Bent Creek (5 page)

In the past twenty years, Grandpa Abe had buried his wife and eight of his children; leaving only him and Roy as the last of his generation of Rileys. In his whole life he had never been more than twenty-two miles from his home.  He said he would have gone further but that’s the spot where the mule died and it was a real long walk home. He lived alone and liked it. He made homemade corn liquor that he drank from a wooden jug he had whittled himself. He liked to play his fiddle and kick up his heels, but time was taking its toll on his old body and it killed his soul to have to ask anyone for help, especially some
one like Paul.

When Paul first came home from the army, he con
stantly complained about being sent home. Grandpa Abe’s only words to him were, “Git over it, Boy. Taint the end of the world.” It didn’t make Paul feel any better.

“What’s yer daddy up tah these days, Rachael,” Grandpa Abe asked, shoving another biscuit in his mouth.

“Same as every day. Jest sittin’ around doin’ nothin’.”

“Well, he better git off his sorry ass and git this place in order fer winter comes. Roof’s got a big hole in it and I don’t see no woodpile.”

Paul called through the open window. “I’m gonna go swimmin’ up at the quarry with some of boys. You want tah come, Rachael?”

Rachael ran her hand over the back of her neck, feeling the raw skin from the heat rash. “Maybe I kin come and jest soak mah feet. You finish off them biscuits, Grandpa. We’ll be back in an hour or so.”

“I’m goin’ too,” Jesse said. “May be the last time fer awhile. I got me a tempry job over at the sawmill.  They need extry halp fer a few weeks.”

“Well good fer you little brother.  Let’s go,” Paul said sarcastically. He reached under the porch and pulled out a small, brown bottle. He put it to his mouth and took a long drink and shoved it into his overall pocket.

“You kids be careful in that thar quarry,” Grandpa Abe yelled after them.

The quarry was full of the sound of laughter and water splashing as boys jumped off of the flat rock into the water. “Where’d all these people come from?” Rachael asked.

“Friends of Billy’s. They come down from Lynch with him. He done vited them up here tah swim.  See that girl over thar in that black suit,” Paul said, “That’s mah gal, Nancy. She and me have been doin’ it over thar in the woods fer about two weeks now. I got a good case of poison ivy on mah ass tah prove it.” He let out a loud whoop and jumped into the water.

Rachael watched as Paul swam over to the girl and splashed water on her. She let out a squeal and sat up, her breasts bulging out of her suit. She slid off the rock and joined him in the water, her arms wrapped around his neck.  Rachael turned her head; this was too much for her.  Climbing down to a lower ledge, Rachael stuck her legs into the water. She was worried about Paul. He had taken several drinks from the bottle before he threw it into the weeds.  It was Billy Tate who inter
rupted her thoughts. “Why ain’t you swimmin’ today, Rachael? The water feels right nice. You got yer monthly?”

“Fer gosh sakes, Billy, you don’t ask girls that! I jest don’t feel like gettin’ mah dress all wet.”

“Yer brother sure has been actin’ crazy like since he come home. I let him drive mah truck last week and he done almost wrecked it. Almost seems like he don’t care whether he lives or dies. Bein’ in no damn army wouldn’t mean that much tah  me.”

Billy no sooner had the words out of his mouth than Rachael heard Nancy screaming. She looked up to see Paul on the other side of the quarry climbing up the vine covered rocks. “
Oh, mah gosh, what is he doin’?” She cupped her hands around her mouth and called to him, but she knew he couldn’t hear her since all of the boys were clapping and laughing as Paul climbed higher and higher.  Finally reaching a sturdy branch, he put his arms around it, and then swung his legs over the top. Sitting on the branch he let out a whoop.  “So the army says I ain’t strong. Did ya’ll see that?  I’m stronger than most them assholes they got runnin’ around in uniforms. Skinny ass little soldiers with big guns. Watch this.” Paul put one foot on the branch and then the other. Holding on to the ledge, he teetered for a moment and then stood up. Everyone was silent.

