Maud's Line (8 page)

There was no denying he was right. So she and Billy walked in silence around the back of the stage, up the side of the dance patch, and into the light again. Billy didn't ask Maud to dance, but a couple of other boys did. She turned them down, watched Lovely dancing with Gilda through two songs, and then she and Billy walked down Lee Street into the dark. They made a stop at the back end of a car. Then they sat on the front steps of a lawyer's office, drank choc beer, and smoked cigarettes. Eventually, they fell to necking as, even to Maud, that seemed to be the only thing left to do.

She awoke the next morning thinking about Booker in jail. Her father had spent many a night with the sheriff and was, in her estimation, safer behind bars than out. So while still on her cot, she convinced herself that a night on a feather mattress probably hadn't produced any hardship on Booker beyond humiliation and that the danger to him would pass for lack of evidence. Booker's being guilty didn't even cross Maud's mind.

When she finally got up and let the chickens out, they scattered like shot from a barrel. She pumped water, went back in, lit the fire, and started making biscuits. Her father was still snoring. Lovely came in the kitchen door from his time outside. He slid between the wall and the table and said, “How'd you get home?”

“With Aunt Nan and Uncle Ryde.”

“Where'd you go?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, you disappeared. You were dancing and never came back.”

Maud turned from the cabinet, flour on her hands. “I did come back. I watched you and Gilda for quite a while. Make any progress?”

Lovely looked to the other room and then back to Maud. “I think I did.”

She turned back to the counter and took up her rolling pin, thinking Lovely would keep talking. But he didn't. So, finally, while cutting biscuits, Maud's curiosity overtook her, and she said, “What makes you think you made progress?”

“She danced with me all night. Even when Charles Howell headed to cut in, she waved him off.”

“I thought she dated Charles in school?”

“She did.”

“What else?”

“What do you mean, ‘What else?'”

Maud was cutting the dough quite deliberately. She twisted with added pressure. “This is like pulling teeth. What else makes you think you made progress?”

Blood came up into Lovely's ears. “Not what you think.”

“How do you know what I think?”

Lovely looked to the other room again. Then he said, “Are you gonna take forever with the biscuits?”

“You may not get any biscuits unless I get some details.”

“A decent man doesn't tell.”

Maud looked around at Lovely, widening her eyes for effect. She slipped the biscuit pan into the oven and then sat down at the table. She looked to the main room, confirmed that her daddy was still asleep, and said in a whisper, “You didn't . . . ?”

“I did not.” Lovely acted indignant.

“Don't pretend.”

“I'm not pretending. We didn't.”

“I didn't think you did. But don't pretend you didn't want to.”

“I'm not pretending anything.” Lovely spread his hands.

“Then what was ‘A decent man doesn't tell' all about?”

“I was just piquing your interest. I know how you like to run your imagination.”

“I do not!”

“Then why are you asking?”

“That's half the fun of a dance. Talking about it later.”

Lovely shook his head and swatted the air like he was going after a fly. He looked once again toward his father's bed and then leaned into the table. “The thing is, Gilda's a Christian. She won't do anything but kiss.”

Maud straightened her back and looked at Lovely with a wrinkle between her eyes. “There's nothing wrong with not being fast.” She bit her lower lip. While still on her cot, she'd begun feeling guilty about necking with Billy. Not about the necking itself, which they'd done before, but about necking when Booker had been carted off to jail, and about necking after meeting Booker at all. She told herself that had she not known Billy expected it, had she not been light-headed from the cigarettes and beer, if it hadn't been dark, and if she hadn't been feeling like she was ready to burst, she never would've done it. She was hoping that none of that showed on her face when Lovely added, “She gave me her Bible to read.”

“Her Bible? She brought it to the dance?”

Lovely put his head in his hands. “No. We walked over to her house to get it. All the Starrs are Christians.”

Maud smiled. “Not all of them. Some are outlaws. The rest have to look respectable just to live down their bank robbers and killers. Don't worry about it.” She got up, opened their little icebox, took out some fatback, and started slicing it. After she'd slapped several pieces into a skillet, Lovely added, “I think I'm gonna read it.”

