The Killer's Game

by Jay Bonansinga

  The night after Frank buried his pa, he got in some corn squeezings, and got drunk enough to imagine weasels crawling out from under the floorboards. To clear his head and to relieve his bladder, he went out to do something on his father’s grave that would never pass for flowers. He stood there watering, thinking about the prize money and what he would do with it. He looked at the house and the barn and the lot, out to where he could see the dead corn standing in rows like dehydrated soldiers. The house leaned to the left, and one of the windowsills was near to the ground. When he slept at night, he slept on a bed with one side jacked up with flat rocks so that it was high enough and even enough that he wouldn’t roll out of bed. The barn had one side missing and the land was all rutted from runoff, and had never been terraced.

  With the exception of the hill where they grazed their bit of stock, the place was void of grass, and all it brought to mind was brown things and dead things, though there were a few bedraggled chickens who wandered the yard like wild Indians, taking what they could find, even eating one another should one of them keel over dead from starvation or exhaustion. Frank had seen a half dozen chickens go at a weak one lying on the ground, tearing him apart with the chicken still cawing, kicking a leg. It hadn’t lasted long. About like a dozen miners at a free lunch table.

  Frank smoked his cigarette and thought if he could win that race, he would move away from this shit pile. Sell it to some fool. Move into town and get a job that would keep him. Never again would he look up a mule’s ass or fit his hands around the handles on a plow. He was thinking on this while looking up the hill at his mule, Rupert.

  The hill was surrounded by a rickety rail fence within which the mule resided primarily on the honor system. At the top of the hill was a bunch of oaks and pines and assorted survivor trees. As Frank watched the sun fall down behind the hill, it seemed as if the limbs of the trees wadded together into a crawling shadow, the way the wind blew them and mixed them up. Rupert was clearly outlined near a pathetic persimmon tree from which the mule had stripped the persimmons and much of the leaves.

  Frank thought Rupert looked quite noble up there, his mule ears standing high in outline against the redness of the sun behind the dark trees. The world seemed strange and beautiful, as if just created. In that moment Frank felt much older than his years and not so fresh as the world seemed, but ancient and worn like the old Indian pottery he had found while plowing through what had once been great Indian mounds. And now, even as he watched, he noted the sun seemed to darken, as if it were a hot wound turning black from infection. The wind cooled and began to whistle. Frank turned his head to the North and watched as clouds pushed across the fading sky. In instants, all the light was gone and there were just shadows, spitting and twisting in the heavens and filling the hard-blowing wind with the aroma of wet dirt.

  When Frank turned again to note Rupert, the mule was still there, but was now little more than a peculiar shape next to the ragged persimmon tree. Had Frank not known it was the mule, he might well have mistaken it for a peculiar rise in the terrain, or a fallen tree lying at an odd angle.

  The storm was from the North and blowing west. Thunder boomed and lightning cracked in the dirty sky like snap beans, popped and fizzled like a pissed-on campfire. In that moment, the shadow Frank knew to be Rupert, lifted its head, and pointed its dark snout toward the sky, as if in defiance. A bolt of lightning, crooked as a dog’s hind leg, and accompanied by a bass drum blow of thunder, jumped from the heavens and dove for the mule, striking him a perfect white-hot blow on the tip of his nose, making him glow, causing Frank to think that he had in fact seen the inside of the mule light up with all its bones in a row. Then Rupert’s head exploded, his body blazed, the persimmon leaped to flames, and the mule fell over in a swirl of heavenly fire and a cannon shot of flying mule shit. The corpse caught a patch of dried grass ablaze. The flames burned in a perfect circle around the corpse and blinked out, leaving a circle of smoke rising skyward.

  “Goddamn,” Frank said. “Shit.”

  The clouds split open, let loose of its bladder, pissed all over the hillside and the mule, and not a drop, not one goddamn drop, was thrown away from the hill. The rain just covered that spot, put out the mule and the persimmon tree with a sizzling sound, then passed on, taking darkness, rain, and cool wind with it.

  Frank stood there for a long time, looking up the hill, watching his hundred dollars crackle and smoke. Pretty soon the smell from the grilled mule floated down the hill and filled his nostrils.

