Red Creek Waltz

by Gregory Kay

  “That’s just it! You’d rather go run around in the woods all day than spend time with me!”

  Her voice was rising, and it didn’t help matters that Joe Bob, still unseen behind her, had begun mimicking her, assuming an exaggerated version of her posture and silently mouthing her words.

  God, he’s going to get me in so much trouble!

  As he saw Jake heading for the counter to pay, Scott fought to keep his eyes on his fiancée, which made Joe Bob try all the harder for his attention.

  “But you're working today...”

  “It’s the principle of the thing,” she was explaining impatiently, “What if I need you for something?”

  Between the stress of sleep deprivation, and of dealing with Becky and her masculine shadow standing unseen behind her, Scott’s temper was finally beginning to fray, and suddenly it came blasting out in his voice.

  “What the hell are you gonna need me for? You’re working a double shift; you’re going to be stuck in here all day! I won’t even get a chance to see you!”

  Becky’s eyes widened and then narrowed with anger behind her glasses.

  Who the hell does he think he is to yell at me?

  “Don’t you cuss at me, Scott Donald!” she yelled, stabbing her finger under his nose and shaking it. “You’d rather go hang out with those two losers than spend time with me!”

  Joe Bob was pointing his finger and still silently mouthing along with her, but when he came to the word, ‘loser,’ he looked shocked. Then he pointed at Scott, and his lips silently pronounced, “She must be talking about you, you pussy-whipped bastard!” making sure to move his lips in an exaggerated fashion to be certain he was understood.

  Scott was becoming more and more frustrated, and he responded instinctively, defending his comrades.

  “Don't you talk about them that way! They’re not losers! They’re my friends!”

  His voice was growing louder too, and Becky, determined to top him, literally screamed back.

  “And I’m your fiancée! Which one is more important?”

  Before Scott could figure out just how to answer that one in a way he wouldn't end up paying dearly for later, Jake stepped up to Joe Bob with two full plastic bags on one arm, and carrying a large box in the other. Joe Bob’s eyes lit up when he saw it and he grinned savagely, snatching the container. Then their eyes turned to Scott, waiting to see how he was going to answer.

  Wilting under the conflicting gazes of all three of them, Scott fell back on whining.

  “Please, Becky...”

  Jake had seen enough, and nodded to Joe Bob, who nodded back, and Scott knew, whatever they were up to, it was going to go down now.

  Oh shit! What am I going to do?

  While he struggled with his indecision, Jake stepped forward, brushing Becky’s right shoulder as he moved around her. His voice was loud and friendly.

  “Hi, Becky, how’s it going?”

  Startled at the unexpected intrusion, she turned towards him, only to have Joe Bob bump her on the other side.

  “Hey, Becky! What’s happening?” Confused and thrown completely off track, she had just started to turn back when Joe Bob thrust the box he had taken from Jake into her arms. “Here; it sounds like you need these!”

  As Becky looked down in open-mouthed shock at the big box of extra-large maxi-pads she was suddenly holding, Scott’s friends grabbed him by each arm and hustled him toward the exit on the run.

  “Let’s go, boy!” Jake yelled, laughing. “It’s burning daylight!”

  The door was already closing behind them when Becky’s surprise finally evaporated and her anger caught up with her. Her face burning bright, bloody red, she threw the box in the floor and ran after them screaming at the top of her lungs.

  “Damn you, Joe Bob, you son of a bitch! Scott Donald, you get back here this minute!”

  The boys were already at the truck when Becky came charging out the double glass doors. Jake threw Scott’s rifle inside and Joe Bob shoved Scott in after it.

  “Get your ass in there, boy! Here she comes!”

  Jake jumped into the driver's seat and was turning the key by the time Joe Bob forced Scott into the middle by the expedient of scooting in beside him.

  “Scott! You get out of that truck right now! You hear me?” Her shrill voice cut like a knife through the cold, clear morning air. “You come here right now!”

