Kentucky Straight: Stories

by Chris Offutt

  Today’s kindly cool with the sky mason-jar blue, gray at the edges like a lid. Winter’ll close down hard soon. Bear and panther were all killed off in Grandpaw’s day. In mine, we cleared out the bobcat and coyote. My sons were left with snakes to kill. The hills are safe now but folks still leave. At night there’s not so many stars as used to be. Some might say I’m old and getting squirrely but they ain’t nobody living close by to judge myself against. I’m going to bed.

  Cody listened to the tape recorder humming in the silence. Night had spread across the land and into the house, and he could see the humped outline of Tar Cutler dead beneath the quilt. Cody ejected the cassette. He glanced again at Tar, expecting him to lean forward and grin at the prank. A mouse scurried along Tar’s stiffened arm.

  Drops of rain rustled leaves outside, thudding against the sheet metal roof. Water dripped through the ceiling and landed in a bucket, loud as a pistol shot. Cody stood sideways in the door, not wanting to look at the bed, afraid to turn his back on the corpse. Everything was wrong. He ran to the yard and placed the tape on an oak chopping block. A hickory-handled ax leaned against it.

  “The wicked shall be cut off in darkness,” Cody muttered.

  He raised the ax and brought it down hard, scattering shards of plastic. He chopped and chopped until his arms were weary and the noise of the ax died away in the drizzling rain. Thunder rumbled low along the hilltops. He lifted his chin, panting, the ax dangling from his hand. He’d never felt so full of God’s glory.

  A breeze brought Tar’s smell from the open door. Cody covered his nose. If he waited in the house while the storm passed, the low pressure and humidity would make the smell unbearable. He hurried along the dark path, his flashlight a dull gleam against the woods.

  Halfway out the ridge, lightning hit a tree above his head. After a few seconds the lightning shot from the ground in front of him, having followed the tree to a root and struck a buried rock. Cody dropped the ax and began running down the steep hill. Branches tore at his face and he fell, tumbling in the dark. The flashlight shattered. He crawled to a hickory and crouched in its shelter.

  Lightning cracked again, and in the sudden light Cody thought he saw movement in the woods. When the next quick flash came, he realized he’d gone down the back side of the hill and was hiding in the shadow of Shawnee Rock. He shivered, jaw tight. He pulled the small red Bible from his pocket and opened it. Rain began dissolving the glue that bound the pages to the spine. Wet paper flew like tissue in the wind. Cody trembled on his knees, watching the pages vanish in the darkness.

  Wind and thunder bellowed above him. He curled his body around the tree trunk. The top was jerking wildly, and he could feel the roots pull from the earth. The ground was lifting beneath his body. A gust yanked the hickory from the soil, tipping Cody along the slope. He rolled onto his back and saw the heavy trunk falling toward him. A Bible page was plastered to the bark. Cody closed his eyes. He wished he had some whiskey and a gun.

  SMOKEHOUSE

  Fenton leaned against the icy wind that rushed up the hollow, trapped by the steep hillsides. He clamped his teeth, trying not to shiver. Blown snow lay like a shawl across his shoulders. His right molars were throbbing and he wondered if the gold bridge in his mouth contracted with the cold.

  The wind slid away, replaced by the eerie cry of a coyote. After the mines shut down and people left, the coyotes had begun coming home. There’d been several sightings and two shot dead last fall. Fenton had never seen one, though he’d heard they were scruffy wild dogs, not good for much. Wind followed him into the bam, swirling hay in tiny funnels, that slowly settled as he closed the heavy door. He sank his arm into a crib full of knobby feed corn so cold it crabbed his knuckles. Buried in a corner was a pint bottle and a rusted coffee can full of money.

  His wife forbade his keeping whiskey in the house since her Melungeon blood made her willful. Melungeons lived deepest in the hills, were the finest trackers and hunters. They were already there when the European settlers arrived. Melungeons weren’t black, white, or Indian, and they didn’t know where they’d come from.

  Fenton slipped the thick roll of money into his pocket. It was carefully garnered from autumn dealing at the Rocksalt Trade Day. He’d taken an ancient well pulley, claimed it an antique, and worked several swaps that included a wheelbarrow, two pistols, a VCR, fifteen railroad ties, a minibike with no seat, and a pair of billy goats. He’d turned it all to cash.

