No Country for Old Men(66)

No. No. Nothin like that.





Do you think God knows what's happenin?





I expect he does.





You think he can stop it?





No. I dont.





They sat quietly at the table. After a while the old man said: She mentioned there was a lot of old pictures and family stuff. What to do about that. Well. There aint nothin to do about it I dont reckon. Is there?





No. I dont reckon there is.





I told her to send Uncle Mac's old cinco peso badge and his thumb-buster to the Rangers. I believe they got a museum. But I didnt know what to tell her. There's all that stuff here. In the chifforobe in yonder. That rolltop desk is full of papers. He tilted the cup and looked into the bottom of it.





He never rode with Coffee Jack. Uncle Mac. That's all bull. I dont know who started that. He was shot down on his own porch in Hudspeth County.





That's what I always heard.





They was seven or eight of em come to the house. Wantin this and wantin that. He went back in the house and come out with a shotgun but they was way ahead of him and they shot him down in his own doorway. She run out and tried to stop the bleedin. Tried to get him back in the house. Said he kept tryin to get hold of the shotgun again. They just set there on their horses. Finally left. I dont know why. Somethin scared em, I reckon. One of em said somethin in injun and they all turned and left out. They never come in the house or nothin. She got him inside but he was a big man and they was no way she could of got him up in the bed. She fixed a pallet on the floor. Wasnt nothin to be done. She always said she should of just left him there and rode for help but I dont know where it was she would of rode to. He wouldnt of let her go noway. Wouldnt hardly let her go in the kitchen. He knew what the score was if she didnt. He was shot through the right lung. And that was that. As they say.





When did he die?





Eighteen and seventy-nine.





No, I mean was it right away or in the night or when was it.





I believe it was that night. Or early of the mornin. She buried him herself. Diggin in that hard caliche. Then she just packed the wagon and hitched the horses and pulled out of there and she never did go back. That house burned down sometime back in the twenties. What hadnt fell down. I could take you to it today. The rock chimney used to be standin and it may be yet. There was a good bit of land proved up on. Eight or ten sections if I remember. She couldnt pay the taxes on it, little as they was. Couldnt sell it. Did you remember her?





No. I seen a photograph of me and her when I was about four. She's settin in a rocker on the porch of this house and I'm standin alongside of her. I wish I could say I remember her but I dont.





She never did remarry. Later years she was a schoolteacher. San Angelo. This country was hard on people. But they never seemed to hold it to account. In a way that seems peculiar. That they didnt. You think about what all has happened to just this one family. I dont know what I'm doin here still knockin around. All them young people. We dont know where half of em is even buried at. You got to ask what was the good in all that. So I go back to that. How come people dont feel like this country has got a lot to answer for? They dont. You can say that the country is just the country, it dont actively do nothin, but that dont mean much. I seen a man shoot his pickup truck with a shotgun one time. He must of thought it done somethin. This country will kill you in a heartbeat and still people love it. You understand what I'm sayin?





I think I do. Do you love it?





I guess you could say I do. But I'd be the first one to tell you I'm as ignorant as a box of rocks so you sure dont want to go by nothin I'd say.





Bell smiled. He got up and went to the sink. The old man turned the chair slightly to where he could see him. What are you doin? he said.





I thought I'd just wash these here dishes.





Hell, leave em, Ed Tom. Lupe'll be here in the mornin.





It wont take but a minute.





The water from the tap was gypwater. He filled the sink and added a scoop of soap powder. Then he added another.





I thought you used to have a television set in here.





I used to have a lot of things.





Why didnt you say somethin? I'll get you one.





I dont need one.





Keep you company some.





It didnt quit on me. I throwed it out.





You dont never watch the news?





No. Do you?





Not much.





He rinsed the dishes and left them to drain and stood looking out the window at the little weedgrown yard. A weathered smokehouse. An aluminum two horse trailer on blocks. You used to have chickens, he said.





Yep, the old man said.





Bell dried his hands and came back to the table and sat. He looked at his uncle. Did you ever do anything you was ashamed of to the point where you never would tell nobody?