the Moonshine War (1969) (20 page)

Dr. Taulbee nodded, "I guess your part in it's done. I don't see any reason for you to stay around."

"I mean it's over for all of us."

"No, sir, Frank, it's over for you, but we got to find us that whiskey yet."

"If he pulls his gun," Long said, "I'll shoot you first."

"Nobody's talking about shooting anybody." Dr. Taulbee sounded hurt. "I'm saying it's time for you to go home is all."

"I guess it was going to come sometime," Long said. "I should've known the day you got here."

"Well," Dr. Taulbee said, "You can't know everything. You took a chance and you didn't make it. Dual here doesn't trust you. He's for putting you under; but I told him, old Frank's not going to sic the law on us. He knows if we get put in jail he's going to be right there with us, hoping and praying some accident don't befall him. Isn't that right? I said to Dual hell, Frank was nice enough to tell us about that boy's whiskey, what do we want to hurt him for?"

"I guess that's it then," Long said. "Since there's not much I can do about it."

"There isn't anything you can do," Dr. Taulbee said, "outside of wish me luck. This next raid I'm leading myself."

Dusk was settling as Long drove away from the farmhouse. Reaching the gravel road he flicked on his headlights.

He told himself that he must be awful dumb. Taulbee must think he was about the dumbest boy he'd ever met. He had called Taulbee in and now he couldn't do a thing about it. What he couldn't figure out was why he had trusted Taulbee in the first place. Probably because he figured he had a hold on Taulbee and, if the man pulled anything, he'd put on his federal agent hat and arrest the son of a bitch. He hadn't thought about Taulbee having a hold on him at the same time. Maybe he should have stayed in the Army. Son Martin had said something about that, about staying in the Amy where there was somebody to think for him. That hadn't made him mad at the time, but it did now, thinking about it, because he could picture Taulbee laughing at him and saying the same thing. Boy, he would sure like to think of a way of nailing Taulbee and that loony-head Dual and the rest them. He had stayed calm and walked away, because he looked stupid enough without crying and kicking his feet and, because if he'd stayed any longer, he would have taken a swing at Dual and gotten shot full of holes before he cleared the yard.

Passing Kay Lyons's house he thought about her for a moment, picturing her, the dea
d e
xpression on her face as he checked out--probably a cold fish underneath her woman's body; no life in there at all. The house, he noticed, was completely dark.

But there was a light farther down the road, off to the right side. He couldn't figure where the light was coming from: the church was down there and the cemetery.

It was a lantern hanging from the stubby limb of a tree. As he drew near the cemetery he could see the dull light beyond the fence and a man digging a grave. It was strange, like he had seen a lantern in a cemetery before somewhere, a little while ago, though he knew it had not been around here. Then he remembered what it was: the grave of Son Martin's father with the light post over it, a lonely grave up on the hill, all by itself.

Long stopped, skidding in the gravel, then backed up until he was even with the lantern light and saw the grave digger looking over toward him. The man leaned on his shovel as Long got out and came through the fence.

"See you're working late."

"They's going to be some burials tomorrow."

"That's what I hear. I knew one of them."

"Boyd Caswell? I see you're coming fro
m t
hat direction."

"That's right. You knew him?"

"I knew them all that's buried here. Them or their children or grandchildren."

"I used to know that girl was married to Son Martin," Long said.

"She's over yan side of that big graveston
e t
here. Her and Son Martin's old mother lying side by side. Next to them's his daddy's folks and I believe two little brothers passed on as babies."

"The whole family," Long said. "Except his dad."

"It's the family plot," the gravedigger said.

Long got in his car and drove on, asking himself, If they are all buried there, then why is that old man all by himself up on the hill? Answer me that.

Lowell got a pot of coffee and some cookies from the dining room and took them in to Mrs. Lyons, who was in the office making entries in a ledger book. She was not in a talkative mood and hadn't been for a few days, so Lowell didn't waste time trying to make conversation.

He went out to the lobby just as Frank Long was coming in the door with his heavy suitcase.

"Did you forget something?"

"No, I'm checking in."

"You just left here a half hour ago."

"Well, I got to thinking, since I've paid the room for the night I ought to get my money's worth, oughtn't I?"

"You'll have to check in again."

"I don't mind."

"How long you 'spect to be?"

"Oh, I don't know," Frank Long answered. "Probably just a short visit this time."

Chapter
Twelve.

Son didn't get home from Corbin until almost noon Wednesday. He had spent the evening with his father-in-law, Mr. Hartley, and finally stayed at his house that night. In the morning he asked Mr. Hartley if he would loan him three hundred dollars. The man wrote out a check without comment or question. Son thanked him and left. He bought his sugar and grain in Corbin and, on the way home, stopped off at Marlett Feed & Seed to pay his past-due bill, counting off one hundred and eighty-seven dollars in front of the store manager, not saying one word, and walked out.

It was a dry, sunny day that June 24. The open yard and the outbuildings lay still in the noon heat. Son came to a stop by the porch. He turned off the ignition and sat there a moment in the stillness. In broad daylight it was quieter than night. There was no breeze and nothing seemed to move. What Son wanted to know right away: where were the hounds? How come they hadn't chased him up the road? Maybe it was always this still at noon on a hot day and he hadn't noticed it before. But he still wanted to know where those hounds were. Aaron was probably up at the still. The hounds could be with him; though Son couldn't remember Aaron ever taking them up there.

