Half of Paradise

by James Lee Burke

  “Bump you a dime more,” Benoit said.

  “Call,” Billy Jo said.

  Toussaint had opened on a pair of queens and had drawn another one.

  “Call,” he said.

  “What you got?” Benoit said.

  “Three queens.”

  “Fuck. I had two pair, ace high.”

  They threw in their cards and Billy Jo took a nickel out of the pot. Toussaint scraped in his winnings. They played four more hands; Toussaint won two of them. One man had dropped out and gone to bed, leaving five in the game. The deal went around again. Toussaint won the next hand on a straight. He had a dollar and a half in coins before him. Benoit dealt the cards.

  “Open for a nickel,” Avery said.

  Everyone stayed.

  “How many you want?”

  “I’m pat,” Avery said.

  “You ain’t taking no cards?”

  “No.”

  “Three,” Toussaint said.

  The discards were scattered across the blanket. The man across from Toussaint drew one card.

  “I’ll take the same,” Billy Jo said.

  Benoit snapped two cards off the deck for himself. He mixed them in his hand and fanned them out slowly.

  “Your bet, opener,” he said.

  “My last nickel,” Avery said.

  Toussaint had drawn to a pair of kings and missed. He threw in his cards.

  “I’m out,” the man across from him said.

  “I’ll see you,” Billy Jo said.

  “Call and raise it a quarter,” Benoit said.

  “That was my last nickel. I got to go in the side pot,” Avery said.

  “No side pot and no drawing light,” Benoit said. “It’s a house rule.”

  “I can’t cover it, then.”

  “I’ll back him,” Toussaint said. He dropped three quarters in front of Avery.

  Avery picked them up and threw them in the pot.

  “Call and raise you fifty cents,” he said.

  “You splitting with him, Toussaint?” Benoit said.

  “I got no part in this.”

  “How come you giving your money away?”

  “I don’t like to see nobody play freeze out.”

  “Call his raise or fold,” Billy Jo said.

  “Give me time.”

  Benoit ruffled the cards in his hands.

  “Do one thing or another,” Billy Jo said.

  “He’s playing on somebody else’s money.”

  “You don’t care whose it is when you put it in your pocket.”

  He waited, his pig-eyes studying the backs of Avery’s cards. “All right, I fold,” he said.

  Avery tossed a nickel out of the pot to Billy Jo and took the rest in.

  “Here’s openers,” he said. He showed a pair of aces.

  “What else you got?” Benoit said.

  “You didn’t pay to see.”

  “I got a right to know.”

  “No, you don’t,” Toussaint said.

  Benoit flipped over Avery’s other cards, a pair of eights and a seven of clubs.

  “You didn’t have nothing but two pair. I was holding three tens.”

  “You should have paid to see those cards.”

  “Listen, kid,” Benoit began.

  “I don’t like that crap, neither,” Billy Jo said. “I run a straight game, and we play like the rules says. You got to put up before you see a guy’s hand.”

  Benoit glared at the discards and was quiet.

  “Hey, you guys, look here.” It was Jeffry. He was coming from the latrine, barefooted, his belt unhitched and hanging loose, and his trousers half buttoned. He had the piece of string in his hand.

  “You’ll wake up the guys sleeping,” Billy Jo said.

  “Look at the string. Them knots is gone. It’s like Brother Samuel said. There ain’t one of them left!”

  “Shut up,” a voice said from one of the bunks.

  “I went into the latrine and I was waiting to get rid of my supper, like I do every night, and I waited and nothing happened. My belly was all right. I didn’t have to crap at all. I was hitching up my trousers and I took out this piece of string and them knots was gone. I don’t feel sick no more. I swear to God I don’t. Wake up, Brother Samuel! You healed my belly. It’s like you said. No more runs.”

  Brother Samuel stirred in his bunk. He sat up and looked at Jeffry. His face was heavy with sleep.

  “You done it,” Jeffry said.

  “I ain’t sure you want to be obliged.”

  “This is the first time I held my food down since I come to camp.”

