The Right Kind of Fool

by Sarah Loudin Thomas

  What else did you see? Who else? Tom signed, an urgency to his motions.

  Loyal had forgotten Earl was there. In his mind he was back at the edge of the river on that hot July afternoon. Until this moment, he’d forgotten the smell of the blood. Now it came back to him sharp and unexpected. He had seen fat bottle flies buzzing around and landing on the dead man, their metallic blue-and-green bodies flashing in the sun. The man had been so pale, and his eyes were wide open. Loyal squeezed his own eyes shut as if that would block the images in his mind.

  He raised his hands and signed I saw—

  He didn’t sense anyone approaching, just felt the boards of the porch shudder as Father ran toward them and grabbed a handful of Tom’s shirt, yanking him to his feet. He didn’t try to follow what anyone was saying but knew without a doubt they were all angry—Tom, Earl, but most of all, Father. He shrank back on the bench, hands clenched in his lap, and waited for the fury to die down.

  After Tom and Earl scurried from the yard, Father knelt in front of Loyal. It was only then he realized his face was wet. He was crying. Father held his arms out, and Loyal crashed against his chest. He was afraid Father was angry with him for talking to those men, but more than that he was shaken by how vivid his memory of finding the dead man was. He’d been so focused on his parents, on the joy of having them both under one roof, that he’d pushed what he’d seen to some dark place where he didn’t have to look at it. Tom, with his signing and his interest, had flung the door to that memory wide open. And now Loyal felt sick.

  Father eased him back just far enough to look into his eyes. “Are you okay?” Loyal tried to nod, but the tears fell faster, and he thought he might throw up. Father drew him close again. He smelled like pipe tobacco and sweat. It helped to drive the memory of the smell of blood from Loyal’s nostrils. Father patted his back and eased to a sitting position on the bench, pulling Loyal in tight beside him. It was too hot to sit like this. Loyal could feel sweat prickling his skin where they were pressed close. But he didn’t care. The only thing that would be better is if Mother were pressed equally close on his other side.

  Father reached down and tapped Loyal on the knee so that he looked up. “Those men aren’t working with the sheriff. They were hoping you’d tell them something more than Virgil has.” Father firmed the line of his mouth. “It makes me think Earl has something to hide.” He eased away a notch. Loyal felt his face drying, even in the August humidity. “You don’t have to talk to anyone you don’t want to.” He frowned. “Even if they can talk with their hands like you do.”

  Loyal gave a jerky nod, his neck hitching. He hadn’t particularly wanted to tell Tom about the murder. It had just been so wonderful to sign with someone new. He felt tears starting to rise again but quickly pushed them back. He squared his shoulders and managed a small smile. Father slapped him gently on the back. “That’s my boy. Now, what say you and me put some supper together and surprise your mother?”

  This time Loyal managed a grin. That sounded like a fine idea.

  She was later getting home than she’d hoped, but Mildred had been desperate over the way her baby would hardly nurse. Spending so much time by herself with Loyal at school and Creed up the mountain had left Delphy time to become, well, not a midwife exactly, but an expert on caring for infants. Seemed like there was always a new mother in need of her help for one thing or another. She’d longed for more children, but after what happened with Loyal . . . As she thought back on those days now, it occurred to her that the way Creed acted, it was almost as if he didn’t trust himself to be a father ever again. She wondered if she could convince him otherwise.

  She wiped the back of her sweaty neck with a handkerchief as she hurried on, steering her thoughts toward home. Supper would be late—that was what she should be thinking about.

  But when she stepped through the back door into the kitchen, she saw her husband and son at the stove with aprons tied around their middles. Creed turned toward her with a shy smile while Loyal beamed—although there was something in his eyes . . .

  “Thought we’d go ahead and rustle up some grub,” Creed said. “We fried up some cabbage along with taters and onions.”

  Delphy smiled and undid the top button of her blouse to let the air reach her neck. She saw Creed’s gaze stray there and was surprised to feel a flush that had nothing to do with the day’s heat. “Smells good,” she said. “Just let me wash up.”