He went into the house. There was a pail of water on the sinkboard and a pot of coffee, that smelled fresh, on the stove. He was upstairs
,
taking off his suit coat and about to change into work clothes, when he heard the hounds faintly, way off. By the time he got downstairs and out in the yard, Aaron was coming across the pasture. The were close in front of him and Aaron's arm was extended, like he was pointing at them. It looked strange until Son realized Aaron had them on a rope leash. It was something else he couldn't remember Aaron ever doing. Or going hunting at noon; though Aaron was sure as hell carrying the 12-gauge.

"You get anything?" Son asked him. He reached for the hounds as they panted and sniffed and jumped up on his legs.

"We got us plenty," Aaron said.

Son looked at him, straightening, "Who'd you see?"

"They up in the woods."

"Who is?"

"The ones your friend brought. I saw one of their cars. I heard other ones making noise in the woods, 'Hey, where you at? Man, I'm lost!' They don't know what they doing up there, but I know what they come for."

"Why didn't they drive in the road?"

"I don't know that. I think they know you was away and they want you to come home and think everything fine before they come get you. But I took these two boys and sniffed like I was squirrel hunting and it ain't any surprise now."

"Maybe we still have time to get out of here."

"Is that what you want to do?"

"They've probably closed the back door by now."

"Sealed off the road. Nobody in or out," Aaron said. "Then they sneak up."

"Or they watch for a while. Think maybe we want to take some whiskey and make a run." "Where'd we run to?"

"I don't know of anywhere," Son answered. "So I guess we stay."

Aaron nodded, at ease. "We here when they come."

They got ready for Dr. Taulbee, knowing he was watching them: two small figures through field glasses three to four hundred yards away: two boys doing the chores, taking their time in the afternoon heat.

They unloaded the pickup truck, carrying what looked like grain sacks into the house. And inside they stacked the heavy sacks beneath the two windows facing the open yard.

They hauled a load of old lumber from the barn to the porch. Son Martin looked like he was repairing the porch steps, replacing some of the boards. Yes he was, through from three to four hundred yards you would never see he was wedging in the two middle steps and not nailing them. And you would never see Aaron, who was pulling lumber inside from off the porch and covering the two offside windows that faced the near slope behind the house.

Throughout the afternoon, every hour or so, they would carry a pail of water into the house until they had half-filled a thirty-gallon barrel.

On the kitchen table, pushed over closer to the windows, they laid out their weapons: the 12-gauge Remington and two rifles, a lever-action Winchester and an 0-3 Springfield, and all the ammunition they had in the house. Son put his Smith & Wesson .38 in his back pocket.

They parked the pickup truck on the offside of the pump in the yard, to give them some protection if they had to go out there again.

They pulled back the linoleum in the kitchen and pried up a couple of floor boards so Aaron could drop down into the cellar and bolt the door that opened from the outside. Then he pickaxed the hard-packed floor and shoveled the dirt into grain sacks and handed them up to Son.

At suppertime they ate biscuits and gravy and green beans and wondered if there was anything else they should do. If they had some bob wire, Aaron said, that'd be good, string it around the place when it got dark. They'd bring the dogs in the house. They'd stay by the windows and keep watch on the yard, because maybe those boys out there were tired from waiting and would feel like doing something. They'd be a moon tonight, Aaron said; that was good.

They went out to the porch after supper, to sit down and smoke and watch the hill slopes fading in the dusk, spreading their shadows over the pasture. The ridges were silent and almost black against the night sky. Son finished another cigarette and flicked the stub out into the darkness.

"What do you think?" he said.

"I think they decide to go home or come visit us," Aaron said. "They no reason to stay out in the dark."

A little while later, inside the house, in the kitchen, Aaron rose from where he was seated by a window.

"All the getting ready we done, I forget the mule."

"The mule's all right," Son told him.

"It don't have any water I know of. If it be awhile before we bring any out there, that old mule be thirsty."

Son looked out the window, at the moonlight that lay in the yard between the house and the deeply shadowed outline of the barn.

"Take the water out of the barrel," he said, "you won't make any noise at the pump." Within a few moments he was watching Aaron crossing the yard, his shadow following him until he was close to the barn and enveloped in silent darkness. Son heard the door creak and saw a faint movement. Aaron was inside.

Son waited. He knew how long it would take to walk through the barn to the stock pen and pour a bucket of water into the trough. As the minutes passed he told himself Aaron had decided to stay there awhile and keep watch from the barn. They could sneak up from that direction, using the barn for cover. Or they could have already done it and were inside the barn when Aaron walked in. After about ten minutes more, Son had to know for sure. He opened the door about a foot, letting the foxhounds run through the opening and down the steps. He watched them sniff around the yard. As they worked closer to the barn, they would sniff, then raise their heads and stand still. The hounds were about ten feet from the deep shadows, when they started growling, then barking and howling, raising a racket to frighten off whatever the unknown thing was inside.

Son didn't see the half door in the barn open or make out the figure there until the repeating shotgun went off four times, louder than the howls that came from the dogs as they were cut down by the charges. By the time Son got his Winchester on the door it was closed and the deep shadow lay in silence.

Dual held out the shotgun. "Here, take it." "I can't see where you're at."

"Then light the goddamn lantern. He knows we're here now, it don't matter."

"I guess you got them, I don't hear anything." "Course I got them--what'd you think I was going to do?"

Aaron said, "They wasn't hurting you any." "Jesus," Dual said, "who asked you anything?"

A gloved hand held a lighted match inside the lantern until the wick caught and the yellow glow showed Dual holding the shotgun and the heavy-set man with the glove and Aaron standing with a rope that was noosed tightly around his neck, reached up over
a h
orse-stall beam and hung slack behind him falling to a tangled coil on the floor.