The Angels' Share

by James Markert

  Dozens of suited men filled the sidewalk looking for work—William bumped into one who called him a wise guy. Then over the sea of bobbing hats and pomade-slicked hair loomed the high mansard roof of the Courier-Journal building—Victorian Gothic, with a dark-red and black brick façade trimmed in stone and cast iron. He focused on it, sidestepping and veering as he neared the home of the city’s largest newspaper.

  “Spare’m some change,” said a man at the corner of Liberty and Third. “So a man can eat.”

  The man, eyes rimmed in red, rested in a heap of rags that smelled of local brew. His face was dirty, his hair long and disheveled.

  “Spare’m some change,” he said again. It was a croak more than a voice, like something was lodged inside his windpipe. “So a man can eat.”

  William hurried across the road to purchase two apples. He squatted and handed the homeless man the fruit. The man stared at the red apples with caution, then took a heavy bite that squirted juice into his beard. “A man thanks you, boy.”

  “Do you know a woman named Pauline? Some call her Polly.”

  The homeless man shook his head. “No, you’re tooting the wrong ringer.”

  “What about a man named Asher Keating?”

  “A man knows of him. A man seen him walk on water. Across the Ohio to save a fisherman from drowning.” The man burst into a phlegm-throttled laugh. William couldn’t read if he was levelheaded or a lunatic. The man craned his neck toward the next passerby. “Spare’m some change? So a man can drink.”

  William continued toward the Courier-Journal building. Once inside the double doors and high-ceilinged lobby, he approached the front desk as he’d already done nine times prior. The stout, rosy-cheeked woman, who today wore a rounded pink hat, looked up from her paperwork and eyed him behind small glasses.

  “Hello, Mr. McFee.”

  “Hi, Miss Kraven. I’ve got another story for Mr. Bingham.”

  She winked. “I’ll be back in the time it’ll take you to correctly button that shirt.”

  William looked to his shirt. By the time he’d fixed it, Miss Kraven had returned with Sylvester Crone in tow, he of the pince-nez glasses and carefully parted hair, the very editor who’d delivered the sour news of his nine rejections.

  Mr. Crone scanned the story. “Is this true?”

  “Every bit of it, sir.” William reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out the picture of Asher they’d found in his bindle, along with the pictures he’d taken yesterday.

  “Have you gone to the Post with this?”

  William seized the opportunity to apply pressure. “I thought I’d give you the first chance.”

  “Wait here a moment, Mr. McFee.”

  Mr. Crone scurried toward another office door, knocked, and entered. Only once had Mr. Crone taken one of William’s stories into Mr. Bingham’s office, and that one—about President Roosevelt’s repeal of Prohibition—had ended with a pat on the back for a good effort. William turned toward the front window and street traffic, clenching his fists so tight his nails cut crescents into his palms.

  “Mr. McFee.”

  William spun around. “Yes.”

  “Mr. Bingham is impressed,” said Mr. Crone. “But I’m afraid it won’t make tomorrow morning’s Courier.”

  William’s heart sank. Why was Crone smiling?

  Crone put his hand on William’s shoulder and looked him in the eyes. “This goes against procedure, Mr. McFee, but I am pleased to inform you that Mr. Bingham has requested your story go directly to the Times. Today.”

  William braced himself on the front desk. Miss Kraven was eyeing him as she typed. The Louisville Times! His story was getting published. In a matter of hours it would be news.

  He waved to Carly Browder—Carly Charles—as she read a book on the steps of her cottage. Published journalists didn’t shyly nod to babes. The three biscuits with apricot jam he’d bought from Miller’s Bakery with a portion of the seventy-five cents Mr. Crone had given him had settled his stomach.

  She waved back with a smile. The sun felt good on his arms; arms that, now when he looked at them, appeared stronger and more roped with sinew and muscle from all the typing he’d been doing. He pulled the car to a stop, got out, and found Barley standing on the porch in a cream suit and fedora, peeling a sliver of dried paint from one of the columns. “What bird got you to rise so early this morning? We needed the car.”

