by James Ross
4
ONE EVENING ABOUT DARK Charles Fisher drove up. I was inside, putting some empty bottles in a crate when I heard the tires crunching in the dust and gravels outside. I stepped to the door to see who it was and if they wanted anything. But I guess Smut had been sitting out front. He was filling up the gas tank. I saw who it was in the car and I walked out the door and sat down on one of the nail kegs.
Lola was driving and Fisher was on this side of her. He partly hid her from my sight. She was slumped down over the steering wheel like she was tired. Fisher yawned like he was sleepy, or maybe tired too. I guess they were just getting in from Florida.
Smut finished filling up the gas tank and came up to the front of the car. He took a rag out of his pocket and stepped up on the running board. He began cleaning the windshield and whistling a song about ‘A beautiful lady in blue. I thought she was someone I knew.’ Lola had on a blue sweater. When Smut began whistling she straightened up and looked out the side of the car.
Smut finished wiping the windshield and hopped off the running board. ‘Anything else, Mr. Fisher?’ he said.
Fisher took out his pocketbook and pulled up a bill. He gave it to Smut and said, ‘I think not.’
Smut gave him some change and then Fisher said: ‘Looks like you’re expanding here. Business must be good.’
Smut pushed back his cap and nodded. ‘Fair,’ he said, ‘just fair. But I hope it’s going to be better after I get my new roadhouse opened up.’
Fisher took off his octagon-shaped glasses and ran his fingers around the rims. ‘So you’re building a roadhouse?’ he said. ‘Well, you ought to do a good business. You haven’t any competition locally.’
‘I hope it does all right,’ Smut told him. ‘Drop by to see us when we get things lined up.’
‘Thank you,’ Fisher said, and yawned again.
Lola Fisher looked over at Smut Milligan right quick and then looked back at the steering wheel. She started the car and they drove off.
Smut came back and sat on a nail keg on the other side of the door from me. ‘Well, well,’ he said. ‘My old gal sure has gone up in this world. She’s done well for a horse doctor’s daughter.’
‘I wonder how she managed to suck him in,’ I said.
Smut looked sideways at me. ‘Suck him in? Hell, that dope’s lucky to get her.’
‘Maybe so,’ I said.
‘Sure he’s lucky. What’s he got that makes him so extra?’ Smut asked.
‘Money,’ I said.
‘That’s right too,’ Smut said, ‘but he don’t look like much of a man to me. I often wonder if he’s man enough to take care of Lola.’
‘He’s the man that’s got her,’ I said.
Smut took his filling-station cap off and scratched his head. ‘Well, he’s the man that supports her, anyway,’ he said.
The carpenters and masons worked pretty fast on the new building, and Smut got so he would go and cuss them out three or four times a day. He wanted the building finished as soon as could be, but he said anything that was built as fast as this one couldn’t be put up right. The first building was almost finished by the day that Lola Fisher drove out in her Nile-green roadster. It had white-walled tires and was a hot-looking number.
It was a fine afternoon in the last of September and the air was crisp. The leaves were turning all red and yellow. Lola pulled up beside the gas tanks and I went out to wait on her.
She was dyked out in green this time. To match the car, I reckon. Green sweater that was too tight, as usual, and green skirt. Her hair was partly covered with a red bandanna of some sort. Her eyelashes were long and black, like she had just had them worked on in the beauty parlor. She looked pretty and up to something. When she smiled at me I looked away from her.
‘Yes, mam, how many?’ I said.
‘Hello, Jack,’ she said. I looked back at her and she was still smiling. It made me feel funny to hear her call my name in that soft, sly voice. I could feel my face getting red. ‘How many did you say, Mrs. Fisher?’ I said.
‘Fill it up,’ she said. ‘I thought I had enough gas to get to Blytheville, but I decided maybe I’d better not try it.’
I began pumping up the gas. While I pumped I watched Lola Fisher. She was sitting crosswise on the seat and she was still smiling. It was sort of a nervous smile, I thought, and she kept folding and unfolding her hands. She turned and looked back at me.
