Pony didn’t grin, but he looked like he might have.
“Sí, jefe,” he said.
41
MARY BETH CAME INTO the sheriff’s office after lunchtime, mush-mouth drunk and weaving as she walked.
“Wanna report a man fuckin’ a child,” she mumbled.
Virgil stood and went around his desk and eased her onto a chair. Then he sat on the edge of his desk right in front of her.
“A man fucking a child,” Virgil said.
“Used to fuck me, now he fuckin’ her.”
Virgil nodded.
“You thinking about what happened to you and Laurel, ’fore we found you?”
“Naw,” Mary Beth said. “Brother Percival fucking us.”
“You let him?” Virgil said.
“I don’…”
Mary Beth slid suddenly off the chair. Quick as he was, Virgil got a hold of her as she went and broke her fall. He eased her the rest of the way down and she sat on the floor with her legs splayed.
“Everett,” Virgil said. “Whyn’t you go see if you can find Allie.”
I nodded and left.
I found her in The Church of the Brotherhood, practicing on the organ. To me it sounded like a cow in labor, but I was never musical.
“What’s wrong?” she said when she saw me.
“Nothing bad,” I said. “Mary Beth Ostermueller is drunk and falling down in Virgil’s office.”
Allie stood up.
“Oh, God,” she said.
As we walked down to the office, Allie said, “What is she doing there. What is she telling you?”
“She was telling us that Brother Percival was fucking Laurel,” I said. “ ’Fore she fell off the chair and Virgil caught her.”
“That’s ridiculous,” Allie said.
“Said he’d been doing it to both of them,” I said.
“Brother Percival is a man of God.”
“I’ve heard even they do it, sometimes,” I said.
“Not if they are holy men like Brother Percival,” Allie said.
“He ever show any interest in you?” I said.
“Of course he shows interest. He cares about my soul. He shows interest in everyone.”
“Care about any of your other parts?” I said.
“Everett!”
When we were at the office, I opened the door and ushered her in. Virgil was at his desk, his feet up, his white shirt gleaming from the laundry.
“Where’s Mary Beth?” Allie said.
“Sleeping in a cell,” Virgil said.
“What did she tell you?” Allie said.
“Not much,” Virgil said.
“Everett says she’s been accusing Brother Percival.”
“She said he was poking Laurel,” Virgil said.
“Everett says she was drunk.”
“Seemed so,” Virgil said.
“She’s drunk all the time,” Allie said.
“Don’t mean she’s lying,” Virgil said.
“Not on purpose,” Allie said. “I know that she had a bad time when the Indian took her. Laurel, too. And it made her crazy, and when she’s drunk she’s crazier. I been trying to help her, and help Laurel, and so has Brother Percival.”
“Girl talking yet?” Virgil said.
“No,” Allie said. “And Mary Beth’s crawled into her bottle and given up being a mother.”
“So who looks out for the daughter?” Virgil said.
“I do. I’ve become the closest thing she has to a mother.”
“And she ain’t, ah, indicated nothing to you about Brother Percival’s intentions.”
“No, of course not. You think I would stand by and let that happen? She’s like a daughter to me.”
Virgil nodded. I poured myself a cup of coffee.
“Well,” Virgil said. “Me and Everett are deputy sheriffs here. I guess we got to go talk with Brother Percy.”
“He doesn’t like to be called Percy,” Allie said.
Virgil nodded.
“I’ll keep it in mind,” he said. “You mind sticking here and looking after her if she wakes up?”
“I’ve done it before,” Allie said.
“Good,” Virgil said. “ ’Preciate it.”
“And you’re really going to talk with Brother Percival?” Allie said.
“Just doing my duty,” Virgil said.
“She’ll say anything,” Allie said.
“I know,” Virgil said.
“You can’t believe anything she says.”
“I know.”
“She didn’t tell you anything about me?” Allie said.
“Anything to tell?” Virgil said.
“Virgil, you shouldn’t ask me a thing like that,” Allie said. “Of course there isn’t anything. What do you think I am?”
“Just asking,” Virgil said.
“You know how drunks are,” Allie said. “They don’t remember things that happened. They remember things that didn’t happen. They make up stories. They’ll say anything.”
“Keep that in mind, too,” Virgil said.
He stood. I put down my coffee cup, and we went out into the street.
“Mary Beth tell you anything you haven’t mentioned?” I said to Virgil as we walked toward the church.
Virgil didn’t answer. When Virgil doesn’t answer, it isn’t because he didn’t hear the question.
I didn’t press it.
42
WE TALKED TO BROTHER PERCIVAL in the front room of his house in the compound in back of the church.
“Where’s my organist?” Brother Percival said, and smiled.
He was in his official church clothes: white robe, sandals, long hair.
“Allie’s looking out for a drunk down at the jail,” Virgil said. “Woman named Mary Beth Ostermueller.”
“Poor Mary Beth,” Percival said. “We’re all trying to help her, but…”
“She says you’re fucking her daughter,” Virgil said.
Percival looked like he might burst into prayer.
“Oh, dear Lord,” he said.