  Fenton moved into the night that was paled by snow, and took a shortcut through the woods to Catfish’s smokehouse. He’d made the trip hundreds of times, first as a kid, then as a young man, and now, he realized, as a man not quite old yet. Forty-four was a peculiar age. He didn’t receive the respect of age but was denied the excuses of youth. Mainly he was better at doing things he’d always done, such as walking to the smokehouse for a night of fun. Winters seemed colder now and he wondered if that was a sign of getting old. He’d ask Catfish.

  Dim light glowed through the tree line at the end of the ridge, then was gone. Someone had opened the smokehouse door. Fenton passed the rock chimney, all that remained of the old Gerald place, long since burned down. Instead of rebuilding. Catfish had moved into his in-laws’ house. Fenton tucked the bottle in the chimney’s hearth and walked to the smokehouse.

  He knocked twice, said his name, and the door opened. Snow skittered inside, disappearing in the heat. Catfish stood grinning, a big man with a beard that didn’t quite cover four scars on his right cheek. He’d smashed through a windshield at fifteen, but let people think he’d been cut by a knife. Fenton had spent more time with him than with his wife. They had mined together, hunted and fished year-round, and dragged each other home drunk in the old days. Catfish’s beard was four years long.

  “By God, boys,” Catfish said. “Fenton must’ve shot his wife for her to let him out.”

  The other men laughed. Fenton removed his coat and leaned over the stove, converted from a fifty-gallon drum. The faint smell of pork still lingered in the smokehouse air. As kids, he and Catfish had nailed cardboard to the rough, ax-hewn stud walls. Over that they’d glued Wishbook pages that were now peeling away. Fenton nodded to the men sitting around a table lit by a Coleman lantern.

  W. Power winked. He was a World War II veteran who raised hogs up Bobcat Hollow. He had been the square dance caller until TV reached the hills and people stayed home on Saturday nights. As oldest, he sat closest to the fire. Beside him slouched Connor. Once a month Connor went to Rocksalt with the purpose of going to jail. He’d been married and divorced three times, and now slept with other men’s wives. Connor’s features marked him pure Melungeon: high cheekbones, black hair, brown skin, and pale blue eyes. He was rat-tail skinny from eating diet pills.

  Fenton was surprised to see Duke hunched at the table, his head low to his shoulders like a dog. Tonight was the first time he’d sat in their game. Many years ago there’d been trouble in the coalfields and Duke was arrested for defending his brother. The law gave Duke a choice: join the army or go to jail. He put in twenty-five years, and returned with a Vietnamese wife and no children. Duke was the same age as Fenton, and he wondered if Duke felt old or young.

  “It’s time, boys,” Catfish said. “Dealer’s choice. No wild cards. All bets of property have got to go by the players in the pot. First jack deals. Any guff?”

  “Just one,” said Connor. “You ever catch that guy?”

  “Who?”

  “Guy that stole your razor.” He laughed until noticing that everyone was silent, then ducked his head and rubbed his hands rapidly together. “Cold as a well digger’s ass, ain’t it.”

  Fenton took the empty seat, two concrete blocks topped with a plank. Catfish flicked the cards face-up around the table. A jack showed at W.’s seat. He called seven-stud, and began to shuffle, his ancient, labor-thickened fingers awkward with the deck.

  With an ace showing, Connor led the betting. Fenton folded after three cards to avoid the
early enthusiasm that sent money across the table fast and loose. Duke peeked at his hole cards once and followed the deal with his eyes. Connor bet high, and Catfish and W. dropped out. Duke raised. After a minute of eyeballing, Connor called the raise.

  “You ain’t buying the first pot,” Connor said. He flipped a pair of aces. “I got two bullets coming your way.”

  “Three fours wired,” Duke said, showing his hand. “I never bluff on the last card.”

  He pulled the pile of greasy bills in front of him, no expression on his face. Connor slouched in the old maple chair and tucked a cigarette in the gap between his upper front teeth. When he talked, the cigarette didn’t move but his legs jittered from the diet pills.

  “Thought I had the pot and wound up sucking hind tit,” he said.

  “That’s the way it goes,” Duke said, “first your money then your clothes.”

  “Since I lost square, I’ll not say you got a smart mouth.”