‘When’d you start working for Smut Milligan?’ she said.
‘About a month ago,’ I said.
About that time Smut came out the door. He was drinking a Coca-Cola and his hair was all rumpled up like he was just out of bed. He saw Lola and held up his hand.
‘Hello, Mrs. Fisher,’ he said, and grinned at her.
Lola unfolded her hands. ‘Hello, Smut,’ she said, and smiled at him just like they were going together again. She opened the door and hung her legs out over the running board. She had a pair of legs to knock your eye out.
‘What sort of a hell-hole is this you’re opening up out here, Smut Milligan?’ she said. She reached around with her hands and pulled on the back of her sweater so it would be tighter in front.
Smut swallowed the last of his drink and put the bottle on the ground for me to pick up later. He grinned and said: ‘The River Bend Roadhouse. Dine and dance. Drink liquor and make love. Slot machines and high dice. Name your sin and your favorite utensils. We’ll have it.’
Lola looked around her to make sure the coast was clear. Then she looked up at Smut and smiled at him in a way to make her husband have a running fit.
‘Sounds interesting,’ she said. ‘But the churches in Corinth aren’t going to like this sort of competition. You think you can get by with it?’
Smut walked over and sat down on the running board like he’d just decided to buy the car. He picked out a spot pretty close to Lola’s legs.
‘Oh, they’ll vilify me from the pulpit,’ he said. ‘But I guess I got a strong enough reputation to stand it.’
‘It’s strong, all right,’ Lola said, and they both laughed.
She gave me a five-dollar bill and I had to go inside to get the change. When I came back out, Smut was still sitting on the running board and they were laughing and talking. Lola had quit twisting her hands and she was leaning back on the cushions like she was comfortable. I gave her the change and went around to look at the new building.
The building looked the same way it had that morning, but I hung around it till I heard Lola’s car start up. She drove off down the river road in the direction of Blytheville, so maybe she really had aimed to go down there. When I got back to the filling station Smut was sitting on his favorite nail keg on the left side of the door and was smoking a cigarette.
‘Hot-looking car Lola’s got,’ he said. I could see he wanted to talk about her.
‘First time I ever see her out here alone,’ I said. ‘First time she’s been out here since she married,’ he said. ‘Except for that time a couple of weeks ago when she come out with her husband. Fisher’s been out here several times to get liquor. Generally comes by himself.’
‘Looks like he’d buy his liquor by the case and not fool with getting a pint or a quart at a time,’ I said. ‘I don’t think he drinks much,’ Smut said. ‘Still, he could get a better grade of liquor if he bought it where liquor’s legal and he can pick and choose,’ I said. ‘He’s up North a lot, where there’s plenty of liquor stores.’
‘Yeah, he’s in New York now,’ Smut said.
‘Looks like Lola’d go with him on his trips,’ I said. Smut looked at me like he thought maybe he’d said too much. ‘Does look like it,’ he agreed. He got up and went inside.
Everything was dull till that week-end. Then things got live enough. The mill ran full time that week for the first time since the last spring, and the hands all drew a full pay check. They probably owed all they drew and some to boot, but things are changed now at the mill. It used to be that the company made all the hand
s trade at the mill store and they took what a man owed them out of his pay check. Plenty of families have worked for as long as five years at the mill and never seen one of their pay checks during that time. But that’s a thing of the past now, and the mill hands made for our place before anybody could get at them and collect. All day Saturday there were a dozen different poker games going on around the filling station. Several boys from the brickyard came down there Saturday afternoon and joined the mill hands. Then there was a handful of boys from Corinth that didn’t work anywhere, but would come to Smut’s on week-ends and get in the poker games. They usually won some. When they trimmed a mill hand he stayed trimmed. Smut didn’t like them, for they wouldn’t play with him so he could take some of it back. Still, he couldn’t order them to get off and stay off. That would be bad for business if it got out that customers weren’t welcome down there.
