The Pecan Man(21)

To this day, I don't know what came over me. Maybe it was the schoolgirl tone of her name-calling that just pushed me over the edge. I rolled up that newspaper and popped Dovey Kincaid right in the head.

"Oh!" she screamed, throwing her hands up to cover her face.

"I said get out of my house and I mean get out of my house!" I punctuated my words with swats aimed at her perfectly coiffed hair.

"Oh! Oh! Oh!" she wailed as she bobbed and weaved to escape my blows. She fled through the front door with me on her heels. I stopped at the edge of the porch and watched her run blindly across the street, cupping her head in her arms and shrieking the whole way.

I stood there for a few moments puffing tiny clouds of fog into the cold December air as I tried to catch my breath. I turned to go back in and Blanche materialized at the screen door.

"Could you call me a cab?"

"Already did. Be here in ten minutes."

"You hear all that?"

"Ain't deaf yet, I reckon."

"Good Lord, what have I done?"

"Look like you done run that one off for good, I'd say."

I couldn't bring myself to tell her I wasn't talking about Dovey Kincaid.



I went straight to the police station and demanded to see Eddie. It was all I could do not to turn myself in immediately when I saw what they did to that pitiful old man. According to Ralph Kornegay, Eddie resisted arrest. That was the official account of the facial lacerations and bruises and the broken bones in his right arm. By the time I got to him, his bones were set and his wounds bound, but his attorney had not made it by to talk to him yet. That didn’t surprise me a bit.

Eddie lay quietly on the lower bunk of the jail cell, his swollen face turned toward the wall. The sound of the key turning in the lock echoed loudly down the row of cells, but it did nothing to move him.

“Eddie?” I spoke softly first and when he didn’t answer, a little louder. “Eddie? I’ve brought you some food.”

He mumbled something then, but did not look up. The guard behind me spoke for him.

“He can’t eat anything, Miz Beckworth. Can’t hardly open his mouth.”

“He has to eat, Mr. - what was your name?” I asked and answered my own question by reading his nametag. “Mr. Smallwood. Oh! You Binky Smallwood’s boy?”

“Yes, Ma’am.”

That’s the thing about southern boys; they can be mean as snakes and twice as deadly, but they’re raised polite. This one didn't have a mean bone in his body, if memory served me correctly, but his father was a piece of work.

Binky Smallwood was a pompous little barrel of a man with six sons and an exhausted, but forgiving wife. He attended The Mayville Baptist Church every Sunday, but it was his Monday through Saturday habits that caused his unsuccessful bid for deaconship there. This was the youngest of the Smallwood crew, as Binky was fond of calling them. Binky was captain of his ship and he made sure everyone knew it.

Our pastor was a forward-thinking man who believed in Southern Baptist doctrine, but had a decidedly Christ-like point of view. He once preached an inspired sermon on marriage and all that it entailed. I remember him looking straight at Binky Smallwood when he said, “If you have to tell everyone you’re the head of your household, then make no mistake about it, you are not.” I have no doubt the message went straight over the fool's head.

“I taught you in Sunday School, didn’t I?”

“Yes, Ma’am.”

“I was rather fond of you as I recall,” I said.

“Yes, Ma’am."

I said a quick prayer that this apple had rolled a good way from the tree.

“Do me a favor then, would you?” I asked.

“Yes, Ma’am?”

“Could you find Mr. Mims some tomato soup?”

“Yes, Ma’am, I could try,” he responded, but did not move.

“Could you do that now, maybe?” I prodded.

“Now?” He hesitated and looked around, obviously weighing the risks of leaving me alone with Mr. Mims.

“Doesn’t look to me like Mr. Mims has any fight left in him, Mr. Smallwood.”

“I’m Chip, Ma’am.”

“Chip. That’s right. I had forgotten.”

“I shouldn’t leave you alone with the prisoner, Ma’am.”

“Would you like to search me?”

I raised my arms. Chip backed away horrified.

“No, Ma’am, that won’t be necessary.”

“Run along then, Chip. I’ll be fine and we’ll both be here when you get back.”

He hesitated, struggling I'm sure with protocol and reason. Then, taking the handcuffs from his belt, he leaned down and reached for Eddie's left arm.

“I'm sorry, Mr. Mims," he said softly as he snapped one link around Eddie's wrist and the other to the rail of the metal bed.

“Do you really think that's necessary?"

“I'll take it off when I get back," he said and let himself out of the cell without looking back.

I turned back to Eddie as soon as I heard the outer door latch shut.

“Eddie, look at me,” I commanded.

He moved his head slowly, almost imperceptibly, and cut his eyes toward me as he did. I moved closer to him and knelt beside his bed.