  “Best not,” Duke said, his voice low. They stared at each other across the scarred table.

  “Next case,” Catfish said. “You two keep your panty hose on. I’d run you outside but it’s a blizzard coming on. We’ll be burning furniture soon.”

  He glanced at Fenton for help.

  “I reckon I got the best seat, then,” Fenton said. “Concrete don’t burn good.”

  W. stood and fed a split oak log into the stove.

  “I’ll take my shift now,” he said. “But it’s on you pups to keep me warm. The old woman’ll faint if I get carried home on a door. Happened to my uncle once.”

  “What?” Connor said.

  “He died.”

  “Just the one time?”

  W. cocked his head and skewered Connor with a stare.

  “If it weren’t for rheumatiz, arthritis, and outright pity for a tomcat, I’d black your eyes and send you home.”

  Everyone laughed and W. returned to the table, worn smooth at the edges from the combined hours of men’s hands. The steel stove cooled. Connor spat on it, and when it failed to ball up and dance, he stood to add more wood. He placed a hand on W.’s shoulder.

  “Stay rested, old man. Don’t want you wore out before we fight.”

  “Honey, you’d best pack a lunch,” W. said. “You’ll need your strength.”

  The faint smell of old smoked meat increased with the heat. They played steadily for a few hours, each man accommodating to the rhythm of the game: three shuffles, a cut, the whisper of cards and money. Fenton’s bridgework ached. One of the tiny struts had broken and he wiggled it with his tongue. His legs and feet felt frozen while his upper body sweated from the stove’s uneven warmth. He was down three hundred, coming in second again and again with cards too good to fold. He tightened his play, hoping the others wouldn’t notice and drive him out with raises he couldn’t afford.

  After losing a big pot to Duke, Connor stepped outside and returned with his face flushed by whiskey. Nobody drank inside. Three years ago Catfish had banned liquor after a scuffle that left a man shot in the forearm. Everyone dived to the floor except W. He insisted they play the hand before doctoring the wounded, and W. won with kings full. A day later someone shot the shooter’s chimney off his roof, following the old Melungeon code of warning. Vengeance escalated until a man was killed and then another in retaliation.

  Feeling responsible, Catfish shut down the game for six months. When he reopened, he barred guns and whiskey, and considered banning Melungeons. Fenton argued that Connor and W. claimed Melungeon blood and would take it the wrong way. Since Fenton’s wife was Melungeon, he’d have to follow the ban as well. Catfish relented. He understood that loyalty to his friend meant preventing Fenton from having to choose a side.

  Connor complained about bad luck and the weather. On his deal, the deck slipped from his hands.

  “Too greasy,” he said. “Where’s the flour poke?”

  Catfish handed him the bag he kept in a corner. Connor dumped the cards in, shook the bag, removed the deck, and dropped the cards again. Flour dappled the floor.

  “Too slick, now,” he said.

  “Let Catfish deal for you,” Fenton said.

  Connor shrugged and passed the deck. Wind carried the high yip of a coyote along the ridge. Fenton had heard they never attacked humans, but he didn’t trust any animal in the woods. He’d once strangled a coon that had chewed a hole in his tent on a fishing trip.

  “Door locked?” Connor said.

  Catfish nodded.

  “Don’t let that coyote spook you,” W. said.

  “Takes more than that.”

  “It should,” W. said. “A coyote is on the human side of dog. Most mutts, they’re to the dog side of a man.”

  Duke’s mouth pulled at the corners. “That’s the first good sense I heard since leaving Asia,” he said.

  Fenton glanced at Catfish to see if he understood.

  “Wood sure is handy for burning, ain’t it,” Catfish said. “Be a hard night without it.”

  Wood was a favored topic, with each man having a preference, depending on season and purpose. Fenton took a breath, intending to explain the virtues of pine, useless in a stove, but sure to draw furious opinion. Duke spoke first. “It’s not wood that burns.”

  Wind shivered the door, rattling the hinges. Stray snowflakes fluttered through a crack and specked the floor. Catfish began to shuffle.

  “Let’s throw out the log pile, then,” he said. “If wood don’t burn, we’ll get some elbow room in here. Place ain’t big enough to swing a cat in.”

  “Oxygen burns, not wood,” Duke said.

