Luke and Albert tried to keep the fire torched, but the wood they’d gathered was damp and gave off more smoke than flame. Drew was too drunk to help. He laughed at the other boys. “No more beer for you if you can’t get that fire going,” he said.
Lewis Champeaux approached the dismal blaze. He pulled smoldering sticks off with his bare hands and rebuilt the stack, breathing on embers, fanning the first flames with his long fingers. He never took his eyes off those flames, as if turning away would be betrayal, as if the fire would know and flicker out.
Soon the fire roared, and Lewis sat back, satisfied and warm. But Drew’s two friends didn’t like being shown up by a skinny black-haired boy.
“Just an Indian,” one muttered.
“Only good for one thing.”
“Who asked you here, anyway?”
They poked at his shoulders.
“Speak up, boy.”
“Somebody cut out your tongue?”
A knife flashed, glinting with firelight in Albert Cornett’s hand. Albert’s face was wide and flat, his eyes unusually small, squinty little pig eyes. He looked like a moron when he grinned, a boy born with half a brain. “Somebody will,” he said.
“Keg’s empty,” said Drew.
“Goddamned Indian drank all our beer,” Albert said, slashing the air.
I couldn’t move. I should have yelled Albert’s name to remind him who he was, but I sat, pretending nothing bad was going to happen. I prayed for faith. I told myself God would protect us all if only I could believe.
“Stand up, boy.”
“You hear me?”
“That’s more like it.”
In a minute they’d stop. They’d laugh and slap Lewis on the back. “No harm done,” they’d say. I kept praying. God would save us if my trust in Him was pure enough.
“Give me your belt,” Luke Stallard said. The fire lit his face. His cheeks were pocked with acne scars, and his big nose made him look like a mad wood rat.
“Mind the man,” said Albert.
“Faster, red boy. We don’t got all night.”
Drew Grosswilder propped himself against the empty keg. He was smiling, enjoying the show.
“That’s a nice boy,” said Albert.
“Now empty your pockets.”
“All of them.”
Lewis turned his pockets inside out. A few small coins and a key fell near the fire. He shook the cloth and seemed bewildered, surprised by his own poverty.
“Shit, he ain’t got nothin’,” said Luke.
“Unzip your pants.”
“Now.”
“You wanna die?” Albert said, waving the knife under Lewis’s nose.
“Unzip them.”
“Good boy.”
Any second now, I said to myself, any second this will all end.
Albert yanked the Indian’s pants down and Luke knocked him to the ground. Lewis scrambled in the dirt, his pants bunched around his ankles. I saw his bare ass, his smooth dark skin. The boys pulled him to his feet.
“Now scat,” Luke said.
He was shackled by his own pants.
“You heard the man.”
They knocked him down again. I thought this could go on all night, so I shouted and charged. Surely the noise would bring someone from the woods. But no one came. Luke Stallard grabbed my arm and flung me backward. I stumbled over my own feet and fell on my butt. “Mind your business,” he said. “Only thing worse than an Indian is an Indian lover.” Lewis rolled toward the trees. When he finally got free of his pants, he tried to grab them, but Albert heaved them out of reach. “Get the hell out of here,” he said.
It was too late for me to help Lewis. I stayed on the ground, minding my business, just as Luke said. The boys turned to face the fire, bored by their own game. They rubbed their hands up and down their thighs. Their faces glowed.
Lewis Champeaux stood in front of me, staring down at my head for just an instant. He was the only one to really look at me that night. He knew I’d seen everything. He knew I hadn’t done a damn thing to help him, not really. My cheeks burned, like the sticks that burst into flame under his gaze. I looked away and still felt his heat all around me. He darted into the trees. The half-naked boy disappeared and left me alone, not to burn but to shiver.
I inched backward to the edge of the woods, waiting a half hour or more for Drew and his friends to forget about the pants and leave them crumpled in the dirt. I gathered them up, a limp bundle, tucked them under my arm and ran, intent on finding Lewis Champeaux. He would see I was better than the rest. I could still redeem myself.
Stumbling in the dark, I climbed out of the gully and headed toward the edge of town, beyond the shambles of the west side, and then another mile to the foot of the hills where the Indians lived. The streets meandered aimlessly; billows of dust rose up with each footstep. There were no streetlights, only the stark glow of bulbs inside unpainted shacks and old trailers.
I’d have to knock on every door until I found Lewis. I was afraid. Anyone could see I didn’t belong here. These two-room huts were crowded with people: old women and babies, men without shirts standing at the windows, and girls taking baths, six or seven in a room.
They were the stragglers who passed through Willis, looking for work at the mill. Indians were lucky to get hired at all. Most times they got jobs sweeping up piles of woodchips at the end of the day, earning half a white man’s wages. In a month or two the constant hunger of too many children drove most families back to the reservation.
Once in a while an Indian was lucky enough to be hired to load the trucks. That pay was decent, but there were accidents: a winch left unsecured, a slipped knot, another man who didn’t pull his weight. Those Indians left too, crippled in one foot or not quite right in the head.
I’d never thought too much about it until tonight. These people left town before I knew their names or recognized their faces. So I never troubled myself with the circumstances of their rushed departures. Daddy said that as soon as a shack was empty, a new family moved into it. Squatters’ rights. “One Indian’s the same as another.” The only one who mattered was Red Elk. Everybody noticed him because he was fool enough to take up with a white woman, because he was bold enough to demand a real job at the mill. I thought about Red Elk all the time, wondering about his son and my sister, knowing how much my father hated him.
I walked the streets, snooping in windows, a ghost no one could see. I clutched Lewis Champeaux’s pants, my one chance to prove myself. He would be grateful. He’d take me in his house. His grandmother would put a fat, dark baby in my lap and I’d hold her close. His mother would kiss me.
Someone hissed from the bushes and I jumped, ready to flee. “Give me those,” he said, stepping out of the brush. I held out the pants and the boy snatched them. He put them on right in front of me. What did it matter what I saw now? “Where’s my belt?”
“I couldn’t find it.” I had forgotten the belt. I was too anxious to get on with my good deed to mind with details.
“Shit,” he said, “cost me three bucks.”
“I’ll go back.”
“Forget it.” He wasn’t grateful. He wasn’t going to ask me inside. “Get outa here,” he said.
Nothing was forgiven. I was a coward, but he knew that already, so I didn’t bother to confess.
It was a long walk home. I had plenty of time to think. My prayers were useless. Lewis Champeaux’s knees were scraped and his butt was bruised. I hadn’t helped him. I had waited too long, expecting God to intervene. I knew people who were brave but not good. Zack Holler had the courage to steal and the strength to fight. That kind of courage was worthless. But what did I have? I believed in the idea of virtue, yet I’d done nothing for Lewis Champeaux. I stood by while Luke Stallard knocked him in the dirt. Without bravery, all my acts would be like this one: puny and meaningless. Such kindness was just another kind of cruelty. My knife was as sharp as Albert Cornett’s and did more damage in the end. I reminded Lewis of his humiliation. I reminded him that his kind was not welcome here. I’d shown Lewis Champeaux what he must have always known: a white girl couldn’t be trusted.