  She ruffled Loyal’s hair and kept an eagle eye on him while keeping her tone light. Something wasn’t sitting right with her boy. In the lavatory she peered at herself in the small glass. She looked tired and no wonder. Splashing water over her cheeks, she took her hair down and rewound it into tidy damp strands. Not that she cared how she looked. Oh, who was she trying to fool? No matter how frustrated she got with that man standing in her kitchen, she still hoped he thought her pretty. She gave herself a stern look in the mirror before returning to the kitchen.

  “Now, before we sit down to this fine feast, I have a surprise!” Creed had one arm behind his back. He whipped it around with a flourish and showed them a melon with a dark green skin. He winked at Loyal and whacked the fruit with a butcher knife, splitting it open with a crack to expose its glistening red flesh. “Watermelon!”

  Loyal clapped his hands, and they all dove in, enjoying the sweet fruit and getting their fingers and faces sticky. It was a delicious surprise, but Delphy could see that as much as Loyal was enjoying it, he was quieter than usual—more still. They ate supper, and Delphy praised her son and husband mightily for how delicious it was. Finally, she sent Loyal off to bathe and change into his pajamas. As soon as he left the room, she turned on Creed.

  “Are you going to tell me what’s going on?”

  “How about I make us some coffee?” he said.

  She pierced him with a look. “Talk while you do it.”

  Creed took a deep breath and began adding ground coffee to the percolator. “Earl—the partner of the fella that got killed—found someone who talks sign language. The two of them paid a visit here today and got Loyal to tell about the murder.”

  She stood from her chair at the kitchen table. “And you let them?”

  “No, I did not. They showed up when he was here alone.”

  Tears sprang to her eyes. “If you think you’re going to blame me for not being here, I don’t want to hear it. You’re hardly ever here and I was only gone—”

  Creed stepped closer and put his hands on her shoulders. “I would never blame you. You’re the best mother in the world to Loyal.” His words were an unexpected balm. “I tend to think Earl would have found a way to talk to the boy alone regardless.” He gently massaged her tense shoulders, and she felt the muscles ease. “At least I came along before too much damage was done.”

  She sank from beneath his hands, limp now, and collapsed back into her chair. “Damage? What kind of damage?”

  Creed sat as well and took one of her hands in his, gently kneading her fingers and palm. She tried to stifle the delicious shiver that coursed through her body. “I think it brought that day back for him a little too clearly. He was pretty upset when I showed up.” Creed sighed and laced his fingers through hers. “He was never really questioned by the sheriff. I let Virgil think I was the one who found the body—just never corrected him. I thought it would be better if Loyal didn’t get pulled in too deep.”

  Delphy tried to sort through what she was feeling. Anger that those men had upset Loyal. Sadness that she hadn’t been here to stop it. Delight to be sitting hand in hand with her husband. And desire for this man who was trying to take care of them . . . at last. She slipped her hand from his—finding it all too much at once. “Loyal can hold his own. He’s smart and strong.” She bit her lip. “He’s had to be.”

  Now it was Creed’s turn to read into her words. “And I haven’t been around to protect him.”

  Delphy began folding and refolding a cloth napkin. “There’s some truth to that.” She g
ave a dry laugh. “Of course, I probably try to protect him too much.” Thank goodness Creed had the sense to keep his peace. “Do you think Earl and the sign language interpreter will be back?” she asked.

  Creed stroked his mustache. “Not here I don’t think. But I wonder if they might try to get Virgil to really question Loyal. And if they get the federal boys involved, it might make Virgil look bad—him not having done it sooner.” He stood and lit the stove under the percolator. The smell of sulfur and coffee perfumed the air. “What if I took him up on the mountain for a while?”

  Delphy stiffened. Not this again. “What do you mean take him up on the mountain?”

  Creed pulled mugs down from the cabinet, his back to her. “You know, spend some time up on Rich Mountain. We could do some fishing, pick the garden. Shoot, I could even teach him to hunt ginseng with me.” He set the mugs on the counter and glanced at her, hope glowing in his eyes.

  “Would he be safe?” Her voice sounded so small.

  Creed stepped closer and knelt beside her. “Safer than here, I think. Safe as I know how to make him.” She could see it cost him to admit that he couldn’t absolutely guarantee their son’s well-being. “I need to do better by him. I’m finally realizing that.”

