Bent Road Part 8

Daniel is glad Dad went out for the night. If he were home, he'd be yelling at Daniel about something. That's what Dad does most of the time now, yells at Daniel. Poking his potatoes and pus.h.i.+ng them around the plate, he silently curses when one tumbles onto the red tablecloth Evie put out. Now he wonders if he'll have to confess to Father Flannery or does it not count if you only think the bad words without actually saying them. Waiting until Mama isn't paying attention, Daniel picks up the potato chunk and scoots his plate to cover the b.u.t.tery stain. He glances up, wondering if anyone saw. Aunt Ruth winks and presses a finger to her lips.

Daniel tries to smile back, but every time he looks at Aunt Ruth since she caught him sneaking the rifle, he thinks she knows about the prairie dogs. He imagines that she saw him shoot that animal for no d.a.m.n good reason, blow its head clean off. That's what Ian had said. He went back and found that prairie dog with its head blown all the way off and showed it to his brothers so they would stop calling Daniel a city kid. Ian said he lifted that dead prairie dog up by its tail and flung it as far as he could, and his brothers had said Daniel must be a pretty good shot to blow off the head but leave the rest. Biting his lower lip and stabbing a new potato with his fork, Daniel wishes he'd never shot that prairie dog because he can't ever take it back. But he did, and Aunt Ruth knows he has been taking the gun without permission.

"What was that?" Evie says, her mouth full of a b.u.t.tered biscuit.

Daniel shakes his head at her. "Stop talking with food in your mouth."

Evie swallows, rocking her head forward to help the biscuit go down. "There's nothing in my mouth."

"There," Aunt Ruth says, staring past Daniel toward the kitchen window. "Is that what you heard?"

Mama pushes back from the table. "I didn't hear anything," she says, pressing out the pleats on the front of her dress. It's what she does when she's nervous, like when Dad went to meetings in Detroit about the Negro workers or the news showed pictures of burned-up cars and buildings. She hasn't done it much since they moved to Kansas where they haven't seen a single Negro or burned-up car. Also, Mama doesn't wear skirts with pleats much anymore.

Evie nods, wiping a crumb from her chin. "That. What is it?"

Daniel turns in his seat, careful not to scoot his chair or make any noise. Through the white sheers, the window is black. "It's the wind."

"That's not wind," Evie says too loudly.

Daniel frowns and quiets her with a finger to his lips.

Again, as loudly as before, Evie says, "That was not wind. That was a thud. There it is again."

"Yes," Mama says, still pressing her pleats. "I hear it."

"I think Daniel's right." Aunt Ruth tucks her napkin under the lip of her plate and stands. "Probably the wind. But to be on the safe side, I'll check."

"No, Aunt Ruth," Daniel says, standing with a jerk and catching his chair before it tumbles over. "I'll go. I should go."

"Both of you stay put," Mama says. "I'll have a look."

Evie jumps out of her seat and leaps toward Mama. "Let Daniel go," she says.

Mama wraps an arm around Evie and kisses the top of her head. All four turn when something b.u.mps the side of the house just below the kitchen window. The white sheers tremble.

"Someone's outside the window," Evie says, her voice m.u.f.fled because her face is pressed into Mama's side.

"Na," Daniel says, watching the curtains, waiting for another thud. "There's no one out there." But he's not sure now. The wind doesn't b.u.mp into the house or stumble around the side yard. He wishes his heart weren't beating so loudly because he can't hear over it. He hates his G.o.d d.a.m.ned beating heart when he can't hear over it, even tries to hold his breath to slow it down.

At the sound of another thud, Evie pulls away from Mama and points at the window. "It's a Clark City man," she says. "That's what it is." And then she whispers. "It's Jack Mayer. He's back and he's looking for food. Maybe he's even got Julianne with him."

"Shut up, Evie," Daniel says. "It's not a Clark City man. And it's not Jack Mayer. Shut up."

As the weather has turned colder, the pond near the curve in Bent Road has shrunk, dried up like every other pond around. Every time Daniel pa.s.ses it, he looks for the tips of Jack Mayer's boots, thinking he might be lying at the bottom of that pond. Daniel has never seen him, and Ian says he won't because Jack Mayer has to be alive since he's the one who swiped Julianne Robison.

"Kids, please," Mama says. "Stop your bickering."

