Hellbender (Murder Ballads and Whiskey Book 2)

by Miller, Jason Jack

  “I don’t,” he said. “Ain’t she cuter than a bug’s ear? Con mucho gusto.” He took her hand, then kissed her on the cheek.

  I said, “A ‘nice to meet you’ will do.”

  Before long, chairs were pulled from rows and people spread into the field, like the tent had erupted. The hum of drinking and laughing grew louder than the music. Soon enough everything was spinning. The cider went down so much easier than beer. When I complimented my pap’s brother on the recipe he smiled, “You must be one of them connoisseurs then. People think it’s as simple as mixing rubbing alcohol and apple juice, but it ain’t.”

  Capitalizing on the mood, Fenton rapped his green bottle on the table then raised it in a toast. “May your glass always be full, may there always be a roof over your head, and may you dirty sinners be in heaven a half hour before the devil knows you’re dead.”

  Everybody laughed when Preston said, “Just so you all know, some of us don’t find that very funny.”

  I didn’t get the joke. But I was happy to drink with them.

  When Jamie noticed the music stopped he went to inquire. With a laugh he released his students to eat and returned. “They’ve run out of songs. But we’ll run out of shine before we run out of music. Give us a few minutes to get ready while we set up.”

  “You don’t play, John Henry?” Alex asked my pap.

  He said, “I was only good at two things growing up. Playing an instrument wasn’t one of them.”

  “Bullshit,” Ben said with a laugh.

  “I used to, sweetheart. Me and my youngest sister would sit on the porch for hours.”

  “Sarah?” I said.

  “That’s right. She died when I was away at school.”

  Champ rested his head upon my pap’s knee. Pap scratched his dog’s neck with hands that looked older than they did when I shook them this morning. He said, “Odelia Lewis wondered why I hadn’t asked her to marry me yet. She figured a lack of available suitors made her the obvious choice. She’s ugly, but she means no harm by it. I told her I planned to marry Alice when I graduated. Odelia took it hard. Kept threatening to kill herself or somebody else. Then just before winter break them girls put Sarah in a barrel and rolled her into the river.”

  Alex gently placed a hand on his wrist. Preston whispered, “Man, that’s harsh.”

  My pap looked away. In a voice almost too low to hear, said, “And they cried the dreadful wind and rain.”

  He took a second, then went on, “Of course I can’t prove it. Like I said, family curse.”

  All around, the party went on. But for Alex and me, and Katy and Preston and Ben, it’d seemingly come to an abrupt, sad, end.

  My pap held out his left hand. With a forced smile he said, “Got this caught in a skidder down on the Greenbrier, up a ways from Cass. Thought I was going to lose a few fingers. That’s why I don’t play.” Faint, white scars trailed across his hand like petroglyphs.

  I heard my name from over my shoulder, Jamie calling me and Katy up to play. But I waved him off. Pap’s stump-hole whiskey made it easier to brood. As happy as I was to be back in my pap’s favor, I hated the view from the dance floor. It pissed me off that I couldn’t find the one thing I wanted from that house.

  “Go on up there, Henry. What’re you waiting for?” My pap gave me a weak smile. “Show this girl what you got.”

  I stood. “Sorry, Jamie. I thought the fiddle was in my closet.”

  He cut me off with a smile and a wink, then gave me an introduction that left me little choice. “We’re here today to welcome back an old friend and to say hello to a new one.” The smattering of applause made me blush. I was about to speak before he cut me off again, “And by now you all know my niece Miss Katy had a bit of fortune this spring.”

  The crowd erupted into a thunderous outburst that dwarfed the smidgen I’d received. Preston came up and stood next to us and I wondered what he was doing here.

  As the family settled down Jamie said, “Don’t worry, son, I knew you’d be looking for it.” He waited until he could be heard, then said, “So let’s celebrate, and make darn sure the sun hears us when it decides to come back around tomorrow morning.”

  Jamie began to sing:

  “C’mon boozefighters, I want you all to hear, All about the booze that we serve ‘em up here,

  It’s made all over these hollers and hills, Where we got a plenty of moonshine stills.”

