“I’d like to know what happened.”
“Those two start fighting. The other boys try to pull them apart and the two start swinging at everybody. Got to hit ’em with shovels to put ’em down.”
“I didn’t see them fighting each other.”
“Then you must have missed that part.” Past Mr. Manly’s thoughtful expression—through the window and down in the yard—he saw a convict walking toward the tailor shop with a bundle under his arm. Frank Shelby. This far away he knew it was Shelby. Norma Davis stood in the door waiting for him.
“Soon as I heard the shots,” Mr. Manly said, “I looked out. They were separated, like two groups fighting. They didn’t look close enough to have been fighting each other.”
Bob Fisher waited. “You want a written report?”
“What’re you going to do to them?”
“I told them before, they start fighting they go back in the snake den. Twenty days. They know it, so it won’t be any surprise.”
“Twenty days in there seems like a long time.”
“I hope to tell you it is,” Fisher said.
“I was going to talk to them when they got out the other day. I meant to—I don’t know, I put it off and then I guess some other things came up.”
Fisher could see Shelby at the tailor shop now, close to the woman, talking to her. She turned and they both went inside.
“I’m not saying I could have prevented their fighting, but you never know, do you? Maybe if I
Fisher pulled his gaze away from the tailor shop to the little man by the window. “Well, I don’t know about that.”
“It could have made a difference.”
“I never seen talking work much on anybody.”
“But twenty days in there,” Mr. Manly said, “and it could be my fault, because I didn’t talk to them.” He paused. “Don’t you think, Bob, in this case, you ought to give them no more than ten days? You said yourself ten days was a long time. Then soon as they come out I’ll talk to them.”
“That Indian was supposed to be in thirty days,” Fisher said, “and you changed it to ten. Now I’ve already told them twenty and you want to cut it down again. I tell a convict one thing and you say something else and we begin to have problems.”
“I’m only asking,” Mr. Manly said, “because if I could have done something, if I’m the one to blame, then it wouldn’t be fair to those two boys.”
“Mister, they’re convicts. They do what we tell them. Anything.”
Mr. Manly agreed, nodding. “That’s true, we give the orders and they have to obey. But we still have to be fair, no matter who we’re dealing with.”
Bob Fisher wondered what the hell he was doing here arguing with this little four-eyed squirt. He said, “They don’t know anything about this. They don’t know you meant to talk to them.”
“But I know it,” Mr. Manly said, “and the more I think about it the more I know I got to talk to them.” He paused. “Soon.”
Fisher saw it coming, happening right before his eyes, the little squirt’s mind working behind his gold-frame glasses.
“Yes, maybe you ought to bring them in tomorrow.”
“Just a minute ago you said ten days—”
“Do you have any children, Bob?”
The question stopped Fisher. He shook his head slowly, watching Mr. Manly.
“Well, I’m sure you know anyway you got to have patience with children. Sure, you got to punish them sometimes, but first you got to teach them right from wrong and be certain they understand it.”
“I guess my wife’s got something wrong with her. She never had any kids.”
“That’s God’s will, Bob. What I’m getting at, these two boys here, Harold and Raymond, they’re just like children.” Mr. Manly held up his hand. “I know what you’re going to say, these boys wasn’t caught stealing candy, they took a life. And I say that’s true. But still they’re like little children. They’re grown in body but not in mind. They got the appetites and temptations of grown men. They fight and carry on and, Lord knows, they have committed murder, for which they are now paying the price. But we don’t want no more murders around here, do we, Bob? No, sir. Nor do we want to punish anybody for something that isn’t their fault. We got two murderers wanting to kill each other. Two mean-looking boys we chain up in a dungeon. But Bob, tell me something. Has anybody ever spoke kindly to them? I mean has anybody ever helped them overcome the hold the devil’s got on them? Has anybody ever showed them the path of righteousness, or explained to them Almighty God’s justice and the meaning of everlasting salvation?”
Jesus Christ, Bob Fisher said—not to Mr. Manly, to himself. He had to get out of here; he didn’t need any sermons today. He nodded thoughtfully and said to Mr. Manly, “I’ll bring them in here whenever you want.”
When Junior and Soonzy came back from clubbing the Indian and the colored boy, Frank Shelby told them to get finished with the unloading. He told them to leave a bottle of whiskey in the wagon for the freight driver and take the rest of it to his cell. Soonzy said Jesus, that nigger had a hard head, and showed everybody around how the hunk of wood was splintered. Junior said my, but they were dumb to start a fight out in the yard. This old boy over there called them sweethearts and that had started them swinging. If they wanted to fight, they should have it out in a cell some night. A convict standing there said, boy, he’d like to see that. It would be a good fight.
Shelby was looking at Norma Davis outside the tailor shop. He knew she was waiting for him, but what the convict said caught in his mind and he looked at the man.
“Which one would you bet on?”
“I think I’d have to pick the nigger,” the convict said. “The way he’s built.”
Shelby looked around at Soonzy. “Who’d you pick?”
“I don’t think neither of them look like much.”
“I said who’d you pick.”
“I don’t know. I guess the nigger.”
“How about in the mess hall,” Shelby said. “The Indin showed he’s got nerve. Pretty quick, too, the way he laid that plate across the boy’s eyes.”
“He’s quick,” Junior said.
“Quick and stronger than he looks,” Shelby said. “You saw him swimming against the river current.”
“Well, he’s big for an Indin,” Junior said. “Big and quick and, as Frank says, he’s got some nerve. Another thing, you don’t see no marks on him from their fighting in the snake den. He might be more’n the nigger can handle.”
“I’d say you could bet either way on that fight,” Shelby said. He told Junior to hand him the bundle for the tailor shop—a bolt of prison cloth wrapped in brown paper—and walked off with it.
Most of them, Shelby was thinking, would bet on the nigger. Get enough cons to bet on the Indin and it could be a pretty good pot. If he organized the betting, handled the whole thing, he could take about ten percent for the house. Offer some long-shot side bets and cover those himself. First, though, he’d have to present the idea to Bob Fisher. A prize fight. Fisher would ask what for and he’d say two reasons. Entertain the cons and settle the problem of the two boys fighting. Decide a winner and the matter would be ended. Once he worked out the side bets and the odds.
“Bringing me a present?” Norma asked him.
Shelby reached the shade of the building and looked up at her in the doorway. “I got a present for you, but it ain’t in this bundle.”
“I bet I know what it is.”
“I bet you ought to. Who’s inside?”
“Just Tacha and the old man.”
“Well, you better invite me in,” Shelby said, “before I start stripping you right here.”
“Little anxious today?”
“I believe it’s been over a week.”