  “Sorry.” William shrugged. “Figured you’d be in your chair all day.”

  “Figured wrong.” Barley looked at the car. “So where’ve you been?”

  “Bread was on sale at Miller’s.” William retrieved the loaf he’d bought as cover.

  “You drove all the way to the city for a loaf?”

  “Reckon so.” William headed inside.

  Barley caught his arm. “You’re not a very good liar.”

  “Not nearly as good as Johnny, I’ve been told. Where do you want me to take you?”

  “To the doctor,” said Barley. “I want a scientist’s opinion on Annie’s legs.”

  Dr. Nedry Lewis was a busy man. Samantha was told on the telephone that the doctor’s slate was full for the day; but after his secretary was informed of the possible miracle, the doctor was on the other end of the line in seconds, encouraging them to hurry to his office. Judging by his expression as they entered, he hadn’t expected the entire McFee family.

  Dr. Lewis shook Barley’s hand and gave Samantha a quick nod before focusing on Annie, who stood in the middle of the office in a pink dress. He knelt beside her and felt her legs, first the left from the knee to the ankle and then the right.

  “The braces have done their job, Annie.”

  Samantha scoffed but then quieted herself. Dr. Lewis heard her but didn’t comment. He was a strict man of science. A framed picture of Mendi the Chimpanzee, dressed in a suit and hat, hung on the wall behind his desk. William imagined it served as a reminder of the Scopes “Monkey Trial” in 1925 and the sensational argument between evolution and creationism that had captivated the nation. Clearly, Dr. Lewis favored science, and he wasn’t afraid to punch holes in anything religious.

  His mother was more of a modernist. She believed that science and religion were two different truths that need not contradict each other. “Go ahead and learn the story of Adam and Eve in Sunday school,” she had said to William once, “but we should honor the rights of those who believe in Darwinism as well. Not everything is black and white.”

  William was proud that she’d bitten her tongue in front of the doctor. William was unable to disguise his emotion as he stood with a goofy grin. He was still on a high from having his story accepted—it wasn’t his secret dream of rekindling the distillery, but it was a close second—and now Annie was walking without braces.

  “The braces actually hurt,” Annie said. “It was Johnny who healed me, Dr. Lewis.”

  He smiled, half genuine. “And how did Johnny heal you, Annie?”

  “He prayed for me. At that man’s grave.” She twirled in a circle and her dress clipped Dr. Lewis in the face.

  He stood as if searching for a rational head in the room. “What man?”

  “The bum in our potter’s field. Johnny prayed for my legs to work and the next morning they did. Henry is—”

  Barley held up his hand. “It’s a long story. Can you look her over and—?”

  “But it’s true,” Johnny said. “I prayed like I’ve never prayed before, Dr. Lewis.”

  Barley said, “Hush up, boy.”

  Samantha said, “He has a right to his words, Barley.”

  Dr. Lewis clenched his jaw. Then he put his hands on Annie’s shoulders and looked into her eyes. “Now, Annie,” he said condescendingly. “We’ve put years of work into making you better. We crafted braces specifically to fit your legs. You wore them so they would help you walk normally. Do you understand?”

  William wasn’t about to let the doctor spoil Annie’s belief, and his confidence was soaring. “So y
ou healed my sister?”

  Dr. Lewis looked at William. “Yes. Or I might say we did it together.”

  “That’s mighty lofty of you.”

  “It was the reason you brought her to me.” He looked directly at Samantha. “Did you not ask me to help your daughter?”

  “I did. And I appreciate everything you’ve done,” Samantha said. “But as you can see, she’s fine now.” She took Annie by the hand. “Come on, Sugar.”

  Dr. Lewis ran a hand through his thinning silver hair. “What was the point of this visit, exactly?”

  “Barley needs answers to things,” Samantha said. “Because he’s as stubborn as you are.”

  “This is preposterous. I’m thrilled for Annie’s improvement, but—”

  “You are a fine doctor,” she said. “No one denies that. But you’ve been quite blunt with me and Annie, and for that I hold no qualms about being blunt as well.”

