’d he know where to look? Somebody musta steered him. Damn…sorry…that there is dangerous, Serena. Lord love a duck, why don’t you haul him down to the sawmill and put him to honest work?”

  “I tried, I really did. See, he’s a little short on gumption, I guess. He’ll take the easy dollar every time.”

  “I am truly sorry to hear that. Is there anything I can do to help, talk to him, anything?”

  Serena looked at Jesse, her expression as serious as death itself. Then she leaned forward and kissed him square on the lips. Before he could react, she jumped down off of the car and tripped her way across the dirt yard.

  “Get off this mountain, Jesse Sutherlin, get off right now. You are too nice a person to get yourself killed over nothing.”

  The door of her cabin slapped shut and she was gone. A bewildered Jesse sat in his rocking Model T. The motor had started to miss. He adjusted the spark, eased the clutch, and wheeled back on the road. What had just happened?

  By the time he drove the five miles of rutted road back to his own house he knew two important things he did not know before. If Solomon had caught Jake Barker poaching Big Tom’s still, Jake could very well be the man who shot him. Anybody, not just a Lebrun, caught doing that would be dropped in his tracks with no questions asked, and Jake would not want to be caught. It was an idea Jesse did not want to think about.

  The second thing shouldn’t have been more important to him, but it was. Serena had, by God, kissed him. She must have moved closer than she’d let on. That night, it would be images her that occupied his thoughts and kept him awake, not who killed whom and what might happen Saturday at noon.

  Chapter Thirty-three

  Sometime back, Jesse recalled—was it really only a week?—he’d told his mother that the dark could be a time to do good as well as do bad things. Now he would find out. Something, he couldn’t say what, seemed to be calling him out. He waited until the sun set and the twilight extinguished. He kissed his mother’s head and looked in on Abel. There’d been no change in his brother’s condition yet. Addie said she thought she saw his eyes flicker, but Jesse figured that it was more wishful thinking on her part than real. He didn’t say so. Sometimes people need hope more than they need facts. This was one of those times.

  He stepped into a near moonless night. He had no immediate purpose or plan. His instincts, developed in hunting and sharpened in the war, urged him to be out and away. Somewhere in that inky night someone had something to tell him. He headed toward Big Tom’s house, his ears tuned tight to the night sounds. He was on patrol again and an enemy soldier, a German, might be anywhere nearby. He caught himself crouching, as if he really were in No Man’s Land. He smiled at his foolishness and kept moving, as quietly as a forest floor carpeted with new fallen leaves would allow. He checked his bearings and realized he’d strayed off course and Big Tom’s was way off to his left. He was about to correct his line of march when he heard voices. He froze. People were talking, more like arguing in forced whispers. It went back and forth, the whispers turned to low murmurs. One of them sounded desperate. Straight ahead. He wished he could make out words. He strained to listen. If he wanted to know what was being argued about, he’d have to move closer. If he did that, he might be discovered. He took a step. Another. Slowly, slowly. So far, so good, one step at a time. Step, pause. Step, pause. He’d moved maybe five feet when a muffled shot rang out and someone ahead of him yelped in pain. Another, louder report and that followed by the sound of feet crashing through the brush and away.

  Jesse moved toward where he thought the sounds had originated. He stumbled over what he thought must be a fallen tree limb, but which turned out to be a man’s leg. He lit a strike anywhere. In the flare, he saw Tommy McAdoo, Little Tom. The boy sprawled on his back. He’d been shot once in the belly and once between the eyes. Jesse stood upright. What to do? Here he was standing over the dead body of his second cousin. What would folks think? Someone had argued with Little Tom. They’d disagreed and that other person shot him once low, like maybe he had the gun hidden in his pocket, and then he must have pulled it out and finished Tommy off with a bullet square in the middle of his forehead.

  Jesse turned in the direction of Big Tom’s. Had he heard the report? More than likely and he’d be wondering. Only coon hunters and night light deer hunters fired guns at night. If anyone were out with their coon dogs, you’d know it. Coonhounds are a lot of things, but quiet isn’t one of them. Further, the only person in this part of the country who night lighted would be Tom himself. Jesse pulled his Army automatic and fired it three times. One shot, a pause, two more in quick succession. It was the signal arranged when searching for Abel. He hoped his grandfather would remember. He heard a commotion in that direction. He repeated the gunshots. That was six out of the pistol. He only had one left. He hadn’t brought the extra clip. Didn’t think he’d need it.