Aunt Ruth tucks Evie under her arm while Mama sidesteps toward the back door.

"I'm sure it's nothing," Mama says, but she's inching toward the porch like she definitely thinks it's something. "Evie, you stay here with Daniel and Ruth. I'll go . . ."

"No, Mama." Daniel walks around the table, tilts his head down and looks up at Mama from under his brow. "I'll give a look-see."

It's what Dad would have said.

Stepping onto the porch, Daniel pulls the door closed behind him and exhales a frosted cloud. He yanks on the k.n.o.b again, listening for the click that tells him the door is latched good and tight, and once he hears it, he thinks he should feel more like a man. Instead, he slouches and pulls up the collar of Dad's flannel jacket because maybe whoever is stomping around their side yard will mistake Daniel for Dad. Mama says that by his next birthday, Daniel will be as tall as Dad. Keep eating Aunt Ruth's good cooking, she says, and you'll be as broad, too. He gives Aunt Ruth, Mama and Evie a thumbs-up sign through the window in the back door and walks across the screened-in porch. With the toes of his leather boots hanging over the first stair, he sees nothing or no one as far as the porch light reaches.

Ian had clipped out the latest story about Jack Mayer from page 3 of the Hays Chronicle Hays Chronicle, the shortest one yet, and one of many that didn't make page 1. After nearly four months, police now believe Jack Mayer has either left the Palco area or has died of exposure. Authorities at the Clark City State Hospital declined to comment on Jack Mayer's whereabouts, other than to say the hospital had successfully implemented new security measures. After Ian showed Daniel the article that he kept under his mattress along with a dozen others about Jack Mayer, he took Daniel out to the barn and showed him a wadded-up flannel blanket and empty tin can that were hidden behind three hay bales and an old wheelbarrow. Daniel kicked the can across the dirt floor. Ian stumbled after it, his right side lagging behind because he didn't have on his new boots, picked it up, and placed it back with the blanket because he thought the tin can and blanket were proof positive that Jack Mayer was alive and well and living in the Bucher barn. "No need to make a crazy man mad," Ian had said as he cleaned the brim of the can with his s.h.i.+rttail.

At the bottom of the stairs, Daniel tucks his bare hands under his arms, stomps his feet, and looking toward the barn, he wonders if Jack Mayer might just be hiding in there. Mama found the pie that Aunt Ruth baked for Father Flannery and nothing else has gone missing in the house except the last piece of Evie's birthday cake, which Daniel knows Dad ate but won't admit. Ian said their food disappeared all the time. He said Jack Mayer stole it right off their kitchen counter. He said Jack Mayer crawled through their windows every night and helped himself to corn m.u.f.fins, sliced pork roast and ham and bean soup. Daniel asked Ian how he could be sure Jack Mayer was eating all that food with so many brothers living in the house. Ian had said that no man alive could eat like Jack Mayer because Jack Mayer is a mountain of a man.

Walking into the center of the gravel drive, Daniel turns in a slow circle. Mr. Murray's old rusted car is still parked behind the garage. Mama complains about it, says it's dangerous to have around with young children in the house, but Dad says the children aren't so young anymore and he'll get to it when he gets to it. Next to the garage, near the fence line, stands the chicken coop that Dad and Jonathon started to build. Halfway through, Mama said no chickens because she saw the mess they left at Grandma Reesa's and because she didn't want to have any more dead chickens hanging in her yard. Dad told Jonathon he could have the wood if he'd tear it down.

Beyond the three-sided chicken coup, and opposite the garage, the barn seems to lean more than it did when they moved in. Wondering who or what is hiding out there, Daniel wishes he had grabbed his rifle. But what if it is Julianne? What if Jack Mayer stashed her in there? More than ever, Daniel wishes Mama would have slammed into Jack Mayer at the top of Bent Road. But Ian's right. Mama must not have hit him, at least not directly, because he swiped Julianne Robison and a dead man couldn't do that. If Mama would have hit Jack Mayer, Daniel wouldn't have to worry about accidentally shooting Julianne and blowing her head off like he did when he shot that prairie dog.

