Raintree County (133 page)

—All right, boys, said a man in a tall black hat, who had been waiting at the starting line. You have the field to yourselves. Now
what I want to know is, do you want me to set you off by word of mouth or by pistol?

—Shoot a gun, Cash said. I want John to hear it.

—All right, the starter said, it'll be a gun. One, two, three, and bang.

Johnny Shawnessy stood at the starting line and ran his eyes over the crowd. Everything was bathed in a dewy brightness. Some distance down the lane of faces, he saw Nell. Desire to win, to be first, to get the garland rushed over him in a wave of fire and longing.

—John, Cash Carney was saying in a low voice, it's now or never, boy. Remember, I got one hundred dollars planted on you. One hundred dollars.

—John, Zeke said, you got to get in there and run. Pa don't know it, but I got two months' hire bet on you.

An important-looking citizen walked from the crowd, took off his hat, and said,

—Folks, I know you're eager as I am for the Race to start. Now these two boys are as fine boys as you will find anywhere. They're both trained to the limit, and I know they're going to show us a fine exhibition of speed and endurance. I understand that this race is something of a grudge battle, and it's been talked about in the papers for some time now. I guess both boys are known to most all of us here, but I will interduce them to you anyway. Now, I want to interduce first—

He was motioning to Johnny, who stepped forward and stood hands on hips.

—Mister John Wickliff Shawnessy!

There was a great deal of handclapping and a violent agitation of parasols among the many girls lining the course. Johnny looked down three hundred yards between the roped-in walls of faces to the platform where a darkhaired girl in a white dress was leaning over the rail. . . .

OLYMPIC GAMES, 1859

(Epic Fragment from the
Mythic Examiner
)

Barbarian woman, steepbreasted and passionate, do you wait with a garland of bay to catch the victor? What flagon of grape shall be poured for the stringbreaker! What wine pressed from the vineyarded hills! O, delicious and blood-exciting potion! He shall drink deep
the viny adoration of your beautiful eyes. None shall prevent him. Victory, winged goddess, be in his bounding feet!

—Go home and git some meat on your bones, kid, a man's voice said.

—Isn't he cute! a girl said.

—This boy, the announcer said, comes from Danwebster, or near it, a place about which we've read a good deal in the county papers lately. Are there any folks from that locality here?

—Yes, sir!

—Betcher life!

—I see, the man said. Danwebster has sent a big delegation to cheer their favorite son. Five or six anyway. (Laughter.) Well, he's a fine upright young man as you can see for yourself, and I'm sure that, win or lose, he'll reflect credit on the home community.

—Speech! Speech!

—Hello, folks, Johnny said. I'll do my best.

—And best of luck to you, Johnny, the announcer said, and now, folks—

Johnny retired, and Flash Perkins stepped out.

—Now, folks, here's a lad needs no interduction. Orville Perkins of Freehaven, better known as Flash. (Thunderous applause.) Flash here hasn't lost a race since he was kneehigh to a grasshopper. He's won the Fourth of July Race five years straight now, and if somebody don't beat him pretty soon, he'll trip on his beard, and get beat that way. (Loud laughter.) Would you say a word to the crowd, Flash?

—Hello, folks, Flash said. I mean to win this here race.

—That's the spirit, Flash. All right, clear the street.

A few dogs and boys were chased out of the street, leaving a lane about ten feet wide down to the flagdraped platform. Shading his eyes, Johnny could see a thin white line of string tied to the platform and stretching into the crowd. A throng of girls made a vague wall of color behind the finish line. Some were standing, and some were sitting in buggies, drawn up in a halfcircle at the end of the street.

—How about them girls down there? a man said. Ain't they too close?

—Let 'em take keer a themselves, Flash said. Let's git this race started.

Flash was stamping his bare feet on the ground and swinging his great arms. His teeth laughed. His forehead was ridged. He kept shaking the shag of his hair out of his fierce eyes.

—Shake hands, boys, the announcer said.

Johnny and Flash shook hands savagely. The crowd yelled like savages. Someone savagely clanked a cowbell, and a whole string of firecrackers went off under a wagon on which a half dozen girls were sitting. The girls shrieked, and the crowd laughed like savages.

