The Killing of Butterfly Joe

by Rhidian Brook

  ‘Hello, Mrs Bosco.’ I put out my hand but she waved it away.

  I fixed my gaze on her good eye, which was, if you could somehow isolate it, a quite lovely eye, full of green and yellow flecks. From this eye you could almost reconstruct what might have been.

  ‘It’s good to meet you. Thanks for letting me stay.’

  ‘Not my idea. Shit-for-brains here tells me you are some hotshot salesman with a top-dollar education and that you’re going civilize him and us and teach us how to transform his bullshit into gold.’

  I couldn’t stop myself laughing.

  ‘The fuck you laughing at?’ Her voice was so smooth-sounding it seemed ventriloquized.

  ‘Sorry. That’s . . . a . . . it was a funny metaphor.’

  ‘Metaphor? I’m being damn serious. You work for us you gotta bring something in. You do want to come work for us?’

  ‘Yes. I . . . well . . .’

  ‘Hesitation? I hate hesitation. We can’t have a hesitator. Joe?’

  I stood up straighter, trying to compensate for a perceived lack of backbone. ‘I really do want to work for you.’

  ‘Why?’

  Remember: not too timid. Not too cocky. ‘Well. I have always wanted to see America and . . .’

  ‘We’re not a goddamn travel company!’

  ‘And, I think you have a product that can bring a little joy and beauty into people’s lives and I’d like to be a part of . . .’

  ‘Sentimental bull-crap!’

  I looked for help, but Joe was revelling in my discomfort, smiling like a fool, while Isabelle was behind me, out of sight.

  ‘Tell me. Rip! Do you think I am an attractive woman?’ She leant forward on the cane, studying my reactions.

  So this was the little test. Whatever you do: speak the truth. I tried to look her in the good eye, and I could see past the scars to what she might have been. Her mouth was pretty. There was a good underlying structure to the face. Her pre-fire eyes must have once entrapped someone into falling in love with her. Come on. She’s waiting. You have to say something.

  ‘Notwithstanding your scars, yes.’

  I thought this was a good answer and, feeling emboldened, I stood up even straighter and held her gaze.

  ‘Scars?’

  ‘Yes. You’ve been . . . Joe told me. About the fire.’

  There was a silence. Was she so deluded as to think I might not notice? Had I failed the little test already?

  ‘Damn right, I got scars. What of it? Answer the question.’

  I took the dive.

  ‘I can see that you were – you have – a natural beauty. The scars make this harder to appreciate but they are not representative of who you are.’

  She continued to look at me and I stared into her good eye trying with all my will not to look at its dead, black counterpart.

  ‘Flatterer.’ She looked to Joe. ‘I hope he’s going to do better than the last guy you brought here.’ She pointed her cane towards the window. ‘We buried him somewhere in the woods. Over there somewhere. English? Irish? Bolivian? I can’t remember. Another lamo, anyhow.’

  Joe was sniggering.

  Then she came towards me, taking my hands, feeling them and flipping them over, like a slave-owner.

  ‘Soft and pudgy. I have no use for soft and pudgy. And you been painting your nails?’ There were flecks of barn paint on the nails of my right hand.

  ‘I was painting my aunt’s barn.’

  ‘Stick out your tongue. Tongue!’

  I looked at Joe. Is this really necessary? He nodded: you better do what she’s asking. So I stuck my tongue out and kept it there for a couple of seconds, or until I noticed Joe really laughing, unable to contain himself any more. Edith let go of my hands. She was laughing too! And then she said: ‘If you can make me sound like Miss America then maybe you got a future selling. But I’m going to give you a tip, Rip! A dishonest pitch is way easier to deliver than an honest one. Honesty pays, but dishonesty pays better!’

  It seemed I had passed the ‘Little Test’.

  As Edith and Joe walked on through to the dining room Isabelle drew alongside me. ‘I don’t like it when Ma does that but she does it to everyone, so don’t feel too bad. No one gets to work for us unless they are prepared to say what is so.’

  Later, we – that is, Edith, Joe, Isabelle, Celeste, Elijah and I – sat around a piece of plywood mounted on boxes in an assortment of chairs that put us all at different heights to each other. Isabelle brought in the moose burgers cooked by the still unseen Old Man Clay, who seemed to have many roles: servant, cook, valet, porter, wood-collector. Joe was halfway through a rambling and profane grace when Mary-Anne entered, all the lovelier for being clothed. He improvised a sign off: ‘. . . and we also thank you for Mary, who is slowly learning the ways of the humans after years in the forest. Amen.’