“Said you was fucking her, and now you’re fucking Laurel.”
“Must you speak so coarsely, Deputy?” Percival said.
“Just quoting Mary Beth, Reverend,” Virgil said.
“She was drunk.”
“She was.”
“The charge is, as you must know, entirely untrue,” Brother Percival said.
The front room of Brother Percival’s house wasn’t much: a table and chair, an uncomfortable-looking round-backed blue couch, a large Bible on a stand near the door. A big photograph of Brother Percival hung in an oval frame on the wall. In the picture he was wearing a dark suit with a vest and a white shirt with a dark tie. In the picture, his hair was short.
“I’m sure it is, Reverend,” Virgil said. “But me ’n Everett, here, bein’ law officers, we have to ask.”
“Of course you do,” Percival said. “I understand perfectly.”
“Got any idea why she might be thinking these things about you?” Virgil said.
“Aside from drunkenness?” Percival said.
“ ’Side from that,” Virgil said.
“Perhaps my attempts to share my religion with them, to help them, somehow became distorted in her degenerated mind. What happened to her and all. The poor woman clearly isn’t right.”
“Something’s wrong,” Virgil said. “Tell me a little ’bout your religion.”
“My religion is the presence of God in me.”
“How’s God feel about sex?” Virgil said.
“Do not blaspheme,” Percival said.
“Sorry,” Virgil said. “Tell me a little ’bout how you been trying to help these two ladies we brought you.”
“I counsel them every day,” Percival said.
“Meanin’ you take them someplace and talk to them,” Virgil said.
“Yes,” Percival said. “I talk with them here. Though it is, of course, a bit more than that.”
&nb
sp; “Girl talk any?”
“Not yet,” Percival said. “Poor child.”
“Well, she probably don’t argue much,” Virgil said.
“No, she surely doesn’t,” Percival said. “I’m not sure she understands what I’m saying. I’m not sure she is at all in her right mind.”
“What are you saying?” I said.
“I explain to them that His eye is on the fall of a sparrow,” Percival said. “That He never sends you a burden too great for you to bear.”
“Ain’t found that to be the case myself, Reverend,” Virgil said. “But you probably know more than I do ’bout all that.”
“I know that the Lord resides in me,” Percival said. “I know what the Lord shares with me.”
“Lord always been there?” Virgil said.
“He is always there in all of us,” Percival said. “But many of us deny him.”
He looked sort of pointedly, I thought, at me and Virgil.
“Didn’t realize he was there,” I said.
“I denied him, at first,” Percival said. “There was a time when I denied God, when I lived a life of the physical self, when I drank, when I committed fornication, when I relied on violence. But God would not be denied. He battered my defenses. He forced himself upon me until we have become one.”
“You and God?” I said.
“Yes.”
“One thing?” I said.
“Yes.”
“You and God being one thing,” I said. “Must be pretty hard to think anything you do is wrong.”
“The Lord governs me in all things,” Percival said.
“He tell you to keep Choctaw Brown on the payroll?” Virgil said.
“As you must know, there is no payroll,” Percival said. “Choctaw came to me, as I had been. He came from a life of dissipation and cruelty. He said he wanted to be saved. We welcomed him to the brotherhood.”
“He saved?” I said.
“He is.”
“Still wearing a Colt,” Virgil said.
“I told you we are militant Christians,” Percival said. “We will not allow those who have not been saved to do us harm.”
“I guess probably I ain’t been saved yet,” Virgil said. “But I don’t want you touching that girl.”
“To accuse me is to accuse the Lord, who abides in me.”
“Seems to be the case,” Virgil said.
Percival seemed to get taller as he stood in front of us. He folded his big arms across his wide chest.
“You can’t accuse me,” Percival said.
His voice was firm but not very loud.
“Because of the Lord?” I said.
“We are one,” Percival said. “You cannot accuse us.”
Virgil looked at Percival for a while, the way you’d look at an odd insect you’d found. Percival stood with his arms still folded like he was going to give the Sermon on the Mount. Then he turned and stalked out of the room.
As we walked back to the sheriff’s office, Virgil said, “You believe any of that?”
“Sure,” I said. “Like I believe the world’s flat.”
“Looks flat,” Virgil said.
“But it ain’t.”
“Can’t prove it ain’t,” Virgil said.
“You believe what Percival’s saying?”
Virgil shook his head.
“I think he’d fuck a snake if you held it for him,” Virgil said.
“You think he believes what he’s saying?” I said.
“He might,” Virgil said.
“Think he’s been bothering the women?” I said.
“Something you mentioned,” Virgil said. “You mentioned that if he thought God was in him and he was, you know, part of God, and God was part of him, then he’d feel pretty good about doing anything he wanted.”
“Anything God does is the right thing to do,” I said.
“You think he thinks he’s God?”
“Might,” I said.
“That’s disappointing,” Virgil said.
“ ’Cause you thought you were?”
“Still do,” Virgil said. “Just don’t like it that Percival thinks different.”
“So we know it,” I said.
“Can’t prove it,” Virgil said.