  “Mother, we should go.”

  “Wait, William.” She spoke to Dr. Lewis again. “Your wife has tuberculosis. How long has she been at the Waverly Sanatorium—three years? And science has yet to cure her?”

  Dr. Lewis tightened his jaw. “I have confidence she will defeat it.”

  “As do I,” said Samantha. “As do I. But there was once a doctor at Waverly who lost faith in science and turned to healing his patients with music. It’s believed he saved many.”

  “What is your point, Mrs. McFee?”

  “My point is that there are multiple roads, Dr. Lewis. And there can be unexplainable powers. Good day, Doctor. I will pray tonight for your good wife.”

  “Good day,” he said softly, staring at the floor.

  The doctor’s visit was a bad idea; not so much the visit, but the way in which they’d gone about it. William pulled to a stop in the driveway, and Samantha moved like she couldn’t wait for fresh air. After the rest of the family disappeared into the house, Barley lit a Lucky Strike. “Take me to see Wildemere.” He took a drag. “And why were you smiling so much this morning? I don’t see that a lot. You smiling.” Barley exhaled. “You finally get with a woman?”

  “No. Better.”

  “Better? How would you know what’s better than a woman?”

  William looked at the house and slipped the car into gear. “How would you?”

  Barley didn’t paste him for having a smart lip. Some chin music, he would have called it. Instead, he sat quiet all the way to the jailhouse, which was fine with William. Barley was still fidgety; he got anxious whenever he returned to the city. They’d had a house there for years—it was where William grew up—before Barley suddenly moved the family to Twisted Tree. Up until then, the distillery had been a weekend getaway, a private vacation spot, somewhere Barley refused to live full-time.

  His father had been trained to become the next master distiller of Old Sam McFee. But the war derailed him. That much of Barley’s story William knew, just as he knew his grandfather jumped from three stacked, empty barrels to snap his neck.

  But as William drove through the crowded downtown streets, watching his father fidget with the creases in his pants, his knuckles bone-white, he wondered what else had happened in the fourteen years after Old Sam was locked up. Why, as soon as Roosevelt repealed the Volstead Act, did Barley suddenly move the family back to a place that had ghosts made of painful history?

  “Park there.” Barley pointed to a vacant spot on Armory Street. “Follow me and don’t talk unless I tell you to.”

  They headed toward the brick-and-stone jailhouse, a progressive institution according to the papers, the design an elaborate series of corridors and cell blocks meant to segregate the five hundred prisoners into four groups: men and women, white and colored.

  Barley McFee had a way of walking into a room, a straight-backed swagger that made him appear a foot taller than his six-foot frame. Necks turned, eyes followed, and William found himself enjoying the attention as he followed in his father’s wake.

  The administration wing was built in a castellated style, like a battlement, the entryway arched and bordered by turrets and a parapet. The armed guards jerked nods as Barley strolled into the jailhouse unquestioned. A fat man with a bushel of curls patted him down, and his pudgy hand came out of Barley’s coat with the Colt .45 they both knew he had. From there a guard whisked them down a poorly lit hallway, where Barley spoke to a plain-clothed man who patted his back and laughed at something Barley whispered into his ear.

  There was some kind of exchange after the handshake, and William felt certain he’d seen cabbage. The last time they were there, the warden had banned Barley from the visitation room. Told him that he could never see Preston Wildemere under any condition, not after threatening his life in front of ten other prisoners, four guards, and a dozen visitors. Yet here they were.

  William followed Barley through a set of double doors and into the visitors’ room. Amid a cluster of occupied tables, where prisoners and visitors leaned forward in hush-hush conversations under the hawkish gaze of five guards, was an empty table with two chairs on one side and one on the other. William and Barley took their seats, and a guard led a shackled Preston Wildemere into the room.

  Wildemere was a small man, barely over five feet tall and 140 pounds. But his size hadn’t mattered in the accident. What mattered was the size of the vehicle and how fast his Studebaker had been going, and how sloshed he’d been behind the wheel.

