A Garden of Earthly Delights (6 page)

Carleton was impatient to get out of here but had to be polite with Helen teasing and flirting like a dog desperate to have its head stroked, asking how's the family, how's Pearl, and when Carleton shrugged not taking the hint he didn't want to speak of such things saying with a pulled-down mouth how pretty Pearl's hair was if she'd fix it up more and Carleton muttered something inaudible not rude exactly, but Helen persisted, “You know, Carl'ton, I try real hard to be friendly with that wife of yours but she don't give me the time of day, why's that?” And Carleton said, “My wife ain't got the time of day, honey. What's going on in her head, it ain't got a thing to do with the time of day or what month or year on the calendar. Got it?” Carleton was speaking in almost his pleasant-Daddy voice, and the bitch caught on like he'd reached out and pinched that floppy white breast on the nipple.

There came Rafe to join him with a yodel—“Whoooeee!”

Rafe was in a damn good mood, Carleton saw.

Seeing too that his friend's living quarters weren't much cleaner than his own. Kids running wild, and flies—a sticky ribbon of fly-catcher hanging down from the light above the kitchen table like a Christmas tree decoration, must've been twenty fat black flies stuck in the thing and some of 'em buzzing and wriggling their wings. Enough to make you sick, you had to eat supper there. And Helen wasn't a mental case. Beneath the cabin that was propped up on concrete blocks was a shadowy space where bits of garbage and trash lay strewn, a scuttling of palmetto bugs you would not want to investigate.

The men walked through the camp to the highway. Just each other's company, it was like oxygen pumped in the lungs.

For a man requires a good friend like a soldier requires a buddy he can trust. Closer than a brother, even. 'Cause you can't trust your brother. Can't trust any woman for sure.

They were almost at the highway when there came a thin little cry—“Dad-
dy
!”

Carleton whipped around: it was Clara.

The little blond girl with fingers stuck in her mouth, smiling at her daddy who was shaking a forefinger at her. It hurt Carleton's heart to see how small she was, there in the rutted lane. “You, Clara! What the hell you doin followin me? Get the hell back home.”

“Daddy take me with you? Dad-dy?”

“Damn little brat, you are not going anywhere tonight with your
dad-dy.
”

Carleton hot-faced and riled up. Always embarrassed of some kid of his acting up in public. Clara wavered in the lane, then ran to hide behind the corner of a tar-paper shanty, peeking out. Rafe said with seeming sincerity, “That's Clara? Pretty little girl.”

Carleton said, “Pretty little ass is gonna get warmed, I warn you.” He was worrying, if he kept on walking out of the camp, along the shoulder of the highway, his daughter would follow him; there was a bold streak in Clara, small as she was. Daddy tried sweet talk: “Be a good girl, kitten. Said I'd bring you something, didn't I? You can have it tomorrow.” His fingers twitched with wanting to grab on to her and break the brat's neck.

Clara giggled, hid behind a straggly tree and peeked out at her
daddy through her fingers. Rafe was trying to be polite, which burned Carleton's ass: “What's she, four? Three?”

“Five.”

Carleton chucked some dried mud toward Clara, not to hit her but scare her like you'd scare a damn dog, and finally Clara lit out running back toward home. It was unspoken between the men that Clara was young to be wandering through the camp this time of early evening.

The men walked on. Carleton said, “The other day some nigger kids were teasing my girls.”

Rafe cursed. His words were hissing, scintillant.

Carleton said, “If anybody gets hurt, it ain't going to be my fault. But a man will protect his children.” He was conscious of making a statement, like to the man with the clipboard who'd asked him questions. Something that Rafe might repeat. Possibly the incident had been more play than teasing, and not mean-spirited, but Carleton hadn't liked the sound of it, his kids squealing and carrying on with nigger kids like there was no difference between them. “Now I know, them families have got to live down by the crick, not up here with us, but the fact is they're in the camp and acting like they got a right and that's the first step. Course they're no more dangerous than spics that're worse 'cause they speak their own language not like niggers who are leastways Americans.” Carleton spoke vehemently, and Rafe nodded. Anything Carleton said in such a mood, Rafe was going to agree.

“I know by Jesus what I'd do,” Rafe said. “Any one of 'em touched my kids.”

“There's some white women saying white men are getting to be cowards.” Carleton spoke tentatively.

