Deep in the Heart of Me (7 page)

We get to the jail
,
and Sheriff drives around back where the yard is. Sometimes prisoners are held until the judge decides their fate or they are taken to Springfield.

This yard is a high fence with the boards tight against each other but plenty been in here and talked to their families through the cracks because the boards have shrunk over the years and there are gaps big enough to see one eye up close at a time, or to pass a smoke. Course we have dared one another on some occasions to take a look in here without getting caught. The old sheriff didn't like it. But Jim says they held John Dillinger in here overnight, and he came up here and looked right at him, and Dillinger said, "Hey young man you got a smoke?"

Well, I held his arm behind him until he took it back. God couldn't be that mean to let John Dillinger be held this close to our farm and me not get a look at him. But it was all lies. My dad said so too. Jim always has some big story about how we're missing out living on the farm.

So we follow the sheriff through the gate into the yard. He takes us in there, and it's a first for Joseph and me. I don't believe Tillo and Utz have been in here either, but they've surely been in the jail to haul their old man home.

So we walk through that scraped off yard, and the sheriff knocks on the thick back door to the jailhouse, and fat Ned lets him in. Fat Ned is the deputy that can't catch nobody if he even tries. So Sheriff tells Ned to lock us in one cell while he locks the Smiths in another.

Joseph is looking around, and it's pretty disgusting in here, but not so bad. Two cots that come out of the wall and a bucket, then across the way the same.

"You boys let me know when you're ready to shake," Sheriff says rattling his keys before putting them on the hook. He hangs his hat after and pours him a cup of coffee out of a speckled tin pot. He takes this to his desk.

"How long we gotta stay in for?" Utz asks.

"We'll see," Sheriff says, then proceeds to tell Ned what happened at the school.

I keep looking out across the room, but that means I've got no one to look at, but the Smiths and they are already hunkering down against the wall.

Joseph stands same as me. I can still hear the sound of this cell's door clanging shut. It's a terrible thing to be put in a cage, I can say that. But if Tillo can take it this quiet, then I can too.

"What you standing there for
tauschens
?" Tillo says to us.

"No talking," Sheriff says putting his feet up on his desk and leaning back in his noisy chair to sip that coffee.

So it's this way, him having his fun. Put the bad boys in a cell and scare the little gangsters straight? He doesn't scare me. I look at Joseph and nod I'll take one bunk. He should take the other. His hands come out of his pockets because I'd been doing the same, and he looks at the cot, then me like I've made a mistake. But I go to my cot, and I'm lying down, and he turns slowly and does the same. We're going to take naps, like good little boys. We don't lie abed at home unless it's Sunday afternoon, and then we never lie abed when we can be outside running through the woods. But Sheriff wants to give us a nightie-night, we'll take it then.

This blanket stinks, but so do the ones I take from the chest at home when I spend the night under the stars.

There is a board ceiling overhead. Some good solid carpentry in here. I fold my hands under my head and think of Sobe, right off. I must have looked pretty strong fighting two buffoons, well mostly before my brothers came along. She seemed to be drawn to me anyway. I was dragged around a little, but I stayed fierce I think. I wish I could see it, so I close my eyes and try to imagine it in a very good way, and I feel around on my head. I think I've had some hair ripped out, and I'll have a shiner because one eye is hard to open.

I have to smile because I'm thinking of Joseph with that broom. He reads those stories about knights and tells them to Ebbie and me when we're trying to go to sleep. His voice is like a lullaby with those tales he has memorized. He wishes he was born then. He turns every hoe and rake on our farm into a sword. Many's the time I've fenced with him, and I've given him worse than he ever gave me.

Sometimes I'm hard on him.

But he finally got to be Lancelot.

She gave him the broom. I've no regrets. She said she would fight too if she were a boy.

I'm glad she is not. A boy. I am the happiest over that.

Sophia Bell. It is beautiful. Like her. I like her. Everything about her. Her voice. Her guts. Her touch and the concern in her beautiful eyes. Sophia Bell. Next to Maman, she is the prettiest girl I've ever seen. In this whole county, she is the prettiest.

