The Kill-Off

'I'll take care of her! I'll fix that filthy slut! I'll t-teach her how t- to-'

'Lily!' I said. 'Listen to me, Lily! I'm going to-'

'You! You don't c-care! You don't know what it means to a woman t-to-I'LL CLAW HER EYES OUT! I'LL PULL HER FILTHY TONGUE OUT OF HER THROAT! I'LL-LET GO OF ME! Y-YOU LET-'

I didn't let go. I held on tight, shaking her as hard as I could. And I didn't like doing it, you know, but I was more afraid not to.

As soon as she was quieted enough to listen, I began to talk. To tell her and keep telling her that I'd see Luane Devore myself. That I definitely and positively promised I would. I kept repeating it until it finally sank in on her, and she snapped out of her fit.

'All r-right, Henry.' She shuddered and blew her nose. 'I certainly hope I can depend on you. If I thought for a moment that-'

'I told you I would,' I said. 'I'll do it this evening. Right after I close the office.'

'After? But why can't you-?'

'Because,' I said, 'it's a personal matter; you can't get around that. Even seeing her after office hours could put me in a pretty awkward position if someone chose to make anything out of it. But I certainly can't do it on the county's time.'

She hesitated, studying me. At last, she sighed and turned away again.

'All right,' she said. 'But if you don't really intend to, I wish you'd say so. In fact, the more I think about it, the less I care whether you do talk to her. I'm perfectly willing to do it myself-I'd like doing it-'

'I said I'd do it,' I said. 'Immediately after five tonight. Now, it's all settled, so forget it.'

I left before she could say anything more. I drove down to the courthouse, and went up to my office.

It was a pretty busy morning, all in all. I had a long talk with Judge Shively about the coming election. Then, Sheriff Jameson dropped in with a legal matter, and I had another long conference with him. As you may or may not know, a sheriff gets part of his income from feeding prisoners. This county pays Jameson fifty cents per meal fed, and what he wanted to know was, could he feed them one double meal a day instead of two, and still collect a dollar.

Well, it was a pretty fine legal point, you know. Something you might say was this way or that, and you could make a case out either way. I finally decided, however, that there might be just a leetle danger in the double-meal proposition. But I pointed out that the word meal could mean just about whatever he wanted to. A bowl of beans could be a meal or a plate of fried potatoes, or even a hunk of bread.

It was eleven o'clock before I got Jameson straightened out. I was hoping I'd have time to take a deep breath- maybe get out and see a few voters-but it just wasn't in the cards. Because now that I'd gotten all those other things cleared up, why Nellie Otis, my secretary, needed me.

Oh, I didn't really mind. Nellie is an attractive young woman, as well as an excellent secretary and there are twelve votes in the Otis family-and she's always so appreciative of everything I do for her.

She stood by watching, all the time I was untangling the ribbon on her typewriter. She said she just didn't know how I did it; she'd tried and tried herself, and she'd just made it worse. I said there was nothing to it, really. It was just a matter of going straight to the source of the trouble, like it would be in any other problem.

I passed it off lightly that way, but it was a pretty bad snarl. Just about the worst I'd ever untangled for her, and that's really saying something. By the time I'd finished with it, and gotten washed up, it was five minutes after twelve. The whole morning was gone, and I was already into my lunch hour.

I was turning away from the washroom sink when I happened to glance out the window. And I just stood there for a moment, staring, wondering well, what the hell next.

Now, there, I thought, that's really something. Kossmeyer and Goofy Gannder! One great man talking to another great man. Yes, sir, I thought, water really finds its level.

Mind you, I have nothing against Kossmeyer. I've never said a word against him to anyone. But I do feel-yes, and I'm justified-that if he's what's supposed to be smart, why I don't want to be.

The way I look at it, if he's so damned smart, why isn't he rich? Where's the proof that he's smart? Why, half the time he don't even use good English!

I had him figured right from the beginning. He's one of those jury jaybirds, one of those howlers and pleaders. All the law he knows you could put in your right eye. And he's just been lucky, so far. If he ever came up against a man who dealt in facts and details, I guess you know how long he would last.

I went to lunch.

The afternoon was even busier than the morning.

The way the work was piling up, it began to look like I might be so tied up I couldn't get out to see Luane Devore tonight. But, then, I thought about the way Sis had acted, and I decided I'd better, work or no work.

I was on my way out of the courthouse when Sheriff J ameson called to me and asked me to step into his office. He'd confiscated a batch of evidence, and he wanted my opinion of it before he went into court on it. I tested it. I told him I wouldn't hesitate to go before the Supreme Court with evidence like that. So he laughed, and gave me a bottle to take with me.

It was a little after five when I got in my car and headed out of town. Just before I got to the Devore place, I took a right fork in the road and drove up toward the hills. The land up there isn't much good any more. Either worn out, or eroded and gullied of its topsoil. All the farms have been abandoned, including the one where I was born and raised.

I turned into the lane that led up to our house. I stopped in the yard, all grown up to weeds now, and looked around. One side of the barn-loft was caved in. All the windows of the house were broken, and the kitchen door creaked back and forth on one hinge. And the chimneys had toppled, scattering brick across the rotting and broken shingles of the roof.

It was kind of sad. Somehow it made me think of that poem, The Deserted Village, I used to give at Friday afternoon school recitals. It was sad-but it was nice. Because everything had gone to hell now, but in my mind it hadn't. In my mind, nothing had changed; everything was as it used to be. And the way it used to be… nothing was ever nicer or finer than that.

No worries. No one fussing at you. Always knowing just what to do and what not to do, and knowing that it would be all right if you made a mistake. Not like it is now, when you mean well but you ain't real sure of yourself, and there's no one to come straight out and set you straight.

Not like it is now, when people can't understand that you're truly sorry about something-and being sorry is about all you can do-and they wouldn't give a damn if they did understand.

I took a big drink of the whiskey. I guessed I ought to be seeing Luane Devore, but it was so nice and peaceful here, and I had all evening to do it. So I got out, and went up the back walk to the kitchen.

The big old range was still there. Lily had said what was the sense of moving an old wood-burner into town, for pity sake. So we'd left it behind, and consequently, fine stove that it was, it was rusting into junk. It looked like junk. But in my mind I could see it like it had been. Like I'd used to keep it when I was a kid, and Mama and Papa were still alive.

That was my job, keeping the stove blacked and polished. I did it every Saturday morning, as soon as it was cooled off from breakfast, and no one was allowed in the kitchen while I was doing it. First, I'd take a wire brush and dry-scrub it all over. Then, I'd get busy with the blacking rags and polish. I'd rub it in good, get it wiped