  She turned her face away from him. “Why didn’t you realize it sooner?” She didn’t mean to chastise him but couldn’t help herself. “We’ve needed you for so long, and now you’re going to take Loyal away from me.”

  Creed reached up and tilted her face back toward him. “You could come, too,” he whispered. She could see the longing in his eyes—the desire that matched her own. She began to lean into him, pulled by a force she’d felt since she first set eyes on him. Then she stood, making the chair jump and stutter against the floor.

  “Take him. You’re right. He’ll be safer up on the mountain with you.” She moved to leave the room, then spun around and looked at him as if she were offering a condemned man one last chance at redemption. “At least he’d better be.” Then, tears in her eyes, she hurried up the stairs to the room that had belonged to her alone for a long time now.

  thirteen

  RICH MOUNTAIN

  Loyal woke to the smell of bacon frying. Mother only made bacon on Saturdays, but this was a Wednesday in August. He grinned. He guessed Father liked bacon as much as he did. He scrambled up from the pallet Father had made for him in the corner of the cabin’s bedroom. There were really just the two rooms—a main living area with a sofa, a table with two chairs, and the stove, and this room with Father’s bed and a chest of drawers. There was a privy out back, and a shed that he had yet to investigate.

  Having slept in his shirt and underwear, all he had to do was shimmy into his britches and he was ready to face the day. He hurried into the main room just as Father was cracking eggs into bacon fat in a big black skillet.

  “Show me how you say ‘good morning.’” Loyal smiled and showed Father the two-step sign. Father imitated it. “Like the sun rising,” he said to describe the second part of the motion. Loyal signed yes, and they just stood there grinning at each other, until Father whirled back to the stove and scooped eggs out of the pan. As they ate, Loyal could have sworn everything tasted better up here in the cabin without Mother watching and fussing over him.

  Father got his attention before speaking. “Wish we could just fish and play today, but I need to get after that garden. You want to help me or would you rather explore?”

  Loyal realized he’d let his mouth fall open. Was Father offering to let him go off on his own? He stuck his index finger in the air and circled it with a question in his eyes. Father tilted his head and squinted his eyes. “Hang on.” He went in his room and dug in the dresser, then came back with a pad of paper and a pencil. He handed them to Loyal, who wrote Go alone?

  Father furrowed his brow, then nodded. “Guess your mother doesn’t much let you do that.” He rubbed a hand up the back of his neck, ruffling his short-cropped hair. “Still, you’re welcome to poke around so long as you don’t go too far or stay away too long.” He gave Loyal a lopsided smile. “Although I’d sure enjoy your company while I work.”

  A feeling like getting exactly what he wanted for Christmas washed over Loyal. He made the sign for stay, and Father thumped him on the shoulder. “Good. Let’s get some tools and see how much we can get done.”

  Creed was grateful Loyal hadn’t taken him up on the offer to go poking around the mountain on his own. When he’d suggested it, he hadn’t really thought the idea through. What if the boy got lost? He couldn’t holler to call him back to the cabin. And he wouldn’t be able to hear if an animal—or a person, for that matter—came up on him.

  He’d never thought about it before, but there were quite a few clues he listened for in the course of a day on the mountain. It might be distant thunder or a rising wind alerting him to a change in weather. Or the sudden hush of birds telling him someone was coming. Loyal wouldn’t be able to hear the howl of a coyote or the warning huff of a black bear. Shoot, there were rattlers up on the mountain as well, and the boy wouldn’t have any notion of being warned off by a shimmying tail.

  Creed felt sweat pop out on his brow, and it wasn’t because the sun had climbed above the trees. The weight of the responsibility he’d taken on when he brought Loyal to the cabin with him was sinking in. Was this what he’d left Delphy to live with every day? Wondering and worrying and imagining ways their silent boy could get into trouble?

  He watched Loyal hoeing his few rows of corn. The boy was completely focused on his work, oblivious to anything around him. If he couldn’t see, smell, taste, or touch it, he wouldn’t know it was there. Creed felt a familiar fear rise in him. He struggled against it, not wanting to remember, not wanting to give in. He squeezed his eyes shut and clenched his fists.