Maybe in the country.

How lucky that I would find the prettiest girl.

"You put them in jail!"

It is Sobe. Her father is not here, just Fat Ned. I can't believe I actually slept. I am on my feet so quickly I barely have my good eye open.

"How could you do this!" she yells at Fat Ned setting her books on a bench.

He is flushing red. He gets off the chair I'd last seen the sheriff on. But there is no sheriff in here now.

"Now Miss you need to talk to your father about that. You need to go on home now."

"I will not go home." She marches to the hooks with the big iron key rings and keys. "I am putting an end to this foolishness," she says reading the tags on the rings and finding the one that suits her.

Ned goes to her and tries to take the keys away, but she turns quickly and dances toward the door to my cell.

"Now Miss Sobe you need to give me those," Ned says fumbling toward her like she bites.

"No thank you," Sobe says looking briefly at me as she tries the first key.

"Miss Sobe," Ned says with more sand, "now you listen to me, girl."

"You're gonna have to pull your gun and shoot me, deputy," she says trying the second key.

"I'll shoot him," Ned says pulling his gun and waving it toward me which frankly makes me nervous, not what he says, but that he is dimwitted enough to point a weapon at me with his finger on the trigger.

Sobe stops what she's doing and looks at Ned.

"You let him out Miss Sobe, I'll shoot him."

"And I will testify that you shot an unarmed man, and they will hang you by the neck until dead," she says back.

I have forgotten to say anything, well, all four of us have watching this back and forth.

"Sobe," I do say.

"Your poor eye Tonio. Don't you worry, I'll have you and Joseph out in no time. Ned won't shoot you."

"Sobe," I say again, "put…put the keys back."

She ignores me and the lock clicks, and she swings the door open. I glance at Joseph, and his eyes are big as silver dollars.

"Well, come out Antonio…Joseph," she says letting her arm swing wide.

Joseph looks ready to faint.

"We can't," I say.

"Well, that's fine," she says. "I will just come in." And before I know what's what she pulls the keys from the lock and steps into our cell and slams the door again.

"Now Miss Sobe come out of there," Deputy says holstering his gun.

She holds up the keys and swings them a little. "Come and get me, Ned."

I laugh some. We all do, even my brother puts his hand over a grin. Sobe is about the most amazing girl I ever knew.

"Sobe," I say.

"Don't tell me to let myself out, Antonio. As long as you are in here, I am. He shouldn't play favorites, or spare me because I'm a girl. I hate that pretty much."

She is such a fierce little thing. Hand to the Bible we are the same. Only I hold back, oldest of the herd, but Sobe does not.

"Your father will be angry," I say.

She disagrees, walking to the bed I vacated and plopping down. "You need a wet rag for your eye."

"You love him or something?" Utz calls out.

"Watch your mouth," I say like Utz has cursed at us.

"Why you like him so much?" Tillo says.

She pops up and marches to the bars. "You boys started the trouble, and you never owned up. You let Tonio get all the blame. But I've made sure my father and Miss Charlotte know exactly what happened."

Then she turns to me. "He didn't even give you a chance to tell your side of it. He's bull-headed that way."

I suppose she means her father.

"I um…I'm no snitch," I say.

Her eyes grow…offended. She thinks I called her a snitch for setting the facts straight.

"Not you," I say. "I just don't say. I'm oldest. If something goes wrong, it's my fault." I say this just for her, but I know it travels.

Fat Ned is disgusted with the whole thing. He is back at the desk rooting through drawers.

"For Pete's sake," Sobe says observing Ned. She fishes the key out of her pocket and unlocks the cell door. "There."

Ned looks up and slowly shuts the drawer he'd been digging through.

Sobe goes back to my bed and sits. She folds her arms. "How can you take the blame for all of your brothers and sisters?"

"Miss Sobe come out of there," Ned says.