Nancy had climbed up the bank and was now standing next to Rachael. She called o
ut to Paul. “You ain’t provin’ any-thin’ up thar, Paul. Now you git down fer you kill yerself.”

Without warning, Paul leaned forward and jumped feet first into the water. Several boys still swimming below him yelled out as his body plummeted pas
t them and disappeared under the surface. Rachael let out a gasp and covered her mouth to keep from screaming. How long would it take him tah surface, fifteen seconds, half a minute…surely not any longer than that. How deep did he go? The seconds were ticking by.  Where was he? Why wasn’t his head poppin’ up out of the water?  And then the scream escaped from her throat. “Paul, Paul, where are you?” She was in the water, swimming out to the middle, diving under the surface along with Jesse and a few other boys. Holding her breath as long as she could, she saw nothing but dark, dark water. Diving below the surface over and over until her lungs were burning like fire and her arms were too weak to hold her on the surface she felt her body sinking deeper into the quarry. Someone’s arms went around her waist and she struggled to free herself. “He’s done gone, Rachael.  I ain’t lettin’ you be next.” Jesse pulled her to shore.  She was too tired to resist.

The bank was lined with a row of somber boys and sob
bing girls and they stood looking into the now calm water as if Paul was going to miraculously appear from beneath the deep. As darkness set upon the quarry, the crowd disbursed leaving Rachael and Jesse to go home and tell their parents that Paul, their oldest son, would not be coming home.  Billie Tate put his arm around Nancy and said he would notify the sheriff as soon as he got back to town.

The sheriff called the State Offices and a team of divers was sent to look for Paul’s body. Two days later Rachael waited with her parents on the bank of the quarry as each diver descended into the depths only to return empty handed.  Pulling himself out of the water, one of the divers approached the Rileys.

“There’s a large outcropping of rocks on the far side that forms almost cavern-like crevasses. When Paul
jumped into the water he must have landed in one of those cracks in the rocks or he may have gotten tangled in the tree roots. I’m sorry we couldn’t find your son, but the water is too deep and too dark.”

Ida Mae collapsed into Roy’s arms and wailed. He could hardly hold her up as she flailed about screaming Paul’s name.

To honor Paul, a white cross was put in the cemetery next to Willie’s grave. Rachael sat down next to the cross.  She wondered what his last few minutes of life were like.  She wondered if he knew he was going to die as he struggled to free himself from his watery grave or is that what he had planned to do when he climbed onto the rocks.  She wondered if that was what he really wanted.

A ‘No trespassing’ sign was put up on the road leading to the quarry. No one really wanted to go there to swim any
way.

Chapter Seven

As the months passed, the leaves on the trees were beginning to wear their fall colors. The sound of the cicadas filled the air during the day and the evenings were becoming a slight bit cooler. It was September and the mine had still not opened. The town of Bent Creek had become desolate except for an occasional truck or wagon that came through to pick up the boards that were falling off the abandoned buildings.  They would be used for repair or firewood for the people who still tried to eke out a living until the mine reopened.

It wasn’t long until Mabry’s general store and the livery stable were the only stores left on the dusty street. One small section of Mabry’s was turned into the post office.  Each week when Joe Mabry, who was now the postal clerk, went to Lynch to pick up the mail, he would bring home a wagonload of sup
plies. He brought flour and sugar and salt and coffee and anything else he could afford that week.  He’d mark everything up a few cents and hope that someone would come in that week with enough money to buy a few staples and didn’t ask for credit. Most days he just sat around the pot bellied stove with a few other men who wandered into town to break the silence and loneliness in their own lives. Puffing on their corncob pipes they would still lament over the closing of the mine and contemplate their miserable future. On the days Joe Mabry made his trip to Lynch, Rachael would watch the store in case someone came in to pickup mail or buy something.  Joe paid her twenty-five cents and a half-pound of coffee.