Johnny Shawnessy turned and set his foot to the mark. His teeth chattered with excitement. Goosepimples stood on his arms. At this moment there was nothing that he wanted more in the world than to break the white string three hundred yards off in the middle of the Court House Square. Three hundred yards off through walls of faces, where the flags were hung on the platform, three hundred yards and a few seconds away was the summit of all desire. Victory, winged goddess, be in his bounding feet!

It seemed to him that he was out of his body. He wondered if it would run when he wanted it to. Where his body should be, there was nothing but a void of desire. Nevertheless, he saw his own slender foot going to the mark beside the brown foot of Flash Perkins, and though he didn't look at Flash nor Flash at him, he was aware of the powerful body of his rival drawn back like a bow.

—All right! the starter said coming out in tall black hat, swallowtail coat, and stickpinned tie. Quiet, everybody!

He raised a pistol and put a finger in his ear. The crowd laughed, and he took it out. He fumbled with the pistol and raised it again.

—Don't run till you hear that shot, boys.

He waved toward the far end of the course, hallooed,

—Judges ready?

—Fire away! came a thin, high voice from the finish line.

—On your marks, boys, the starter said. One. Two. Three.

There was a long, long, long, long silence. . . .

BANG!

(Epic Fragment from the
Mythic Examiner
)

The Fourth of July Celebration this year in the Court House Square featured some pyrotechnic displays that were quite out of the ordinary. A couple of rockets so constructed as to simulate human form
were set in the ground and the fuses having been lit, suddenly took off together at a tremendous speed and whizzed along the ground like two runners to a distant mark. A lively interest was exhibited in the new infernal device, especially by the ladies, a group of whom having gathered . . .

—Go it, Johnny!

—Take him, Flash!

—Look at them two scalawags go!

RIVER RACE

(Epic Fragment from the
Mythic Examiner
)

The
Red Streak
and the
Comet,
those two wellknown sidewheelers, leaned into the current, coming together. Crowds lined the shore as the two fastest boats on the river jostled each other on the last long run into New Orleans. The
Streak
was crammed with fastburning pine, and a nigger squat on her boiler. ‘More pine, Mr. Shawnessy?' ‘A little more, thank ye, Mr. Burns.' The
Comet,
a more durable-looking craft, though lacking the
Streak's
speedy design, was gathering head, and as they came into the bend she had a lead of a half length. The banks were lined with shouting thousands, the wealth and beauty of America's sultriest City, as the Mistress of the Delta, all braceleted with lights, cheered the stacking steamers to their piers. . . .

—Catch 'im, Johnny! Catch 'im!

—Keep it up, Flash! You got 'im whipped!

—Don't give up, John! One hundred dollars! Jerusalem, boy! Go! Go! Go!

IRON HORSES IN SPEEDTEST

(Epic Fragment from the
Mythic Examiner
)

Running side by side, the Midnight Express and the Northern Fury were like two huge projectiles in the night. Going fully forty-five miles an hour, fullblast, together they roared toward the signal light. It was do or die. A long, thin scream of pain emerged from the Fury as she began to close the gap on . . .

Johnny Shawnessy was turning the earth with his bare toes. Always before, this drumming fury that he had in his feet had beaten his rivals back until he was alone at the halfway mark, in front and
thundering to the string. But now at the halfway mark, as faces went by him faster and faster, he and Flash Perkins were running side by side and stride for stride, and every effort of his own seemed only to increase Flash's speed, as if they were one body. A strange madness, akin to joy, anger, and intoxication, ran through Johnny Shawnessy. He fixed his eyes on the white string and leaned into the hot air, trying to overcome and subdue this remorseless companion. But now his legs were growing heavy, he was laboring hard, his arms felt like lengths of lead that he had to swing to keep running. With terror he saw the white string closer and closer. The wall of restless color behind it became the faces of girls: he could see the lines of their lips and eyes, the beauty spots on their cheeks, thin ribs of their parasols. And there was not enough room, not enough, not enough, not enough. Thirty yards, twenty yards, ten yards . . .

