Read Online The Devil All the Time by Donald Ray Pollock - Free Book Online

glancedat the clock on the wall. Charlotte needed another prescription filled, but the drugstore was open until six. “Yeah, I reckon I could,” Willard said. He sat down in the wooden chair across from the lawyer’s soft leather one while Henry got two glasses and a bottle of scotch from a cabinet. He poured the drinks, handed the renter one.
    Taking a sip from his drink, the lawyer leaned back in his chair and gazed at the money lying on top of the desk in front of Willard. Henry’s stomach was sour from worrying about his wife. He’d been thinking for several weeks about what the golfer had told him about his renter beating the fuck out of that man. “You still interested in buying the house?” Henry asked.
    “Ain’t no way I can come up with that kind of money now,” Willard said. “My wife’s sick.”
    “I hate to hear that,” the lawyer said. “About your wife, I mean. How bad is it?” He pushed the bottle toward Willard. “Go ahead, help yourself.”
    Willard poured two fingers from the bottle. “Cancer,” he said.
    “My mother died from it in her lungs,” Henry said, “but that was a long time ago. They’ve come a long way with treating it since then.”
    “About that receipt,” Willard said.
    “There’s damn near forty acres goes with that place,” Henry said.
    “Like I said, I can’t get the money right now.”
    The lawyer turned in his chair and looked at the wall away from Willard. The only sound was a fan swiveling back and forth in the corner, blowing hot air around the room. He took another drink. “A while back I caught my wife cheating on me,” he said. “I ain’t been worth a shit since.” Admitting to this hillbilly that he was a cuckold was harder than he thought.
    Willard studied the fat man’s profile, watched a trickle of sweat run down his forehead and drip off the end of his lumpy nose onto his white shirt. It didn’t surprise him, what the lawyer said. After all, what sort of woman would marry a man like that? A car went by in the alley. Willard picked up the bottle and poured his glass full. He reached in his shirt pocket for a cigarette. “Yeah, that would be hard to take,” he said. He didn’t give a damn about Dunlap’s maritalproblems, but he hadn’t had a good drink since he’d brought Charlotte home, and the lawyer’s whiskey was top shelf.
    The lawyer looked down into his glass. “I’d just go ahead and divorce her, but, goddamn it, the man she’s fucking is black as the ace of spades,” he said. He looked over at Willard then. “For my boy’s sake, I’d rather the town didn’t know about that.”
    “Hell, man, what about kicking his ass?” Willard suggested. “Take a shovel to the bastard’s head, he’ll get the message.” Jesus, Willard thought, rich people did fine and dandy as long as things were going their way, but the minute the shit hit the fan, they fell apart like paper dolls left out in the rain.
    Dunlap shook his head. “That won’t do any good. She’d just get her another one,” he said. “My wife’s a whore, been one all her life.” The lawyer pulled a cigarette from the case lying on the desk and lit it. “Oh, well, that’s enough of that shit.” He blew a cloud of smoke toward the ceiling. “Now about that house again. I’ve been thinking. What if I told you there was a way you could own that place free and clear?”
    “Ain’t nothing free,” Willard said.
    The lawyer smiled slightly. “There’s some truth to that, I guess. But still, would you be interested?” He set his glass on the desk.
    “I’m not sure what you’re getting at.”
    “Well, neither am I,” Dunlap said, “but how about you call me next week here at the office and maybe we can talk about it. I should have things worked out by then.”
    Willard stood up and drained his glass. “That depends,” he said. “I’ll have to see how my wife’s doing.”
    Dunlap pointed at the money Willard had laid on the desk. “Go ahead and take