Bent Creek (16 page)

Jesse trotted after her. “What picture show?  And what I wuz doin’ is what yer supposed tah do.  It’s called French kissin’. Give me another chance. Come on, Lily, let me kiss you agin.”

“This time you keep yer mouth shut, you heer? Don’t be doin’ that French thing.” Jesse kissed her again.  His lips closed tightly as he pressed his mouth on hers for a few seconds. Without warning he pulled her tightly to his body and his erection pushing into her groin.  Lily shoved him away.  “Yer nasty! You jest stay away from me, Jesse Riley.  I don’t want you courtin’ me. Not till I’m good and ready.”  Making a fist she landed a blow on the front of his pants.  Jesse dropped to his knees and groaned.

Rachael and Ben looked out the window after hearing Lily shouting. “What’s goin’ on?” Rachael asked.

“I suppose it’s jest a lover’s quarrel.  One minute thar kissin’ the next minute she popped him.”

Rachael looked at her own reflection in the window glass. Her hair was a mess.  She tried to push it behind her ear. Looking down at her clothes, Rachael realized that her jeans were ragged and she smelled of perspiration.  There was grit under her fingernails and the tops of her feet were dirty. “I’m goin’ tah go take a bath,” she announced.

“Now? It’s the middle of the week?” Ben said as Rachael disappeared into the bathroom.

Chapter Twenty

Rachael put the last of the skins over the cases of whis
key and jumped into the driver’s seat of the truck.  “You git out of thar, Rachael. I’m drivin’,” Jesse said.

“Not this time.  I still need the practice. I gotta larn how tah drive real fast.” She shifted the car into gear and it began to roll with Jesse still hanging on to the door.  “I swear, Rachael, you are jest gittin’
too big fer yer britches.”

Clyde was waiting for them to arrive as usual. Pulling around back, Rachael went inside. “We only got eight cases this week. Do you want them?”

“Yeah, I reckon I’ll have tah settle fer them.” Clyde replied. “Where’s Nevers? This is the second week in a row you two have been makin’ the delivery. How sick is he?”

“He ain’t sick, Clyde, he’s dead,” Rachael blurted out. “He done died three weeks ago. He was up at the still and he dropped a
box of glass jars on his arm and cut himself real bad. Damn fool bled
tah death.” Jesse let out a loud gasp at Rachael’s confession to Clyde.

Clyde stared at her. “You go on.  He’s dead. Is that a fact? Yer lyin”.”

“No I ain’t, Clyde. It’s the truth. Me and my kin are gonna be runnin’ the still as soon as we get a plan.  So, you got a choice.  Keep yer mouth closed and we kin go on and do business as usual or we can jest put an end tah the business all together.”

“You wait jest one minute, Girl.  You come in here tellin’ me this story and I ain’t even had time tah ponder on it.”

“We need the money, Clyde, jest like you and this has got tah be kept a secret. If anyone else finds out about Nevers, his wife, Lily will lose everythin’ and I suppose the rest of us will go tah jail. So what do you say, Clyde?”

Clyde grinned. “You sure have got some mocksey for such a youngin’. But I ain’t settlin’ fer no second grade swill. My customers are reel particular.  They’d have my head if’n I tried tah pass off some bad stuff on them.”

“I ain’t got time tah be a youngin and don’t you worry none, we’ll be bringin’ you first class stuff, maybe even better than what you got from Nevers.  Do we have a deal?” They agreed on the same terms that Clyde had with Nevers.  Instead of bringing in the skins, the cases of moon would be covered with produce. No one would ever suspect a couple of young holler kids to be runnin’a still.

“Sometime I may bring in a load of chickens.  I gotta make sure that no one gets suspicious.” She tucked the roll of bills into her pocket and headed for the truck. She felt as though she was going to be sick to her stomach.  It was a hard day and there would be another one to come.  The jars at home were empty. Not a drop of moonshine in any of them.

Arriving at home, Rachael placed the money in the box and put it back under the floorboards.

“What smells good in here?” Rachael said entering the kitchen.

“Ben is teachin’ me how tah make cowboy stew.  I got everythin’ in here you kin imagine.” Lily stirred the pot and added another cup of fresh peas.

With buttered biscuits and a bowl of stew in front of them everyone was quiet for a few minutes.  “That wuz real good, Ben,” Rachael said. “It sure hit the spot.” Clearing her plate away from in front of her, Rachael pulled out a pad of paper and a pencil from her overall pocket.  “I got somethin’ I want tah talk tah all of you about. First off, I want tah find Joe Seminole and see if he’ll halp us. Then I want tah move Nevers’ still down here tah the house.”