But Smut was pretty nasty to them and sometimes got in fights with them. Once before I started working there, one of these sharks, Whitey Duke, cut Smut and it was a bad mess. But like a fool Whitey came back again. One night Smut got him down and held him and beat his head half in. Smut used a beer bottle. Whitey had been hot stuff after he cut Smut that time. He got to bragging about how he’d cut the guts out of any man that fooled with him. He got to believing he was a hard boy. That night Smut worked on him with the beer bottle, Whitey cried and begged Smut not to kill him. It ruined his reputation, and after that everybody would cuss him and kick him around. After a while Whitey left town and went to Charlotte. He started driving a taxi there.
About three o’clock Saturday afternoon two of the mill hands fell out over a game of blackjack. A fellow named Rance, and a pimply-faced boy that had on blue overalls and white shoes. They had been playing outside in a car. The pimply-faced one chased Rance inside the filling station. Rance came running in and ducked behind the counter where Smut was standing, with his back to the door. Rance was a fat man that wore horn-rimmed glasses. He was blowing hard.
‘Hold him offen me, Smut,’ he said. ‘He’s gonna cut me if something ain’t done. Don’t let him cut me.’ Rance shifted down the counter. ‘Done cut two fellows this year.’
The pimply-faced boy had stopped in the door. Then he came on up to the counter. His face was red as fire, with the little festered bumps stuck out all over it. He tried to hop up on the counter, but Smut pushed him back.
‘Get down, Slop Face,’ Smut said. ‘Put up your knife and get the hell out of here.’
The pimply-faced boy shifted his knife from his right hand to his left. He reached up with his right hand and pushed the hair out of his eyes. There was something on his wrist that looked like a chain bracelet, but when he turned his hand I saw it was a wrist watch.
‘Bastard had a extra ten-spot,’ he said. The sweat was running down his forehead and a string of his hair fell down and stuck to the stream of sweat.
‘What of it?’ Smut asked. ‘You probably had half a dozen hid back too. Put up that knife.’
The pimply-faced boy made a dive and got one leg over the counter. Rance made a rush for the back and went into the other room. Smut grabbed the boy’s leg and held him. Then he grabbed the boy’s wrist and bent it backward. The boy’s mouth came open and in a minute his fingers came open too, and the knife dropped out of his hand. Smut slapped him down to the floor and reached over and picked up the knife.
‘Get out, Sloppy,’ Smut said. ‘If I hear tell of you arguing around here any more I’ll fix you up so you can’t run that set of speeders next week.’
The boy named Sloppy looked back at his knife as soon as he got up. Then he turned and walked out. I didn’t hear any more from him that week-end. He was a thin fellow, and not very dangerous without his knife and some liquor.
Sunday morning about a dozen of them came back and began gambling again. They were the ones that had won the money the night before. They kept dropping out one at a time until about two o’clock that afternoon, when there were three of them left. They were sitting out under the mulberry tree in the back, and Smut called them inside.
They came in pretty quick, because Smut offered them a drink of good liquor. I was in the kitchen making myself a cheese sandwich when they came in there. Smut was as big as all three of them put together. One of them was a fellow that limped and his name was Crip Wood. The other two were named Red and Lonnie. I think Red’s last name was Smith; I don’t know what Lonnie’s was. Lonnie’s hair was thin and sort of faded-looking. There were freckles on the top of his head, in between the strands of hair.
Smut got three glasses and set them on the kitchen table beside the bottle of liquor. ‘Here it is, boys. Help yourselves,’ he told them.
They helped themselves to three big drinks and I took my sandwich and got out. I knew it wouldn’t take Smut long to get in their poker game. I didn’t think it would take him long to get most of their money.
Out front there wasn’t much business. Once in a while one of the kids would squawk about the slot machine not paying off. I would go fix it—Smut had showed me how—so it would pay off a couple of times and then get broke again. Anybody with any sense would have quit playing that machine. But some folks can’t wait to lose what little money they have. And the other one was always busy.
About four o’clock Wilbur Brannon drove in and parked his car under a red oak. He got out and came up to where I was sitting. He had on a brown tweed suit, with a green hat, green shirt, and red tie. He was dressed a little too good to be hanging around a filling station.