“Mary Beth saying so ain’t enough?”
“Nope,” Virgil said. “Too drunk.”
“We could shoot him anyway, just to be safe,” I said.
“Can’t do that,” Virgil said. “Got to know.”
“How you gonna know?” I said.
“Gotta ask the girl,” he said.
43
ALLIE BROUGHT LAUREL down to the office.
“She got anything to say about Percival,” Virgil said, “better to ask her here.”
Allie sat with Laurel on the couch. I leaned on the doorjamb. Virgil moved his chair to the couch and sat down in front of Laurel.
“You remember me, Virgil,” he said.
She might have nodded.
“I need to ask you some questions about Brother Percival. And I need you to tell me the answers.”
She stared at him as if he hadn’t spoken.
“I can whisper to you,” Virgil said. “And you can whisper back to me if you want to, but I need you to help me with this.”
“Go ahead, honey,” Allie said. “You can do it. It’s important.”
Laurel showed no sign that she heard.
Virgil sat quietly for a time. No one can be as quiet as Virgil Cole, when he wanted to be quiet.
After a little time, he said, “Allie, you and Everett wait outside.”
Allie looked at Laurel.
“You all right with that, honey,” she said.
“We’ll be okay,” Virgil said.
Again, Laurel might have nodded. I opened the office door and stood aside. Allie didn’t seem pleased. But she stood and went out. I followed her and closed the door. We stood near the front window and watched. Virgil took off his hat and put it on the desk behind him. Then he leaned forward and put his face next to Laurel’s and whispered something. He waited. She was motionless. He leaned forward again and whispered and then put his ear next to her lips. The two of them sat that way, with their heads together, Virgil’s hands folded in his lap. I could see that he was whispering.
“What is he doing?” Allie said.
“Whispering,” I said.
“I don’t know if she should be left alone with a man after what happened to her,” Allie said.
“Don’t seem to mind,” I said.
“And Virgil did rescue her,” Allie said.
“All by himself,” I said.
“No, you know what I mean.”
“Virgil was in charge,” I said.
“Virgil’s always in charge,” Allie said.
“True,” I said.
“How’s he know to whisper to her?” Allie said.
“Virgil knows things,” I said.
“How’s he know it’s the right thing to do?”
“Virgil always knows what he’s doing is the right thing to do,” I said. “ ’Cept when it ain’t, and he knows that, too.”
“I guess I still don’t understand him,” Allie said.
“Nothing to understand,” I said. “Virgil don’t never pretend.”
We watched the whispered pantomime through the office window. Laurel was still motionless, her head and Virgil’s close together. I couldn’t tell if she was making any response. But she hadn’t pulled away. I realized that while their heads were close together, Virgil was not touching Laurel.
“I don’t know anyone like him,” Allie said. “Do you?”
“You don’t get to be Virgil Cole,” I said, “being like other folks.”
In the office I saw Virgil nod his head. Then Laurel nodded hers. They still had their heads close to each other.
“Jesus,” I said. “I think they’re talking.”
“My God,” Allie said.
Virgil nodded again. And waited. And nodd
ed again. And whispered. Laurel nodded. Virgil nodded slowly and kept it up, as if Laurel was saying things he agreed with. Then she leaned forward and put her face against his neck and cried. Virgil sat quietly. He didn’t make any move to touch her.
“I better get in there,” Allie said.
“No,” I said.
“She’s crying,” Allie said.
I blocked the doorway.
“No,” I said.
She couldn’t get by me, and she knew it. So we turned back to the window. Inside, Virgil sat quietly while Laurel cried. After a time she stopped and raised her head and sat back. Virgil sat back, too. He reached behind him to the desk and picked up his hat. He put it on and adjusted it, and nodded once at Laurel.
She smiled at him.
“Did she smile?” Allie said.
“Yes,” I said.
He stood and came to the door and opened it.
“We’re done in here,” Virgil said.
“She spoke?” Allie said.
“Yes.”
“What did she say?” Allie said.
“I promised I wouldn’t tell,” Virgil said.
Allie looked like she wanted to argue, but she didn’t. Laurel stood.
Virgil said, “I’ll come by. We’ll take a walk.”
Laurel nodded.
“Maybe tomorrow,” Virgil said.
Laurel nodded.
He looked at Allie.
“Stay with her,” he said.
“I will,” Allie said. “I do.”
She put her arm around Laurel and they went out of the office.
I looked at Virgil. He shrugged slightly. I didn’t ask him what she’d said. I knew he wouldn’t tell me.
44
TWO SADDLE HORSES plodded up Arrow Street, each dragging something. Sitting on the front porch, Virgil and I watched them come. As they got closer we could see that what they were dragging were the bodies of two men.
I stood.
Virgil said, “Let’s see where they’re going.”
We went out to the street as the horses passed and followed them up Arrow Street. The dead men were covered with dirt, and their heads were black with dried blood.
“Scalped,” Virgil said.
I nodded.
“You recognize them?” I said.
“Kinda hard, them being such a mess,” Virgil said.
“Want to guess?” I said.
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