Mammoth Book of Best New Horror (48 page)

    "Thing is," the deputy said, "I could use some help. I don't know I can get back safe with this fella, havin' not slept good in a day or two. Was wondering, you and Old Timer here could watch my back till morning? Wouldn't even mind if you rode along with me tomorrow, as sort of a backup. I could use a gun hand. Sheriff might even give you a dollar for it."

    Old Timer, as if this conversation had not been going on, brought over a bowl with some mouldy biscuits in it, placed them on the table. "Made them a week ago. They've gotten a bit ripe, but you can scratch around the mould. I'll warn you though, they're tough enough you could toss one hard and kill a chicken on the run. So mind your teeth."

    "That how you lost yours, Old Timer?" the manacled man said.

    "Probably part of them," Old Timer said.

    "What you say, preacher?" the deputy said. "You let me get some sleep?"

    "My problem lies in the fact that I need sleep," Jubil said. "I've been busy, and I'm what could be referred to as tuckered."

    "Guess I'm the only one that feels spry," said the manacled man.

    "No," said, Old Timer. "I feel right fresh myself."

    "Then it's you and me, Old Timer," the manacled man said, and grinned, as if this meant something.

    "You give me cause, fella, I'll blow a hole in you and tell God you got in a nest of termites."

    The manacled man gave his snort of a laugh again. He seemed to be having a good old time.

    "Me and Old Timer can work shifts," Jubil said. "That okay with you, Old Timer?"

    "Peachy," Old Timer said, and took another plate from the table and filled it with beans. He gave this one to the manacled man, who said, lifting his bound hands to take it, "What do I eat it with?"

    "Your mouth. Ain't got no extra spoons. And I ain't giving you a knife."

    The manacled man thought on this for a moment, grinned, lifted the plate and put his face close to the edge of it, sort of poured the beans towards his mouth. He lowered the plate and chewed. "Reckon they taste scorched with or without a spoon."

    Jubil reached inside his coat, took out and opened up a pocket knife, used it to spear one of the biscuits, and to scrape the beans towards him.

    "You come to the table, young fella," Old Timer said to the deputy, "I'll get my shotgun, he makes a move that ain't eatin', I'll blast him and the beans inside him into that fireplace there."

    Old Timer sat with a double barrel shotgun resting on his leg, pointed in the general direction of the manacled man. The deputy told all that his prisoner had done while he ate. Murdered women and children, shot a dog and a horse, and just for the hell of it, shot a cat off a fence, and set fire to an outhouse with a woman in it. He had also raped women, stuck a stick up a sheriff's ass, and killed him, and most likely shot other animals that might have been some good to somebody. Overall, he was tough on human beings, and equally as tough on livestock.

    "I never did like animals," the manacled man said. "Carry fleas. And that woman in the outhouse stunk to high heaven. She ought to eat better. She needed burning."

    "Shut up," the deputy said. "This fella," and he nodded towards the prisoner, "his name is Bill Barrett, and he's the worst of the worst. Thing is, well, I'm not just tired, I'm a little wounded. He and I had a tussle. I hadn't surprised him, wouldn't be here today. I got a bullet graze in my hip. We had quite a dust up. I finally got him down by putting a gun barrel to his noggin' half a dozen times or so. I'm not hurt so bad, but I lost blood for a couple days. Weakened me. You'd ride along with me Reverend, I'd appreciate it."

    "I'll consider it," Jubil said. "But I'm about my business."

    "Who you gonna preach to along here, 'sides us?" the deputy said.

    "Don't even think about it," Old Timer said. "Just thinking about that Jesus foolishness makes my ass tired. Preaching makes me want to kill the preacher and cut my own throat. Being at a preachin' is like being tied down in a nest red bitin' ants."

    "At this point in my life," Jubil said. "I agree."

    There was a moment of silence in response to Jubil, then the deputy turned his attention to Old Timer. "What's the fastest route to Nacogdoches?"