"I am staying here until my father comes. He'll see that door was open the whole time, and he'll see these boys wouldn't even come out they are that good and fair. If I'd of opened their cell," she gestures toward the Smiths, "they'd of run into Sunday already."

"What she mean?" Utz asks Tillo.

"Running Sunday or something. I don't know," Tillo says.

"Now we can all just wait," she says like it's settled.

"Give me those keys, Miss Sobe," Ned says.

"Ned, you'll get apoplexy if you don't settle down." She stands and throws the keys out the door like she's rolling a ball.

Now Ned will have to bend over for them.

"Ain't you worried your dad will get mad?" Joseph finally speaks up.

She smiles big. "I'm mad. Does anybody care?"

"I do," I say quick.

"What he say?" Tillo asks Utz.

"Clean out your ears!" Sobe yells.

Ned has gone back to the desk and hung the keys. He sits on the desk very worried it seems. "Soon as your father gets here Miss Sobe I am telling him what you've done."

"Ned," Sobe says with a laugh, "he sees his own daughter sitting in a cell he can put the clues together and solve the case."

There is no stopping Miss Sobe.

"What?" she says to me. I guess I'm gawking. I know I am.

"Nothing," I say. Then I smile.

"You look like you've been in a match Tonio," she sighs. "Does it hurt?"

"Nah," I say strong. Just saying that hurts my lips some.

"I got him good, the sissy, and I didn't need a broom," Tillo says.

"Two against one," Sobe says. "You think that's fair? Maybe in Dewberry but regular citizens call that low down!" Sobe says.

"Sobe," I say. I don't think girls are supposed to speak this way. The Smiths are rough people. She doesn't want them thinking she is not a sweet girl like Maman probably was. I know what I mean. When girls get in trouble, they need backup.

But Sobe doesn't have anyone but her father. Well, now she has me. But I can't always…she needs to be careful.

Does she have any fear?

"And Tonio won! He was beating the both of you!" she adds with her fist in the air.

"We got our licks in. He didn't get that eye from a bug bite," Utz says.

"Yes, he did. A Dewberry cockroach," she says back.

I am staring at her. Soon as she says it she looks at me and gives me a smile. "You won Tonio. You're the best."

I look over there, and Utz and Tillo are trying to keep up. She said all of this. I'm the best. She knows it.

I open and close my right hand. It's sore, but I feel how strong.

She's so beautiful, and she makes me feel so proud. But I know something about her, I feel it.

"Will you shake," I call to Tillo.

I need to end it. Sobe…it's for her.

"To get out," Tillo says.

"Yes," I say. "To get out."

"Are you sure, Tonio?" Sobe whispers. She is gripping the bars. I know she was just getting started.

But I nod. Sobe is good, but there is trouble deep inside her. I am protecting her.

We hear the car pull up to the sheriff's office. And the truck. That would be my dad is my guess, and Joseph's guess too, from the big eyes he turns on me.

"You should step out and close the door, Sobe," I say.

"Tonio…," she says as I move her toward the door.

She studies my face.

"Step out and close the door, Sobe." I am not asking, but I am not rude. I am firm. That is what works on people and animals most of the time. My hand on her arm is firm, and there is resistance, but she is allowing me to move her. I get her out enough I pull the door, and there is that clank. She is looking at me, she is not speaking but in her mind there are many words, that's what I think.

"Don't tell him," I say to Fat Ned. There is no need to tell what is fixed now. Sobe is out, and we are where the sheriff put us, and the deputy does not look like a fool.

The door opens then, and the sheriff is first with Dad behind. Sheriff holds the door, and my dad steps slowly inside. I stand at the door of my cell, my hands on the bars. I meet Father's eyes. He'll remember if I do that, and if not I'll hear about it.

"Here they are Mr. Clannan," Sheriff says.

"Well," Dad says. "Will you look at that? I have to come out of the field and leave a day's work to get my sons out of jail. How is it their mother sends them to school and their father must come for them at the jail? It's a puzzle."