  “Hello out there. Who’s shooting?” Big Tom had remembered.

  “It’s me, Jesse. I need some help over here. Little Tom’s been shot.”

  “Is he hurt bad?”

  “I think he’s dead.”

  “Christ on a crutch, where you at?”

  Jesse pulled the bandanna off his neck and twisted it into the tightest roll he could manage. He tied it around a stick, lit it, and waved it back and forth. As a torch, it wouldn’t last long, but he figured long enough for Big Tom and whoever was with him to find their way on over.

  ***

  Four visibly shaken men stood around the lifeless body of Thomas Bale McAdoo, Big Tom’s grandson and namesake. They were Jesse, Big Tom, Wesley, and Frank McAdoo. Jesse wondered what these men were doing this time of night at Big Tom’s house but he daren’t ask. Not yet. Maybe his grandfather would tell him later. There’d been a huge commotion when they carried Little Tom in. Anse burst through the door of his room, out of breath and disheveled. Nobody much noticed him. Jesse did, but dismissed it. At that moment, Anse McAdoo and his splinted wrist was the last person on Earth he wanted to waste his time thinking about. They had another killing to deal with, another one of their own and a young man too close to the center of things. Anse started to say something about the Lebruns and Big Tom wheeled on him.

  “Anse McAdoo, you shut that trap of yours this very minute ’fore I put my foot in it.”

  “But this is just what I been saying, Grandpa. Lookit the facts. It’s gotta be them Lebruns. They—”

  Before he could finish his thought, Big Tom grabbed him by the collar and seat of his pants, picked him up, walked to the door, kicked it open, and tossed him out into the night. “Go home to your Momma, boy. You are as useless teats on a boar. Now git!”

  Frank McAdoo rocked back and forth on his heels, his whole body shaking. Little Tom was his youngest, the last born before Frank’s wife died. They said it was consumption and not the flu everybody else seemed to be dying from.

  “Well, thank the Lord his Ma didn’t have to see this. Who in the name of goodness done this?”

  “The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away…” Big Tom said.

  “Blessed be the name of the Lord.” They all mumbled in response.

  It was what they always said when death came too soon and took them by surprise. Jesse must have heard the words a hundred times. It was cold comfort.

  They laid Little Tom out on the bed recently vacated by Anse and sent for the undertaker.

  “No police,” Big Tom said. “This is something we will deal with our own selves. Jesse opened his mouth to say something, but Big Tom held up his hand. “Not now, Jesse. We all know how you feel. Trust me on this. No police.”

  Jesse frowned and then nodded his assent. There was something in Big Tom’s voice that said, ‘wait, be still,’ and…‘I know.’ On top of that, inviting the police in would break a centuries-old precedent of ignor
ing the Law. Mountain folks took care of their own. That might change. Jesse hoped so. The Lebruns had called in the sheriff when Albert was murdered, hadn’t they? Why, this one time, had the folks on the east side broken the unspoken tradition of avoiding the law? Or had they?

  Wesley left to tell the rest of the clan. News traveled fast on the mountain. No radio, no telegraph, just word of mouth. Neighbor to neighbor, kin to kin. There were days when Jesse thought it must be done by mental telepathy. He’d seen an old faker do an act in a tent show one summer. He’d bragged that he could read folks minds. It was all a trick, but it did make you think. Did the minds of close relations sometime communicate like that? From time to time it, for sure, seemed like it.

  After everything settled a bit, Big Tom motioned Jesse to join him on the porch. They sat in the dark and passed a jug.

  “What were you doing out there in the dark, Jesse?”

  “I don’t quite know, Grandpa. Searching for answers to questions I ain’t asked. I had a feeling, you could say. Not that there’d be a shooting, no, but that something was out there and I needed to go find it.”

  “It looks like you did.”

  “Maybe. I don’t know.”

  They sat in silence for a minute, passed the jug and Big Tom lit his pipe.

  “I spent an uncomfortable two hours with Garland Lebrun this afternoon, Jesse.”

  “That a fact? Why’d you do that?”

  “You said I should jump in and do my part unraveling this business, so I did.”

  “What did the Kaiser have to say?”

  “Who?”

  “Sorry, but sometimes what we are about up here on the mountain seems more like the war in France than the Blue Ridge, that’s all. On the mountain, you’d be the King of England and Garland Lebrun is Kaiser Bill.”