“I’ll do whatever I can to help you,” Harville said. “But there won’t be any drawdown.”
Ellard went to the door and turned back. He drew breath to speak but couldn’t think what he wanted to say. Finally he opened the door and shut it behind him. By the time he got to the elevator he’d run out of steam. He walked out of the building into the street with his head down.
When Washburn called Ellard’s name he didn’t turn around. “Sheriff!” he called again. Ellard stopped at the car and saw Washburn coming down the wide steps toward him, past others on their way inside. “You can’t just leave,” the boy said, out of breath as he reached the curb.
Standing between the bleak buildings, the sun glaring off the vehicles motoring by, Ellard felt cornered. He had to look way up to see the sky. “No use wasting more time going over it.”
“Clarence Harville’s a decent person,” Washburn said, not sounding convinced himself.
“Right now I ain’t too worried about Clarence Harville one way or the other.”
“Will you come back in with me?”
“I told you, I’m done wasting time. He don’t care if that child’s alive or dead.”
“Well, I care,” Washburn said. “I mean to help you find her.”
Ellard looked Washburn in the face. “What if we don’t find her? Are you going to help me cuff Annie Clyde Dodson and drag her off of her farm? Like that man in there wants?”
Washburn averted his eyes. “I don’t know.”
“That’s right. You don’t know nothing. What do you think will happen down yonder?”
“I think we’re going to find the child and give her back to her mother.”
“Maybe. But she might be tied up dead in a barbwire fence. Or tangled up in a brush pile.”
Washburn paled but he didn’t respond.
“I’ve found them with their eyes eat out by the catfish, and I’ve found them without a mark on them, like they’re just asleep. That might be the worst. Are you ready to see that?”
“No,” Washburn said softly. “But I’ve seen a lot of good things done in Yuneetah over these last two years. If you’ll work with me, we might get one more good thing done.”
The boy sounded so young and chastened then that Ellard felt sorry for him. “I don’t want to argue with you, son,” he said. “We ought to get along if we mean to help the Dodsons.”
Washburn nodded. “If Harville won’t see reason, I’ll go over his head.”
Ellard opened the car door. “I got to get on back.”
“I’m behind you,” Washburn said.
Ellard didn’t know if the boy meant on the way to Yuneetah or something else. He felt alone either way as he got into his car. He dreaded the long trip back home. He had too much time to wonder what was waiting for him. Too much time to think about his exchange with Washburn. He already regretted what he’d said about Gracie. He didn’t know what had come over him. Ellard supposed he wanted to knock the boy down a peg, standing there on the curb in his polished shoes, looking so hopeful and sure of himself. Washburn was an idealist. He believed progress was the answer to everything. Ellard wished he saw it like Washburn did, but in his experience the state was motivated less by altruism and more by their own selfish pursuit of power. The boy needed to believe that Harville was a decent man, that the Tennessee Valley Authority was trying to save the people of Yuneetah. But Ellard had come to the conclusion after twenty years that there was no saving his people. Sometimes he thought they didn’t want to be saved. He’d had many rows with his neighbors on the porch of Joe Dixon’s. For all their common sense they’d rather starve than take what they called handouts. They voted Republican or Democrat according to what side their grandfathers had picked before they were born. They said there had always been a Depression going on around here. It was hard to get much poorer than they had been. But to Ellard it seemed foolish for any but the wealthy to back a man like Herbert Hoover, giving aid to banks and railroads and corporations instead of workingmen with families.
Regardless of what Washburn wanted Ellard to believe, Harville was no better than the politicians in Washington claiming it wasn’t their place to provide relief, passing the responsibility off to charities and churches. Ellard thought the government that got them into this mess ought to get them out of it. But he’d do what he could for the Dodsons, as he had done what he could for his own kin when the banks began to take their farms. His mother was from a place called Caney Fork, right outside of Whitehall County, and he had a first cousin there named Bill Harrell. A few years ago he’d stopped to see Bill on his way back from Clinchfield and found an auction sign at the end of the road up to his place. Before supper was over Ellard had decided to stay and see what he could do to help Bill keep his fifteen acres. They’d gone to the neighboring farmers, worried they might lose their own property. It wasn’t hard to talk them into organizing. Come the day of the auction men from all over Caney Fork converged on Bill’s land. Ellard watched from the chaff-floating shade of the barn with his revolver showing on his hip and a noose hanging from a nail over his head, letting strangers know they were unwelcome. The auctioneer stood on a wagon bed pouring sweat under the morning sun. But when he called for bids and the other Caney Fork farmers piped up with their offers, his face flamed from more than the heat. Every starting bid was a penny, for tracts of hardwood timber and tools alike. The bidding commenced at one cent for the house and closed at a quarter. Bill’s neighbors refused to bid over a nickel for anything, until the auctioneer gave up in disgust. By the end of the day Bill had bought back all that he owned for five dollars. Ellard knew a child was not a farm but the principle was the same. The ones that loved her would have to be the ones to try and save her.
Ellard had vowed long ago to treat the people of Yuneetah the same as he would his first cousin. They all felt like kin to him, especially Annie Clyde Dodson, since he’d grown up with her mother and her aunt. Now driving farther into the foothills he hoped he hadn’t made things worse for her by turning Clarence Harville against him. Once he was across the steel bridge the first splatters of rain hit Ellard’s windshield. By the time he reached Yuneetah it was falling in curtains across the hood. His tires spun on the way down the slope into town, churning in the ruts made by other vehicles passing or getting stuck that way while he was gone. As he drove through the square he saw two uniformed men standing on the courthouse steps, one lighting a cigarette behind his cupped palm. Deputies from Sevier County, not state police. He nodded to them but didn’t slow down. He meant to put off dealing with any more outsiders as long as he could. Aside from them the town square was empty of lawmen and searchers. They were likely using the Walker farm as their base of operations. Ellard headed that way, listening to the distant cries of the men and women spread out through the pines bordering the fields along the road before cranking up his window against the weather. He would see about the Dodsons, but Amos was his priority. He didn’t need the state police. Ellard knew the drifter and his habits better than they did anyway.
He had almost reached the farm when he saw Silver Ledford at the side of the road. She was coming down the bank across from the cornfield, her pale ankle flashing in the chicory as she stepped across the gully. Silver was unmistakable as anybody else. She possessed her own wild beauty, like bark and quartz rocks and flowering weeds. As she hurried ahead of the car Ellard sped up to pull alongside her. She glanced his way but kept walking in her liver-colored dress. He cranked the window back down, chill droplets splashing in on him. “Silver Ledford,” he called. She tucked her chin, pretending not to hear. He blasted the siren mounted on his front fender once and she stopped where she was, glowering as if he had slapped her. He reached across the seat and pushed open the passenger door for her. “Get in. I won’t keep you long.” She looked at him for another second before climbing inside. He turned off the engine, the downpour battering the roof. He closed up the window, the cornfield and the weedy bank blurring out of focus. “Why didn’t you go to Annie Clyde last night?” he asked. “I sent somebody after you.”