  It was the same fear he’d felt when he brought this boy home so very sick from a spring gobbler hunting trip. It had been Loyal’s fourth birthday, and Delphy insisted he was too young to tag along. But Creed was determined. If he was going to make something out of the boy, it wasn’t too soon to start shaping him. He’d pushed Loyal, even when he seemed sluggish and listless. By the time they got home, he was running a high fever and was clearly ill. Delphy didn’t fuss, just cared for the child, nursed him as only a mother could. The infection settled in his ears, and within the month Loyal had been stone deaf.

  Delphy had taken it in stride and immediately started in on learning to talk with her hands and teaching Loyal to do the same. She found out about the West Virginia School for the Deaf and the Blind and made plans to send Loyal there as soon as he was old enough. Creed never felt like Delphy blamed him exactly—and yet he knew it was his fault. He’d pushed his son to please his own father, who wasn’t even alive anymore. And so he let Delphy take over the raising of their boy lest he make a worse mistake.

  That was when the fear began creeping in. Fear that he would damage Loyal even worse. That if they had another child, he’d make more mistakes. Creed had left his role as sheriff behind and spent more and more time up on the mountain. It was the only place he’d been able to escape the tide of terror that washed over him every time he tried to imagine what kind of life a boy who couldn’t hear would have. Every time he thought about how thoughtlessly he had condemned his own son to such a life.

  It had been years since he thought about the fear that made his ears buzz and the tips of his fingers tingle. But he was sure as shootin’ feeling it now. He gulped a breath and opened his eyes when he felt a hand on his arm. It was Loyal, looking a question at him. He made a shape like the O for his name, then another like a pair of open scissors.

  Creed swallowed past the dryness in his throat and placed his hands on his son’s shoulders. “I’m okay,” he said.

  Light dawned in his son’s face. It was like watching the sun touch the tip of a mountain and then slowly spread its life-giving warmth down into the valley. His son had known he was suffering. Without words, without a sound he’d known.
And Creed had understood the boy’s question in turn.

  He felt the fear ebb. It didn’t leave him completely, but he thought he could manage it now. He thought maybe it was worth the managing.

  After working in the garden all morning, Father gave Loyal cold corn cakes and jam for his midday meal, then handed him a walking stick that was as tall as he was. “We’ll check some of my ginseng patches this afternoon. It’s cooler in the woods.”

  Loyal grinned. He’d seen the dried roots Father brought into town to sell, though he’d never actually seen one of the plants. Maybe he could learn to “hunt sang” as well as his father. Of course, Mother thought he should grow up to be a teacher, but Loyal wasn’t so sure about that. He sure liked it better out here on the mountain than he did in a classroom, or even their house in town. Maybe he was cut out to be a woodsman like Father.

  Loyal soon learned that the walking stick wasn’t just for fun. They headed into the deep woods, where trees towered over their heads and there was less undergrowth. It was also where the hills were impossibly steep. He needed the stick to save himself from sliding down the side of Rich Mountain where the leaf litter was deep and rocks jutted out as though the mountain were trying to keep them from passing. He also needed it to pull himself back up the mountain and to push through tangled laurel thickets. But there were gentler places too, where green ferns feathered against his legs and scarlet newts darted.

  Father knelt beside a rotting log and waved Loyal over. He crouched beside his father and examined the plant growing there. At first he didn’t think there was anything really special about it, but then he saw the crown of reddening berries growing where three stems supporting leaves met. It was kind of pretty, and yet he didn’t see what the big deal was. Father tapped his shoulder and began to explain what they were looking at.

  “This one is big enough to harvest since it has three prongs. They can have more, but they ought to be at least this big. While it’s a little early yet, we’ll go ahead and dig this one so you can see.” He had a short stick with a pointed end stuck in his belt. He pulled it out and began working it into the soil in a big circle around the plant. He loosened the soil until he could work it with his fingers, pushing his hand in along the stem of the plant until he’d worked a fat, gnarled root loose. He brushed off the dirt and showed Loyal how it almost looked like a man with tapering arms and legs. “Over there in China, they think this will treat all kinds of troubles.” Father shrugged. “Maybe it will.”