Shadow Country

Cox said, “That done it.” He pulled out a pistol. Mis Hannah screeched at Green to shut his mouth, didn’t he know that white trash loves their mothers good as anybody? Waller was scared to death but wouldn’t quit. The man was plain crazy in love, showing off for his sweetheart so she could see her man weren’t just some drunken hog thief the way Mister Watson said. He pointed at his own chest, said to Cox, “How about it, kid? You yeller enough to shoot a man in his cold blood that is twice your age?”

Maybe Mist’ Green Waller had Cox figured for another Dutchy Melville, Frank said, dangerous talker but not all bad at heart. Mis Hannah Smith did not make that mistake. She was struggling up out of her chair trying to get between them, telling Cox, “Don’t pay no attention to that idjit!” Frank claimed he called in from the kitchen, “Nemmine, Mist’ Les, Mist’ Green was only foolin.” But like Frank said, Cox had more excuse already than his kind ever needs. Bein drunk, arm wobbling, he said, the foreman had trouble getting Waller in his sights. “Sit still, you sonofabitch,” he yelled, “don’t make me go wastin these here bullets!”

Mist’ Green Waller finally understood the fun was over. He brought his hands up slow and careful so as not to flare the man behind that pistol. Cox lowered his weapon into his lap, then fired anyway underneath the table. Ever hear a gun go off in a small room? Their ears exploded with that noise. Even Cox looked stunned. “That was a accident,” he muttered. But this nigra swore that Cox done that on purpose, shot him in the belly cause that hurts the worst.

Mist’ Green was still setting at the table clutching his belly. Looked kind of sheepish, Frank said. “Well, Hell,” he whispered. Them were his last words. Scowling, he leaned into the table, then toppled over soft onto the floor.

Mis Hannah had barged out of her chair. She flew and shook him, moaning, “Christamighty, Green, ain’t you never going to learn? Oh, Christamighty, sweetheart!” Howled with woe and headed for the kitchen. Cox jumped up with his pistol, took off after her and she darned near beheaded him, splitting that door frame with the big two- blader ax which she kept leaned in the corner behind the kitchen door. Cox went down but sat up and fired before she could try him again. She took a bullet in the shoulder, dropped the ax, crashed off the wall, threw a pan at Cox with her good arm, then headed for the stair.

Cox picked himself up, very bad scared by his close call. He was furious Frank never warned him. Pointing his gun, he said, “Stay right there, nigger. I got business with you.”

Miss Hannah was cumbersome climbing the stair and Cox overtook her before she reached the landing. Knowing how strong she was, he gave her room, stood a step below while they got their breath. Miss Hannah weren’t the kind to beg for mercy and she knew she’d never get none if she did. She screeched, “Run, Little Joe! We’re done for! Run! He’ll kill you, too!”

Time he heard that, he was already outside, out past the cistern. Two shots came, then another. From the wood edge he could hear a thump, thump, thump of someone falling, then a queer high laugh like a horse nickering. Being drunk, Cox had shot so poorly that he had to sneak around behind, give her a brain shot, he told Frank later. Only she weren’t done yet cause her big leg kicked, knocked him off balance: he slipped on the blood, fell down the stair, but never hurt himself, being so drunk. That nickering noise weren’t nothing but his nerves. When he seen Frank was gone, he commenced to holler, told him to come give him a hand with this here manatee before she bled all over, nastied up the place for Mis Edna. The dead woman went a good three hundred pound and he could not work the body down the stair. Couldn’t stop hollering out of his excitement. “Ah Jesus, will you look at that damn mess!” he moaned. “Know who will catch hell for this? Les Cox, that’s who!”

Mister Watson’s old skiff was some ways down the bank, overturned with the old oars underneath, all growed over by bushes. Frank doubted Cox ever knew about that skiff, probably forgot about it if he had. Trouble was, he couldn’t make a run for it without crossing open ground. Before he could make up his mind, Cox came reeling out, threatened to shoot him in the belly same as he done Green, leave him for the bears or panthers or the crocodiles, whichever ones got to him first. Next, he tried to talk reason-able. He was sounding scared again. Hell, I was only foolin, Joe! Promised not to shoot him and the nigra reckoned he meant it, at least until they finished cleaning up.

