Early Times, called J-Bone. Best little old drink they is. Drink that and you wont feel a thing the next mornin.
Or any morning.
Whoo lord, give it here. Hello Early, come to your old daddy.
Here, pour some of it in this cup and let me cut it with Coca-Cola.
Cant do it, Bud.
Why not?
We done tried it. It eats the bottom out.
Watch it Suttree. Dont spill none on your shoes.
Hey Bobbyjohn.
When’s old Callahan gettin out? said Bobbyjohn.
I dont know. Sometime this month. When have you seen Bucket?
He’s moved to Burlington, the Bucket has. He dont come round no more.
Come set with us, Sut.
J-Bone steered him by the arm. Set down, Bud. Set down.
Suttree eased himself down on the arm of the sofa and sipped his beer. He patted J-Bone on the back. The voices seemed to fade. He waved away the whiskeybottle with a smile. In this tall room, the cracked plaster sootstreaked with the shapes of laths beneath, this barrenness, this fellowship of the doomed. Where life pulsed obscenely fecund. In the drift of voices and the laughter and the reek of stale beer the Sunday loneliness seeped away.
Aint that right Suttree?
What’s that?
About there bein caves all in under the city.
That’s right.
What all’s down there in em?
Blind slime. As above, so it is below. Suttree shrugged. Nothing that I know of, he said. They’re just some caves.
They say there’s one that runs plumb underneath the river.
That’s the one that comes out over in Chilhowee Park. They was supposed to of used it in the Civil War to hide stuff down there.
Wonder what all’s down in there now.
Shit if I know. Ast Suttree.
You reckon you can still get down in them Civil War caves, Sut?
I dont know. I always heard there was one ran under the river but I never heard of anybody that was ever in it.
There might be them Civil War relics down there.
Here comes one of them now, said J-Bone. What say, Nigger.
Suttree looked toward the door. A gray looking man in glasses was watching them. I caint say, he said. How you boys? What are ye drinkin?
Early Times, Jim says it is.
Get ye a drink, Nig.
He shuffled toward the bottle, nodding to all, small eyes moving rapidly behind the glasses. He seized the whiskey and drank, his slack gullet jerking. When he lowered it his eyes were closed and his face a twisted mask. Pooh! He blew a volatile mist toward the smiling watchers. Lord God what is that?
Early Times, Nig, cried J-Bone.
Early tombs is more like it.
Lord honey I know they make that old splo in the bathtub but this here is made in the toilet. He was looking at the bottle, shaking it. Bubbles the size of gooseshot veered greasily up through the smoky fuel it held.
It’ll make ye drunk, said J-Bone.
Nig shook his head and blew and took another drink and handed over the bottle with his face averted in agony. When he could speak he said: Boys, I’ve fought some bad whiskey but I’m a dirty nigger if that there aint almost too sorry to drink.
J-Bone waved the bottle toward the door where Junior stood grinning. Brother, dont you want a drink?
Junior shook his head.
Boys, scoot over and let the old Nigger set down.
Here Nig, set here. Scoot over some, Bearhunter.
Lord boys if I aint plumb give out. He took off his glasses and wiped his weepy eyes.
What you been up to, Nig?
I been tryin to raise some money about Bobby. He turned and looked up at Suttree. Dont I know you? he said.
We drank a few beers together.
I thought I remembered ye. Did you not know Bobby?
I saw him a time or two.
Nigger shook his head reflectively, I raised four boys and damned if they aint all in the penitentiary cept Ralph. Of course we all went to Jordonia. And they did have me up here in the workhouse one time but I slipped off. Old Blackburn was guard up there knowed me but he never would say nothin. Was you in Jordonia? Clarence says they aint nothin to it now. Boys, when I was in there it was rougher’n a old cob. Course they didnt send ye there for singin in a choir. I done three year for stealin. Tried to get sent to T S I where they learn ye a trade but you had to be tardy to get in down there and they said I wasnt tardy. I was eighteen when I come out of Jordonia and that was in nineteen and sixteen. I wisht I could understand them boys of mine. They have costed me. I spent eighteen thousand dollars gettin them boys out. Their grandaddy was never in the least trouble that you could think of and he lived to be eighty-seven year old. Now he’d take a drink. Which I do myself. But he was never in no trouble with the law.
Get ye a drink, Sut.
Nigger intercepted the bottle. You know Jim? He’s a fine boy. Dont think he aint. I wisht McAnally Flats was full of em just like him. I knowed his daddy. He was smaller than Junior yonder. Just a minute. Whew. Damn if that aint some whiskey. He wouldnt take nothin off nobody, Irish Long wouldnt. I remember he come over on what they used to call Woolen Mill Corners there one time. You know where it’s at Jim. Where Workers Cafe is at. Come over there one Sunday mornin huntin a man and they was a bunch of tush hogs all standin around out there under a shed used to be there, you boys wouldnt remember it, drinkin whiskey and was friends of this old boy’s, and Irish Long walked up to em and wanted to know where he’s at. Well, they wouldnt say, but they wasnt a one of them tush hogs ast what he wanted with him. He would mortally whip your ass if you messed with him, Irish Long would. And they wasnt nobody in McAnally no betterhearted. He give away everthing he owned. He’d of been rich if he wanted. Had them stores. Nobody didnt have no money, people couldnt buy their groceries. You boys dont remember the depression. He’d tell em just go on and get what they needed. Flour and taters. Milk for the babies. He never turned down nobody, Irish Long never. They is people livin in this town today in big houses that would of starved plumb to death cept for him but they aint big enough to own it.