  Fenton frowned at the stove, which was flaking paint from the heat. He’d burned wood all his life and enjoyed watching a log’s collapse into fine gray ash.

  “Then Where’s the wood go?” he said.

  “Gets took hostage till the heat shows up,” Connor said. “To hear him tell it, I don’t reckon a hen lays eggs either.”

  “Not without a rooster,” Duke said. “And that’s what wood is. Oxygen is a hen and fire’s the egg.”

  His voice held a tone of finality that silenced the men. Fenton didn’t know if Duke was joking or presenting fact. Maybe he’d learned something in his years away, or maybe his sights were a little off.

  Connor kneaded his crotch with both hands.

  “If that’s true,” he said, “I got me a big old log needing a hen. I’ll bet twenty dollars against five I got the stoutest here.”

  The men grinned, shaking their heads. Connor leaned close to W.

  “I heard you owned a turkey neck, old man. Willing to put money on it?”

  W. rubbed the side of his nose. The red-veined tip hung nearly to his lip. Patches of white hair showed under his jaw where he’d missed while shaving.

  “It hibernates come winter. Catch me at the thaw if I’m still living.” He jerked his chin at Catfish. “Deal, son. I ain’t had a hand in ten years.”

  The men laughed and everyone anted but Duke, who stared across the table at Connor.

  “Maybe I got what you’re after,” Duke said. His head was tipped forward, mouth tight, eyes hard. He snapped a five-dollar bill between his hands. “I’ll take your bet.”

  Connor snatched a bill from his pile and set it to the side.

  “You first,” Connor said.

  “No. I called your bet.”

  Connor lifted his eyebrows to Catfish.

  “Way it is, Connor,” Catfish said. “It’s on you to show your hand.”

  Saliva clung to the corners of Connor’s mouth. He pushed his lower jaw left and scratched it, frowning. Fenton recognized the gesture from previous card games. Connor’s bluff had been called and he wanted to fold, but he’d proved himself so many times, he was stuck in the habit.

  A knot exploded in the stove, rattling the metal like buckshot. Connor scooted his chair away from the table, slowly stood and turned around. The back of his belt loosened and his jeans went slack. His right arm pumped twice. Fenton sucked the i
nside of his cheeks to stifle his laugh. Connor was cheating with a couple of strokes. Suddenly he spun back, his genitals swinging at the dusky edge of the lantern’s light.

  Duke’s hands lay across his eyes.

  “You win,” he said. “I fold.”

  “You never looked.” Connor’s face turned red as he quickly stuffed and zipped his pants. “I don’t know what to say about a man who makes a bet and don’t look at the cards.”

  Duke uncovered his eyes and gazed steadily at Connor.

  “Now I know how you play.”

  Wind rushed beneath the old smokehouse, carrying the smell of char up from cracks in the floor. Cigarette smoke rose to the high side of the slanted ceiling.

  “My dead uncle’s was bigger,” W. said.

  Connor spun his chair to straddle it backwards, legs splayed around the ladder back. His eyes were grim. Catfish dealt, naming the cards in a loud voice.

  “Hook to the Duke. Connor gets a nine. A queen for Fenton.” He flipped an ace to himself. “The doctor, always good to see.” He bet without looking at his hole cards. “Five in the dark.”

  Everyone called and Catfish moved the cards smoothly across the table.

  “Ten to the nine, straightening. Two diamonds for the Duke. Fenton gets a six.” Catfish gave himself a second ace. “Another doctor, got to bet ten on the clinic.”

  Fenton’s up cards matched his hole to give him two pair early. He raised the limit. Everyone called but W. “I got a hand like a foot,” he said, and turned his cards over.

  After the next round, Catfish bet twenty and Connor called. Fenton raised sixty-four dollars, knowing that unusual bets threw Connor out of kilter; he wasn’t so sure about Duke. Both men called and Catfish dropped out. The last up card didn’t help Fenton. Connor got an eight to give him four to a straight showing. Duke’s card was a fourth diamond. He passed the bet to Connor, who grinned as he counted a hundred into the pot. Fenton studied the cards. He’d need a full house to beat the straight and the flush. The pot was worth the bet, but his cards weren’t. Fenton sighed and pushed money to the center of the table. He was tired and ready to quit, and hoped it wasn’t because of age. Duke silently called the bet.