  Jake jammed the shift into gear, and Joe Bob hung out the passenger side, waving the Playboy at Becky, it’s centerfold open and dangling its nude image like a matador’s cape before an angry bull.

  “Don’t worry, Becky!” he shouted with an exaggerated leer, just before he slammed and locked the door, “We’ll keep him entertained!”

  Angered even more at the sight, she picked up speed, and was less than ten feet from the truck when Jake rolled down his window.

  “Bye, Becky,” he said sweetly, “Have a nice day!”

  He popped the clutch and mashed the gas, and the truck peeled across the lot with the roar of the engine doing its best to match the squeal of burning rubber. They hit the road sliding sideways, and despite being painfully peppered with stray flecks of gravel, Becky actually chased them several yards down it in her rage, yelling, “Scott! Scott!” before they left her behind in the darkness and a cloud of tire smoke and exhaust fumes.

  Inside the cab, the two rescuers were howling with unrestrained laughter.

  “Oh shit!” Joe Bob gasped, doubling over. “That was too damned funny!”

  Jake wasn’t in much better shape, holding the wheel with one hand and his cramping stomach with the other.

  “Oh God Almighty! I’ve heard of people having hissy-fits before, but that the first time I’ve actually seen one! I thought she was going to jump right in the truck after him!”

  “She would have, if you hadn’t given it the gas!”

  “She damned near caught us anyway! Did you see her chasing the truck?”

  Joe Bob nodded jerkily as he rocked back and forth.

  “She chased it like a dog! She even barked at us! Didn’t you hear her? Scott-Scott-Scott!” He rapidly said the name, actually sounding very canine. “Scott-Scott-Scott!”

  Jake was doubled over so far his face was almost resting on the steering wheel.

  “Stop it, man! You’re gonna make me piss my pants!”

  Not quite ready yet, Joe Bob turned and barked in Scott’s ear.

  “Scott-Scott-Scott!”

  “Quit it, guys!” Scott demanded, wringing his hands, “It’s not funny!” Throwing his head back against the seat, he moaned, “Oh man, she’s gonna be mad!”

  “Gonna be?” Jake asked him. “I hate to break the news to you, partner, but I think she’s already mad.”

  Joe Bob grinned hugely, enjoying every second of it.

  “I don’t know if mad covers it. She looked downright pissed off to me!”

  “Oh, man...”

  “I think she stays that way as far as you’re concerned,” Jake told him. “Why in the hell do you put up with that shit?”

  “Because I love her.”

  Joe Bob turned his head away in disgust.

  “Oh God! I think I’m gonna puke!”

  Ignoring his dramatics, Jake went on, more soberly this time. “I got no doubt about that. The real question is, does she love you?”

  “Of course she does! You saw her back there; she doesn’t even want me out of her sight!”

  “That ain’t love, Scott; that’s obsession. It ain’t got nothing to do with love, but just plain ol’ want. Shoot, just ask Joe Bob there; he don’t know much about love, but he knows everything in the world there is to know about want.”

  Joe Bob shot Jake a dirty look before turning to his friend beside him.

  “Do you really want to go through the rest of your life like this, with her telling you where you can go and what you can do, every minute of the day?”

  “Becky’s worth it.”

  “Why?” J
ake asked.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, why? What the hell makes her worth being treated like a dog on a chain?”

  “Because I love her.”

  Joe Bob snorted and said, “We’re back to that again!” and Jake shook his head and looked away in disgust.

  “Because she’s beautiful!” Scott added, trying desperately to make them understand something he suddenly realized he didn’t understand himself.

  “Damn it, Scott,” Jake began, but Joe Bob cut him off, taking out his by now somewhat dilapidated magazine and opening it to a nude photo spread of a recently divorced celebrity.

  “Look here, Scott; see this? Take a good look. Now this is beautiful; just look at that ass. Becky don’t look nothing like this! To top it off, she’s a rich and famous movie star. And you know what? She’s divorced! As much money as she has and as good looking as she is, some guy out there still got sick and tired of putting up with her shit, and was man enough to walk away. That tell you anything?”