‘How’s your health, Jack?’ he said. He pulled up a nail keg and dusted it off with his handkerchief before he sat down.
‘How’re you, Mr. Brannon?’ I said.
‘I’m all right,’ he said. ‘But I need a drink. Got any cold water and a bottle of ginger ale?’
‘Inside,’ I said. ‘I’ll bring them out.’ I got up and started in.
He followed me inside. ‘I think I’ll take it in here,’ he said. I noticed his eyes were a little red and his birthmark was paler than usual.
I got the jug of water out of the icebox, and a bottle of ginger ale. I took a glass out of the icebox too, for we kept glasses in there so they’d be cold. We didn’t keep glasses in there for the mill hands and farmers. Just for ourselves when we got ready to take a drink, and for the special customers. Brannon poured the glass half full of water and finished filling it up with liquor from a bottle he pulled out of his inside coat-pocket. He swallowed it quick and took a drink of ginger ale.
‘Hello!’ he said when he sat the bottle down. ‘I forgot to offer you a drink.’
‘That’s all right. I can’t drink on the job,’ I said.
‘Might cheat a customer, hah?’ he said, and smiled.
‘A customer might cheat me is the main reason,’ I said.
When we went back outside Bert Ford was sitting on one of the nail kegs. He had on a pair of striped overalls and a gray chambray shirt. The shirt was clean and starched so stiff that it stood out from Bert’s body a little. Bert had a snuff-brush in one hand and a tin snuffbox in the other.
‘Hello, boys,’ he said.
‘Drinking today, Bert?’ Wilbur asked him.
Bert Ford spat out a gob of brown spit. ‘I got some of my own,’ he said. ‘Just took a drink when I come by the spring on t’other side of the highway.’
‘Got some mighty good Scotch here, if you want a drink,’ Wilbur said.
‘Druther have corn,’ Bert said. ‘I’m drinkin corn and don’t care to mix my brands.’
‘How about a game of checkers?’ Wilbur Brannon said to him. I looked at Wilbur’s face and his birthmark had changed to a red that was almost black. A drink did him a lot of good sometimes.
‘Soon to as not,’ Bert Ford said. He took his brush and dribbled it around inside the snuffbox. Then he put it in the side of his mouth and shut his lips tight.
I went inside and brought out the checkerboard. Bert pulled up another keg and they put the board on th
at.
I watched them playing for a while and they were pretty good. But Wilbur was the best. He was more daring than Bert Ford was. Bert played a close, safe game of checkers. He would rather play for a tie than take a chance and maybe lose. After a while I got tired of watching them and went inside and turned on the radio.
It wasn’t long before the poker game in the back busted up. None of the boys came out the front. But two of them, Crip Wood and Lonnie, drove out past the filling station in an old V-8 sedan. In a few minutes Red Smith—or whatever his name was—drove his car around the back and took off down Lover’s Lane. I turned off the radio and went back outside to watch the checker game. Wilbur Brannon was jumping a double jump on Bert Ford’s kings when Smut Milligan came out the door.
He was eating peanut-butter sandwiches out of a little cellophane package and he looked sour as vinegar. Wilbur looked up at him.
‘Hello, Smut,’ he said. ‘Eating supper?’
Smut nodded his head. ‘Probably,’ he said. He sat down in the doorway. He certainly looked gloomy about something.
It was twilight then, and there was a dark red look to the sky in the west where the sun had gone down. The air was cool like it is in the fall and I felt good. We all sat there looking off at the sky. The only fuss was Smut chewing his peanut-butter crackers.
Finally he swallowed the last mouthful and threw the cellophane away.
‘You boys want to run a few hands of poker, or blackjack or something?’ he said.
Wilbur folded his arms across his breast and leaned back on his keg.
‘Suits me,’ he said.
Bert Ford took his snuff-brush out of the side of his mouth. He spat in the dust. ‘Soon to as not,’ he said, then put the brush back in the side of his mouth.
They got up without saying another word and went to the back. I went inside and turned on the lights. When Smut first bought the place he used oil lamps down there, but when the power line came through he had the place wired and began using electricity.