  “I healed you through the Black Man. Sometimes the spirits come back and make it bad for you in another way.”

  “I ain’t worrying about no more spirits. They can do anything they got a mind to as long as they don’t give me no more dysentery.”

  “You guys shut up,” a voice said from the darkness.

  “I told you there was something in that ball of hair,” Benoit said.

  “You guys been in stir too long. It’s got to you,” Billy Jo said.

  “Look at the string. There ain’t a knot in it.”

  “Who untied them? That Belial guy?”

  “I don’t know. I’d like to shake his hand, whoever he is,” Jeffry said.

  “Them spirits can come back,” Brother Samuel said.

  “They ain’t coming around me no more,” Jeffry said. “I swear to God I never thought nothing like this could happen.”

  “Button up your pants. You’re hanging out,” Billy Jo said.

  “I knowed that ball of hair jumped in my hand,” Benoit said. “I felt it, just like a frog leg jumps.”

  “Spread this around camp and you’ll all go to the nut house,” Billy Jo said.

  “The spirits can put a grigri on you,” Brother Samuel said.

  “What the hell is a grigri?”

  “It’s a spell. It makes you have bad luck.”

  “I ain’t worrying about no grigri. It couldn’t be no worse than the runs.”

  “I ain’t got the power to take it off. It takes a man that’s sold his soul to get rid of a grigri.”

  “I ain’t worrying.”

  Somewhere in the distance a train whistle blew. They could hear the rush of the engine and the rumble of the wheels. They never saw the train except the day they rode it to prison and the day they left. There was an old story that if an inmate saw the train’s headlamp shining at him out of the darkness he would be released from the camp soon. The whistle blew again and the men sat in silence. Even Jeffry did not speak. The train was closer now and the whistle shrieked once more in the quiet of the night.

  “The midnight special going to glory,” Brother Samuel said. “Shine your light on me.”

  Three weeks passed and the sky became like scorched brass. The air was hot and dry, and the wind blew across the land like heat from an oven. Dark thunderclouds were spread over the horizon, but the rains didn’t come. At night the heat lightning flashed in the sky, and black strips of rain clouds floated across the moon. The earth was cracked from lack of water. The grass in the fields was burnt yellow and whispered dryly in the hot wind. The men waited for the rains to drench the parched ground, and the thunder clapped and rattled over the horizon like someone beating a sheet of corrugated tin against the sky.

  Gang five was still working on the irrigation canal the day LeBlanc was brought to camp. A pickup truck ground along the right-of-way in second gear and stopped close to the ditch. LeBlanc sat in the front seat between two guards. He got out on the driver’s side, and the other guard slid out behind him. LeBlanc’s face was marked with scars and the bridge of his nose was crooked. He hadn’t had a haircut since he had been arrested, and the hair along his neck stuck down over his shirt collar. The two guards walked him to the area where gang five was working.

  “Here’s a new one, Evans. He just got in from Angola. The warden told me to bring him on down and get him started,” the
driver said.

  “What’s his name?” Evans said.

  “LeBlanc.”

  “I been expecting him. You all can go on. I’ll get him a pick and put him to work.”

  “Watch him. He spit on the cop that brought him on the train.”

  “He won’t do that here.”

  The guards got into the pickup, turned it around, and drove back along the right-of-way towards the gravel road.

  “Come with me,” Evans said.

  They went to the line shack and LeBlanc was issued a pick. They went back to the ditch.

  “I ain’t eat breakfast yet,” LeBlanc said.

  “You should have told them when they checked you through the office.”

  “I did. Them guards was supposed to take me to the mess hall.”

  “They was probably in a hurry. Get down in the ditch and go to work. You can eat at lunch time.”

  “I ain’t used to working on an empty stomach.”

  “You’ll get used to a lot of things around here. You come into camp with a bad record or they wouldn’t have put you on my gang. Step out of line and you’ll wish you was back in the hospital. Now start sweating some grease into that pick handle.”

  “I ain’t got much use for people that wear uniforms.”

  “Get down in the ditch.”

