Chapter 7
(I)
Portafoy awoke just as the clock struck twelve. The indentured 60ish African-American butler opened his eyes in the dark, then heard—
clink
And then:
A loud and rather rowdy fart.
Oh my, Portafoy thought, eyes going wide as silver dollars. He’d worked here well over twenty years—in fact it had been Thibald Caudill himself who’d hired him. The old man had said to Portafoy’s face, “What I need, boy, is a loyal, hard-workin’, yazzah-boss buck to run my house fer me. You interested?” Well, Portafoy didn’t care for the boy or the buck references, or any of the other myriad racial jabs that sailed from the mouths of this white-trash-turned-rich family. (The little girl, ‘Becca, was by far the worst). But, hell—$500 per week? No way he’d turn that down. Nevertheless, for the entirety of his employ at the Caudill Mansion, Portafoy could recall not a single time when anyone had broken in.
clink
Then: another rumbustious fart.
And then: an unmistakably backwoods accent in the faintest whisper: “Fuck, Micky-Mack. Yer dang butt’s makin’ more noise’n a fuckin’ circus.”
“Shee-it, Unc. Cain’t help it. It’s all them beans I et. But…dang! This here’s a dandy house inside—”
“Shhh!”
Oh my…my, my, my, Portafoy thought, then quite shakily rose in his pajamas. There could be no doubt: intruders were present. He grabbed the small revolver in the nightstand, then picked up the phone to call 911.
No dailtone.
And his cellphone was downstairs.
Portafoy gathered all his courage, then slipped out of the room into the very dark hall. Pistol in the lead, he took two steps, then stopped.
More voices: “She ain’t here, Paw.”
“You shore?”
“Checked every room, shore as shit.”
The voices came from the landing, which was just out of view.
“The black fella’s asleep in the room on the end. But the master bedroom’s empty.”
“Lemme check. But, wait. What about the girl?”
“Oh, we got the girl. Micky-Mack just took her down the stairs…”
The girl, Portafoy thought with a pounding heart. ‘Becca. He could hear the floor creaking from none-too-discreet footsteps. Several moments passed, then the housebreakers returned to the landing and proceeded down the stairs.
Were they kidnaping ‘Becca? Portafoy felt sworn to protect the girl, little foul-mouthed racist redneck shit that she was. Be brave, he told himself. I might have to kill some men tonight…
Then, with resolution, he walked down the hall, turned toward the landing, and—
“Got’cha!”
A hand snapped out of the dark and snatched away Portafoy’s revolver.
Portafoy nearly lost consciousness.
A long-haired hillbilly in his ‘30s grinned in the subdued light. “Howdy. Ain’t no call ta be scairt.” He waved the gun in Portafoy’s face. “Come on down. We needs ta talk.”
Oh-oh-oh…what am I going to do? The manservant took unsteady steps down. The vast, luxurious downstairs stood dark but he could see the bright white lights of the kitchen blaring.
More sounds.
First, a crunching, then someone said “Ahhhhh,” in unison with a spattering sound. The long-haired man urged him in.
Even in the midst of this calamity, Portafoy was indignant. A younger hillbilly, with mussed blond hair, stood up on his tiptoes, urinating into the kitchen sink—a Kohler kitchen sink. “Sir! Please! There’s a toilet just down the hall!”
The boy looked over his shoulder and grinned. “Dang. Sorry, sir. Couldn’t wait, ya know?”
The crunching sound encroached; Portafoy reeled at the mammoth of a man who stepped forward, eating out of a bag of Gourmet Sweet Potato Chips. “Howdy, sir,” he greeted with mushed chips stuck between his bad teeth. “Terrible sorry ta barge in like this.” The man must’ve been six-four, husky but with wide shoulders and plenty of brawn. He wore a tattered wool coat, old boots, and a floppy leather hat that had probably seen better days decades ago. A great bushy gray-blond beard consumed the bottom half of his face.
“Can I…help you?” Portafoy asked absurdly.
“‘S’matter’a fact, ya can. We’se lookin’ fer Marshie Caudill.”
Robbers, no doubt, and then some. Portafoy did his best to assume the role of his authority in this house. “Mrs. Vinchetti is not available at the moment. She happens to be out of town.” A thought kindled. “I’d be happy to call her, that is if you’d kindly reconnect the phone line. Who shall I say is asking for her?”
The great man roared, while the other two cackled with him. “You gotta hail of a sense’a humor, sir! Naw, there’ll be no phone calls. But, shucks, that kind’a alters our plan.” He looked to the long-hair. “Guess the girl’ll have to do, son. Let’s have a look.”
“Micky-Mack?”
The brash blond man hitched up his zipper at the sink, deputed himself into the next room, then reappeared, pushing along a chubby teenaged girl with hair dyed bright as Kool-Aid Pink Lemonade and a long nightshirt that read HANNAH MONTANA! Her eyes looked more infuriated than afraid, even with her hands tied and some nylon stockings knotted through her mouth.
“‘Becca!” Portafoy exclaimed. “Are you all right?”
Her face reddened in rage as she gruffed something through the gag, but then the blond man who’d relieved himself in the sink took the gag off, and at once, in a tight, high-pitched backwoods accent, she bellowed, “Does it fuckin’ look like I’m all right, you stupid”—and she used the N-Word.
Silence closed over the room.
The large man’s brows shot up. “Young lady, lemme tell ya somethin’. Only the worst kind’a hill-trash use that there word. Decent folks don’t make no slurs regardless of a person’s race, their color, or even their creed.”
“Aw, fuck yew, ya big bearded hillbilly fuck!” the girl yelled. Inflamed eyes shot to the cocky blond man. “And this pervert was rubbing his crotch against me and feeling my tits!”
“Ain’t much ta feel, girlie, hate ta say.”
“Aw, fuck yew, ya stinky cracker! All’a yas!” Next, the eyes shot to the indentured family servant. “Portafoy! Shoot these pieces’a shit with your gun!”
Portafoy faltered. “Regrettably, Miss ‘Becca, this other gentlemen here took the gun away from me.”
The girl hurled more invectives, starting with “Why yew stupid”—and she used the N-Word. “Only the dumbest”—she used the N-Word—“in the world would let some redneck steal their gun! What fuckin’ good are ya? A house”—she used the N-Word—“who’s got his gun took away!”
The long-hair chuckled, arms crossed. “Some mouth on the little beast.”
“Shore is,” the big man said, “but we’ll’se see what we kin do ’bout that a right quick.”
The girl heaved and blared, “Yew-yew-yew—aw, fuck yew, you dog-dick! You hillbillies are so poor ya gotta eat the fuckin’ corncob after ya wipe yer dirty ass with it! When my stepfather hears about this, he’s gonna kill yew! He’s in the Maff-ee-ah—I know ’cos my Mama tolt me!—and he’ll throw all your redneck asses in a wood-chipper!”