Rafe cursed, and Carleton drew his switchblade out of his pocket, that had a six-inch spring blade and a discolored mother-of-pearl handle. A spic knife, you had to know. Carleton had found it in the men's latrine, back in Jacksonville. He punched it open and the men admired it. Rafe had seen it before but always whistled at that blade.

Carleton said quietly, “You can trust a blade better'n a twenty-two, know why?”

“A blade don't make no sound going in.”

“A blade don't leave no evidence behind.”

Rafe laughed. “A blade don't need no fuckin ammunition to reload.”

They had to walk at the edge of the highway for maybe two miles before they entered a crossroads town with no name Carleton knew. A shut-down sawmill, and a coal yard. Boys were hanging out on the bridge over the creek tossing stones into the water, talking loud and laughing. They weren't from the camp, you could tell by their accents. Ahead there was a blare of radio music. Carleton felt a rush of hunger, like a stab in the belly, Christ he was hungry, starving, for that kind of music, and lanky teenaged boys tossing stones into a creek, laughing in the summer twilight.

When Carleton had first seen this town, on the bus going through to the camp, the place had been empty with noon heat. Now, at the tavern, there were cars, pickups, loud-talking people. You had to push through the open doorway to get inside, and push your way to the bar. Carleton looked straight ahead as he walked; he wasn't the kind to look around in any new situation, for that showed weakness. Yet he had a sense that there was hardly anybody from the camp here, the patrons were locals. Farmworkers, hired men, day laborers maybe. Not looking too different from Carleton and Rafe, he was thinking. It was a dense, noisy atmosphere. The air was smoky and congenial. You wouldn't be judged here, maybe. If you minded your own business.

Carleton and Rafe ordered beers at the bar and the bartender took his time waiting on them, took their money without smiling though he hadn't eyed them suspiciously, either. Which was a good thing. Carleton was thinking of these dollar bills he'd saved out for tonight, carefully folded in his pants pocket: how many hours in the hot sun had been required to earn them. Which made his thirst more hurtful. Which made the first swallows of lukewarm bitter beer more delicious. Which made Carleton laugh at some damn-fool thing Rafe was saying. In a tavern Rafe was the kind of companion you wanted, the guy lighted up like a Christmas tree needing to have a good time. You could laugh with Rafe not hearing
half the words he was saying except you knew they were meant to be funny.

A large mud-spangled hound lay wheezing-sleeping beneath a table. Even in the smoke and din there were flies: big fat horseflies. And fuckin mosquitoes, biting Carleton's neck. Another picker from the camp, a white man like themselves they'd befriended since Valdosta, Georgia, came to join them, and later two others. These guys were all right: Carleton had nothing against them. But the bar area was getting seriously crowded. You had to stand sideways at the bar, and you were always being jostled, and it took a long time to get waited on unless the bartender knew you. Carleton had seen that the men the bartender knew and was friendly with, who had to be locals, were sitting at the bar, a long line of them, on stools, at the curve of the bar by the opened windows where the air was cooler, you could smell a breeze now and then from the creek. Carleton was thinking if he lived here, had his own place here, he'd be sitting with those men and not standing with these farm pickers, though they were all white men and that should mean something at least.
Cowards, fuckin cowards
a voice sneered. Not Pearl's voice exactly, and not Carleton's own. He signaled for another beer, and drained the glass he had. You come to a no-name place in some godforsaken whitetrash countryside for a purpose. Turn off your mind from everything. Like shutting off a car ignition. Younger men were pushing in, guys who knew one another, muscle-guys in their early twenties looks like. And now Carleton saw with a stab of irritation a half-dozen swarthy-skinned workers from the camp. These jabbering bastards, Carleton despised. Not spics exactly, but maybe they were. Some spics and mexes were dark like Indians. The breeds were all mixed, Carleton supposed. Only the Caucasian was not mixed, but that could be a disadvantage in certain climates where you stood out like a goiter on some poor bastard's neck.