  Preston harmonized with Jamie on every other line. “We hain’t ever heard of the Volstead Law,

  And for prohibition bulls we don’t care a straw, We make it out of buckwheat, rye, and corn,

  And bottle it up in the early morn’.

  And the fawn will lay down with the lion, after drinking this old moonshine.”

  Somebody let out a yell. I finally relented and joined Jamie in the next verse, trying to sing over Preston.

  “Tip your head back and take a little drink, Then for a week you won’t be able to think

  First thing you know you’ll be getting kind of tired, after church trying to raise a fight.

  So tip up your head and take a little more, then for a month you’ll be feeling mighty sore.

  Then you’ll swear you won’t drink it anymore, but you said that a thousand times before.

  And the fawn will lay down with the lion, after drinking this old moonshine.”

  Alex was watching with Ben and my pap. She suppressed a giggle. I blushed when Jamie let me take the last verse by myself. This kind of thing wouldn’t have been acceptable in Ohiopyle. Preston continued to harmonize.

  “One drop’ll make a possum whip a bulldog,

  One drop will make a kitten chase a wild hog,

  Make a field mouse spit in a blacksnake’s face,

  Make a hard-shelled preacher fall from grace.

  And the fawn will lay down with the lion,

  After drinking this old moonshine.”

  I raised my drink to the people gathered there. Alex laughed and clapped. Jamie brought Katy into our little circle, smiling an ornery grin. Standing next to them reminded me of all those festivals, hundreds at least, where I played like a boy possessed. Jamie handed me a small black instrument case that stopped me in my tracks. “No way.”

  “Yeah, I’m sorry. I’ve been playing it at the school, there’s something sublime about the way it feels.”

  I lifted the clasps and inhaled the rock candy-like scent of resin that mingled with the fiddle’s spruce to make a one-of-a-kind smell that, sadly, some people died without ever smelling. It had been Ben’s, but he wasn’t musically inclined. Thus I inherited it.

  I reached into my pocket.

  “What’re you looking for?” Katy said.

  I showed her the long set of rattles I found in my dad’s closet. Jamie watched with keen interest, then said, “To keep the devil away, huh?”

  “Think I need it?” I gave him a half smile, which he didn’t reciprocate. I dropped the rattles into an f-hole, then gave it a shake.

  Preston said, “Those don’t always work, you know.”

  “You hush up now, Preston.” Jamie looked at me, “’Hell Up Coal Holler,’ on three?”

  Jamie, Katy and I drew our bows like archers about to fire. When we released, sad triads floated into the valley. The syrupy notes that sprang from my f-hole stunned even my own ears. That unmistakable sound couldn’t be produced where Kentucky’s bluegrass sprouted. They were too busy with horses and basketball. And that sound couldn’t be produced in Tennessee’s Smoky hollows. They were too worried about Country and Western. That sad squeal was pure West Virginia. As I played I could feel the devil riding my bow.

  I had a real hard time keeping up with Jamie and Katy, who played these notes with well-practiced flourishes. These twelve notes that journeyed with my pap’s grandfather over the gray North Atlantic, when famine forced him from Ireland’s stony-green shore. These twelve notes that sustained my grandfather’s father when food couldn’t, when his trail led over fros
ty ridges into territory still haunted by ghosts of the first people. These few measures that I played to announce my gratitude, to announce that my blood flowed for those who made me what I was, and for those who would speak of me when I was dead.

  My aunts and their aunts danced reels and jigs while my uncles and their sons, by law, sipped rather than gulped the family recipe. Alex, who was not yet familiar with this type of throw down, just stared. Ben pulled her to her feet to dance with him.

  When we finished the number the dancers clapped and asked for more. Rachael brought up jugs of wine and we drank while we caught our breath, then we drank a little more. As long as we played the libations flowed, so I let my brain work in the melodic languages that I had all but forgotten. Song after song about life and hardship. Logging. Deception. Love. Song after song in twos and threes, American and Irish and German and Mountaineer.

  Preston couldn’t keep up. When he returned to the table I felt like I’d won something. Katy sang a few songs. Her voice, prettier than that of any instrument, rang high and soft like the glow of stars on a cloudless January night. Rachael watched admiringly as her baby girl sang.

