The Saints of Swallow Hill(28)

That night as she laid on the couch, clutching the pistol and the pillow Warren had used, and she’d thought to keep because it still smelled of him, she talked as if he was there instead of saying her prayers.

“I miss you. You took good care of me all these years. It was only ’cause of you I finally had me a real home, first one in my life. Now, I don’t know what all’s gonna happen. Oh, Warren. I only wish you’d listened to me, because it shouldn’t’ve been this way.”

Even while she talked, her mind was on Butch. What if she let him, just the once, like he’d said? No. To consider it was absurd. Not only would it sully the memory of what she’d had with her husband, she’d have to reconcile those actions for as long as she lived. No doubt she would regret it. As to Eugene, she knew nothing about him other than what Warren had told her, but one thing was certain, he’d not seen fit to come home all these years. He’d barely ever written, never addressed her in the times he did. When it came down to it, she believed his distancing had been because Warren married her, though he’d blamed it on Eugene not caring about the land. Probably to protect her. If she refused to go along with Butch’s blackmail, and stayed, what might Eugene do once he heard what Butch had to say? All she knew was, she wasn’t about to leave her future in the hands of these two men; neither was trustworthy.

She tossed and turned until finally, she heard the clock chime five times, and got up. Sitting there at the kitchen table in the predawn hour, she stared at the chair Warren always sat in, noticing how the wooden rung at the top had a deeper finish from where he’d put his hand many times. She’d never noticed this before, and tears came, as they did so often now. After a few minutes, she wiped her face on her apron. She stared at her kitchen, at all the little things she’d done to make it hers, realizing it really never had been, when it came right down to it. The tone of that letter said it was Eugene’s. At least Warren had a little bit of money set aside, but once gone, that was it. They had some gum stores she could sell, but not much, and there was the question of time.

Rae Lynn poured herself some tea and as she was sipping on it, seemingly from nowhere, she remembered something Butch said and her pulse quickened. She’d been focused only on what she and Warren had planned together, confining herself to those ideas and not thinking beyond. With the sun barely peeking into the kitchen window she began to formulate what she needed to do. The most important part was she had to hurry. She had to be gone before Butch came again, and her intention was to disappear. She grabbed the truck key and drove into town. Luckily, Dinky Dobbins, who ran the General Mercantile, was always open early. She went in and asked for the smallest sized men’s boots.

Dinky said, “Warren, he wears a size eleven not a seven.”

“Ain’t for him.”

He stared at her long and hard.

“You wanting this money or not?” she said.

He took it. On her way home she recollected how the orphanage pinched every single penny to make do, yet even by those standards, Warren Cobb had been tighter than a tick. Once, the soles of his shoes had got so thin he’d cut his foot when he’d crossed over the railroad tracks and stepped on some random piece of metal. He’d come home bleeding while waving two thin strips of rubber at her.

He’d said, “Got these off’n them tires from that no-good piece of junk truck sitting abandoned on the side of the road. This’ll work better than ‘Hoover leather,’ don’t ya think? They’ll be good as new.”

She was glad he’d been that way, at least now, as she thought about the money still left after this purchase. Sitting in the truck, she glanced down at her feet and felt a twinge of guilt remembering what he’d been buried in. She stared at the smooth, unmarred leather, wiggled her toes, guilt surging, retreating. Well, he wouldn’t know the difference, and what was done was done, wasn’t that the way of it?

Back home she confiscated his extra pair of overalls, cut the hem so they didn’t drag the ground. Next, she set aside a couple of his shirts. She was grateful he’d not been much bigger than her, a couple inches taller with more muscle. What she did next hurt, but only because of vanity. She moved with purpose onto the front porch, scissors in one hand as she pulled the pins out of her hair with the other. Grasping handfuls at a time, she began cutting section by section, then went back around again, and again, until it reached midway to her ears. She did the best she could and when she felt it was short enough, she stood in front of the mirror where Warren used to shave every morning. She had to stand on tiptoe to give herself a decent view of her face. It would have to do. With shorter hair, she could feel a draft against her neck and it was as if someone breathed on her. She thought of Warren sleeping beside her at night, his breath soft and steady against her skin.

She gathered the shorn hair where it lay around her feet, like some sort of boneless, skinless animal, and took it to the fresh mound near the line of old catfaced trees. She tossed it softly across the fresh dirt of his grave, as if scattering seed, leaving him this one last thing, a small token of her love. She stayed another minute, ruminating on the direction her life was about to take. She tried not to think too much on Warren, how she’d last seen him. It was not easy. Images came anyway, and in nightmarish color. She left the graveside and went back into the house. She’d already packed the truck with a few necessities. Her skillet, coffeepot, sheets she’d embroidered, the extra shirt of Warren’s, some food for the trip, and some of the dry goods. What was left of the cash was in the bib section of the overalls she would wear in the morning when she left. She spent one last, tense night on the couch, holding on to the pistol. Come dawn she was up, and out the door for the last time.