Big City Girl (5 page)

The rain had stopped sometime during the night and dawn had been gray with mist coming up from the river and hanging wet and dripping among the pines along the hillside. It was midmorning now as Mitch came up toward the house from an inspection of the fields, anxiously watching the sky for some sign that the sun was going to break through. If it cleared now it would be two days before they could work in the upper fields and nearly a week before the bottom was dry enough to plow.

He came up past the barn and turned the mules out to pasture, thinking impatiently of all the work that cried out to be done if they were to save the crop and could not be started until the ground began to dry. If it rains any more we’re goners, he thought. It’s got to stop. We won’t even pay off the credit and we’ll be rooting for acorns like the hogs this winter if it keeps on. He cut across the yard, walking silently on the white, hard, rain-packed sand, and nodded a solemn greeting to Mexico as the big hound came out from under the house. Mexico approached him with the stately dignity of age and high rank and shoved a moist black nose against his palm in courtly salutation.

Mitch gave the pendulous chops an affectionate slap with his hand and went on toward the house, hearing now the excited rattle of voices somewhere out in front.. He turned and started around the corner and was hit a glancing blow by Jessie, running full tilt along the side of the house. She bounced off him, frozen-faced, unrecognizing, her eyes full of the horror she was running from, and ran on toward the barn. He saw her go at full flight into the door and turned and ran after her. She was nowhere in sight in the gloomy interior among the empty stalls, but the door of the corn crib was open and he bent over and went in. She was huddled on the pile of unhusked corn with her face in her arms against the wall, not  crying, for there-was no sound of crying, but her body was shaking as if with chill.

“Jessie, what’s the matter? What is it, Jessie?” he asked, afraid, and conscious of the old helplessness he always felt when confronted with her problems because they were never the same as his and he could not understand them or cope with them, no matter how much he ached to help her.

She did not answer and he knelt down awkwardly beside her and put a hand on her shoulder. It was still shaking badly and she drew away from his touch as if she would burrow into the corn and escape from sight.

“Go ‘way, Mitch,” she said in a muffled voice.

“What is it?” he asked again.

“Don’t look at me. Go ‘way.”

“Are you hurt?” She shook her head.

“Do you feel bad?”

She shook her head again and drew away.

“Can I do anything?”

“No,” she said in the same muffled voice. “Only go away. I’ll be all right in a little while.”

He stood up, wooden-faced, and went back out the door and across the yard, walking fast. Cass and Joy were sitting on the steps of the front porch and Prentiss Jimerson was walking up and down in front of them bursting with his story and they all talked at once.

“He escaped, Mitch,” Prentiss said breathlessly, in a hurry to get it out before the others could beat him to it.

“Got clean away. They can’t find hide or hair of him,” Cass broke in.

“Killed a deputy,” Prentiss said, verbally shoving Cass aside. “It’s all over the radio, in the news. More’n it was before. Wrecked the car, shot the deputy, and couldn’t find the keys to the handcuffs so he sawed off his hand with a pocketknife.”

“He did what?” Mitch asked.

“Cut the deputy’s hand off that he was handcuffed to,” Prentiss went on in an eruption of words, too excited to see the fury in Mitch’s face.

”And you come over here and told that in front of Jessie? Why, you long-nosed sonofabitch!” Mitch said with the singing edge of violence in his voice. He took a step toward Prentiss and the youth backed up with his hands held out placatingly and shocked bewilderment on his face.

“Hold on, Mitch,” he pleaded. “I ain’t done nothing. I just said what was on the radio.”

“You didn’t have to say it in front of Jessie. You better go on home. When we want any more of your goddamned news, we’ll send for you.”

Prentiss looked from Mitch over to Cass as if for support, with his face puzzled and hurt. He had always been somewhat in awe of both the Neely boys, and this violent reception of his news, especially after the way Cass and Miss Joy had hung onto his words, was disconcerting and a little frightening.

“Well, I didn’t mean no harm,” he said. He looked around at all of them and turned to go. Cass started to say something but glanced toward Mitch and changed his mind.

“Thanks for telling us, Prentiss,” Joy called after him. She threw a spiteful glance at Mitch.

After Prentiss had shuffled his deflated way up the road Cass stirred uncomfortably on the step. “That was a cruel thing to say to a neighbor, Mitch. You oughtn’t to talk like that,” he said, not looking up.