  “Shit,” Frank said. “Shit. Shit. Shit.”

  Late morning, when Frank could finally drag himself out of bed, he went out and caught up the horse, Dobbin, hitched him to a single tree and some chains, drove him

  out to where the mule lay. He hooked one of the mule’s hind legs to the rigging, and Dobbin dragged the corpse up the hill, between the trees, to the other side. Frank figured he’d just let the body rot there, and being on the other side of the hill, there was less chance of the wind carrying down the smell.

  After that, he moped around for a few days, drank enough to see weasels again, and then had an idea. His idea was to seek out Leroy, who had been used to train Rupert. See if he could work a deal with him.

  Frank rode Dobbin over to Leroy’s place, which was as nasty as his own. More so, due to the yard being full not only of chickens and goats, but children. He had five of them, and when Frank rode up, he saw them right away, running about, raising hell in the yard, one of them minus pants, his little johnson flopping about like a grub worm on a hot griddle. He could see Leroy’s old lady on the porch, fat and nasty with her hair tied up. She was yelling at the kids and telling them how she was going to kill them and feed them to the chickens. One of the boys, the ten-year-old, ran by the porch whooping, and the Mrs., moving deftly for such a big woman, scrambled to the edge of the porch, stuck her foot out, caught him one just above the waist and sent him tumbling. He went down hard. She laughed like a lunatic. The boy got up with a bloody nose and ran off across the yard and into the woods, screaming.

  Frank climbed down from Dobbin and went over to Leroy who was sitting on a bucket in the front yard whittling a green limb with a knife big enough to sword fight. Leroy was watching his son retreat into the greenery. As Frank came up, leading Dobbin, Leroy said, “Does that all the time. Sometimes, though, she’ll throw something at him. Good thing wasn’t nothing lying about. She’s got a pretty good throwin’ arm on her. Seen her hit a seed salesman with a tossed frying pan from the porch there to about where the road meets the property. Knocked him down and knocked his hat off. Scattered his seed samples, which the chickens ate. Must have laid there for an hour afore he got up and wandered off. Forgot his hat. Got it on my head right now, though I had to put me some newspaper in the band to make it fit.”

  Wasn’t nothing Frank could say to that, so he said, “Leroy, Rupert got hit by lightning. Right in the head.”

  “The head?”

  “Wouldn’t have mattered had it been the ass. It killed him deader than a post and burned him up.”

  “Damn. That there is a shame,” Leroy said, and stopped whittling. He pushed the seed salesman’s hat up on his forehead to reveal some forks of greasy brown hair. Leroy studied Frank. “Is there something I can do for you? Or you come around to visit?”

  “I’m thinking you might could help me get a mule and get back in the race.”

  “Mules cost.”

  “I know. Thought we might could come up with something. And if we could, and we won, I’d give you a quarter of the prize money.”

  “I get a quarter for grooming folks' critters in town.”

  “I mean a quarter of a hundred. Twenty-five dollars.”

  “I see. Well, I am your man for animals. I got a knack. I can talk to them like I was one of them. Except for chickens. Ain’t no one can talk to chickens.”

  “They’re birds.”

  “That there is the problem. They ain’t animal enough.”


  Frank thought about Leroy and the fucked goat. Wondered what Leroy had said to the goat as way of wooing it. Had he told her something special? I think you got a good-looking face? I love the way your tail wiggles when you walk. It was a mystery that Frank actually wasn’t all that anxious to unravel…

  “I know you run in the circles of them that own or know about mules,” Frank said. “Why I thought you maybe could help me.”

  Leroy took off the seed salesman’s hat, put it on his knee, threw his knife in the dirt, let the whittling stick fall from his hand. “I could sneak up on an idea or two. Old man Torrence, he’s got a mule he’s looking to sell. And by his claim, it’s a runner. He ain’t never ridden it himself, but he’s had it ridden. Says it can run.”

  “There’s that buying stuff again. I ain’t got no real money.”

  “Takes money to make money.”

  “Takes money to have money.”