Twice, in the week since he killed that animal, Daniel has gone shooting with Ian. He can sneak the gun out and return it, tucked back in the gun cabinet, fingerprints wiped off the gla.s.s, lock snapped in place, before Dad gets home from work. Shooting tin cans and gla.s.s bottles instead of prairie dogs, Ian says Daniel is a good shot, a d.a.m.n good shot. Ian says that if Daniel practices a lot, almost every day, he will be the best shot of any kid around. Daniel wants to run back to get that gun but it seems so far away now. He hears the sound again, a loud thud coming from the side of the house near the kitchen window.

Taking slow, quiet steps, Daniel slides one foot in a sideways direction and meets it with the other as he walks in an arch that will lead him around the side of the house. He looks behind and ahead, behind and ahead, and at the edge of the boundary laid down by the porch light, he stops and listens. In between wind gusts, he hears something crus.h.i.+ng small patches of dry gra.s.s. There is a rustling sound, another thud, his own heartbeat. He leans to his right, peering around the side of the house without stepping outside the yellow light. He leans farther, bending forward and bracing himself with one hand on his knee. Something moves. A dark shadow. Daniel stumbles, stands straight and presses a hand over his heart.

He knows now that Sheriff Bigler didn't haul Uncle Ray off to Clark City but that he is living in Damar for as long as William Ellis will keep him, hopefully until he's dried out. When Daniel thought his uncle was locked up, he imagined Uncle Ray might escape like Jack Mayer and live off stolen leftovers. Before he knew Uncle Ray was living far away in Damar, Daniel would lie awake at night, listening for him. He would imagine opening his eyes and seeing Uncle Ray's face pressed against his window, his breath fogging the gla.s.s so Daniel couldn't quite see which way that bad eye was pointing. But Damar was a whole other town and Uncle Ray was with a whole other family. This is when Daniel began to imagine Jack Mayer's face pressed against his window. His breath would be cold and wouldn't fog the gla.s.s like Uncle Ray's. Then Christmas got closer, and Mama said the best store for wool fabric was in Damar, and since she needed a new dress for the holidays and Damar was only a few miles away, the whole family should go. Now, standing in the middle of the gravel drive, the thud ringing in his ears, Daniel doesn't know if he should be afraid of Uncle Ray, who isn't living so far away, or Jack Mayer.

His heart has begun to beat so loudly that Daniel isn't sure if he hears the next sound. If he had been sure, he wouldn't have looked around the corner again. Instead, he would have waited and listened or maybe run for the house, but his beating heart is like cotton in his ears, so he braces himself again and leans forward. Even though the maple that grows along the side of the house is bare, all of its leaves raked up and burned in the trash barrel, the moonlight s.h.i.+ning through the empty branches is not enough to light up anything that might be hiding. The light from the kitchen throws shadows on the nearest branches but doesn't reach any farther. If the something is still there, hiding under the window, it isn't moving now, and Daniel can't tell it apart from the rest of the darkness. He takes a step forward, watching, listening, and the shadow s.h.i.+fts again.

Holding his breath, Daniel thinks he hears something. It sounds like metal clanking against metal, like a chain tangled up with itself. He crouches down, pressing both palms on the ground. The back door doesn't seem so far away now. He could run to it, reach it in a dozen steps, but he can't move. Yes, that is the sound of a tangled-up chain, broken handcuffs. He hears breathing-heavy, hot, long breaths-and footsteps crus.h.i.+ng dry dead gra.s.s, footsteps kicking up gravel.

Hoping to see that Aunt Ruth and Mama are watching him through the screened door, he glances at the porch, but sees no one. Aunt Ruth's stomach is beginning to swell but she covers it with ap.r.o.ns and Elaine's skirts that she cinches up at the waist with safety pins. "You're in charge," Dad had said to Daniel before leaving. Mama had smiled and brushed the hair from his eyes. For a moment, Daniel imagines Julianne is sneaking around the side of the house. He could be the one to find her. He'd be a hero and kids would like him without even caring how good of a shot he is. Daniel drops his head again, knowing the breathing and chains and footsteps are closer even though his heartbeat has filled his ears. He decides it can't be Julianne because she wouldn't be wrapped in chains. He inhales, raises his eyes first and next his chin. Still crouched, his palms pressed to the ground, he cries out and falls backward.

"G.o.d d.a.m.n," he says. "Good G.o.d d.a.m.n already."