I do not speak. He is taking in the picture of his sons the convicts.

"If your grandmother could only see," he says.

I stand tall. Sobe is watching. My setting her out made her quiet.

"I'm ready to shake hands with Tillo and Utz," I say to the sheriff.

"Oh he's ready to shake hands," Dad says. "A moment to be proud of. My son, the jailbird, is ready to shake hands with the other jailbirds. How fancy fine. Look at the lot of you."

Dad spreads his scorn over the four of us.

"You two, doing your mother proud are you?" he says this to Tillo and Utz. "Otto needs the hardship of two worthless sons making the new classroom look like an outhouse with all the white daubs, does he?"

"No he don't," Tillo says, then Utz.

"Well, you'll be scraping that classroom clean, and you'll help my sons whitewash the school house starting this Saturday. You'll be there at sun-up, and you'll work until it's done." Dad gets closer than ever to the cell housing the Smiths. "Don't disappoint me lads or your school days are over."

"Yes, Sir," Tillo says, and Utz echoes the same.

"Okay, Sheriff, let them out. I'm a busy man," Dad says.

Sheriff has yet to ask his daughter what she is doing here. Maybe he doesn't want to hear the answer.

Sobe says, "Hello, Mr. Clannan."

"Miss Sobe," Dad says as Sheriff takes the key from Ned's willing hand.

"I suppose you know none of this is Tonio's fault," she says.

"We'll see Lass," Dad says.

"Well, just in case Tonio doesn't want to snitch…," she shoots a look at me. I think she might be a little mad at me, but it's very confusing seeing as she also thinks I'm pretty great…or she did a minute ago, "So he'll probably leave a lot out."

"But his sisters won't Lass. That's the thing."

I step out of the cell then, and Joseph behind me. It feels so good to have freedom. The deputy has opened the Smith's cage, and they step out and the evidence of having wrestled a hell-cat is on them. Dad says a man's actions speak louder than words. He won't have to wonder if I got my licks in.

Tillo puts out his hand, and they are scratched up, but not as badly as my right. But I put my hand in his, and he squeezes, and I squeeze back, and it's all I can do not to yell out from the pain. But I don't, and we break apart.

Then I shake with Utz and Tillo with Joseph and Utz also squeezes too hard and I pull away catching a sneer and a dirty name just before I say it. I'm glad I beat them.

Then Joseph shakes with Utz, and it's even.

"Back of my truck boyos," Dad says to the Smiths. "You've plenty of work to do at the school. And you two of mine in the truck."

"Do I have the word of you boys you'll not repeat what happened today?" Sheriff asks.

We are still. I see Sobe's bright expression as she waits for me to speak.

"I can't say that Sheriff. I was taught to stand up for myself," I say.

Sobe breaks into quick happy clapping. "You see Dad? You don't know Tonio."

I am breathing through my sore mouth. I think my nose is broken anyway. But this Sobe, she just speaks out. And she's not even shy.

"You have it then Sheriff," Dad says, and he goes to the door and pulls it wide.

"No more Mr. Clannan, not from either of yours. I find there is more trouble they are out for good. Same goes for the Smiths if you see their dad."

"You'll be seeing him all right," Dad says hand holding the door wide while he makes a sweeping motion with the other. "Friday nights in particular, eh boys?"

The Smiths do not answer. They are the first to go out. Joseph then. I look at Sobe.

"Goodbye, Antonio. You need that cold rag," she says.

I nod, looking quickly from her father to her.

She takes some quick steps forward and before our Dad's and Fat Ned and myself she reaches up and whispers in my ear, "Do you have it still?"

Have it? I look quickly at her father again. He is not amused by this.

She must mean that hankie. I'm not pulling it out in front of them all, and it's disgusting now anyway what with my blood.

But I pull back and look at her and nod.

She smiles, and I am struck again by her beauty. She looks like a porcelain doll. But alive. Very alive.

"Your mother is waiting," Dad says from behind.

I lose my smile then. Maman. One look at me and she will have plenty to say.