“You should. It's got interesting stories.” Maud's mind swam to Jonah and the whale. She'd learned the tale in school, and it had captured her imagination the same way
Moby-Dick
had. Maud didn't feel any particular animosity against individual Christians as much as she was inclined to see the hypocrisy in their religion. Beyond that, she was too mixed blooded to have any truck with the Keetowahs, and there weren't any other faiths around. So she hadn't given religion much thought beyond recognizing that powers in the universe, like the river and the sun, were mightier than humans and had to be reckoned with. She did hope there was a force that would propel her into a better life, but she felt like that could only be a combination of pleasing looks, some education, and her wits.

About that time, a grunt came from the next room, and the conversation about the Bible died. But as soon as Mustard slid in at the table, he was eager to swap news. He'd arrived in town with some of his running buddies as the band was closing up and a fight was being organized on the dance square. He'd laid a bet on who'd win, and he reached into his pants pocket and drew out several large bills. “By damn, don't ever bet against an Indian if he's fighting a white man. If the Indian's sober, you'll lose ever'thing ya got. I'm gonna get my dog with these winnings. Lovely, after breakfast, we're gonna build us a dog house and pen. We'll use them boards and wire we salvaged from the roosters' coops.”

Maud did her chores while they hauled from the barn wire and boards that had, before the flood, been fighting cocks' pens. The posts were still standing, and as they strung the wire, she sat in her daddy's chair holding
Arrowsmith
and thinking about Booker in jail. When Mustard left to ask Blue who he knew with a ready litter, Maud was so busting to talk about Booker that she blurted out even before Lovely's butt reached the stoop, “The sheriff arrested the peddler for setting fire to the school.”

Lovely had heard that. “Does he have any evidence?”

“Only vicious gossip. And him selling kerosene.”

“He's a stranger,” Lovely added.

That was, of course, the root cause, at least in Maud's estimation. She knew there were strangers in No Man's Land where, for all of her life, they'd come from every corner of the continent to make money in wheat. She also knew there were strangers in the central part of the state where oil was gushing, and in the Osage oil fields in the Outlet. But around the bottoms and Ft. Gibson, strangers came only to dig potatoes. And it was too early in the season for them to start dribbling in.

Maud and Lovely chewed on the possibilities facing Booker, and as they did, the urge grew in Maud to walk into town, go into the sheriff's office, and testify that she . . . well, that was just it. She couldn't provide an alibi; she couldn't even be a character witness for someone she'd talked to only twice. But Maud knew, in the way women do, that the stranger in the bowler carrying the books on his wagon was the most interesting man she'd ever met. She had a pulling on her heart that was taking it out of her body into a space she didn't have a name for yet. Maud was so in tow to that tug that Lovely's attempts to bring the conversation around to Gilda felt like the irritating tap, tap, tapping of a woodpecker. But at the same time, she didn't have anything to say about Booker that she hadn't said ten minutes in the past, and she didn't want to share with Lovely feelings that she couldn't even describe to herself and that were also private beyond any she'd ever had. So not on Lovely's first attempt, but on one soon after, she gave in, pulled her mind back to the porch, and talked over with him everything they knew about the Starrs. They were trying to work out exactly how Gilda was related to one of the Starr outlaws, Henry, when they heard the sound of a car. They turned toward the section line to see who was coming and were disappointed when they saw it was only their father.

But Mustard was in a fine mood, and he brought more news. Blue knew of someone who had a litter of three-week-old Labs and he thought there were four not spoken for. Mustard had a name and a number he was planning to call the next morning from the feed store. The three of them fell into talking about the dog and how Mustard was going to train it, and into anticipating ducks, geese, and all sorts of good birds to eat. It wasn't until they'd finished that talking, had eaten supper, and were back on the porch that Mustard, between puffs of a cigarette, said, “Blue saw John and Claude Mount in town last night. They was selling whiskey and drinking at the fort.”