Standing at the corner of the house, her head inside the yellow cone of light, Olivia the cow looks down on Daniel. She seems to nod at him, and then she drops her snout to nuzzle the cold, hard ground. Her lead dangles from the red leather neck strap, the buckle and bolt-snap rattling like loose chain. Dad will be angry if he sees someone forgot to take it off.

"Good G.o.d d.a.m.n."

Chapter 12.

Over and over in her head and a few times aloud, Celia says, "It's the wind. Nothing but the wind." But she isn't sure. In Detroit, she feared firebombs, tanks and the Negro boys who called Elaine, none of which banged up against the side of her house. Being so new to Kansas, she isn't sure what she should be afraid of, but whatever it is, it is walking through her yard. s.h.i.+vering because she is wearing only a thin cotton dress and no stockings on her feet, she leans forward. On the other side of the screened door, across the driveway, Daniel sidesteps around the house. If he goes much farther, she'll lose him in the dark. Behind her, Ruth and Evie huddle together inside the back door that Celia made them lock. She cups her hands together and blows hot breath inside them to warm herself.

"Can you see him?" Evie calls from inside. Through the frosty pane of gla.s.s, her voice is muted. She has wrapped both arms around Ruth's waist and must be standing on her tiptoes to see out the window.

Celia reaches to open the screened door, but Evie cries out and presses her face into Ruth's side.

"Okay, okay," Celia says, letting go of the cold handle and leaning forward until she feels the imprint of the mesh screen against her right cheek. "There he is. I see him." Exhaling a deep breath and motioning for Ruth to open the back door, she says, "It's Olivia. Olivia got out again."

Ruth flips the deadbolt lock, and Evie skips across the cold wooden floor and lands at Celia's side. Celia wraps one arm around her and opens the screened door so they can both see. A cold breeze slaps them in the face.

"See?" Celia says. "He's walking her back. Looks like her lead is on. Did you put it on without remembering to take it off?"

Evie shakes her head. "I took it off. I'm sure I did," she says through chattering teeth. "I walked her a little. But I took it off."

Celia watches Daniel until he and Olivia have disappeared through the gate and into the barn. When she can no longer see them, she steps back and motions for Evie to join her on a nearby wooden bench. Ruth flips a switch that floods the porch with light, then steps inside for a moment and reappears with Celia's lavender house shoes, one in each hand. She waves the slippers, which makes Evie giggle, tiptoes across the porch and slips the fuzzy shoes on Evie's bare feet.

"We shouldn't really walk Olivia," Celia says, wrapping both arms around Evie. "Left to her own, she could get hung up on that lead." Evie nods as Celia tightens the pink ribbon tied at the end of her single braid. "Be careful to always lock up the gate and take care to do as you're told. You know Daddy would be upset about this."

"Will we tell him?" Evie says, twisting and frowning.

"I don't see the need. I'm sure Daniel will slip it off and lock things up good and tight."

Evie smiles, nods, and lowering her head, she says, "I guess it wasn't Julianne out there, huh?"

Celia lifts Evie's chin with her index finger. "No, honey. It wasn't Julianne. Did you really think it was?"

"Just hoped, is all."

Celia glances at Ruth across the top of Evie's head. "Yes, I guess we all did. How about we say an extra prayer tonight? Especially for Julianne."

"Yes," Evie says. "An extra prayer."

"Good enough, then." Celia winks at Ruth and together they help Evie untangle her slippers from the hem of her robe so she can stand.

Evie giggles over the size of Celia's lavender slippers on her own small feet. "Thanks," she says once she has straightened out her legs and planted both slippers on the ground.

Celia smiles, gives a few tugs on the belt around Evie's terry-cloth robe and, hearing footsteps on the stairs and the squeal of the screened door opening, she turns her smile toward Daniel.

"Ruth."

Ruth stands.

"Ray," she says.

In the beginning, in the very beginning, Ray felt badly for hitting Ruth. Over many morning cups of coffee, Ruth told Celia about the twenty years she had spent with Ray. When he would wake the day after, sober, he wouldn't remember the black eye he had given Ruth, the split lip, the bruised cheek. He would look at her, puzzled at first, and then apologize. "It's hard," he would say. "So d.a.m.ned hard." Ruth said she understood. She understood well enough to dab powder on those early bruises, withdraw from cake sales with an upset stomach when her lips were split open and swollen, cancel lunches with her mother and father because of one of her headaches when Ray had blackened her eyes. As the years pa.s.sed, Ray began to wake, sometimes before he was fully sober, and say, "This is your doing as much as mine." Finally, just, "This is your doing."

