Snopes: The Hamlet, The Town, The Mansion

“All right,” Uncle Gavin said. “Go on.”

“That’s all,” Mr Hampton said.

“How did he get in?” Uncle Gavin said.

“He?” Mr Hampton said.

“All right,” Uncle Gavin said. “Take ‘they’ if you like it better.”

“I thought of that too,” Mr Hampton said. “The key. I said the key because even that fool would have more sense than to have a key to that place anywhere except on a string around his neck.”

“That one,” Uncle Gavin said.

“Yep,” Mr Hampton said. “I dropped it into the drawer where I usually keep such, handcuffs and a extra pistol. Anybody could have come in while me and Miss Elma” (she was the office deputy, widow of the sheriff Mr Hampton had succeeded last time) “was out, and taken it.”

“Or the pistol either,” Uncle Gavin said. “You really should start locking that place, Hub. Some day you’ll leave your star in there and come back to find some little boy out on the street arresting people.”

“Maybe it’s lucky you at least had that suitcase locked up. I suppose you’ve still got that, since Mr Gombault hasn’t got back yet?”

“That’s right,” Mr Hampton said.

“And Jack Crenshaw and his buddy are just interested in whiskey, not photography. Which means you haven’t turned that suitcase over to anybody yet.”

“That’s right,” Mr Hampton said.

“Are you going to?” Uncle Gavin said.

“What do you think?” Mr Hampton said.

“That’s what I think too,” Uncle Gavin said.

“After all, the whiskey is enough,” Mr Hampton said. “And even if it aint, all we got to do is show Judge Long just any one of them photographs right before he pronounces sentence. Damn it,” he said, “it’s Jefferson. We live here. Jefferson’s got to come first, even before the pleasure of crucifying that damned—”

“Yes,” Uncle Gavin said. “I’ve heard that sentiment.” Then Mr Hampton left. And all we had to do was just to wait, and not long. You never had to wonder about how much Ratliff had heard because you knew in advance he had heard all of it. He closed the door and stood just inside it.

“Why didn’t you tell him yesterday about Flem Snopes?” he said.

“Because he let Flem Snopes or whoever it was walk right in his office and steal that key. Hub’s already got about all the felonious malfeasance he can afford to compound,” Uncle Gavin said. He finished putting the papers into the briefcase and closed it and stood up.

“You leaving?” Ratliff said.

“Yes,” Uncle Gavin said. “Wyott’s Crossing.”

“You aint going to wait for Flem?”

“He wont come back here,” Uncle Gavin said. “He wont dare. What he came here yesterday to try to bribe me to do is going to happen anyway without the bribe. But he dont dare come back here to find out. He will have to wait and see like anybody else. He knows that.” But still Ratliff didn’t move from the door.

“The trouble with us is, we dont never estimate Flem Snopes right. At first we made the mistake of not estimating him a-tall. Then we made the mistake of overestimating him. Now we’re fixing to make the mistake of underestimating him again. When you jest want money, all you need to do to satisfy yourself is count it and put it where cant nobody get it, and forget about it. But this-here new it. Butg he has done found out it’s nice to have, is different. It’s like keeping warm in winter or cool in summer, or peace or being free or contentment. You cant jest count it and lock it up somewhere safe and forget about it until you feel like looking at it again. You got to work at it steady, never to forget about it. It’s got to be out in the open, where folks can see it, or there aint no such thing.”

“No such thing as what?” Uncle Gavin said.

“This-here new discovery he’s jest made,” Ratliff said. “Call it civic virtue.”

“Why not?” Uncle Gavin said. “Were you going to call it something else?” Ratliff watched Uncle Gavin, curious, intent; it was as if he were waiting for something. “Go on,” Uncle Gavin said. “You were saying.”

Then it was gone, whatever it had been. “Oh yes,” Ratliff said. “He’ll be in to see you. He’ll have to, to make sho you recognize it too when you see it. He may kind of hang around until middle of the afternoon, to kind of give the dust a chance to settle. But he’ll be back then, so a feller can at least see jest how much he missed heading him off.”

So we didn’t drive up to Wyott’s then, and this time Ratliff was the one who underestimated. It wasn’t a half an hour until we heard his feet on the stairs and the door opened and he came in. This time he didn’t take off the black hat: he just said “Morning, gentlemen” and came on to the desk and dropped the key to Montgomery Ward’s studio on it and was going back toward the door when Uncle Gavin said:

“Much obliged. I’ll give it back to the sheriff. You’re like me,” he said. “You dont give a damn about truth either. What you are interested in is justice.”

“I’m interested in Jefferson,” Mr Snopes said, reaching for the door and opening it. “We got to live here. Morning, gentlemen.”

ELEVEN

V. K. RATLIFF

And still he missed it, even set—sitting right there in his own office and actively watching Flem rid Jefferson of Montgomery Ward. And still I couldn’t tell him.