  He climbed over the mound of clay and slid down the embankment.

  “Hi, LeBlanc,” Avery said. “When did they bring you in?”

  “I come on the train this morning.”

  “How was it at the hospital?”

  “They sewed up my face and put my ribs back together. I still got to wear some tape around my sides.”

  “I wasn’t sure you were going to make it. You looked pretty bad when they carried you out of the jail,” Avery said.

  “I’m going to even up things back there sometime.”

  “You better forget about it for a while.”

  “I aim to get things straight. I owe some people for messing up my face.”

  “What was Evans talking to you about?”

  “Who’s Evans?” LeBlanc said.

  “The hack.”

  “I give a cop some trouble.”

  “What did you do?”

  “I spit on him at the front gate.”

  “Who’s the new guy?” Billy Jo said. “This is LeBlanc,” Avery said. “He came in from Angola.”

  “What happened to your face?” Jeffry said. “I fell on the sidewalk playing hopscotch.”

  “I was in Angola,” Billy Jo said. “So was Daddy Claxton.”

  “I was there when they was going to set fire to the hacks,” Daddy Claxton said.

  “Who done that to your face?” Jeffry said. “Them stitches ain’t been out very long.”

  “He was in a fight,” Avery said.

  “The other guy must have been using a ball bat.’

  “My face ain’t your business,” LeBlanc said.

  “I didn’t say it was.”

  “Stare at something else, then,” LeBlanc said.

  “This is the best gang in camp,” Billy Jo said. “Everybody here is doing life or they showed the hacks they don’t take crap.”

  “You got a cigarette on you?” Daddy Claxton said.

  “They took them away from me at the office.”

  “What are you pulling?” Billy Jo said.

  “Three and seven.”

  “Daddy and Brother Samuel is pulling life,” Jeffry said.

  The dust rose from the earth as the men worked. LeBlanc rested his pick and took off his shirt. There was a wide band of tape around his ribs and stomach. He swung the pick into the ground.

  “You got something busted?” Billy Jo said.

  “It’s healed up now.”

  “Brother Samuel can heal it for you if it ain’t right,” Jeffry said.

  “There ain’t anything wrong with me,” LeBlanc said.

  “Who done it to you?” Jeffry said.

  “Let the man be,” Brother Samuel said.

  “I was only asking.”

  “Listen to the thunder. Maybe we’ll get some rain tonight,” Daddy Claxton said.

  “It ain’t going to rain. We’ll be breathing this goddamn dust the rest of the year,” Billy Jo said.

  “Not us. We only got a week to pull,” Jeffry said.

  “Shut up,” Billy Jo said.

  “Why is everybody on my ass today?”

  “Because you ask for it,” Billy Jo said.

  “I ain’t done a thing and everybody is getting on my ass about it.”

  “Then shut your mouth and we’ll leave you alone.”

  “I can smell the rain in the air,” Daddy Claxton said. “Like a paper mill. They say it means somebody is going to die when it stays dry a long time and then it rains.”

  “This weather ain’t natural,” Brother Samuel said. “I only seen it like this once before. The sky was yellow and the sun was like a red ball. When the rains come the fever come too, and people was dropping dead in the marsh like sick rabbits. They was still finding bodies two months later.”

  “It’s a drought. Ain’t you guys ever seen a drought before?” Billy Jo said.

  “This one ain’t natural,” Brother Samuel said. “It means something.”

  “Where do you get a drink of water around here?” LeBlanc said.

  “Call for the trusty.”

  “Where is he?”

  “Down the ditch someplace.”

  “Don’t drink too much water if you can help it,” Avery said.

  “What’s wrong with it?”

  “It makes you sick.”

  “Trusty! Bring the water barrel,” Billy Jo said.

  “Why ain’t there any decent water?” LeBlanc said.

  “The state don’t want to pay for digging a new well,” Jeffry said.

  The trusty brought the water can. LeBlanc drank from the dipper.

  “I wouldn’t water stock with this,” he said. He threw the dipper inside the can. The water splashed over the rim.