Johnny Shawnessy shut his eyes and gave a tremendous leap. Something light touched at his breast, and he plunged into a flashing pool of colors, shrieks, perfume, laughter, and flailing bodies. He was down on his hands and knees and then rolling on his back, while girls' voices shrieked in shrill delight. Fluffy summer gowns raked his shoulders; girls' arms and hands pushed and clung to his body. He felt as if he had just been hurled head foremost into an immense costume closet, where twenty naked girls had been hiding.

Someone grabbed his arm and plucked him out of the heap. It was Flash Perkins, standing up to his knees in girls and holding up a capsized buggy with his shoulders while girls scrambled out from beneath it.

—Who won? Johnny said.

Just then, for answer, out of the exultant morning a great wave of arms and voices surged under him and picked him up, as if he were a light flower floating, and he was tossed on hands and shoulders and borne wildly hither and thither, his panting body sustained by rushes of hoarse sound.

—Hurrah for Johnny! Hurrah! Hurrah!

—Hurrah for the New Champeen!

He was being borne like a balloon aimlessly on tempests of summer violence, and then someone yelled,

—Take him around the Square!

His body was tossed above the faces of the Court House Square.
Hands waved. Lips smiled. Parasols pointed and bobbed. Hats went up.

Below him standing at the finish line was Flash Perkins, rubbing his chin and shaking his head. His eyes had a hurt, bewildered look. He was all alone, and apparently only Johnny remembered him. Johnny felt pity and even remorse for the thing that he had done. He knew then that to become the Hero of Raintree County, it was necessary to kill the Hero of Raintree County.

—Speech! Speech! yelled the crowd.

—I was lucky, folks. I couldn't do it again in a million years

Someone was yanking at his leg. Looking down, he saw Cash Carney.

—Jehosaphat, John! Cash said. We cleaned up two hundred and fifty dollars. You sure you won't take some a that?

—No, thanks, Cash. It's all yours.

Cash was eating his way into his cigar. Both fists were full of coins, and people were still paying off.

—Just remember, boy, Cash said, the party this afternoon is strictly on me. Every bit of it. Soon as you can get away, meet me in front of the Saloon and we'll get the girls.

Now the crowd was carrying Johnny around the Square while the bearers sang, ‘Hail to the Chief!' and ‘Yankee Doodle.' In front of the
Clarion
office, Garwood Jones was leaning on the door fanning himself with a copy of the
Clarion.

—Come and see me sometime at the poorhouse, sprout, he said, shaking his head in disgust.

On the east side of the Square, Johnny saw Nell Gaither, standing lonely and apart under a tree on the court house lawn. When he looked at her, she twirled her parasol and watched him with shining eyes. She looked very small and far-off, as the crowd bore him resistlessly on.

And now they were moving again over the ground where the Race had been run. They carried him toward the platform, and with one last surge they tossed him up and over the rail. He was standing beside Susanna Drake. She looked up at him, her eyes brilliant and soft.

—Hi, Susanna, he said. Well, here I am again.

—You ran beautiful, she said, as she fingered a chaplet of oak-leaves.

—How about that race you and I were going to have? he whispered.

—I wouldn't have a chance, she said.

The crowd was applauding so loud he could hardly hear his own voice.

A minister of the community came forward and said,

—Mr. Shawnessy, we are gratified that you should encourage a spirit of helpful and manly contest; not for the sake of winning, not for the sake of defeating another, but that you may so strengthen yourself that you may be victor in the contests of life. Consider the symbolism of these flags—innocence, truth, purity, manliness. Let them guide you in your different paths through life.

—Mr. Shawnessy, Susanna Drake said, putting her little hand on his arm and holding the oakleaf garland as high as his head, allow me to present to you in behalf of all these young ladies here present this wreath. To the victor belongs . . .

A GARLAND FOR OUR JOHNNY

(Epic Fragment from the
Free Enquirer
)

The conclusion of this great sporting event, certainly the most exciting ever seen in Raintree County, was a moving and memorable one, leaving more than one eye drenched with sympathetic dew. Miss Susanna Drake, that charming ambassadress from the land of mint and magnolia, decorated the head of the young hero with a garland in token of his prowess. . . .