  ‘Amen.’

  ‘Fuck you, Joe.’

  ‘Language, Mary?’ Isabelle said, attempting to keep order. Everyone in the family was a fluent cusser, except for Isabelle who never gave up trying to keep a lid on it all, mainly for the benefit of Elijah and Celeste.

  ‘It’s English ain’t it?’ Mary said, picking up her burger and perching on the arm of my armchair, working hard on her nonchalance whilst knowing she had become the lightning rod in the room. She bit into her burger and began to make speaking and eating at the same time look alluring.

  ‘You working for us now?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Rip passed the test!’ Joe confirmed. ‘Better than anyone, so far. Wouldn’t you say, Ma?’

  ‘He did OK, for a Limey.’

  Joe’s termagant mother was now – if not quite the First Lady entertaining the King of England – friendly. She concentrated on eating her food and let the next generation have their say.

  Mary was keen to mark her territory. ‘How did it go with the bank?’

  ‘They’re all fools,’ Joe said. ‘We don’t need no bank. I been working on getting us the super-deal of the century. Plus we got Rip here to help out. As soon as he’s learned the ropes, we’ll get him selling on the road. They are gonna be lovin’ on him. We’ll be heading into the Midwest. You are gonna be our secret weapon, Rip.’

  ‘I get to drive, right?’ Mary said.

  ‘It’s Izzy’s turn to make a trip. And you just been with me to Mississippi.’

  ‘But she don’t drive.’

  ‘It’s fine if you go, Mary,’ Isabelle said. ‘I have plenty of work to do. Books to read.’

  ‘Our Izzy’s going to Yale,’ Edith said, with pride.

  ‘We gotta sell a lotta bugs so Izzy can learn about all those depressed Europeans,’ Joe said.

  ‘I appreciate it,’ Isabelle said, flushing.

  ‘You had your chance, Joe,’ Edith cut in.

  ‘I know. I ain’t complaining. I’m learning every day.’

  ‘Reading ain’t working though is it, Iz?’ Most of Mary’s remarks were aimed at puncturing Joe’s fancy or undermining Isabelle. She really had it in for her sister and I sensed early she was upping things because of me.

  ‘You OK with that, Iz?’ Joe asked.

  ‘I’m OK.’

  I looked from Isabelle to Mary-Anne and then to Joe. I was not unhappy about this configuration. Mary-Anne seemed happy with it, too. ‘You don’t want to be with my brother on your own for that long,’ she said. ‘All those words tumbling out of him and most of them meaning nothing. You need somebody to interpret that bullshit.’

  Joe laughed, these sisterly slights sliding off his back. But Isabelle seemed agitated by her younger sister’s brazenness and she started pouring water to channel it.

  ‘Have you been to Europe?’ I asked Isabelle.

  ‘Not yet. I would like to go. Joe thinks I’d find it too decadent and the people too cynical.’

  ‘It’s older so it’s got more to be cynical about,’ I said.

  ‘Maybe America just needs more time to get cynical,’ Isabelle said. ‘To ex
perience the decline first.’

  ‘I don’t see America in decline,’ I said. ‘Even if it does decline it always bounces back.’

  ‘Oh, you’ll see the decline,’ Isabelle said.

  ‘But you’ll see the wonder, too,’ Joe said. ‘Such wonders that you’ll blub like a babe.’

  ‘I can’t wait.’

  The end of the meal was signalled by Edith pushing her plate away. ‘I’m turning in. Where you putting our guest here?’

  ‘We’ve put him in Ceelee’s room,’ Isabelle said. ‘Ceelee can share my bed.’

  ‘OK. You better show him where it is.’

  ‘Maybe Ceelee can show him,’ Mary said. ‘Izzy’s got to study. Ain’t that right, Izzy?’

  ‘Sure. I don’t mind.’

  If Isabelle cared about being ousted as my chaperone she didn’t show it, but from day one my presence was stirring trouble between the sisters.

  Then Edith stood and fixed me with a look. ‘Well, it’s nice to have you here, Rip; but remember. If you fuck up, I’ll kill you.’

  CHAPTER FIVE

  In which I get high with Mary and she tells me things.