“Sumbitches. Can't speak English they should go the fuck back where they came from.” Carleton made this pronouncement in a loud aggrieved voice. Half-hoping the bartender would hear him, and the guys at the far end of the bar, but the damn noise. Too many goddamn people. A few women, he'd noticed. Indian-looking
women, with that straight crow-black hair, coarse faces. They were with the swarthy-skinned men and didn't give a damn how people stared at them. The jabber they talked, it was all
ssss'
s and and
a'
s and they spoke so fast you couldn't hear 'em almost. Carleton believed this was Spanish.
Sí
he knew and
buena
he knew and
gracias
he guessed he knew and there was
por favor?
and
como?
he'd figured out. What riled him were certain
zzzz
sounds unnatural to his east Kentucky ear and those
a, o
endings to their words that had an air of deliberate mockery.
Adíónde va?
he heard in his presence and
me entiendes?
more than once provoking muffled laughter and he had known with certainty that it was of him the sons of bitches were speaking and his heart was filled with rage but he had been alone at the time. Only just the switchblade in his pocket he had not dared touch.

Out back of the tavern to take a leak in some bushes already stinking of piss and when he returned his place at the bar was taken. Goddamn: Carleton made like somebody was pushing him so he could push back against a stocky fat-assed spic of about his age.

Words were exchanged. Carleton was shoved, and Carleton shoved back. Rafe and his friends crowded in.

Fat-faced spic bastard backed off. The moment passed.

Loud voices. There was a dispute at a table: someone had brought a girl of about eleven into the tavern. “It's the law, you. Get her out of here.” Somehow, Carleton didn't know how this was, he and Rafe were involved. “See, it's the law. Translate for your friends.” They protested: “They're not our friends. We're Americans.”

Carleton's heart was beating pleasantly hard. Like he'd been running. Christ, he was feeling good: that good hard cider, and now the beers, a warm buzz at the back of his skull. Thinking he'd like to break some spic bastard's face for him. Or anybody, who insulted him. You don't insult a Walpole, a Walpole does not walk away from a fight. Hadn't hit a man since, where was it—Carolina. Damn near broke his fist. “Gimme a shot. Whiskey.” Rafe was drinking whiskey. Carleton unfolded dollar bills to count out. The noise was louder, you got used to it. Drum-sounding noise making you want to laugh. Standing up like this, Carleton couldn't feel those damn boil-like things in his ass: hemorrhoids. His face was good and
sweaty, that kept the mosquitoes off. A strong smell in his armpits and crotch.

“Hey, mister: gonna buy me a drink?”

Two young girls, white-skinned girls in shirts open to practically their boobs, were laughing with Rafe, eyes sliding onto Carleton but he knew to play it crafty. Girls from towns: you had to be damn careful.

“Bet he's married. Bet he's got kids.”

“Five kids, at least. Six, seven! All of 'em real young.”

The girls giggled together. They were young, maybe eighteen. Couldn't remember Pearl at that age. Couldn't remember himself at that age.

The men Carleton was drinking with were laughing so hard tears gathered in their eyes. Hard to say what was funny, but Carleton laughed, too. Another time he was shoved, and shoved back. The girls squealed sighting friends just coming into the tavern and without a word hurried to join them. And Carleton and Rafe had just bought them beers! “Fuckin bitches.” Carleton was seriously pissed seeing the girls making up to some hulking guys, especially the long-haired cat-faced one who'd been giving him the eye, now she's practically shoving her boobs against this six-foot boy in just overalls, no shirt or undershirt, gap-toothed and grinning like he'd won him a prize.

“Better wash your cock, it's gonna fall off you mess with her. Turn gang'rous, know what that is? Rotting-black. Falls off in your hand.”

Carleton yelled this warning to the boy in overalls but the noise in the barroom was such, nobody heard except Carleton's friends who near to broke up with laughing. Walpole was shit-faced drunk and still on his feet, had to hand it to him. He could see himself from a little distance and liked what he saw, long as he didn't have to see his actual face close up. Couldn't say where the fuck he was. Georgia, Florida. One of the Carolinas. His ass hurt from the bus seats. His ass hurt from having to take a crap, in the latrine so smelly you near to puked just approaching it. Or the stink of lye, so strong your eyes watered. On the bus, the kids squabbling and Pearl rocking holding the baby against her floppy cow-breasts and her
own mouth agape, glistening with saliva, Carleton chewed tobacco until his aching teeth were numbed and consoled himself thinking if the bus crashed, slid down a ravine into a river, maybe that would be for the best. He saw himself setting Clara aside, “ 'Scuse me, kitten.” Walk to the front of the bus and knock the driver aside with a single blow of his fist and turn the steering wheel sharply, and—