Maud said, “I didn't know Uncle Blue still drank.”

“He don't. He was over there sparking some woman. But when he seen the Mounts and their gang, he came in and sparked closer to town.” Mustard took a long, last draw, crushed his cigarette beneath his boot, and added, “John Mount had already been fighting. Blue said his right hand were bandaged.”

The next morning, after Maud had done her usual chores and both of the men had left the house, she filled a tub with water, shed her clothes, and bathed with the Woodbury soap behind a corner of wood erected for privacy out next to the pump. Midmorning wasn't her usual time for a bath, but Maud had determined she was going to put on her hat and walk into town and see what she could learn about Booker. Shortly afterward, she passed Nan's without stopping, passed the lane that led to where her grandpa and his brood were living, and didn't even yell to Lovely, whom she saw in the distance struggling with the mule and a tree stump. But as soon as the ruins of the school came into sight, she focused on them, and when she got up to them, she circled the mountain of rubble, found a little piece of wood that was burnt only on one end, picked it up, and carried it away in her hand. She was almost to the highway when she looked northwest toward Mr. Singer's potato barn and house. There, as clear as smoke signals on the plains, was a bright patch of blue. She clutched her little piece of wood tighter, brought her fist to her heart, and headed toward the blue like a hard rain falls to earth.

As outbuildings go, the potato barn was the most substantial structure in the bottoms. Its two long stories of brown brick had small windows close to the roof and two tall, wide doors on either side in the center. There was a potato stand several paces in front of the building, and Maud had, on occasion, bought potatoes at that stand. But she'd never been inside the barn. It was for the storing and sacking of huge amounts of potatoes all year round, and Maud found the odor of potato multitudes overwhelming. However, potato stink was the last thing on Maud's mind. Even the building shrank. The only thing she saw was the blue—that is, until Booker walked out of the barn with a sack thrown over his shoulder and followed a woman to her car. The woman opened the back door and Booker laid the sack in. Then he shut the door and stood next to the car, clearly in conversation. Seeing him talk like that both relieved Maud and infuriated her. How dare he be out and around and talking to some woman when she'd been worried sick about him.

She hadn't set out to buy potatoes, and although she had money for food back at home, she hadn't tucked any into the little pouch pinned inside her slip where she carried her valuables. She didn't have a cent on her. And besides, they had planted their own potatoes. Booker had surely noticed their garden when he'd driven down their lane. So Maud marched through a potato field, heading straight toward Booker without the strength to turn around, but also without any money or any excuse to be out there, without anything except a piece of partially burnt wood in her hand, a hat on her head, and a will to get to Booker as fast as she could without looking eager.

While she was walking, another car pulled up to the stand. Booker went over to it and talked to somebody sitting inside. Then he walked back to the potato barn and came out with a sack on his shoulder again. It was when he turned toward the car that he saw Maud. He raised his free hand. His smile made Maud forget the predicament she was in. She slowed her walk so that she'd arrive after the car left.

By the time they were face-to-face, Maud didn't make any pretenses. She said, as honestly as she had ever said anything in her life, “I've been worried sick about you.”

“I've been worried about myself. Mr. Singer sprang me. But the sheriff says if I leave these parts, he'll come after me with a warrant.”

“What've they got on you?”

Booker rubbed the back of his neck. “Not much that I know of. Some woman says I was acting suspicious, and she thinks I gave her a raw deal on some cloth she bought. Evidently, it had a flaw down in the bolt. If we'd unrolled it to the end I would've caught it, but she wanted to make curtains out of it, and I was trying to give her a deal and not be left with just a remnant, so . . .” He shrugged his shoulders. “Lesson learned, I guess.”

“I saw that woman. I don't know her. But she was talking to some men at the fire.” Maud wanted to tell Booker that she'd taken up for him, but she knew full well that most men didn't like being defended by a woman. So she held that back. She said instead, “Mr. Singer's given you a job?”