The Orchard Keeper(3)

Inside there was a genuine bar, purportedly of mahogany, that had been salvaged from a Knoxville saloon in 1919, done service in a laundry, an ice cream parlor, and briefly in a catacombic establishment several miles from Red Branch on the Knoxville road that failed early in its career due to an attempted compromise between graft and cunning. With the exception of two Doric columns of white marble set in either end the bar was of plain construction. There were no stools, and along the front ran a high wooden foot-rail chucked between wagon-wheel hubs. Four or five tables were scattered about the room attended by an assortment of wrecked chairs, milkcases, one treacherous folding campstool. When the inn closed at night the proprietor opened the back door and swept all litter out into the yawning gulf, listening to the crash of glass on glass far below. The refuse collected there cascaded down the mountain to a depth undetermined, creeping, growing, of indescribable variety and richness.

One evening late in March the drinkers blinked in a sweep of lights on the curve, watched a glistening black Ford coupe pull up across the road. It was brand new. A few minutes later Marion Sylder came through the door of the inn resplendent in gray gabardines, the trousers pressed to a knife edge, the shirt creased thrice across the back in military fashion, his waist encircled by a strip of leather the width of a whip-end. Clamped in his jaw was a slender cheroot. On the back of his neck a scarlike gap between sunburn and hairline showed as he crossed to the bar.

There he propped one pebbled goat-hide shoe upon the rail, took from his pocket a handful of silver dollars and stacked them neatly before him. Cabe was sitting on a high stool by the cash register. Sylder eyed the coins briefly, then looked up.

Come on, Cabe, he said. We drinkin or not?

Yessir, Cabe said, clambering down from his stool. Then he thought: Cabe. He studied the man again. Wraithlike the face of the lost boy grew in the features of the man standing at the bar. Say, he said, Sylder? You the Sylder … you Marion Sylder, ain’t you?

Who’d you think I was? Sylder asked.

Well now, said Cabe, don’t that jest beat … Where you been? Hey, Bud! Looky here. You remember this young feller. Well now. How about this.

Bud shuffled over and peered up at him, grinned and nodded.

Here, Sylder said, give these highbinders a drink.

Sure thing, Cabe said. Who’s that?

Sylder gestured at the dim smoky room. They all drinkin, ain’t they?

Well now. Sure thing. He looked about him, uncertain as to how to proceed, then suddenly called out into the tiny room: All right now! All you highbounders got one comin on Marion Sylder. Better get up here and get it.

• • •

When Rattner reached the road he stopped and lit a match by which to examine his shin. In that small bloom of light the gash in his leg looked like tar welling. Blood trickled in three rivulets past the black smear his trouser had made, deltaed, rejoined; a thin line shot precipitously into his sock. He let go the match and jammed his scorched thumb into his mouth.

Aside from the torn leg his elbow was skinned and stinging badly. A low strand of barbed wire had been his undoing. Now he pulled a handful of dried weeds, crumpled and struck a match to them. They crackled in quick flame and he hiked his trouser leg again. Wiping the blood away with his palm he studied the rate of flow. Satisfied, he patted the sticky cloth back against the wound and took from his front pocket a billfold. Holding it to the light he pulled out a thin sheaf of folded notes and counted them. Then he ripped the billfold open, scattering cards and pictures. These he examined carefully along with the insides of the ruined purse, then kicked them away and tucked the money into his pocket. The weeds had burned to a ball of wispy cinders, still glowing like thin hot wires. He kicked them away in a burst of dying sparks. Far up the road a pale glow hung in the night like the first touch of dawn. He had left Atlanta at ten … it could not be past midnight. He patted his leg once more, sucked at his thumb, and started off in the direction of the lights.

Jim’s Hot Spot, the sign said in limegreen neon. He circled catlike among the few cars, peering in at their black insides and keeping one eye weathered to the door where in a dome of yellow light an endless whirlpool of insects aspired. He came past the last empty car to the door and by this light checked his furrowed leg once again and then made his entrance.

• • •

The little coupe could be seen leaving or entering the Sylder place at strange hours, or in the heat of the day parked glistening and incongruous before the house, sleekly muscled and restless-looking as a tethered racehorse. Saturday evenings he collected parcels of townward-walking boys in new overall pants from the roadside as you might gather hounds the morning after a hunt—them leaping awkwardly in, riding solemnly or whispering hoarsely one to another until they gained speed. Sylder could feel their breath on his neck—those in the rear, wedged in like crated chickens—as they peered over his shoulder. A long silence as they watched the needle vanquish the numerals on the dial in a slow arc to hover briefly at 80 on the last and long straight stretch before reaching the city limits. Sometimes one of them would venture a question. He always lied to them. Company itself don’t know how fast she’ll go, he’d say. They plannin to take one over to the Sahary Desert to find out.