At home, Rachael and Emma Jane spent their days foraging through the woods looking for anything edible.  They gathered nuts and berries and wild garlic.  Along with Jesse they harvested the rest of the vegetables from the garden and the fruit from the few remaining trees.  Except for a few laying hens and the old rooster, all of the chickens had been eaten.  Ida Mae refused to butcher the cow saying milk was more important than meat. Jesse spent his days hunting, bringing home a few rabbits or squirrels each day.  And Roy still sat on the porch playing solitaire, letting the rest of the family do all the work. He watched as Jesse and Ida Mae chopped wood and stacked it next to the house. His life seemed to be frozen in time.  He was no longer a part of the family, just a bystander with hopes that the mine was still going to open so once again he could provide for his family.

Laying in bed at night along side Emma Jane, Rachael prayed that things would get better for the family. Sometimes they would hug each other and cry and Emma Jane would ask over and over what they were going to do. It was a miserable existence for two teenage girls. Other times they would talk about what they would do if they had money to spend.  Emma Jane always had the same wish.  “I would buy a car and go into Lynch. I would walk into one of them stores and buy me a whole box of Butterfingers and eat them all and then I’d buy me another box tah take home.” The remembrance of a candy bar she had over three years ago still stuck in her mind.  She had nothing else to think about. Rachael’s dreams were more complicated and Emma Jane usually fell asleep while Rachael was talking.

When Rachael heard about an organization in Lynch that would help out people in need, she mentioned it to her father. She never saw him get so mad. He knocked over a chair and pointed his finger at her. “Don’t you ever, and I mean ever, go tellin’ anybody our business. We ain’t starvin’ and I ain’t gonna accept no handouts. I ain’t gonna be beholden tah any
body. You mind yer business little girl and stay outta’ mine.” Why did he call her little girl?  She was almost eighteen years old, two years older than her mother when she married.

Two weeks before Christmas
, as the icicles formed on the inside walls of the bedrooms and the snow collected on the roof, Jesse returned from Bent Creek with a letter in his hand.  It was scribbled in pencil on a smeared envelope. Roy could hardly make out the writing. The letter was postmarked almost two months previous. He handed it to Rachael and she carefully opened it. It was from Ben. In his barely legible script he wrote that he was still in California. When he was given a physical, the doctors found that his eyesight was not good enough to send him overseas. Ben was kept on the base and was going to school to learn how to repair jeeps and tanks.

Ben talked about the electric lights in his barracks that were on all the time and the warm water in the showers.  He said that he was fed three times a day. He hoped that everyone was well. The best part was he enclosed a ten-dollar bill, folded in another piece of paper. When Rachael handed it to her father, she could see the tears in his eyes and a smile on his face. She had no idea if he was happy because he got the letter from Ben or that he could go now have a chaw of tobacco that he missed so much.

Because of Ben’s generosity, Ida Mae made sure that each of the children was given something small for Christmas. Rachael received a box of three handkerchiefs trimmed in blue. Emma Jane got a crocheted hat that Ida Mae had made out of new yarn and Jesse was given a pocketknife.  Ida Mae made chicken and dumplings and a rhubarb pie. Even Roy seemed happy on Christmas day as he sat by the stove with his pack of tobacco and the six dollars left over from the trip to the store in his pocket. He only wished that his two eldest sons were there to celebrate with them. Grandpa Abe came to the house and brought his jug of corn liquor. Roy got out his banjo and was joined by Jesse playing the fiddle. It was a good Christmas.  As it turned out it would be the last one Grandpa Abe ever have.

On New Year’s Eve, Grandpa Abe started celebrating early. By nine o’clock he had already finished one jug of moon
shine and by ten he was all-lickered up. By eleven o’clock he had his rifle out and was shooting branches off the trees all around his cabin. He was staggering down the road in his red long johns, waving his gun in the air when two of his friends saw him and took him back home. He was cussing and screaming that the owners of the mine didn’t give a damn that his family needed work. The men put him to bed and left.  Sometime after midnight he must have gone outside to go to the privy.  He fell head first into the rain barrel.  A neighbor from down the road found him two days later. His head was still in the frozen water and the jug of corn liquor lay on the ground next to him. When they pulled him out he had a wreath of ice around his blue face.