Read Online Woe to Live On: A Novel by Daniel Woodrell - Free Book Online

chest.
    “Pin it on him,” he said. “We’ll set
him
up pretty. He lived longest.”
    When I put my knees to ground and leaned over the Federal, he lurched up and I reared back.
    “My wife,” he whispered. “Write my wife.”
    Arch laughed and held in front of me the letter he had ransacked.
    “This must be from her. I can’t read to tell.”
    I pinned Black John’s sermon to the Federal’s tunic. He was flat again but breathing.
    When I stood Arch said, “Read me this letter, Dutchy.”
    “That’s
his
letter,” I said.
    “Was,” said Arch. “I want to hear you read it.”
    “I don’t think I care to.”
    “Oh, is that so?” drawled Arch. His eyes sank behind his lids and his mouth hung open. “I think if you think a little more, Dutchy, that you’ll think you
do
want to read me it. Right now, too.”
    “Yes,” said Pitt Mackeson. “Why, there might be secrets in it. Read it at us.”
    I scented trouble with my comrades if I showed a dainty spirit here. The prospect was not delicious.
    The script on the letter had bold girlish leaps and bounds to it, with circles above the
I
’s. It was addressed to Corporal Miller Eustis.
    I began to read the letter aloud, and acted as if I enjoyed the process. The first many lines were without secrets, and mainly contained a young wife’s version of everyday events in Mount Vernon, Iowa. It seemed the Methodists wanted a school there to prosper, and the Cedar River had flooded, and old Ben Eustis had snapped a big toe kicking at a growling dog.
    A new mood was then hove into the letter, and the wife said she loved this pink thing on the dirt before me with a devotion that would not wane.
    The boys chuckled at this, as though the love of a Yankee woman had no merit. But I was envious in a way. There was a straight-ahead womanness to this author, and I found it admirable.
    Eustis, the Federal, had lost where he was and spoke to people who were not nearby. He said friendly things to them. It was good that his soul had started aloft, for there was a secret in this letter that made me ashamed.
    “ ‘Miller, Miller,’ ” I read, “ ‘I miss you so. I miss your cool brow and warm brown eyes. The way your cheeks crease when you smile. It makes me crazy, but I most miss your tender red-faced turtle head atop that sweet length of neck. I dream of petting him so special that he drools into my palm and I lick my fingers for a taste of you.’ ”
    The boys about shattered themselves with rude laughter upon hearing this.
    “My Lord,” said Arch, all manner of unpleasant glee reflected in his face. “Them Yank gals! Them
Yank
gals! Why, only a whore would say that.”
    The Federal now thrashed about some. He may have understood. It was pitiful.
    “No southern woman would say such a thing,” Pitt Mackeson said. “Ho, ho! I
cain’t wait
to be in charge of
Iowa!
”
    I couldn’t stand it. The Federal gurgled and the boys said, “Tender turtle head! Tender turtle head!” real loud.
    So I shot him where he lay and put a period to the letter. My act was sudden and it stalled the boys’ laughter.
    I walked off with my Colt cocked and my step steady.
    Not a word was said to me.
    Later on I lounged about, trying to dredge up the tart taste of a jenniton apple in my memory, and the perfumed-sweat smell of real ladies waltzing all night with someone else at a levee dance, and the gushing warmth I’d always felt when Asa Chiles had tousled my hair and called me lucky.
    But all that past was a sluggish slough, and I could not flow it up to me at all.
    My thoughts were just of now or tomorrow.
    Jack Bull Chiles was near me but did not speak for a great stretch of time. He had been a bystander to the day but never an active part of it.
    “Say, Jake,” he eventually said, “what are you knowing?”
    “I feel I am knowing too much.”
    “Ah. Well, forget it. Throw it down.”
    “Once you are knowing it, that is hard to do.”
    “Oh, hell, Jake. Too much knowledge is