  “What the hell!” the trusty said. “You got my shirt wet.”

  “Go put some clean water in the can,” LeBlanc said.

  “That’s all there is. You drink the same as everybody else.”

  “What’s going on down there?” Evans said from the top of the ditch.

  “This guy don’t want to drink the water.”

  “Let him go thirsty,” Evans said.

  “This water come out of a swamp,” LeBlanc said.

  The other men had stopped work to watch. LeBlanc’s eyes shone hotly at Evans. The scars and the holes where his cuts had been stitched were pink against his face.

  “You’re starting off your stretch the wrong way,” Evans said.

  “Was you ever in the army? You look like the kind they got in the stockade,” LeBlanc said.

  “Cool down,” Avery said.

  “You always got a uniform and a gun, and sometimes they let you carry a stick to bust somebody’s ribs with. I seen them like you in the stockade.”

  “You want to spend your first day in detention?”

  The trusty started to move off with the water barrel.

  “Come back here,” LeBlanc said. He grabbed the water barrel and pulled the lid off. “Look at it. It’s swamp water.”

  “That water come out of a tap,” Evans said.

  “You try it.”

  “You’re talking yourself right into detention.”

  “Drink it,” LeBlanc said. He held the barrel up at Evans. “Drink it, you fat swine. Drink it till your fat belly is full of worms.”

  “God damn you. Get up here. I’m going to make you sweat your ass off for that.”

  “You filthy swine.” LeBlanc hurled the barrel at Evans’ head. The water whirled out in a shower over the men.

  Evans had his pistol in his hand and was blowing his whistle. Two guards came running from further down the ditch. The inmates had scattered along the canal when Evans drew his weapon. Picks
and shovels were strewn over the ground. The wheelbarrow lay overturned on a mound of dirt.

  “Bring him up here,” Evans said.

  The guards slid down the side of the ditch and came towards LeBlanc. He stepped back and raised his pick over his shoulder. They stopped and one of them, a lean rough-skinned man named Rainack, drew his revolver and cocked the hammer and aimed it at LeBlanc’s head.

  “I won’t miss,” he said.

  “For God’s sake, put it down, LeBlanc,” Avery said.

  “It’s three to one, and you ain’t got but one swing with that pick,” Evans said.

  “Come closer and I’ll pin you to the ground,” LeBlanc said.

  “Quit while you got a chance,” the other guard said.

  “I seen your kind in the stockade. They know how to use a billy club real good. They know how to jab you where it hurts and it don’t show.”

  “Let go of the pick.”

  “They’ve got you. Put it down,” Avery said. “You can’t beat them like this. LeBlanc, listen to me. For God’s sake. He means what he says. He’ll kill you.”

  “I ain’t waiting much longer,” the guard named Rainack said. “A few more seconds and you’re a dead man.”

  Avery broke towards LeBlanc in an attempt to grab the pick. Toussaint dove into his body and dragged him against the wall of the ditch and held him there. Avery fought to get loose, saying, “He’s sick, he was in the war and his mind’s not right, don’t you understand, he should be in a hospital, you can’t shoot him down, Evans, he doesn’t know what he’s doing, he thinks you’re somebody in a stockade—”

  “Be still,” Toussaint said.

  “Make your play one way or another,” Rainack said.

  LeBlanc remained motionless, the pick held in the air above his shoulder, while his eyes moved slowly over the two guards in the ditch and then looked up at Evans. He lowered the pick and dropped it by his foot.

  “I ain’t going to let you kill me,” he said. “You wouldn’t have to worry about me no more. You’d like to shoot me. You want me to make it easy for you so there won’t be no kickbacks from the warden or an investigation. Well, I’m going to stay alive, because when I get out of wherever you lock me up I’m going to kill that man standing on the ditch.”

  “You ain’t going to do nothing,” Rainack said, “except lay in the box and pray Jesus you was dead.”

  “I’m going to kill you,” he said to Evans. “Do you hear me? I’m going to get you, or I hope I die and go to hell.”