Feast for Thieves

by Marcus Brotherton

  Cisco Wayman stood directly before me. He was dressed in his bathrobe, rubbing sleep out of his eyes, and appeared in that halfway state between dreaming and wakefulness. His mouth dropped open when he glimpsed me, and a smile crept up on the edges of his mouth.

  “Danny,” he whispered. “You’re alive.”

  TEN

  I was a deer in his headlights, and the hurtful knowledge of what I’d done rushed at me like it was perched on the front of a speeding semitruck.

  “I’m sorry, Mr. Wayman,” I whispered. “I’m so, so sorry. If I’d known, I never would have asked.”

  His smile faded, and tears filled his eyes. His wife was crying too—standing three steps away from him.

  “The boy needed some clothes to do his job,” Augusta said to her husband. “He was a perfect fit.”

  In another flash Cisco’s eyes narrowed. He pointed at the door and yelled, “Get out of my house! You come into my restaurant without a job, and you come into my home and try on my boy’s clothes. You’re nothing but a drifter. I want you out this minute!”

  “The boy didn’t know, Cisco. Be merciful on him. He just didn’t know.” Augusta was pleading now, hanging on the end of his arm. He brushed her aside, grabbed me by the front of the suit’s lapels, stood to his full height, and yanked me within an inch of my face. The blood rushed into his eyes and a vein throbbed deep in his forehead. I didn’t want to defend myself against a man who was grieving so hard, but I clenched my fists just in case he decided to whale on his wife instead of me. He held those lapels in his hands. His fingers twitched, at first involuntarily, it looked. But then I knew he was fingering the cloth on purpose, running his thumbs over the familiar texture. The anger fled from his face and he began to sob. To my complete surprise, he buried his head on my shoulder and hugged me tight with both arms. “Ah Danny,” he cried. “My Danny … my Danny … my Danny.”

  Augusta was all business now. Her own tears dried, as if this wasn’t the first time she’d seen her husband’s mind snap. She helped loosen his arms from around me and guided him to the living area. All the while he kept sobbing. The man lay fully on the floor. He huddled his arms to his knees and kept sobbing. Augusta covered him with a blanket, stroked his forehead, gave him a small hug, then broke herself away. She came over to where I stood.

  “Keep those clothes,” she said. “Keep them and do some living in them.” She patted my arm and tried to smile.

  “I’m so sorry, Mrs. Wayman,” I said. “So, so sorry.”

  She hugged me, the purest touch she’d presented my direction since I’d first met her, then backed away and looked me in the eyes. “You’ve got to help my husband through his grieving, Reverend Slater. He’s been like this ever since we got the telegram from the war department. He has his good days and his bad days. Most of the time, when he’s not fixing breakfast for the café, he just sleeps. I have my times when it all feels unreal, like Danny’s still coming back, then the grief hits me all over again and I have a good cry. But my husband—there’s something unnatural about his grieving. You got to help him, Reverend Rowdy. I’ll be praying for you. I’m at my wits end, but the good Lord will show you what to do.”

  The door was opened for me. Augusta put my old clothes and boots in a paper sack and handed them over. There was nothing more to do for the time being, I gathered. Augusta led me downstairs and out the kitchen’s back door. “We’ll see you at dinner,” she said, and gave me a kiss on the cheek, quickly turned, and went inside.

  Well, I felt a mite rattled by the whole experience. It was careless of me and where I’d been for not putting two and two together sooner. In the past few years, plenty of families across the country had lost sons my age. I didn’t know how to help Cisco through his grieving. Shoot, heaps of times I’d seen men get shot in the chest, their legs blown away, their arms ripped off. These were my friends, the men on the line next to me. I never considered the lengthier process of grieving, about what a father might do when his son didn’t return home. Any time I lost a friend there was no time for a man to think. You shouldered your weapon and kept firing at the enemy. On reserve you gathered the men in your squad still left and drank to the dead man’s honor. Afterward you buried your pain deep in the bed of a woman, a woman you’d hired for that exact purpose, although it never brought joy to do so. And then your orders came again, so you shouldered your rifle again, and the next day you got up and marched to your place on the line. How was I supposed to be a church minister to a man such as Cisco Wayman? What did God ever know about losing a son?