"Why are you here, Ray?" Celia says, stepping in front of Evie and gently pulling Ruth backward a few steps.

Ray glances outside at the sound of Daniel's footsteps on the stairs, and then turns back, placing one hand on the doorframe, one foot on the threshold. "Thought it might be around dessert time. Thought about a piece of Ruth's pie."

"We're not having pie tonight." Celia takes another backward step toward the house, keeping Ruth and Evie behind her. Daniel walks halfway up the outside stairs but says nothing because Celia shakes her head-a tiny movement, but enough.

"A cup of coffee maybe," Ray says, moving aside, and with the sweep of one hand, he motions for Daniel to pa.s.s by.

Slipping between Ray and the doorframe, Daniel stops next to Celia. He takes a half step forward, trembling.

"Too late for coffee," Daniel says, his voice barely more than a whisper.

"What's that you say?" Ray fills the doorway but doesn't cross the threshold.

Under his brown hat, Ray's hair is clean and the skin on his face is smooth. Standing beneath the light of the single bulb hanging in the center of the porch, his hat shading his face, he looks like a younger Ray, like the one Celia saw on her wedding day. Besides being clean-shaven, his face is swollen. She knows it's the alcohol, years and years of it, that makes his cheeks and jowls puffy and the lid over his bad eye droop. He is hanging on, probably by nothing more than his fingertips. He is sober, barely.

"I didn't hear your truck," Ruth says.

"Truck's dead. Walked up here thinking Arthur could give me a jump." Ray takes off his hat, holds it at his side and tips a nod in Evie's direction. "Thought about that pie, too."

"Arthur's not here." Celia takes Daniel's arm. "Try again tomorrow."

"Dan can help, can't he?" Ray glances at Daniel. "Arthur letting you drive a truck these days?"

The tips of Ray's boots hang over the edge of the threshold, teetering there, not quite inside, not quite out.

"No, Ray."

Everyone turns toward Ruth. She is almost lost, wedged between Celia, Evie and Daniel. Celia glances down at Ruth's belly. She has wrapped both arms around her waist as if hugging herself for warmth.

"Daniel can't help," Ruth says. "You try tomorrow. When Arthur is here."

"Sure is a cold one tonight," Ray says, winking his droopy lid at Celia. His good eye travels from her face down to the white b.u.t.tons on the front of her dress. It lingers there long enough to be too long, while his cloudy eye floats about. "I can wait maybe. Nothing wrong with waiting a spell. Arthur be home soon?"

Caught between two answers, Celia can't reply. It's something about the way he stares at her, taking his time, letting his eyes linger, maybe imagining something. Wondering if the others notice and feeling ashamed for it, she shuffles her bare feet and wraps her arms around her waist.

"Tomorrow," Celia finally says. "You'll see Arthur tomorrow and no sooner."

Daniel yanks off Dad's jacket, slings it toward an empty hook where one arm catches, leaving the jacket to hang lopsided, and stomps into the kitchen. Evie follows, still clutching Mama, while Aunt Ruth flips the deadbolt and waits in the window until Uncle Ray's footsteps go down the stairs. Then she hurries into the kitchen ahead of Daniel, Mama and Evie, and leaning over the sink, she stands on her tiptoes so she can see out the window.

"He's leaving," she says quietly, as if Uncle Ray might hear, and hoists herself onto the counter for a better view. "He's at the end of the drive now."

"Ruth," Mama says, dropping Evie in her seat at the kitchen table. "Please get down before you hurt yourself."

"He's gone for sure," Aunt Ruth says, holding her swollen belly as she slides off the counter. "I'm so sorry for the trouble. So sorry if he scared anyone."

"I wish it had been Julianne," Evie says, poking her cold potatoes with the tip of her b.u.t.ter knife. "I wish we would have found her."

Mama tilts her head, sighs and brushes the hair from Evie's forehead.

"I should have had my rifle," Daniel says.

Mama's head lifts straight up. "Daniel, no," she says, reaching out to him.

He steps back and doesn't take her hand.

"Don't say that. Don't you ever say that."