A Swollen Red Sun (23 page)

Now she couldn’t get out of bed.

Dale and Jude told her they loved her. She was in their prayers. Jude asked what name Becky would give the baby and she said she would call him Bo. If it was a girl: Billy. After Bo’s dad.

She said, “Bo was a good man. Maybe his daddy was, too. Maybe he just got lost.”

Banks said that was true. Bo
was
a good man—and yeah, maybe his daddy was, too. Maybe he did get lost. Maybe they both did.

There was no funeral for Hastings. His mother collected his remains and returned to Saint Louis. What service there had been was private. His mother wanted nothing more than to quietly escape and put the memories of his death behind her.

Banks did not go to the service. Not that he’d been invited. He drove his family to the Brandt farm instead. They had a surprise for the old man and she rode on Grace’s lap.

Banks turned on Olen’s road and followed waves of drooping fence line. Rough and smooth barked trees. Leafless and bare limbed.

It was a cool day growing colder. Frost had come and killed what it could and wounded everything else.

He parked the Bronco and opened the door and took the puppy from Grace.

“No,” she said. “Dah-dee! Puh-pee!”

Jude’s and Banks’s eyes met. Each smiled. “This is for Olen, puddin’, remember?”

“Puh-pee!”

“Hang on, hon. Mama’s gotta get you out first.”

Jude helped Grace out of her car seat and she cried. Wanted the pup.

Olen walked out the front door and smiled.

“Well, how’re you good people doin’ today?” he said.

Jude met him with a hug, and Banks watched him smile over her shoulder.

He looked down at Grace. Told her to give Olen the pup. She said no.

“Yeah, sweets, we got that for Olen.” She shook her head and said, “Puh-pee.”

Jude reached down and took her hand and walked her to Olen. When he saw the pup, there was a small spark of life in his eyes that had dimmed long ago.

Grace refused to give the dog up, and Banks was forced to trick her with some pointing and a sucker and with subtle misdirection. Soon she was sidetracked, walking hand-in-hand with Jude toward the cattle, memories of the pup already fleeting.

Olen stroked the pup’s fur, and she shook her fuzzy head and sneezed.

“Good-lookin’ pup,” he said.

“That she is. She’s a bird dog, Olen.”

He looked up. Eyebrows arched. “Huntin’ dog?”

“Damn straight. What do you say we break her in right? Start takin’ her out. Get her used to the sound of gunfire.”

Olen put his head down and looked at the walk. Looked up at Banks.

Thank you
, he said without words being spoken.

They watched the pup amble toward the shed. Sniff and squat. She walked toward a chicken, then stopped suddenly. Pawed the dirt and pounced.

The chicken jumped, took to flight. The other chickens followed.

“Uh-oh,” Olen said.

Beauregard came from the shade at a run and jumped and came down beside her and pecked her head and ran. A small cloud of dust grew by the shed as the chickens jumped and ran, and the rooster chased the pup around a tree.

Then the pup stopped, and the rooster stopped. Strutted and scratched dirt.

The pup leaped at the rooster and slid into him and pawed.

Beauregard squawked and pecked and ran off to the shade and waited.

Banks and Olen laughed. “She’ll fit right in,” he said.

Banks nodded. “She sure will. I’m glad to see that.”

A sharp northern wind pushed a wall of cold through the low bottoms and the swag.

Banks pointed to a Dodge Ram. “Can’t believe you bought a new truck.”

Olen smiled and shrugged. “Well, that boy from the insurance company said my old Dodge was kaput. ’Sides, guess it was time for a change. What good’s havin’ all that money layin’ around if you ain’t gonna use it?”

“That’s right,” Banks nodded. “Cuz when you’re gone, somebody’s goin’ to.”

“Exactly,” Olen said. He looked up at Dale. “And that somebody’s gonna be you.”

“Huh?”

“When I’m gone, this’ll all be yours. I’d like you ’n’ your family to have it. I just wanted you to know. Had it drawn up like that for some time. Figured I might as well tell you.”

Banks was speechless. There were no words he could say to express his gratitude.

“I really ain’t got nobody else to leave it to anyway.”

“Well, sure you do. You got that nephew Jackson, don’tchya? And what about Wade? He’s out of jail, from what I hear.”

Olen laughed. “Neither of ’em’s worth two shits ’n’ you know it. Besides, that boy of mine, he’s lost, ’n’ I don’t wanna see ’im.”

“You never know, Olen. Maybe he’s changed.”

The old man smiled. “I’d like to think so. Guess time’ll tell.”

Banks wasn’t going to defend him. “Olen, I don’t know what to say.”

“Don’t say nothin’. Just make sure that when I’m gone they lay me beside Arlene.”