  I walked far down the street and over to the baseball fields. A bell rang right as I walked up. School let out, and all the young folks of Cut Eye streamed out of the building with a holler. A few of the older ones quick got up a game. One boy took a bat, another took the mound, and another went to the field. The pitch was tossed, the batter swung wide, and the ball clattered against the metal backstop. The batter ran and got the ball, tossed it back to the pitcher on the mound, and stepped to the plate again. This time a fastball zipped in. The batter eyed it closely and walloped it with a solid thwack. The ball soared high over the head of the outfielder, and the runner ran around the bases and back to home.

  I watched that game. Those boys so full of life. That was all I did for some time. I just watched that game. While I was watching I shook those troubling thoughts out of my head, those thoughts for which I had no place to secure.

  The game was over, and I figured I had more work to do—at least to complete my day. So I walked up the street to Gummer’s filling station. A big sign in the window featured a grinning fella in a Humble Oil & Refining hat and read, Buy War Bonds: it’s my job to serve your essential wartime needs today to hasten your motoring pleasures of tomorrow. The sign next to it celebrated the sixtieth anniversary of Dr. Pepper. The small print read, Delicious, nutritious, it helps when you’re hungry, thirsty, or tired. First introduced in 1885 by a Waco, Texas, druggist who had a penchant for experimenting with new flavors at his fountain.

  Nobody looked to be around, and before I could pop inside the garage to see if anybody was there, a fella ambled out of the door, stuck his hands in his pockets, and exclaimed, “Mother of Jehoshaphat! You are just the fella I want to see.”

  “Nice to see you again, Gummer.” I held out my hand.

  “Thank you for the help the other night at the accident, señor,” Gummer said. “I would have been out there all night trying to get that truck righted if you had not come along.” Way back, he came from Mexico, I gathered, or at least his great-grandparents did, by the way he talked English so good yet with a clip. He was thick-necked and strong, about a head shorter than me, and his eyes looked like they were permanently half closed. He wore pants but no shirt.

  “It ain’t nothing,” I said.

  He spit a wad of chaw on the dirt. “Come around out back, Reverend. I have been getting ready your buggy.”

  I nodded. “Sheriff said you might be able to get me a pickup truck. I understand there’s a bit of driving involved in this job.”

  “That, I could not do, amigo.” Gummer reached into his back pocket, took out another wad of chaw, and stuffed it in his mouth. He held it out to me. I’d been known to dip on one or more occasions, but I remembered Mert’s words and thought best not to test a preacher’s expectations just yet.

  “What were you able to find then?”

  “Oh.” Gummer’s word took much longer time to say than it should have.

  “You found me a truck, didn’t you?”

  “Oh.” Gummer was twisting in his trousers, the man truly was, and he coughed before saying, “Well, I did get you a truck of some sorts or another.” He cleared his throat, chewed twice, spit a stream, then added, “What is good to remember is that the job comes with all the gasoline a man could ever use. It is only twenty-one cents a gallon anyway, and this is Texas where we have oil in every backyard ditch.”

  “Show me the vehicle.”

  He winc
ed and pointed the way behind the garage.

  I blinked twice when I rounded the corner. It’s hard to describe such a vehicle if you’ve never seen one up close. Oh, you see them in newspapers making amphibious landings on beaches in the Pacific. In pictures, they’ve got a soldier up top, and sometimes another twenty men in the rear. I gave a low whistle. “Where did you ever find such a brute?”

  “Army surplus. You may have heard we have a shortage of cars in the country right now. Some roads you need a wide load permit just to drive this thing down, but not around here. Just make sure you stay well to the right shoulder whenever another car passes your direction.”