Mitch thought of Jessie trying to shut out the sight and the thought of it by burrowing her face into her arms out in the barn and felt no sympathy for Prentiss. It
wasn’t
his fault, if you thought about it, but maybe the big-mouthed fool would stay away from her the next time he had any news like that.

“What about Jessie?” he asked coldly.

“Well, she’d have to know sooner or later. No way you could help that. Now you’ve insulted him like that, he won’t come back no more.”

“I can stand it,” Mitch said.

“We won’t hear no more news about Sewell,” Cass said querulously.

Mitch stared at him. “That’ll be all right, too. I don’t want to hear no more of that news about Sewell.”

Cass sighed and looked at the ground. “A hard heart is a sin. You got no feeling for your brother.”

“Listening to it ain’t going to help him.”

“You just got no feeling for him.” Cass brought out a soiled bandanna handkerchief and dabbed futilely at his eyes. “I tried to raise my boys up to be Christians,” he said tearfully to Joy. “But I reckon it’s a judgment of some kind on me that they’re so hardhearted. It’s a sin visited on the father.”

I hope the old goat ain’t going to cry, Joy thought. She patted his arm. “Don’t take it so hard, Cass. It’ll work out all right.”

“It’s an awful thing,” Cass went on piteously. “Thinking of that boy out there somewheres running from the law and prob’ly hurt and hunted down like a wild animal and we don’t even know where he is and got no way of finding out. He might be shot right now with a bullet in him and we’d never know. Got no radio, and no nothing. I reckon nobody cares, though. Ev’body’s got to be hardhearted.”

Mitch looked at both of them with contempt and turned and went around the corner of the house, feeling the sickness in his stomach. If we had a radio, he thought, and could set and listen to the news, everything would be all right and we’d find out that Sewell didn’t hold up nobody or kill no deputy or butcher him up with a knife. That’s all we need—more news.

Because he had to be doing something, he went out to the woodpile behind the house and began splitting wood for the kitchen stove, attacking the pile of red-oak blocks with a bitter violence to shut out his thoughts. In a little while Jessie came out of the barn and went past him toward the kitchen, looking straight ahead like an Indian. Mexico trotted toward her but she went on past him and into the house. Mitch watched her helplessly and left her alone. There’s nothing you can do, he thought.

He looked up suddenly, and dropped the ax. Cass had come around the corner of the house carrying a short length of old plowline in his hand. He stopped a whistled to Mexico, not looking toward Mitch.

Mitch watched him. Well, he’s got it squared around his mind till it’s all right, he thought. I should have known I was just making it easier for him when I bounced that damn Prentiss out of here. He works it around in his mind till all the facts agree with him and then he goes ahead.

He walked over to where Cass was knotting the line about Mexico’s neck.

“You going somewhere with Mexico?” he asked, choking on the fury inside him but keeping his voice quiet because he didn’t want Jessie to hear it in the kitchen and because he knew he was fighting water that would flow around him until he drowned in it without ever finding a solid place to hit.

“I ain’t one to put a dawg ahead of my family,” Cass said with martyred politeness.

“I didn’t say nothing about that. I said, where you going with Mexico?”

“Ain’t air one around here that’s got more regard for Mexico than I have, but my family comes first with me.”

You could talk all day and never get an answer, Mitch thought. “Where you going with Mexico?” he insisted.

“Maybe it’s my fault that I ain’t hardhearted enough to just set here and do nothing while they chase my boy around the state with guns like he was a wild animal and not do nothing about it and not even know where he is, but that’s the way I am, and I’m getting too old to change.”

“You figure that’s going to be a big help to Sewell, setting in front of a radio and hearing ‘em talk about him?”

“No. It won’t help Sewell none, unless there’s some way the Almighty can let him know that there was at least one of us cared enough about him to try to find out where he was.”

I could stop him, Mitch thought. It ain’t that I ain’t big enough to stop him, but it’s what would happen afterward. Any man can raise his hand against his daddy if he wants to, when he’s big enough, but he can’t never live with him any more. Sewell did it when he sold his guitar, he hit him and called him a name nobody can call his own daddy and ever forget about it afterward, but he left when he had done it.

How am I going to leave? I couldn’t take Jessie with me, working in sawmills and road camps. And what would happen if I left her here? He can’t work the crop by himself, even if he would, and you can’t live on grass.

“Go on,” he said, his face dark with passion. “If you’re going to do it, go on before she comes out here and sees you.”

