The Saints of Swallow Hill(101)

She said, “I don’t feel the same about you, Butch. I ain’t ever going to feel like that. I mean, is this what you want? Trying to force me to feel something for you I don’t?”

“It’s ’cause a him, ain’t it. That new feller.”

“He ain’t got nothing to do with it.”

“But . . . I bought this place on account a you.”

“Like I said before. I ain’t never given you one reason to do none of this.”

“I could change my mind, tell Eugene my version, you know.”

Furious, she said, “Go on ahead, but I think he’d find it mighty peculiar you bringing it up after all this time. Maybe he’d think you shot Warren. Matter a fact, maybe that’s what I’d tell him, and say you wanted this place all along.”

They glared at each other, his eyes glassy with pain and anger, hers unwavering, determined. After a few tense minutes, his body sagged, the fight seeping out of him like the blood dripping from his nose.

He pointed at her with a shaking, bloody hand and said, “It’s best you don’t never come back here.”

It was true. She thought it could have worked, this little arrangement, but she could see it wouldn’t. Facing the gravestone, her eyes traced Warren’s name, the dates. She took in the sunny yellow of the flowers against the white marble and committed it to memory.

She said, “I agree.”

As she hobbled off toward the truck, Butch yelled, “Not never again!”

She didn’t let on she’d heard him.

Back at the farmhouse, she was careful to walk as normal as she could into the kitchen, except she couldn’t get anything past Cornelia.

She said, “Were you just now limping?”

Rae Lynn waved a hand through the air in a dismissive gesture, reminiscent of Warren, and said, “I’m all right. I stumbled, turned my ankle.”

Del said, “They said you went to the old place this morning?”

She nodded, squirmed a bit, and Del opened his mouth, then closed it.

Then he said, “Was Butch Crandall around?”

“Yes.”

“Did he bother you?”

It was such a direct question, it caught Rae Lynn off guard. She first focused on the scene out the window, the pastures dotted with cows, the sky with not a cloud in it. She remembered how Butch acted, and it made her face go hot. She didn’t want to lie about it, she wanted to forget it.

Del gave Amos a look, while Sudie May pointed to a chair and said, “Sit.”

Rae Lynn said, “I’m fine, I’m fine!”

Cornelia said, “Um-hmm. You can’t hardly walk worth a lick.”

Del said, “Amos, want to go for a ride with me? I got to go into town and get something.”

Amos said, “Sure.”

The men left while Cornelia filled a tub with water, pouring in Epsom salts.

She said, “Stick your foot in that.”

Rae Lynn did as she was told, and a bit later, Cornelia rubbed turpentine on it and wrapped her ankle in strips of old sheets.

She said, “See now if you can’t walk a bit.”

Rae Lynn stood and took a step. “Better. Thank you.”

Del and Amos came back later on in the afternoon and when Del got out, he held a wood crate. In the back of the truck she thought she heard clucking. He brought the small crate to her as she sat on the porch, her foot propped on a stool.

He said, “I picked up some things for you.”

Puzzled, she pulled aside newspaper to find Ida Neill Cobb’s milk glass dinnerware. Shocked, she lifted her eyes to Del’s, and he winked.

Amos plopped into the chair beside her and said, “Funny how some find they can be reasonable with only a little persuasion, ain’t it right, Del?”

Del said, “Works every time. I got your laying hens too. I’m going back with the trailer to get the mule, while we’re cleaning house, so to speak.”

Rae Lynn hid her smile as she pressed a plate close to her chest, her chin touching the edge. It was like hugging an old friend. She rose from the chair and hobbled over to the truck to look at her hens.

She turned to the men and murmured, “Thank you, the both of you.”

*

In mid-spring that year, 1933, Del began working the longleaf on the back acreage behind the farmhouse. He’d told her how his granddaddy and his pap always wanted a turpentine farm. She had finally started talking to him some about Warren. Not much, but when certain things came up, she offered a little bit of information.

One evening in the kitchen as she was getting supper on the table, she said, “Me and Warren tried to run a small operation too.”

Del said, “Is that how you learned how about turpentining? ”

“Yes. We couldn’t never seem to get it going like Warren wanted, though. I could help you,” she offered.

Del tilted his head, surprised. “Well. All right.”

Rae Lynn would never admit she’d been paying attention to Del Reese. She’d observed how he was careful, methodical, and particular in how he went about his work. He was always watchful and had snatched Joey out of the way of the corn picker when Amos missed seeing him one row over, playing at hiding from Norma. Over time, like a pond that’s been frozen all winter, the spot gone numb in her after Warren died started to thaw. She began to want to spend more time with him, and Cornelia eyed her knowingly while Del washed his hands at the kitchen sink. Rae Lynn ignored the look and dumped buttery new potatoes into a bowl.