    "Well now," Old Timer said, "you can keep going like you been going, following the road out front. And in time you'll run into a road, say thirty miles from here, and it goes left. That should take you right near Nacogdoches, which is another ten miles, though you'll have to make a turn somewhere up in there near the end of the trip. Ain't exactly sure where unless I'm looking at it. Whole trip, travelling at an even pace ought to take you two day."

    "You could go with us," the deputy said. "Make sure I find that road."

    "Could," said Old Timer, "but I won't. I don't ride so good anymore. My balls ache I ride a horse for too long. Last time I rode a pretty good piece, I had to squat over a pan of warm water and salt, soak my taters for an hour or so just so they'd fit back in my pants."

    "My balls ache just listening to you," the prisoner said. "Thing is, though, them swollen up like that, was probably the first time in your life you had man-sized balls, you old fart. You should have left them swollen."

    Old Timer cocked back the hammers on the double barrel. "This here could go off."

    Bill just grinned, leaned his back against the fireplace, then jumped forward. For a moment, it looked as if Old Timer might cut him in half, but he realized what had happened.

    "Oh yeah," Old Timer said. "That there's hot, stupid. Why they call it a fireplace."

    Bill readjusted himself, so that his back wasn't against the stones. He said, "I'm gonna cut this deputy's pecker off, come back here, make you fry it up and eat it."

    "You're gonna shit and fall back in it," Old Timer said. "That's all you're gonna do."

    When things had calmed down again, the deputy said to Old Timer, "There's no faster route?"

    Old Timer thought for a moment. "None you'd want to take."

    "What's that mean?" the deputy said.

    Old Timer slowly lowered the hammers on the shotgun, smiling at Bill all the while. When he had them lowered, he turned his head, looked at the deputy. "Well, there's Deadman's Road."

    "What's wrong with that?" the deputy asked.

    "All manner of things. Used to be called Cemetery Road. Couple years back that changed."

    Jubil's interest was aroused. "Tell us about it, Old Timer."

    "Now I ain't one to believe in hogwash, but there's a story about the road, and I got it from someone you might say was the horse's mouth."

    "A ghost story, that's choice," said Bill.

    "How much time would the road cut off going to Nacogdoches?" the deputy asked.

    "Near a day," Old Timer said.

    "Damn. Then that's the way I got to go," the deputy said.

    "Turn off for it ain't far from here, but I wouldn't recommend it," Old Time said. "I ain't much for Jesus, but I believe in haints, things like that. Living out here in this thicket, you see some strange things. There's gods ain't got nothing to do with Jesus or Moses, or any of that bunch. There's older gods than that. Indians talk about them."

    "I'm not afraid of any Indian gods," the deputy said.

    "Maybe not," Old Timer said, "but these gods, even the Indians ain't fond of them. They ain't their gods. These gods are older than the Indian folk their own self’s. Indians try not to stir them up. They worship their own."

    "And why would this road be different than any other?" Jubil asked. "What does it have to do with ancient gods?"

    Old Timer grinned. "You're just wanting to challenge it, ain't you, Reverend? Prove how strong your god is. You weren't no preacher, you'd be a gunfighter, I reckon. Or, maybe you are just that. A gunfighter preacher."

    "I not that fond of my god," Jubil said, "but I have been given a duty. Drive out evil. Evil as my god sees it. If these gods are evil, and they're in my path, then I have to confront them."

    "They're evil, all right," Old Timer said.

    "Tell us about them," Jubil said.

    "Gil Gimet was a bee-keeper," Old Timer said. "He raised honey, and lived off of Deadman's Road. Known then as Cemetery Road. That's 'cause there was a graveyard down there. It had some old Spanish graves in it, some said conquistadors who tromped through here but didn't tromp out. I know there was some Indians buried there, early Christian Indians, I reckon. Certainly there were stones and crosses up and Indian names on the crosses. Maybe mixed breeds. Lots of intermarrying around here. Anyway, there were all manner people buried up there. The dead ground don't care what colour you are when you go in, 'cause in the end, we're all gonna be the colour of dirt."

    "Hell," Bill said. "You're already the colour of dirt. And you smell like some pretty old dirt at that."