  Celeste showed me to my quarters and the fearless little thing took my hand and pulled me along, firing question after question at me like the Elephant’s Child.

  ‘I am adopted. You know what that is?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Mama Edith chose me out of a hunnerd chillen. She says she picked me ’cos I looked smart. You think I look smart?’

  ‘You do. You are.’

  ‘I know the names of a hunnerd butterflies. My favourite is an Alexander birdwing ’cos it’s green and big and rare. Joe says when I get to eighteen he will give me one and if I sell it I will be able to buy my own house with it. We got five which is more than the museum in Washington.’

  Celeste’s bedroom was in the eaves at the very top of the house and reached via a bare wooden staircase. The walls of her room were covered with her own drawings.

  ‘I did all these. Do you like to draw?’

  ‘I can’t draw to save my life.’

  She laughed at this. ‘That’s funny.’

  The pictures were portraits with detailed outsized heads and generalized stick bodies. ‘Can you guess who they are?’

  I paused to identify each of them, calling out the names:

  ‘Let’s see.’ (Male. Filling the whole page. Huge glasses and smile. A butterfly sitting on his head and another in an outstretched hand.) ‘I recognize this one. This is Joe.’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘And this . . .’ (Female. Hair up in a bun. Big eyes and long lashes. Book pressed to chest with one hand. Other arm out like Julie Andrews.) ‘Isabelle?’

  ‘Uh-huh.’

  ‘OK. And this is . . .’ (Female. Exaggerated bosom. Barbie waist. Large nose. Cigarette. Cowboy hat.) ‘Mary-Anne?’

  ‘I got her face wrong. Who do you think is the prettiest?’ Celeste asked me. ‘Mary or Izzy?’

  I starred at the two sisters for a bit and eventually placed a finger on Mary.

  ‘Izzy says it’s better to be prettier on the inside. Man looks on the outside, but God looks on the heart. Do you know that song? We sing it in Sunday school.’ Celeste started to sing the song and perform accompanying hand signals: ‘Man looks on the outside, God looks on the heart’ (hand pointing outward; hand on breast, repeat).

  It was a noble sentiment – one I should have heeded – but ‘inside-prettiness’ could wait.

  ‘And who is this?’ (Female. Warm smile, bright eyes and big yellow-gold hair. Friendly. Pizza box. Gun.).

  ‘That’s Mama Edith, silly!’ By process of elimination I assumed it was Edith but there was no indication of her deformity; either Celeste was being kind or she just didn’t see it. Or, she saw ‘on the inside’.

  ‘Why does she have a gun?’

  ‘For the Boogie Man.’

  Celeste moved on to the next. ‘Guess who?’

  I identified Elijah easily enough from his baseball cap and coloured-in brown face. And I correctly assumed the portrait of a black man with silver hair to be Old Man Clay. There was a joint portrait of the dogs, Nancy and Ronnie, looking as loveable as puppies. Celeste’s self-portrait was a little girl in her trademark dress, standing on a mountain-top with a sky holding sun, moon and stars simultaneously.

  ‘This must be you.’

  ‘Uh-huh.’

  ‘Ceelee – you let our guest alone now! It’s bedtime.’ It was Isabelle calling from the bottom of the staircase.

  ‘I think Isabelle wants you, Ceelee.’

  ‘How long you staying? Will you stay for ever?’

  ‘Well. That’s a long time.’

  ‘Ceelee?’

  ‘I’m coming!’

  ‘Thanks for letting me have your room.’

  Isabelle poked her head round the door. ‘Ceelee? Let our guest alone now.’ Isabelle turned to me. ‘I brought you a towel. There’s a restroom at the bottom of the stairs. Don’t mind the colour of the water. It’s just the rust.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  I looked at Isabelle’s eyes. The lashes were indeed thick and dark around small almonds. Small eyes are always prettier in my view.

  ‘Anyway. If you get too hot there’s a fan in the wardrobe there. Come on, Ceelee. Say good night to Mr Jones.’

  Ceelee gave me a hug goodnight and I half hoped Isabelle would do the same. Instead, she made a little bow and left, closing the door carefully behind her.