  Leroy put the seed salesman’s hat back on. “You know, we might could ask him if he’d rent out his mule. Race is a ways off yet, so we could get some good practice in. You being about a hundred and twenty-five pounds, you’d make a good rider.”

  “I’ve ridden a lot. I was ready on Rupert, reckon I can get ready on another mule.”

  “Deal we might have to make is, we won the race, we bought the mule afterwards. That might be the way he’d do it.”

  “Buy the mule?”

  “At a fair price.”

  “How fair?”

  “Say twenty-five dollars.”

  “That’s a big slice of the prize money. And a mule for twenty-five, that’s cheap.”

  “I know Torrence got the mule cheap. Fella that owed him made a deal. Besides, times is hard. So they’re selling cheap. Cost more, we can make extra money on side bets. Bet on ourselves. Or if we don’t think we got a chance, we bet against ourselves.”

  “I don’t know. We lose, it could be said we did it on purpose.”

  “I can get someone to bet for us.”

  “Only if we bet to win. I ain’t never won nothing or done nothing right in my life, and I figure this here might be my chance.”

  “You gettin’ Jesus?”

  “I’m gettin’ tired,” Frank said.

  There are no real mountains in East Texas, and only a few hills of consequence, but Old Man Torrence lived at the top of a big hill that was called with a kind of braggarts lie, Barrow Dog Mountain. Frank had no idea who Barrow or Dog were, but that was what the big hill had been called for as long as he remembered, probably well before he

  was born. There was a ridge at the top of it that overlooked the road below. Frank found it an impressive sight as he and Leroy rode in on Dobbin, he at the reins, Leroy behind him.

  It was pretty on top of the hill too. The air smelled good, and flowers grew all about in red, blue and yellow blooms, and the cloudless sky was so blue you felt as if a great lake were falling down from the heavens. Trees fanned out bright green on either side of the path, and near the top, on a flat section, was Old Man Torrence’s place. It was made of cured logs, and he had a fine chicken coop that was built straight and true. There were hog pens and a nice barn of thick, cured logs with a roof that had all of its roofing slats. There was a sizable garden that rolled along the top of the hill, full of tall, bright green corn stalks, so tall they shaded the rows between them. There was no grass between the rows, and the dirt there looked freshly laid by. Squash and all manner of vegetables exploded out of the ground alongside the corn, and there were little clumps of beans and peas growing in long, pretty rows.

  In a large pen next to the barn was a fifteen-hands-high, chocolate-colored mule, prettiest thing Frank had ever seen in the mule flesh department. Its ears stood up straight, and it gave Frank and Leroy a snort as they rode in.

  “He’s a big one,” Leroy said.

  “Won’t he be slow, being that big?” Frank asked.

  “Big mule’s also got big muscles, he’s worked right. And he looks to have been worked right. Got enough muscles, he can haul some freight. Might be fast as Rupert.”

  “Sure faster right now,” Frank said.

  As they rode up, they saw Old Man Torrence on the front porch with his wife and three kids, two boys and a girl. Torrence was a fat, ruddy-faced man. His wife was a little plump, but pretty. His kids were all nice looking and they had their hair combed and unlike Leroy’s kids, looked clean. As if they might bathe daily. As they got closer, Frank could see that none of the kids looked whacked on. They seemed to be laughing at something the mother was saying. It certainly was different from his own upbringing, different from Leroy’s place. Wasn’t anyone tripping anyone, cussing, tossing frying pans, threatening to cripple one another or put out an eye. Thinking on this, Frank felt something twist around inside of him like some kind of serpent looking for a rock to slide under.

  He and Leroy got off Dobbin and tied him to a little hitching post that was built out front of the house, took off their hats, and walked up to the steps.

  After being offered lemonade, which they turned down, Old Man Torrence came off the porch, ruffling one of his kid’s hair as he did. He smiled back at his wife, and then walked with Frank and Leroy out toward the mule pen, Leroy explaining what they had in mind.

  “You want to rent my mule? What if I wanted to run him?”

  “Well, I don’t know,” Leroy said. “It hadn’t occurred to me you might. You ain’t never before, though I heard tell he was a mule could be run.”

