Read Online Cold Quiet Country by Clayton Lindemuth - Free Book Online
Authors: Clayton Lindemuth
Tags: Fiction
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Bittersmith and leave your worries behind.
I hope young Gale G’Wain enjoys all this scenery while he can.
Smith Bixby and Marvin Waldoff breezed into town and knocked over Jessup and Clare Mails. Left them stranded on the side of the road, thumbing their way into town like second-rate trash that didn’t work their whole lives for what little they had. And them boys, racing across the state in the Mails’ F-150, thinking what they did in Bittersmith would fade like the plume of dust at their rear wheels.
I had something for them. Four days of something.
You strip a man naked and leave him in a cell with no lights or blankets or food, and show up at midnight to remind him the whole blessed world thinks he’s a piece of shit with no future, and reinforce the notion with a little body work, he’ll make sure he steers clear of your town when he gets out. There’s ways of doing it that leave no marks. Take the fleshy part of a man’s hand between the thumb and finger, and squeeze the nerve ’til he’s standing in a puddle. Take a broom handle and make him suck it, and tell him he better get it good and wet. Give him a minute to pick off any splinters so they don’t give him problems for a month, every time he takes a shit. Then do what you’ve been promising, shove that goddamn thing so far you get shit on your knuckles. You’ll break him into a thousand sniveling pieces, and he’ll always remember the folks in your town ain’t afraid to do right, distasteful or not. He damn sure won’t hijack another car.
Gale G’Wain, you better damn hope you get away.
Not thirty feet from the tire tracks I debate what the boy was thinking when he took Gwen into all that snow. Where was he going? I’ve hunted these woods and though the trees give some protection from the wind, and a copse of ponderosa might seem snug compared to a field, the air is still twenty degrees. Unless Gale has some kind of lodge out there, they’re lost. And every second I waste wondering what a boy in a dead panic was thinking, the smaller the chance Gwen will survive.
I cross the edge of the field and question the wisdom of a seventy-two-year-old walking into a blizzard with a half-pound of jerky and day’s worth of tobacco. Gwen keeps me going. The air is cold, but once a fella gets walkin’ it could drop another twenty degrees and it won’t bother him. A good heavy coat—and all of a sudden I realize Gwen’s got no coat. I just turned away her mother and all I took was the sweater, and part of me is already thinking in the back of my head that it isn’t going to matter, and I quiet that voice and turn back. Follow my steps to the tire tracks and then the widow’s footprints to the house. Winded by tobacco smoke, I rap my corncob pipe on the porch post. The cherry falls and there isn’t even a sizzle as it plunges into the snow.
Fay Haudesert opens the door, and her face is lit like she expects me to tell her something she hasn’t heard.
“Let me take her coat,” I say.
“Of course. I’ll just pack a couple of things. Some food for her.” Her eyes are fixed on my pocket and she steps to me.
“Just the coat,” I say, and spot it draped over a chair.
“What’s that?” she says. All at once she’s up close, pulling her daughter’s shoelace from my pocket, and when she holds the shoe in her hands, it’s like a wave of tears has nothing left to hold it from breaking loose. Her chin puckers.
“I’m going to find Gwen.” I lift the girl’s coat from the chair, and take her shoe from her mother’s hands. Back out the door and close it before Fay Haudesert reveals any more of her horror.
I’m careful negotiating the steps. There’s three, but no rail, and it’s different going down than going up. On snow. The latest is an icy powder, not so much flakes as beads. I’m on the last step and the crunch of tires pulls my attention and I look to a sedan spinning up the driveway, fishtailing, plowing through a plot of
I hope young Gale G’Wain enjoys all this scenery while he can.
Smith Bixby and Marvin Waldoff breezed into town and knocked over Jessup and Clare Mails. Left them stranded on the side of the road, thumbing their way into town like second-rate trash that didn’t work their whole lives for what little they had. And them boys, racing across the state in the Mails’ F-150, thinking what they did in Bittersmith would fade like the plume of dust at their rear wheels.
I had something for them. Four days of something.
You strip a man naked and leave him in a cell with no lights or blankets or food, and show up at midnight to remind him the whole blessed world thinks he’s a piece of shit with no future, and reinforce the notion with a little body work, he’ll make sure he steers clear of your town when he gets out. There’s ways of doing it that leave no marks. Take the fleshy part of a man’s hand between the thumb and finger, and squeeze the nerve ’til he’s standing in a puddle. Take a broom handle and make him suck it, and tell him he better get it good and wet. Give him a minute to pick off any splinters so they don’t give him problems for a month, every time he takes a shit. Then do what you’ve been promising, shove that goddamn thing so far you get shit on your knuckles. You’ll break him into a thousand sniveling pieces, and he’ll always remember the folks in your town ain’t afraid to do right, distasteful or not. He damn sure won’t hijack another car.
Gale G’Wain, you better damn hope you get away.
Not thirty feet from the tire tracks I debate what the boy was thinking when he took Gwen into all that snow. Where was he going? I’ve hunted these woods and though the trees give some protection from the wind, and a copse of ponderosa might seem snug compared to a field, the air is still twenty degrees. Unless Gale has some kind of lodge out there, they’re lost. And every second I waste wondering what a boy in a dead panic was thinking, the smaller the chance Gwen will survive.
I cross the edge of the field and question the wisdom of a seventy-two-year-old walking into a blizzard with a half-pound of jerky and day’s worth of tobacco. Gwen keeps me going. The air is cold, but once a fella gets walkin’ it could drop another twenty degrees and it won’t bother him. A good heavy coat—and all of a sudden I realize Gwen’s got no coat. I just turned away her mother and all I took was the sweater, and part of me is already thinking in the back of my head that it isn’t going to matter, and I quiet that voice and turn back. Follow my steps to the tire tracks and then the widow’s footprints to the house. Winded by tobacco smoke, I rap my corncob pipe on the porch post. The cherry falls and there isn’t even a sizzle as it plunges into the snow.
Fay Haudesert opens the door, and her face is lit like she expects me to tell her something she hasn’t heard.
“Let me take her coat,” I say.
“Of course. I’ll just pack a couple of things. Some food for her.” Her eyes are fixed on my pocket and she steps to me.
“Just the coat,” I say, and spot it draped over a chair.
“What’s that?” she says. All at once she’s up close, pulling her daughter’s shoelace from my pocket, and when she holds the shoe in her hands, it’s like a wave of tears has nothing left to hold it from breaking loose. Her chin puckers.
“I’m going to find Gwen.” I lift the girl’s coat from the chair, and take her shoe from her mother’s hands. Back out the door and close it before Fay Haudesert reveals any more of her horror.
I’m careful negotiating the steps. There’s three, but no rail, and it’s different going down than going up. On snow. The latest is an icy powder, not so much flakes as beads. I’m on the last step and the crunch of tires pulls my attention and I look to a sedan spinning up the driveway, fishtailing, plowing through a plot of
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