  “Hey, guys,” Scott said, clearly irritated, “I can run my own life without your help, okay?”

  Joe Bob shook his head.

  “Fine, whatever; go ahead and hand her your balls along with the knife to cut 'em off. We’re just trying to look out for you.”

  “I can look out for myself!”

  Jake looked at him meaningfully. “Sure you can. I’ll remember you said that when she sucks all the life right out of you!”

  Chapter 6

  Red Creek, West Virginia, 6 June, 1920

  “I'm telling you, the union is the working man's only salvation!”

  The graying, middle-aged man never stopped sawing at his fiddle; his eyes flicking briefly in the direction the two Yankee strangers sitting on the porch of his cabin beside him the only indication that he had heard. The waltz continued filling the air, and the corner of his mouth twitched in a half-grin.

  “Ol' Reverend Sykes might argue with you about that.”

  “Sykes is no real preacher!” the larger of the two, the one with dark hair, declared with some heat, his accent plainly revealing his Pennsylvania origins, “He's a company man, a suck-ass no different than the thugs Red Creek Coal hires to keep the workers down!”

  “You think I don't know that? Hell, I sit there in the pew every Sunday, and if that big-nosed, long-winded son of a bitch spent half the time talking about the Lord as he does bad-mouthing the union, this whole damned coal camp would be saved by now.” The grin spread to full width, showing his amusement. “Except for me, of course; he thinks I'm some kind of magician or something; the old fart even called me a witch once! Do you see any tits or pointy hats on me?” He laughed out loud.

  He didn't miss the smaller of the two's complexion paling a shade or two.

  “Why would he think that?”

  “Because he's superstitious; he knew my mama back when she was still alive. She was a witch, some said; at least, she could read the cards and the stars and tell you what was going to happen, and she could make medicines and charms out of herbs and such. Then, to top it off, I'm the seventh son of a seventh son, plus she taught me...a few things, so lots of folks are a little scared of me, which means they listen when I talk.

  The newcomer waved his hands in frustration; the union organizer talked so much with his hands, the fiddler was willing to bet he wouldn't be able to speak if he couldn't use them.

  “So what's the problem?”

  The musician nodded, the gesture passing over the heads of his fellow miners dancing with their wives and sweethearts in the dusty street in front of his cabin, and toward the company office.

  “There's the problem. The company is ready for us to try; those thugs you mentioned? They're everywhere; they've got this camp locked down tight.”

  “So you're just gonna take their shit?”

  The fiddler's eyes flicked toward him again, cold and hard as a blade, and the organizer belatedly realized he had just pushed things a little too far. From the anger in his look, the speaker was somewhat surprised the older man spoke instead of hacking him across the face with his fiddle bow.

  “If I was gonna take their shit, boy, I wouldn't be sittin' here jawin' with you now, would I?”

  “Sorry, I...”

  “Skip it; we ain't got much time. Red Creek Coal has eyes and ears everywhere, and if they don't already know you're here, they soon will, and then we're gonna have to cut this thing short...if you want to live.”

  The two union men swallowed hard, but he didn't give them time to say anything else before speaking again.

  “I'll spread the word, set up a meeting.”

  “How soon?”

  “Within a week. You all still staying over in Thurmond?”

  “Yeah, at the Dunn Glen. We'll be catching the next train that way.”

  “I'll send word. Now, you'd best...shit! Get the hell out of here, because here they come!”

  The two cast no more than a glance in the direction the fiddler was looking; that was all it took to see the waving gun muzzles sticking up above the half-a-dozen men coming down the dirt street on the run. Then they were on their feet and running themselves, toward the wooded mountainside in back of the cabin. Behind them, they heard their contact's voice shout, “Alright, boys, let's kick up the dust!” before switching to a fast, wild tune.