  Pap heckled his brothers and Jamie, shouting out any song he thought they wouldn’t know. “‘Ducks on the Millpond’” he said, then “‘Little Pink.’”

  But his brothers didn’t miss a beat. They told the old bastard to shut up, then brought forth songs so obscure that even Jamie, the ethnologist, was at a loss. We did our best to play along, but were out of our league. I filled my cup with wine before leaving the rest of them to their thing, embarrassed that I’d only lasted a little longer than Preston did. Alex was spinning circles with Ben, so I went back to sit with my pap.

  My dad sat a few chairs down from my pap, but our eyes hadn’t met yet. I was too embarrassed to look at him. He thought playing a fiddle was an impractical waste of time. Dark hair with a touch of gray stuck out from beneath an old grease- stained engineer’s cap he had from his railroading days. He wore a real thick beard, like shaving cut too much into his drinking time. Seeing him took a little of the spring out of my step. I sat across from him. The Collins family either produced loud drunks or sad drunks, and my dad looked sad. Even though I had a thousand things to say, my mouth wouldn’t let me spit any one of them out.

  My pap finally broke the ice. “This is a good thing, this here,” he waved a few fingers back and forth between my dad and me.

  I nodded. “How you been?”

  I waited, but he just stared into his drink.

  Finally, he nodded and I got mad and went on. “Been good. Three days ago a girl shows up out of nowhere and says I’m supposed to protect her from Charlie Lewis. Saved a guy’s life two days ago. Jumped into the river and pulled him out from under a rock. That night, Darren Lewis comes up to Ohiopyle and starts waving a gun around. Let’s see—”

  “Sorry to hear that, Henry. I suppose I should’ve asked.” He tried to make eye contact, but I wouldn’t let him.

  “Yeah, well, you didn’t. And I haven’t even gotten to the best part. So yesterday morning—first thing—Charlie Lewis brings four trucks up into PA to ambush me.”

  “Jesus, Henry. I get it. Straighten up and act like you have some sense.” His voice rasped liked a hound dog on a short leash. “What do you want me to say?”

  “I don’t know, I don’t care and it doesn’t make any difference. There’s not a fucking thing I want you to say.” I stood up. “So how you been? How’s life treating you?”

  “Now don’t go acting above your raising. We’re all impressed by you, Henry. Can’t finish a semester of school because he’s too busy playing around in boats.”

  “Here comes the loud drunk. I love it.”

  “C’mon, now, Henry,” my pap said, “Sit back down.”

  I was already walking away. I heard my dad say, “That boy don’t have a lick of sense in his head.”

  “Want to get some air?” I waved to Chloe to take over as Ben’s dance partner and I grabbed Alex’s hand. The music had kind of died down anyway. Jamie had begun to talk about Katy and Preston, and as much as I wanted to listen, I couldn’t be around people. Preston strummed an old acoustic guitar, a Gibson, and sang. He sounded real good.

  Alex and I walked past the fire, past where Fenton and some of my pap’s brothers talked about ginseng and hidden trout pools, about coyotes and copperheads, and into the glow of a waxing moon over Canaan Mountain. The golden orb crowded the stars, brightening the night.

  “Sorry about my family,” I said, mostly to myself. I tried to smile. “Suppose you just needed time to recover from everything.”

  “It’s perfect. Everybody’s wonderful and so kind to me.” We sat on an old picnic table bench. “You don’t have to apologize.”

  “I guess you didn’t meet my dad, so yeah, you’re right.”

  “How bad was it?” She put her hand on my knee. “I saw.”

  “I don’t know. Could’ve been worse. But after all the shit this week I just wanted somebody else to be the adult. Like I needed to come back here and worry about him, too. Wondering is he mad or is he going to do something stupid? I just don’t need this. He’s the reason I left in January.”

  Alex said, “I’ll go wherever you go.” She rested her head on my arm.

  Time stopped for a moment. I was able to see the moon set into the western hills, the morning and all that came after. My heart warmed with the thought of all the days and nights Alex and I still had to spend together.

  I kissed her. She relaxed into me, sliding a hand up to my neck and through my hair.

  “I won’t let you down, I promise,” I said, running a finger down her cheek. We held each other for a while. I wished that there were fireflies in this part of the valley this time of year.