  Wildemere was the type of man who got chewed up inside the big house, and his disheveled appearance and dark eyes showed that he’d been through the wringer. He finally looked up from the floor just before sitting at the table, and when he saw Barley he immediately attempted to flee. But the guard easily put Preston Wildemere in his seat.

  “I’m sorry, Mr. McFee. So sorry. I told you that last time. If I could take back—”

  “Close your head,” Barley said.

  Wildemere stopped talking right away.

  “I’m not going to kill you.” Barley leaned forward, hushed his voice. “Not today.”

  Wildemere had a wife and three kids. How much did they miss him?

  “Then what do you need from me?”

  “I need you to remember that night.”

  “That won’t be hard. It keeps me up every night.”

  “Good,” said Barley. “I hope you never sleep again.”

  “Father . . .”

  “Hush, boy.” Barley leaned on the tabletop, staring Wildemere down. “When I came to, I saw you behind the wheel with your head smashed.” A white scar scratched a lightning bolt below Wildemere’s hairline. “My boy was in the grass. I need to know how he got there.”

  Wildemere folded his hands on the table, fingers interlocked to fight a tremor.

  “Was there another man there?”

  He nodded.

  “What did he look like?” Barley asked.

  “He was tall. Six and a half feet, at least.”

  Barley seemed at a loss for words.

  “Did he have a beard?” William asked.

  “He had a beard, yes!” Wildemere looked more comfortable talking to William. “And long hair. Broad shouldered.” Tears welled in his eyes. “I’m sorry about your brother.”

  “Did you see him carry my brother to the grass? Mr. Wildemere? Did you actually—?”

  “Yes. Like a giant holding a flower. That’s the thought I had while I watched him. That’s how delicately he held the boy. My first notion was that . . .”

  “What?” William asked.

  “That they knew each other. There was a familiarity between them.”

  “There’s no way my boy knew that man,” Barley said. “We’ve never seen him before.”

  William wasn’t so sure. At the dance marathon, a couple hundred folks had gathered inside the aging house. It wasn’t out of the question that Asher had been one of them. William recalled his conversation with Johnny on the barrel run, the talk they’d had about the Hash Man. Johnny had asked Henry about how he knew certain
things, and he’d said, “He told me.” Could the “he” have been Asher Keating?

  “Asher placed Henry on the side of the road. What happened next, Mr. Wildemere?”

  “I blacked out.”

  Barley abruptly stood from the table. He kicked his chair to the floor and left the room. William waited for the commotion to settle. “Why didn’t you tell this to the newspapers?”

  “To be honest, I thought I’d dreamed it.” Wildemere massaged his forehead with two fingers. “I wasn’t certain he was real—”

  “What about his shoes? Did he have my brother’s shoes? Did Asher have shoes around his neck?”

  “Who is Asher?”

  “The man who carried my brother. The drifter you saw.”

  “I maybe saw.” Wildemere turned on William. “Your father? Why did he have the boy in the car? With all that booze? At that hour of the night? Bottles of Old Sam all across the road—”

  “He was taking Henry to the doctor. Henry had trouble breathing after a hard dance—”

  “So he was a hoofer?” Wildemere sounded like his father. He started to say something, then stopped. He touched his temples and shook his head. “All those bottles.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about. There were no bottles. Nothing about bottles was in the newspapers. Tell me about Asher. Where did he go?”

  “Walked off to the trees. But was he really there? The police covered it up for your father.”

  “What did the police cover up?”

  “The coppers cleaned up the bottles before any reporters got there.” He gave an ugly grin, like a man who’d discovered every ill-treatment a prison could offer. “Because he’s Barley McFee. And I wasn’t the only one drinking that night.”

  Barley was ready to go as soon as William left the visitors’ room. He was outside pacing the sidewalk with his hands against his ears to protect them from the street noise.

  “Get in the car, Father.” That was how William said it, and Barley obeyed.

  William’s knuckles were bone-white against the wheel. “I wasn’t the only one drinking that night.” He couldn’t look at his father. Barley McFee and Preston Wildemere were no different. “Why was Henry in the car?”