  The army called it DUKW. It was pronounced “duck,” just like the web-footed fowl. “D” was the letter the army gave to a vehicle built in 1942. “U” stood for “utility.” “K” meant power was sent to the front wheels. And “W” meant it had two powered rear axles. Put it together and in front of me squatted a huge, green, six-wheel-drive truck that weighed seven-and-a-half tons. It was built with an up-sloped front end, and the machine’s body looked like a boat and could float like a boat. With it, a fella could drive at sea, navigate floodwaters with ease, or drive up on a sandy beach and not get stuck. The DUKW was pure vehicular beast, and this one was all mine.

  “Runs on regular gasoline,” Gummer said. “Tank holds forty gallons. Get about six miles per gallon on land. Maybe four on water. I welded an extra gas tank to the rear, so your range will be nearly five hundred miles between fill-ups. That should get you anywhere you need to go around these parts. Ever driven one before?”

  I grinned. I had friends in the motor pool. “Ten speeds forward. Two in reverse. Top speed fifty miles per hour.”

  Gummer grinned right back.

  I climbed up to the steering box, sat behind the steering wheel, and ran my hand along the dash. The DUKW was as ugly as the back end of a longhorn cow, but it would get any man where he needed to go, and my mind was already hatching a plan. “It’s a beaut, Gummer. Both tanks full?”

  “I filled them both this morning. Stop by anytime for more. Driving is part of your job. If I am not around, just fill it up yourself. Oh, we will find you a more respectable vehicle one of these days. But for now, consider this your new ride, Reverend Rowdy.”

  I climbed down again and slapped his shoulder. “Thanks, Gummer. Say, I’ll be back in a bit. I got some more business in town. You don’t mind if I pick it up whenever?”

  “Whenever you wish.”

  I grinned again, shook his hand, and walked back through town. If you’re coming into Cut Eye from the north, Gummer’s filling station is the second building in past the laundry mat and the hardware store and lumber emporium. He also sells life insurance if you should ever want some. On the other side of Gummer’s is the city hall with the barbershop in back, then you cross Main Street, and then you’re at the mercantile again. I walked inside and shook hands with the mumbling clerk.

  “Say, Mr. Jones, how much left on my credit line?” I asked.

  He checked his figures. “Fourteen dollars and thirty-three cents.”

  “You do cash advances?”

  “On occasion.”

  “I’ll take ten dollars then.” I pointed to the shelf behind him. “How about a half yard of that yellow ribbon.” I pointed underneath the counter. “And maybe a dime’s worth of those red licorice whips.”

  He looked confused at my choice of purchases, but I wasn’t explaining myself.

  With my cash in my pocket, my packages under my arm, and a fresh plan in my head, I strode back to Gummer’s, checked both ways to see if anyone was watching, fired up the DUKW, and started lumbering north up the highway out of town. I knew it would be difficult to escape Cut Eye—a man driving a vehicle like this wouldn’t be hard to track down. But the DUKW didn’t need to take me clear across America. It just needed to take me north to the next city, Rancho Springs. My plan was a long shot, but it was the only plan I could think of.

  Truth be told, I was still mighty unsettled at the thought of becoming a preacher. If I had my druthers, I wanted out. Already I felt trapped in this new role. Spending my days caring for a community filled with grieving men such as Cisco Wayman, sharp-edged church secretaries like Mert Cahoon, a jailhouse full of drunks, a tavern full of prostitutes, the married men who frequented their services, the widows they left behind from their car accidents, and uppity young women such as Bobbie Barker wasn’t my idea of how to best spend my next large chunk of time. I knew the sheriff would hunt me down like a dog if I tried to escape. I also knew that when I reached Rancho Springs night would be falling. From there I could stash the DUKW in a grove of trees, put my ten dollars to good use, and see if there was a better way forward.

  First off, when I reached Rancho Springs, I needed to take care of some long-standing business. It was urgent business. Mighty urgent.

  In fact ’twas why I robbed the bank.

  ELEVEN

  It was 3:30 p.m. when I left Cut Eye. The afternoon sun was powerful warm. Heat shimmered off the blacktop, and I removed my suit jacket and tie, loosened the neck, rolled my shirt at the sleeves, and roared up the highway in the DUKW at a cool 45 m.p.h.