  Alone in my room I had that feeling – a feeling that I kept having in those first weeks with the Boscos – of wondering if I had actually met these people, or whether their eccentricities and grotesqueries were proof that I was still in an elaborate dream that had begun back at Kaaterskill Falls. To counter this, I thought I’d write something down, share something of what was happening with someone else out there, before it evaporated or I woke up! I dug out the airmail letter pad that my mother had given to me. ‘You will write to me, Lew?’ ‘Yes, Mum. Of course.’ But, other than a phone call upon my arrival in New York, I had not communicated with anyone back at home. I sat there, stuck at ‘Dear Mum’ for several minutes, long enough for my hot hand to stain the paper and force me to start again with a clean sheet. I couldn’t decide what address to put – Aunt Julia’s or Joe Bosco’s – and instead settled for the compromise of ‘The Catskill Mountains’. As for the date, well, I literally did not know what day it was, let alone the date, so I wrote ‘evening’ which seemed enigmatic and writerly to me. But when I started the letter I felt like a man writing with his mouth; I was unable to be precise about what I had actually been doing. I tore up another page and started for a third time and ended up writing one of those letters I despise, the kind my sister Fran writes: competent, full of information but saying nothing of true feeling and offering no original insight. I dutifully and mechanically worked through the things my mother would want to know: how I was, how her sister was, sights I had seen. But the thing that I really wanted to explain – the phenomenon that was Butterfly Joe and his exotic family – just would not be explained. I kept the letter to a single page with the promise of a longer one to come, creating the not entirely misleading sensation of being on the hoof. My mother would have been pleased enough with it, not having heard from me in weeks, but she would remain ignorant of what was really going on. When I got to the end I shocked myself by signing off as Rip rather than Lew, bracketing it with the explanation: ‘my new nickname’. I folded the letter and sealed it in an airmail envelope, writing my mother’s name without my father’s for the first time in my life. As I wrote my home address – a simple act I found strangely difficult, as though I was worried I might be transported back there just by writing down the names – Mary-Anne entered without knocking.

  ‘Hey.’

  ‘Hey.’

  ‘You got weed?’

  ‘Yes. Of course. It’s OK? I mean, will your mother mind?’

  ‘She smokes it herself so
metimes. For the pain.’

  I rummaged through the jumble for my doobie-tin and my Kents. I then set the tin on the toy box and set about rolling.

  ‘Does Joe smoke?’

  ‘Joe hates me smoking. He’s pure like that.’

  ‘What about Isabelle?’

  ‘You kidding?’

  Mary lay on my bed and saw my notebook on the bedside table next to the letter pad.

  ‘Joe says you wrote a poem about me.’

  ‘Well. I mentioned you, yes.’

  ‘Maybe you could write another about me. I can just lie here and when you’re done you can read it to me.’

  I lit the joint and took a long, deep toke before passing it to her. I went through the motions of the idea, picking up my notebook and pen and sitting in a chair opposite her as though I was sketching her which, in a way, I was: trying to catch her likeness. Mary was darker skinned than her siblings, there was something Native American about her. It was hard to believe she was Isabelle’s sister. They weren’t just different in appearance, manners, taste and deportment; they seemed to be from different eras.

  ‘You did OK with Ma. Some people can’t be in the same room with her. Joe tell you how Ma got those scars?’

  ‘In the fire, yes.’

  ‘I weren’t born when it happened. I was inside her. They said I was a miracle baby. Sometimes I get close to a flame I scream. If I get hot, I have to get into water. That’s why I go to the lake here. To put the fire out. Like the lake of fire in the Bible. I don’t believe in all that baloney. Hell. The Rapture. You know about the Rapture? That’s when the good people get taken up to heaven. And the bad get left behind. I wish Jesus would hurry up and take them religious folks away and leave me in peace to get on with my life.’

  ‘What do you want to do, with your life?’

  ‘I got plans. I like to drive. NASCAR. I like to go fast. Like Shawna. Shawna Robinson. She’s going to be the first woman to win the touring series. I wanted to be a dancer when I was younger. You wanna see me dance?’ She got up and did perfect pirouettes around the room, spliff between lips.

  ‘You’re good.’ This wasn’t flattery.

  ‘When I was little I wanted to be a ballerina and when I did lessons the teacher said I was a natural. But we were always moving, and lessons was expensive. I think in a past life I was a queen,’ she said, chewing her hair. ‘Like a ’Gyptian. Or something. One of those tribes from the olden times. You ever feel you don’t belong where you are? Like maybe your family ain’t your family?’