“—one of the most intensive man hunts in the history of the state. As you will recall, Neely escaped three nights ago after wrecking the automobile in which he was being transported to the state penitentiary to begin serving a life sentence for armed robbery.

“There are several factors that go to make this one of the most sensational crime stories in this area in the past decade. One of these is the fact that it concerns Sewell, or Mad Dog, Neely, a gangster and hoodlum who has almost reached the stature of Public Enemy Number One, at least in this state. Last year, it will be recalled, he was on trial for the slaying of another hoodlum in a gang war between rival slot-machine syndicates, and he is alleged to have been involved in a number of brutal beatings in connection with the slot-machine rackets and their warring factions. He was acquitted of the murder charge, you will remember, when one of the state’s witnesses disappeared on the eve of the trial, probably as the result of threats and intimidation, authorities believe.

“And another sensational side of the case is, of course, the fact that it has not been three months since Neely was once before the object of a vast man hunt alter a daring, singlehanded attempt to hold up an express company in broad daylight. In the ensuing gun battle a company guard was wounded and Neely fled in a stolen automobile, but not before he was recognized. Thus began a three-week chase across a dozen counties and a series of filling-station holdups that flared into the proportions of a one-man crime wave. Then he disappeared, dropping from sight completely for nearly two weeks, police believe somewhere in Houston. At any rate, there were no holdups during this period and Neely was not seen by anyone, and this when his picture was in every newspaper in the state and he would have been recognized almost anywhere. Then he was finally captured in a running gun battle with police some hundred miles north of Houston following a tip by a filling-station operator.

“And then there is, of course, the escape itself, marked by one of the most brutal crimes to occur in the state in a long time. Apparently Neely in some way managed to get hold of the steering wheel or slug the driver while the car was traveling at a high rate of speed and wrecked it, rolling it over and over down a steep embankment. The officer who was driving was instantly killed with a broken neck, but the other, to whom Neely was shackled, apparently survived, only to be murdered with his own gun. And this is the part of it that has horrified thousands and united the law-enforcement agencies of the whole state into one large armed posse determined to track Neely down and bring him to account at all costs. For, apparently unable to find the key to the handcuffs, he callously severed the hand of the dead officer to free himself of the encumbrance of his body.

“In the sixty hours since then, concerted efforts by law-enforcement agencies throughout the eastern half of the state have not unearthed a single clue as to his whereabouts. In a matter of hours after the discovery of the wrecked car and the bodies, road blocks were set up on every highway within a radius of a hundred miles. Railway and bus terminals were watched. There have been no holdups by anyone even remotely answering to his description. Dogs were brought up from a state prison farm to the scene of the wreck, but proved to be of no value, as Neely apparently took to the highway after leaving the car, and his trail became lost in the overpowering oily smells along the pavement. Police think it likely he was picked up in a car along the road somewhere, though intensive questioning of persons in adjacent towns has revealed nothing to substantiate this theory.

“It is not even known whether or not he was injured in the wreck, but it would appear that if he was not it was nothing short of miraculous in view of the way the automobile was demolished. Officers do know, however, that he was dressed in a blue serge suit and white shirt with no tie, tan shoes, and tan-colored tooled-leather cowboy belt with a silver buckle. He was not wearing a hat. And, of course, at the time of the escape he was still wearing the handcuffs attached to his right wrist. He’s armed, and all police officers have been cautioned that he is extremely dangerous.

“One interesting development has come to light in past few hours, however. This is the discovery of the key that Neely had been unable to find to free himself of the handcuffs. It was found in the mud near the car, where it had apparently been thrown by Harvey Denham, the officer to whom Neely had been shackled. Officers state that the only possible way the key could have got there was for Denham, at the time he was shot or just before, have thrown it through the window of the car into the darkness to prevent Neely’s escape, in a selfless act of heroism and devotion to duty that will be long remembered in the annals of law enforcement.

“At a late hour last night officers were still unable to understand how Neely could have evaded for this long the far-reaching dragnet set for him. They cited the fact that it is nearly impossible for a man whose description is as widely known as Neely’s, and who is under the handicap of forever having to keep his right hand hidden because of the handcuffs, to travel anywhere without being recognized. They predicted that he would be picked up within hours.