    "You gonna keep on, mister," Old Timer said, "and you're gonna wind up having the undertaker wipe your ass." Old Timer cocked back the hammers on the shotgun again. "This here gun could go off accidentally. Could happen, and who here is gonna argue it didn't?"

    "Not me," the deputy said. "It would be easier on me you were dead, Bill."

    Bill looked at the Reverend. "Yeah, but that wouldn't set right with the Reverend, would it Reverend?"

    "Actually, I wouldn't care one way or another. I'm not a man of peace, and I'm not a forgiver, even if what you did wasn't done to me. I think we're all rich and deep in sin. Maybe none of us are worthy of forgiveness."

    Bill sunk a little at his seat. No one was even remotely on his side. Old Timer continued with his story.

    "This here bee-keeper, Gimet, he wasn't known as much of a man. Mean-hearted is how he was thunk of. I knowed him, and I didn't like him. I seen him snatch up a little dog once and cut the tail off of it with his knife, just 'cause he thought it was funny. Boy who owned the dog tried to fight back, and Gimet, he cut the boy on the arm. No one did nothin' about it. Ain't no real law in these parts, you see, and wasn't nobody brave enough to do nothin'. Me included. And he did lots of other mean things, even killed a couple of men, and claimed self-defence. Might have been, but Gimet was always into something, and whatever he was into always turned out with someone dead, or hurt, or humiliated."

    "Bill here sounds like he could be Gimet's brother," the deputy said.

    "Oh, no," Old Timer said, shaking his head. "This here scum-licker ain't a bump on the mean old ass of Gimet. Gimet lived in a little shack off Cemetery Road. He raised bees, and brought in honey to sell at the community up the road. Guess you could even call it a town. Schow is the way the place is known, on account of a fella used to live up there was named Schow. He died and got ate up by pigs. Right there in his own pen, just keeled over slopping the hogs, and then they slopped him, all over that place. A store got built on top of where Schow got et up, and that's how the place come by the name. Gimet took his honey in there to the store and sold it, and even though he was a turd, he had some of the best honey you ever smacked your mouth around. Wish I had me some now. It was dark and rich, and sweeter than any sugar. Think that's one reason he got away with things. People don't like killing and such, but they damn sure like their honey."

    "This story got a point?" Bill said.

    "You don't like way I'm telling it," Old Timer said, "why don't you think about how that rope's gonna fit around your neck. That ought to keep your thoughts occupied, right smart."

    Bill made a grunting noise, turned on his block of wood, as if to show he wasn't interested.

    "Well, now, honey or not, sweet tooth, or not, everything has an end to it. And thing was he took to a little gal, Mary Lynn Two shoe. She was a part Indian gal, a real looker, hair black as the bottom of a well, eyes the same colour, and she was just as fine in the features as them pictures you see of them stage actresses. She wasn't five feet tall, and that hair of hers went all the way down her back. Her daddy was dead. The pox got him. And her mama wasn't too well off, being sickly, and all. She made brooms out of straw and branches she trimmed down. Sold a few of them, raised a little garden and a hog. When all this happened, Mary Lynn was probably thirteen, maybe fourteen. Wasn't no older than that."

    "If you're gonna tell a tale," Bill said, "least don't wander all over the place."

    "So, you're interested?" Old Timer said.

    "What else I got to do?" Bill said.

    "Go on," Jubil said. "Tell us about Mary Lynn."

    Old Timer nodded. "Gimet took to her. Seen her around, bringing the brooms her mama made into the store. He waited on her, grabbed her, and just thro wed her across his saddle kickin' and screamin', like he'd bought a sack of flour and was ridin' it to the house. Mack Collins, store owner came out and tried to stop him. Well, he said something to him. About how he shouldn't do it, least that's the way I heard it. He didn't push much, and I can't blame him. Didn't do good to cross him Gimet. Anyway, Gimet just said back to Mack, 'Give her mama a big jar of honey. Tell her that's for her daughter. I'll even make her another jar or two, if the meat here's as sweet as I'm expecting.'