  By 8 p.m. the outskirts of Rancho Springs were in sight. The town of Denim where I’d grown up was only thirty miles away to the northeast, and when I came to a regrettably familiar dirt road, I pulled off the highway, found a thicket of trees, hid my vehicle, and set out walking. I’d only gone about ten yards before I tensed and stopped fast. Beady eyes blinked at me from out of the dusk. The eyes moved, and I realized it was only a possum scuttling across the driveway. I kept walking.

  For where I was going, I wished I’d brought a gun. Back in Bastogne I’d popped a Nazi officer at two hundred yards and liberated his Luger. It was a honey of a sidearm and a real trophy for any allied soldier, but just before I went into the clink I gave it to my platoon’s second lieutenant. He was a regular fella and never had nothing bad to say about any man. His feet got nearly frozen black from the Belgian cold, and I reckoned the gift would cheer his recovery while he convalesced in Mourmelon.

  Fifty yards in front of me lay my destination. In the quiet of my mind, I called it the devil’s house. It was a ramshackle old pigsty that sat on about twenty acres, and a long dirt driveway gave the occupants a clear view of anyone approaching. I hated this place, but it was part of me, too. As much as I wanted never to set foot through its doors again, it’d be some time still before it was cleared of my life for good. I walked straight up the driveway, rumbled across the wide porch that surrounded the face of the house, and knocked loud at the front door.

  Minutes went by and nobody showed. Hanging from the side wall was the pelt of a badger. The porch light flickered, but that came as no surprise. I could hear rustling inside and could smell the occupants’ smoky presence seeping out the siding. I knocked again, this time louder. The front door cracked and a shotgun barrel appeared in the gloom.

  “What you want?”

  “Sally Jo Chicory—that you? It’s Rowdy Slater. Open up.”

  The crack widened and a swatch of a woman’s housedress appeared. She was a few years older than me, as wide as she was tall, and kept the door safely between her and me. She looked me up and down, shooed a fly away from her face, and scratched her hip. “You got money?” she said, opening the door wider.

  “I reckon I’ll talk to your man about that.”

  She sniffed, turned, and hollered, “Rance! The hero’s here.”

  I waited on the porch while she rummaged around for her man. My eyes stayed fixed on the open door’s darkness. Before long a fella’s frame showed. He shoved the woman out of the way, opened the main door fully, kept the screen door between us, and let out an oily chuckle.

  “Back so soon, Rowdy? Well, absence builds motivation in a man—that’s good for what I’m running here.”

  “I want to see her.”

  “You bring money?”

  “Ten dollars.”
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  He exhaled in disgust, his breath like canned tuna. “That ain’t much.”

  “Reckon it’s good for half an hour.”

  “Yeah, but it ain’t paying your bill in full. Times are hard, Rowdy. Ringtail brings less than two dollars a pelt these days. Gray fox is only ninety cents. Shoot, I brought in two dozen rabbit last week and the fella only gave me six cents apiece.”

  “Well, I got a new proposition for you, Rance. More money—lots more than trapping. You’re gonna like it.” I held my breath, waiting for him to bite.

  The fella opened the door and stepped outside. He was barefoot, the heat spilled off him, and his gut flapped over his dungarees. I could see the unmistakable bulge of a Colt .45 strapped to his hip. “You’re always one for deals, Rowdy.” He let loose with a long angry laugh from beneath his whiskers. “Look where the last one got you. What’s your deal this time?”

  That was exactly what I wanted him to ask. I knew him accepting this new deal would be unlikely, but I reckoned the more intrigued he got, the more willing he’d be to bite.

  “Let me see her first,” I said. “Then I’ll lay out the plan.”

  He scratched behind his ear. “Gimme your ten dollars. You can visit half an hour. Sit on the porch, just like last time. Don’t think I can’t see you if you run.”

  I nodded and forked over my cash.

  He hollered over his shoulder. “Sally Jo! Find the rat!” Rance jiggled the porch lightbulb so it stopped flickering, motioned for me to sit on the steps, then disappeared inside into the darkness. I could see an eyeball through the window watching me from the shadows.