  She picked up a mewing kitten and said, “Maybe we should get back to the party? Maybe, um…we should dance?”

  “Sure,” I said, and we slowly wound our way back through the dark side of the big tent, almost hidden by the music coming from Katy and Preston. They’re good, I thought. Seeing Katy so happy made me smile.

  Making it a point to avoid my dad forced me to go the long way around, but when I saw that he’d left, I cut through the middle. My pap stood up and gave me a big old bear hug.

  “Go ahead, Alex. I’ll catch up.” To my pap I said, “What’s going on?”

  He spoke softly into my ear. “You’re back. Tell me you’re back for good.”

  “I am,” was all that I could say. He was drunk now, too. I could tell by the way his eyes never quite found me.

  He took a deep breath, held it, then said, “I’m sorry that your old man can’t give you what you want. It’s my fault you know.”

  “Hey,” I said, “I’m sure—”

  But he squeezed my arm, making damn certain I was listening. “I made him the way he is. I’m the one that ran your mother off.”

  I tried to pull myself away, to look at his face, but he buried it on my shoulder, and said, “Alice begged me to let this curse be buried with our little girl when she died. But I didn’t.”

  He trembled. “I couldn’t. I believed running your mother off was the only way to save her life.”

  With that, he released me, sat back at the table and returned to his drink.

  FIVE

  Wood smoke from the dying fire tricked me into thinking breakfast was cooking somewhere, teasing me with thoughts of thickly sliced bacon and buckwheats. And our plans for the day had included breakfast. But a lot of time passed between talking about breakfast and getting our asses in gear. Thus, our drive to Spruce Knob for an impromptu overnighter was punctuated with stops in Davis for salads and ice cream since 11 a.m. was officially no longer breakfast in the Mountain State.

  We left town in a burst of speed along the flat, straight stretch of highway through Canaan Valley. Ben laughed while he drove, ice cream dripping down his hand as it jabbed the air to add extra oomph to punch lines and anecdotes and army jokes.

/>   Alex was crammed in the seat behind Ben, feet up, knees pulled to her chest. Her blond hair flew about in the chaos of the open windows. She playfully sucked the white plastic spoon between bites. Whenever Katy insisted Ben slow down, we all laughed. Ben got to her by riding on the shoulder and across the center line.

  I hung out the window, half into the party beside me, half into the blue sky, clear as glass over the wide valley. The dry air magnified a crispness that made the sights sharper, made distant objects seem like they were just inches from my fingertips. With my left hand I could pull pebbles from the rocky crest of Cabin Mountain. With my right, I gently stroked the velvety green expanse of Canaan Mountain.

  “Was it worth it?” Ben asked, seemingly out of nowhere. “You could’ve died, you know. Does Katy know what you did?”

  Ben looked in his mirror and said, “Miss Katy, you know you stole Henry’s thunder last night, right? He pulled a guy out from under a rock. Guy would’ve drowned.”

  “Henry, really?” She stuck her head between the seats, effectively cutting Preston and Alex off from the conversation.

  “Does a rocking horse have a wooden dick?” I said, taking one of Ben’s best lines.

  “Colorful, Henry. You kiss grandma with that mouth?” She sighed, and said, “You’re going to get killed one of these days. Even a cat’s only got nine lives.”

  “Yeah, but a hellbender never dies. You ever see a dead one?” I answered Katy’s question. “I’d take Dimple Rock a thousand times to make up for not being able to do anything about Jane.”

  And the second I said her name all conversation stopped.

  We left Canaan and followed the Dry Fork up to Harmon, the only noise came from the hole in Ben’s tailpipe. There we went east, up and over the Continental Divide. To our right the steep face of the Spruce Knob National Recreation Area slumbered. The smell of smoking brakes and hot rubber led us to the bottom. Busloads of tourists guaranteed that we wouldn’t be stopping at Seneca Rocks today. Instead we drove south, between the Allegheny Front and North Fork Mountain. A land of giants. Peaks over four thousand feet were as common here as bluets. Even in my dreams the streams weren’t as clear, the mountains as tall, or the valleys as deep as they were for real.