Suttree(37)

I’m a huntin Suttree.

We’re closed, said the man. He rose and crossed the yard toward a tarpaper shack covered with hanging hubcaps, no two alike. Bumpers were stacked against the wall and water dripped from a tap into a gastank halved open with a torch. Beyond in the rank and steamy foliage wrecked cars crouched and everywhere in this lush waste were blooming flowers and shrubs.

Look around if you want, the man called. Dont bother me. Dont steal nothin. He disappeared into the shack and Harrogate pushed open the gate and entered. The gate was weighted with a chainload of gears and closed gently behind him. The air was rich with humus and he could smell the flowers. Wild datura with pale strange trumpets and harebells among the debris. Great gangly rosebushes covered with dying blooms that collapsed at a touch. Phlox lavender and pink along a leaning wall of cinderblock and loosestrife and columbine among the iron inner works of autos scattered in the grass. He crossed to the shed and peered through the open door. The man was lying stretched out on a car seat.

Hey, Harrogate said.

The man lifted his arm from his face. What in the name of God do you want anyway? he said.

Harrogate was peering about in the gloom of this small hut crammed with the salvage of highway disasters. Faint country music came from a car radio in the floor. Tires rose in black serried pillars and batteries lay everywhere suppurating a dry white foam.

I’m a huntin old Suttree, he said.

He aint here.

Where might I find him at do ye reckon?

Web City.

Where’s that at?

Up a spider’s ass.

The junkman put his arm back across his eyes. Harrogate watched him. It was incredibly hot in the shack and it reeked of tar. He studied the outlandish collection of autoparts. You a junkman? he said.

What did you need?

Nothin.

What are ye sellin?

I aint sellin nothin.

Well let’s buy or sell one.

I thought you was closed.

Now I’m open. I guess you’ve got a bunch of hubcaps you’ve stole.

No I aint.

Where are they?

I aint got none. I’m just out of the workhouse now for stealin watermelons.

I aint buyin no watermelons.

Harrogate shifted to the other foot. His clothes did not move. You live here? he said.

Mmm.

It’s neat. I bet a feller could fix hisself a place like this for next to little or nothin, couldnt he?

The man’s toes were pointed toward the ceiling and they spread and closed again in a gesture of noncommitment.

Boy I wisht I had me a place.

The man lay there.

Hey, Harrogate said.

The man groaned and rolled over and reached under the car seat and pulled out a quart jar of white whiskey and sat erect enough to funnel a drink down his gullet. Harrogate watched. The man deftly reapplied the twopiece lid and laying the half filled jar against his ribs he subsided into rest and silence once again.

Hey, said Harrogate.

He opened one eye. Boy, he said, what’s wrong with you?

Nothin. I’m all right.

You want a job?

Doin what?

Doin what, doin what, the man said to the ceiling.

What kind of a job?

The man sat and swung his feet to the clay floor, the jar cradled in his arm. He shook his sweaty head. After a minute he looked up at Harrogate. I aint got time to mess with people too sorry to work, he said.

I’ll work.

Okay. You see that frontended forty-eight Ford out there? That ragtop?

I dont know. They’s a bunch out there.

This one is like new. I need the upholstery out of it fore it ruins. Seats, carpets, doorpanels. And I need em cleaned.

What are you payin?

What’ll you take?

Harrogate looked at the ground. A black swarf packed with small parts in a greasy mosaic. I’ll take two dollars, he said.

I’ll give ye a dollar.

Dollar and a half.

You’re on. They’s wrenches in that box yonder and a screwdriver. The seats unbolts from underneath. Them door and winderhandle scutches are spring loaded you push in on em and knock the pins out with a nail. Armrests unscrews. When you get em all out I got some soap and they’s a watertap at the side of the house.

Okay.

The man set down the jar and rose and went to the door. He pointed out the car. It was accordioned to half its length. Bring them sunvisors too, he said.

What happened to it?

Run head on into a semi. Froze the speedometer on the peg. You’ll see it.

Harrogate looked at the car in some wonder. How many was in it?

Four or five. Bunch of boys. They found one in a field about two days later.

Did it kill em?

The junkman looked down at Harrogate. Did it what? he said.

Did it kill em.

Why no. I think one of em got a skint knee is all.

Boy I dont see how it kept from killin em.

The junkman shook his head wearily and went back in.

Harrogate got the toolbox and went out to the car. He pulled on one crumpled door and pried at it. He went around to the other one but it had no handle.