Right about then, they heard the pot-pot-pot of Watson’s boat rounding the Bend. Cox screeched Shit! in frustration, which told him Cox was probably scared that “Little Joe” would get to the Boss first with the true story. Cursing real disgusting, Cox ran inside and came right out with Waller’s shotgun. Waving the gun at Frank in warning to keep his mouth shut, he crossed the yard and ducked inside the boat shed door and screamed again because he had bumped into that hanging body.

Frank was relieved when the boat drew near, knowing that once the Boss was back, he would be all right. All the same he remained hidden, scared that with Watson coming, Cox might try to kill off the last witness. But when he saw Cox disappear into the shed armed with a shotgun instead of going down to meet the boat, he realized the foreman was planning on an ambush. The intended victim could only be Cox’s sworn enemy Dutchy Melville, who was this nigra’s friend.

Dutchy was already on the dock but the boat was drifting off into the current. Frank heard Dutchy sing out, “Where you going, Mister Ed?” By the time Frank ran out yelling a warning, Dutchy had smelled the trap and lit out zigzag for the nearest cover. That was the boat shed. Cox poked the shotgun through a loose slat in the door and Dutchy Melville took a charge of buckshot in the throat, died kicking like a chicken with the head cut off.

Cox had heard the nigra’s yell and swung around in time to catch him in the open. Frank put his hands up, sure he was a goner. Instead Cox marched him to the dormitory behind the boat shed and locked him in with the four field hands he locked up every night so’s they wouldn’t steal nothing or eat a chicken or run off on him-though where them poor fellers would have went to in them miles and miles of salt marl mangrove only God would know. Anyways, they were too scared to try anything. They cringed like mutts when the foreman came around, which was how Cox wanted it. Those colored boys had heard the shooting so when they saw Cox they could only moan.

• • •

Afraid to go back into that bloody house, Cox spent what was left of that night drinking shine out on the porch. At sunup he came and let Frank out but not those field hands; probably imagined he still might get away with what he’d done and didn’t want four more witnesses to see those bodies. Walked him at gunpoint to where Dutchy was laying, ordered him to pick up one of those six-guns, shoot into the body without turning around, then go inside, put bullets in the others, and drop the six-shooter on the ground.

I asked Frank did it cross his mind to swing and put his bullet into Cox instead. He said he thought about it only Cox was too nerved up and had him too close covered the whole time. Anyway, it didn’t matter what he did. He was still a nigger and a fugitive from justice and nobody was going to listen to him, let alone believe him, and besides, he said, real bitter and sarcastic, I weren’t doing them dead people no harm. Said he would hang no matter what for the murder of three whites-make that four if he shot Cox. But as he said, a nigra could never dream of no such thing, let alone do it.

Full of fear, Frank helped drag Miss Hannah down the stairs. That started her leaking all over the place but finally they got her hauled across the porch and down into the yard. Cox planned to sink her in the river, but first we got to gut her out, he said, so she don’t gas up and come back on us. Said he hated to see black hands on a white body, then handed Frank the kitchen knife and held his gun on him while the nigra done this terrible sacrilege on a human woman and the same for the two men, gagging all the way. Next they weighted Hannah and her man with pig iron and bricks and pushed ’em off the dock into the current.

By then there were no weights left for Dutchy, who was buzzing with green flies in the thick heat. Cox said, “To hell with him, let them gators have him.” Cox stripped off Melville’s fancy holster belt and they rolled him in, too. He made no mention of that Injun girl in the shed behind him, acted like she weren’t even there and never had been.

Since the night before they had never ate a bite but they weren’t hungry. Cox ordered Frank to mop that blood that nastied up the floor, “get everything tidied up real nice for Edna.” Cox laughed when he said that. He was putting down a lot more shine, and pretty quick he forgot about the blood. Made the nigra sit down in Mist’ Green’s chair, pushed Green’s glass across the table, said, Let’s don’t go wasting this good likker, boy. Go ahead, drink, maybe try out some of your nigger conversation, cause we’re in this thing together, ain’t that right? Just like old times, right? Telling this, Frank glanced at me to see if I had noticed that him and Cox must of knowed each other good from someplace else.

Cox made him promise he’d back up his story, tell Mister Ed how his foreman weren’t at fault. Tell him how them two drunken fools was abusing him for no damn reason. How Green had his shotgun hid under the table (a lie, Frank said) and Hannah had her big ax ready so his foreman had to shoot in self-defense.