  Some of the dancers – the musician's daughters and the union-minded miners – had been briefed beforehand, and knew what to do. The gunmen suddenly found their progress retarded by dancing couples covering the width of the street, whose every move seemed designed to put them directly in the way. The advancing men pushed and shoved their way through, until one of them the fiddler recognized as Sid Roush, the biggest and worst of the bunch, slammed his shotgun butt into a miner's head and dropped him bleeding on the ground. The girl he had been dancing with – one of the fiddler's own daughters – promptly knelt beside the fallen man while the other dancers drew back, muttering darkly, and a few hands began easing into pockets or inside jackets, although nobody brought anything out...yet. Still, it was enough to make the rest of the guards slow their progress and level their guns, although, since they were in the middle of the crowd, none of them were sure which way to point them. Sid ignored them and strode up to the porch; from where he sat, the fiddle player could see a hunk of hair stuck to the shotgun stock, but he simply struck a last note before setting the instrument and its bow on the porch beside him.

  “Where are they?” Sid barked, and the miner cocked his head.

  “Where are who?”

  “Don't play dumb with me, old man. We know there were two of those Bolshevik union sons of bitches here.” The voice was a low, menacing growl, but it only got pursed lips and a shake of the head in return.

  “Don't know no Bolsheviks, I don't reckon, and ain't no union men allowed in Red Creek, last I heard. There were a couple of strangers here before you all came barging in, but I figured they were some of the new people from the second shift...least ways until they took off for the woods. I wonder if they were the ones you're looking for?” He laughed, leaned forward even as he twisted and casually pointed a finger toward the mountain. “If you hurry, maybe you can catch 'em.” They both knew that was unlikely with the head-start they had, even if he hadn't deliberately pointed at a direction forty-five degrees to the left of the one they'd actually gone.

  Looking into those defiant eyes and that smirk, Sid wanted to shoot him; he badly wanted to wipe that expression away with a point-blank blast of double-ought buckshot that would paint the whitewashed wall behind the man with blood and brains, right there in front of God and everybody...but that was the problem. Not the God part – Sid believed in nothing but himself – but the everybody part; there were way too many witnesses, even if he was on the side of the all-powerful company, and what really pissed him off was that damned fiddle scraper knew it just as much as he did….but there was one thing he could do.

  Sid's muscles had barely tensed
in preparation for knocking him out of his chair with his gun butt when his target pointed a finger at him and made a buzzing sound, and the mine guard suddenly felt like he had a hot coal on his ear.

  With a curse, he released one hand to swat at the pain, and another one promptly hit him in the back of the neck.

  “Careful there, Sid,” the miner said pleasantly before pointing over the guard's shoulder with his bow, “There's a wasp nest right there in the rafters behind you.” Tucking the fiddle back under his chin, he added, “I've been meaning to knock that thing down, but I haven't got around to it yet.”

  He began to play a jig while Sid did an involuntary dance as the insects swarmed him, stinging him repeatedly as he stumbled down the steps and into the street to the laughter of the miners and even some of the guards. It was only when he was well away from the cabin that the wasps returned to buzz in a small swarm protectively in front of the fiddler, who made a final scrape on his instrument.

  “Hell's fire, Sid, I didn't know you were light on your feet. You ought to come by next time we have a dance.”

  The best Sid could do at the moment was to turn on his heel and stride off with the mocking laughter ringing in his ears, clutching his shotgun in a white-knuckled fist and determinedly refusing to rub the painful stings. His only reassurance was those three little words, 'at the moment.' There would be another moment, and soon; Sid would make sure of that.

  Chapter 7

  Kathy Estep was humming along with the Beckley radio station as she went through her daily routine. The laundry was churning away in the washing machine and she was loading the last of the breakfast plates into the dishwasher. She smiled; thanks to Frank, she was a little late with her household chores, but it had been well worth it. She didn’t know how he managed it, but he always made her feel attractive and desirable after all these years.

  That, and he knows all those special, secret little things that just make me melt inside.