“And now to the other news. In Washington last night? Senator Connally, Democrat, of Texas, said that in his opinion—”

Cass reached over and snapped the little button turned the light off. Had to be awful careful, the man had said, and not leave it turned on, because it would run the batteries down, especially since they didn’t have any place to plug in the AC-DC. When the batteries were dead, the man said, they’d have to buy new ones, He wondered how they were going to do that. Oh, well, they’d cross that bridge when they came to it. Probably have the crop in then, with plenty of money to buy batteries. Wasn’t much new. About the same as last night. Well, when there is something new, he thought, they’ll put it n the air. Just got to be listening for it when it comes through. He rubbed the shiny blue leatherette case with a loving hand and thought how pretty it looked and tried to remember what the man had said was the full price, shouldn’t have been too much, though, for the down payment was only ten dollars.

It was a hot, clear morning, with the sun just clearing he treetops along the crest of the ridge, and the red-gold rays splashing against the wall of the, front room reminded him of the bad time he’d had the past two days with miseries in his legs, and that a few more days of hot sunshine ought to bake it all out so he’d be able to get round.

He got up stiffly and hobbled out into the kitchen, where Jessie was putting breakfast on the table. She looked through him and went on pouring Mitch’s coffee. Mitch did not even bother to glance in his direction at all. Joy looked up and smiled.

“Good morning, Cass,” she said.

Only one cares whether I live or die with the miseries is Joy, he thought, and she’s just marrying kin. Ingratitude is sharper than the serpent’s tooth, the Scripture lays. Only true child I got is Joy.

I hope the old cluck goes to work today so I can get a chance to turn on that radio and listen to some music, Joy thought. Way he watches it, you’d think we wanted to steal it. Must be me he’s afraid’ll get at it, because Mitch was down in the field from sunup to dark and he knows Jessie wouldn’t touch it with a ten-foot pole.

“Sure feel stove up in the legs,” Cass said wearily. “Just can’t hardly get around at all.”

No one answered him. Mitch went on eating. Jessie stood by the stove, impassive, still-faced, looking out the back door at the sunlight spilling into the yard.

“Was hoping I’d be able to get around today, we got so much to do, but I just don’t know.”

The silence continued, broken only by the popping of fire in the cookstove.

”Ain’t found hide or hair of Sewell. They’s a state-wide man hunt.” He was beginning to parrot the cliches of the news broadcasts alter nearly two days of listening to them.

Jessie put the plate of fried salt pork on the table and went out the back door, walking erect and rigid like an Indian down the single step into the yard.

“I wish she’d eat some breakfast,” Cass said fretfully. “Ain’t right for a youngun not have an appetite.”

‘When she gets hungry she’ll eat,” Mitch said. “Leave her alone.”

“You ought to have more compassion for others. Jessie’s your sister, same as Sewell’s your brother, and you don’t think about neither one of ‘em. All you got time for is tearing into the crop like a man killing snakes. She ought to come and listen to the radio some. It’d get her in a better frame of mind.”

“I wouldn’t wait till she did,” Mitch said.

“You think maybe she’s still upset about the dawg?”

“No,” Mitch said coldly. “The dawg’s only been around here for about nine years, since she was six years old. And he’s been gone for two days now. She’s all over that.”

Cass was silent for a few minutes, then he asked, “You think maybe Sewell will get away from “em?”

“No,” Mitch said. “He won’t get away.”

“Well, they ain’t found no sign of him yet.”

“They will.”

“How can you say that?” Cass complained. “Don’t nobody know. He might.”

“Ain’t nobody can get away from ‘em when they want him bad enough.”

Cass sighed. “Well, it’s easy enough to say if you just don’t care, I reckon.”

Mitch pushed back his chair and got up.

“Sure wish I could get around,” Cass said plaintively, “It’s saddening to a man not to be able to do his part when there’s so much to be done.”

Mitch did not answer. He went on out into the back yard. Jessie was building a fire under the big soot-blackened washpot, fanning the blaze with an old straw hat to get it started.

Mitch stopped and looked down at her. “You ought to eat some breakfast.”

“I didn’t want any.”

“You ought to eat something anyway. It ain’t good for you, doing without.”

“I’m just not hungry, Mitch.”

“You’re going to be sick if you keep this up.”

“I’m all right.”

What can you tell her? he thought. He stood there for a moment looking down at her forlorn pretense of industry with the fire, wishing he could think of something to say that would help, and then he turned and strode down toward the barn.