  “It’s a good mule,” Torrence said. “Real fast.”

  “You’ve ridden him?” Frank asked.

  “No. I haven’t had the pleasure. But my brother and his boys have. They borrow him from time to time, and they thought on running him this year. Nothing serious. Just a thought. They say he can really cover ground.”

  “Frank here,” Leroy said, “he plans on entering, and we would rent your mule. If we win, we could give you a bit of the prize money. What say we rent him for ten, and if he wins, we give you another fifteen. That way you pick up twenty-five dollars.”

  Frank was listening to all this, thinking: and then I owe Leroy his share; this purse I haven’t won is getting smaller and smaller.

  “And what if you don’t win?” Torrence said.

  “You’ve made ten dollars,” Leroy said.

  “And I got to take the chance my mule might go lame or get hurt or some such. I don’t know. Ten dollars, that’s not a lot of money for what you’re asking. It ain’t even your mule.”

  “Which is why we’re offering the ten dollars,” Leroy said.

  They went over and leaned on the fence and looked at the great mule, watched his muscles roll beneath his chocolate flesh as he trotted nervously about the pen.

  “He looks excitable,” Frank said.

  “Robert E. Lee has just got a lot of energy is all,” Torrence said.

  “He’s named Robert E. Lee?” Frank asked.

  “Best damn general ever lived. Tell you boys what. You give me twenty-five, and another twenty-five if he wins, and you got a deal.”

  “But I give you that, and Leroy his share, I don’t have nothing hardly left.”

  “You ain’t got nothing at all right now,” Torrence said.

  “How’s about,” Leroy said, “we do it this way. We give you fifteen, and another fifteen if he wins. That’s thirty. Now that’s fair for a rented mule. Hell, we might could go shopping, buy a mule for twenty-five, and even if he don’t win, we got a mule. He don’t race worth a damn, we could put him to plow.”

  Old Man Torrence pursed his lips. “That sounds good. All right,” he said sticking out his hand, “deal.”

  “Well, now,” Frank said, not taking the hand. “Before I shake on that, I’d like to make sure he can run. Let me ride him.”

  Old Man Torrence withdrew his hand and wiped it on his pants as if something had gotten on his palm. “I reckon I could do that, but seeing how we don’t have a deal yet, and ain’t no fifteen dolla
rs has changed hands, how’s about I ride him for you. So you can see.”

  Frank and Leroy agreed, and watched from the fence as Torrence got the equipment and saddled up Robert E. Lee. Torrence walked Robert E. Lee out of the lot, and onto a pasture atop the hill, where the overhang was. The pasture was huge and the grass was as green as Ireland. It was all fenced in with barb wire strung tight between deeply planted posts.

  “I’ll ride him around in a loop. Once slow, and then real fast toward the edge of the overhang there, then cut back before we get there. I ain’t got a pocket watch, so you’ll have to be your own judge.”

  Torrence swung into the saddle. “You boys ready.”

  “Let’er rip,” Leroy said.

  Old Man Torrence gave Robert E. Lee his heels. The mule shot off so fast that Old Man Torrence’s hat flew off, and Leroy in sympathy, took hold of the brim of the seed salesman’s hat, as if Robert E. Lee’s lunge might blow it off his head.

  “Goddamn,” Leroy said. “Look how low that mule is to the ground. He’s gonna have the grass touching his belly.”

  And so the mule ran, and as it neared the barb wire fence, Old Man Torrence gave him a tug, to turn him. But, Robert E. Lee wasn’t having any. His speed picked up, and the barb wire fence came closer.

  Leroy said, “Uh oh.”

  Robert E. Lee hit the fence hard. So hard it caused his head to dip over the top wire and his ass to rise up as if he might be planning a headstand. Over the mule flipped, tearing loose the fence, causing a strand of wire to snap and strike Old Man Torrence, and then Torrence was thrown ahead of the tumbling mule… Over the overhang. Out of sight. The mule did in fact do a headstand, landed hard that way, its hind legs high in the air, wiggling. For a moment, it seemed as if he might hang there, and then, Robert E. Lee lost his headstand and went over after his owner.