Banks promised he would.

They watched Jude and Grace talk to the cows. The puppy chased a cat by the barn.

Olen asked Banks about Goat Hill. “What the hell happened up there? I seen fire ’n’ black smoke. And what’d them sumbitches do to my truck?”

Banks asked Olen if he knew Butch Pogue.

Olen made a sour face. “I know of that sumbitch. Knowed of his daddy, too. Evil men, both of ’em. There’s somethin’ ain’t never been right about any of them Pogues. Reckon it seems like they all died hard, too. I know Butch done kilt his daddy back in ’73. You’s still shittin’ green back in ’73, I reckon.”

“Yes, sir.”

“The law couldn’t prove it, but he done it. Another time he kilt a man with an ax handle, I think it was. That may’ve been what he done to earn his time in Algoa.”

“Well, the one stole your truck was Jerry Dean Skaggs.” Banks did not mention the old man’s nephew. Even a shit bum like Jackson Brandt deserved a second chance.

Olen recognized the name. “That’n there’s the fella they’s talkin’ ’bout at the Silver Dollar. One shot that bald eagle.”

“Yep, that’s him, Olen, and he’s a real asshole. But it might make you feel better to know either Butch Pogue or his wife carved him up like a Sunday roast.”

Olen raised his eyebrows. “
Wife?
”

“Uh-huh. Found Jerry Dean at the bottom of the hill, behind the wheel of your truck. Or what was left of it. Had a big huntin’ knife stickin’ out of his belly. They liked ta gutted the man, Olen.”

“I cain’t believe it,” he said. “I ain’t leavin’ the house without my pistol.”

“I don’t blame you.”

Olen frowned at Banks and scratched at his chin. “What’s that about a wife? Cain’t say as I ever seen or heard of Butch havin’ one.”

“Really?”

“Now, there was a sister. An older one, I believe. Strange, just like the rest of ’em.”

Banks shrugged. He did not tell Olen about the girl who’d been shot or the boy who’d been drowned. The old man’s faith in humanity was already fractured. He did not tell him anything more.

Olen excused himself to the house, and Banks grabbed the pup. Walked to the barn and climbed up to the loft. Scurried over old hay bales until he found the bag. But when he opened the bag, it was empty. Banks let it drop to the floor, and his mouth fell open. The money was gone. He searched the loft apprehensively.

This could not be happening
.

He climbed back down the ladder and tucked his shirt in and reached down and grabbed the pup. Olen met him in the doorway.

“Find what you was lookin’ for?”

Banks swallowed anxiously and handed him the pup. “She wandered off. Curious little thing.”

“Might have to start lockin’ this door,” the old-timer said.

Olen looked at Banks, but Banks could not meet his eyes.

Jude returned with Grace in her arms and told Banks they were cold.

Banks said OK and shook Olen’s hand. They said their good-byes and left.

The road was fresh with mud, but the sky was blue and cloudless. Banks looked in the rearview mirror and saw Olen leaning up against his truck. He waved.

“Boy, he sure is proud of that truck,” Jude said.

Banks could not hide the grin on his face for all the Skoal in Texas.

“What’s so funny, Dale?”

“Say what?”

“Well, you got this goofy grin on your face right now. What’s so funny?”

The old man had found the money and used it to buy a new truck.

“Oh, nothin’, just thinkin’ about that old man back there.”

She turned and waved. “Look at him, Dale. He loves that thing.”

Banks grinned. “Uh-huh.”

“You know, I think he’ll be just fine, Dale. That old man is quite a character.”

Banks told her she was right.

Grace threw the remainder of her sucker onto the console and yelled for the puppy as the Bronco spun in the muck and Banks crossed the cattle guard and pulled onto the road and drove west into a swollen red sun.

All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Copyright © 2014 by Matthew McBride

Cover design by Neil Alexander Heacox

ISBN 978-1-4804-8573-0

Published in 2014 by MysteriousPress.com/Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.

345 Hudson Street

New York, NY 10014

www.mysteriouspress.com

www.openroadmedia.com

Otto Penzler, owner of the Mysterious Bookshop in Manhattan, founded the Mysterious Press in 1975. Penzler quickly became known for his outstanding selection of mystery, crime, and suspense books, both from his imprint and in his store. The imprint was devoted to printing the best books in these genres, using fine paper and top dust-jacket artists, as well as offering many limited, signed editions.

Now the Mysterious Press has gone digital, publishing ebooks through
MysteriousPress.com
.

MysteriousPress.com
offers readers essential noir and suspense fiction, hard-boiled crime novels, and the latest thrillers from both debut authors and mystery masters. Discover classics and new voices, all from one legendary source.