Lottie Mae could tell from the sounds behind her that Beeder Mackey had finished.
She turned around and said: “I be afraid it rain snakes.”
“Might,” said Beeder. “Wouldn’t surprise me whatever it was.” She pulled the covers tighter around her throat.
“I don’t know what to do,” said Lottie Mae.
“You know what to do,” said Beeder Mackey.
Lottie Mae looked out the window for a long moment, watching Brother Boy race madly about the yard, hot behind the screaming chickens.
Finally Lottie Mae said: “I misdoubt it.”
“Kill it,” said Beeder.
“Kill it?”
Beeder smiled her sly sweet smile. “The only way,” she said.
“I couldn’t kill nothing.”
The smile left Beeder’s face. “Then find a place to hide.”
“Ain’t no place to hide.”
“No place?” said Beeder. “No place at all?”
Lottie Mae said: “It be the onlyest thing I know. It ain’t no place to hide.”
“You in trouble,” said Beeder. “Bad trouble. It’s one thing I can tell you though. Can you shoot a gun?”
“Cain’t shoot no gun. Ain’t got no gun.”
“Knife?” asked Beeder Mackey.
“Razor,” said Lottie Mae.
Beeder said: “Don’t be without you razor.”
“I couldn’t kill it,” said Lottie Mae.
“Just in case you can, be handy to you razor.”
Lottie Mae took the tray and left. She came back shortly and got the slop jar. Beeder watched her carry it carefully out of the room. Directly she brought it back and slipped it under the bed. Neither of them looked at each other and nothing was said. The wild sound of the television filled the room. When Lottie Mae had finally gone Beeder lay very still and watched the little flickering screen where the Wedding Show Game was taking place. The woman wore a white bridal gown and the man at her side a dark suit. The man facing them had an open book in his hand. He was asking them questions. Every time they gave a right answer the audience screamed and another prize — a washer, a radio, a set of silver — was brought in to them.
Beeder lifted her head about an inch off the pillow and strained to hear over the Wedding Show Game, or rather to see if she could hear over the Wedding Show Game. A sound came to her that she thought was the sharp deep barking of the pit bulls or maybe it was the mechanical thumping of the electric treadmill on the other side of the wall in her father’s room. Whatever it was, it seemed something was coming over the sound of the television, so she got off the bed and turned the volume higher, filling her room with the joyous sound of the wedding couple who had just been pronounced man and wife.
Beeder lay back on the pillow, thinking how peaceful everything was, how peaceful she was even though they were always trying to trick her. How did they think they could trick her with poor silly Lottie Mae? But they never quit trying and never would quit. She knew that now. But the main thing was that she had found a place every bit as good as her mother’s. Sometimes she thought it might be better than her mother’s. But most times she did not.
***
Willard Miller had come by while Joe Lon was still sitting at the little white Formica table in the kitchen. Joe Lon was on about his tenth cup of black coffee, which had revved him up so he had brought out the whiskey and set it beside his cup. Elf was humming contentedly at the baby-smelling sink because after his fourth drink of whiskey he had told her the apron she was wearing was pretty and he wished she’d wear it more.
Willard came in and sat at the table with him and Elf asked if he was hungry and he said yes and Joe Lon said he was ready to eat something now himself so she cooked them both steak and eggs and biscuits. When she had it on the table she asked if she could use the pickup to go to the grocery store. Joe Lon said she could if she took the babies. “Of course I’m gone take them babies, Joe Lon, honey.” Willard watched the pickup pull away from the trailer and through a mouthful of blood-rare steak he jabbed at the window with his fork and said: “Great little woman,” said Willard.
Joe Lon slowly raised his eyes, which were about the color of the egg yolks in his plate and in a dispirited voice said, “You sumbitch.”
Willard laughed and wagged his thick blunt head, stopping only long enough to plunge another ragged chunk of beef into his mouth: “I seen Berenice too.” He stopped between words to chew and shift the meat with his tongue. “So I… goddam know … what you studying. Ain’t she turned into a world-beatin … piece of ass? I wonder if Hard Candy is gonna git super-star titties like Berenice gone off and done?” He winked. “Hard Candy’s already gradin out to a eighty-five.”
Joe Lon took an egg yolk into his mouth and followed it with a drink of whiskey. “You meet the fag debate player?”
“What?”
“Debate player,” Joe Lon said.
Willard smiled and sucked his teeth. “Yeah. Guy on the debate team. I met him. Sweet, ain’t he? Looks like a dirt track specialist to me.”
The whiskey had now put Joe Lon in a sour mood. At least he guessed it was the whiskey. He belched and regarded Willard. “How the hell you play debate anyhow?” Willard stopped smiling, looked first serious and then angry. “It’d make you sick just to see it, Joe Lon. They play it with a little rubber ring.”
“Rubber ring?” said Joe Lon, feeling an immediate bilious outrage start to pump from his heart.
“That’s what it’s played with,” said Willard. “These two guys wear little white slippers and …”
His voice loud with disbelief and shock, Joe Lon said, “White slippers.”
“Little pointy fuckers,” said Willard. “And they throw the rubber rings to each other and try to catch the rubber ring in their mouth.”
Joe Lon stood abruptly from the table. “Mouth?” he yelled. “Mouth!”
“Right’n the teeth,” Willard said.
Joe Lon lifted his palm, thick square fingers spread, and stared at it. “Berenice brought that sumbitch all the way to Mystic to shake my hand.”
“Looks like it,” said Willard.
“Goddam girl’s crazy.”
“As I remember,” said Willard, “she’s crazy when she left.”
Joe Lon wiped his plate good with a piece of bread. “I wonder what it is she wants?”
“Wouldn’t surprise me if it weren’t nothing more pressing than a good fucking.”
“She’s subject to git that,” said Joe Lon. “Hell, I’m apt to fuck Shep before it’s over.”
Beyond the window where they sat, through a haze of dust, campers and pickups roared by and children raced about screaming at one another. Lummy’s first cousin, RC, stood at the head of the dim road leading into the campsites, collecting ten dollars a vehicle. He’d grown up with Joe Lon and was going to a junior college over in Tifton. He kept good records, deposited the money in the bank, and never stole more than ten percent, which Joe Lon thought was fair. Besides, they just passed the cost on to the customer. “Daddy wants you and me to handle Tuffy Saturday night,” said Joe Lon.
“I never thought he’d come to that,” Willard said.