Jesse let out a whoop. “Are you nuts!”

“I surely may be, but I think Joe Seminole could make us some fine whiskey and by havin’ the still here we could make a lot more. It sure is a plain sight better than that old rig we put together. I’m plannin’ on us all buildin’ a smokehouse out back. A real big smokehouse. We kin divide it in two with a wall. We kin smoke all kinds of meat tah sell and with all the smoke coming from it, I reckon no one would ever suspect that it’s a cover for a still.”

Ben slapped the table. “Damn, Rachael, I think that is a real smart idée. Real smart. We got plenty of lumber round here and lots of good rocks. I think we could do it. Now, findin’ Old Joe may be a whole different matter.  You act like you kin jest walk up tah him and say hey, Joe.  That ain’t gonna happen. Let me tell you about old Joe.” Ben leaned back and began his story.

The legend of Joe Seminole had been a topic of conver
sation at many a gathering of the clans in the hollow.  Tipping the glass jars to their mouths, one of the old men would usually start talking about Joe. Usually wondering if he was still alive. Every winter when the snow was on the ground and animals were easy to track, someone would return from the ridge saying that they had seen smoke rising over the trees.  So everyone figured he must still be up there.

The story everyone told was pretty much the same. Joe professed to be a direct descendant from a Seminole Indian chief. He claimed that his tribe was responsible for making the first moonshine in the state
; a fine, clear liquid that went down smooth and kicked your insides into a battle of fire.

When Joe got tired of trapping, he set up his still near the top of Pine Ridge.  Joe had a clear view of the valley and the trail leading up to his cabin, which meant he could draw a bead on a stranger without them even knowing they were about to be shot. His life was making and selling mountain whiskey and he was real good at it. Coming down from the mountain to drink and tell stories with the men in the hollow, he would laugh and slap his knees at his own tales. He said the recipe he used was handed down through the tribe and it finally came to him. When the fiddles were brought out, he could kick up his heels with the best of them and no one could out drink him.  Long after the others lay stupefied on the ground or bent over the horse rail giving up their guts, he finished off the remains in the circle of brown jugs.

Then one day a group of men rode into town and tied their horses up at the general store.  It didn’t take them long tah find out what they were about.  They wanted his business. Heading up the mountain was a mistake because Joe saw them coming.  When Joe called out to them, they just kept on approaching the cabin. Pulling out their rifles was their second mistake. By the time the air had cleared of smoke, six of the men were dead and one was running for his life down the trail.

That one man that was still alive went to the sheriff and told him what happened. He said they were just going up the mountain to do a little hunting. Everyone knew it wasn’t a true story, but Joe was put on trial and wa
s given twenty years in prison—five years for moonshining and fifteen for killing six men.

They took him away in handcuffs and nobody ever expected to see him again.  The revenuers burnt down his cabin and destroyed his still.

Then to everyone’s surprise, he rode back into town on an old mule. It was the Fourth of July, twenty years and six days since Old Seminole had been put behind bars.  He didn’t even nod to the men who greeted him, he just kept his eyes straight ahead and went right to the hardware store.  He left a few hours later with his mule pulling a flatbed piled high with supplies. Everyone figured that before Joe was arrested he must have stashed a wad of money somewhere.

That was the last time he came down to town. He built a cabin on the side of Black Mountain.  He fished and trapped animals for food and used skins to cover his feet in the winter. Every once in a while someone out hunting would leave him a few vittles in a bag tied up in an old oak tree about three hun
dred feet from his shack. That was as close as they would go.

Some people said that Old Joe was plumb crazy and would shoot you without even thinking twice.  And others said he just wanted to be alone and they respected his wishes.

Ben had heard the story many times. And the last comment in the story was always the same.  Old Joe Seminole had made the best white lightning in the county.  Rachael hoped the stories were true. She was betting her life on it.

In the morning Rachael packed four biscuits and a pail of stew in her saddlebag. She took a canteen of water, a few apples and a blanket. Before she left the house she took the gun her father had given her and stuck it into her belt.  She was scared to death, but bent on finding Joe Seminole.

“Now while I’m gone, I want you and Jesse tah visit ma and daddy. They need tah know we are all right.  Pick some of those peaches and take them with you and maybe give them this,” She pulled a ten-dollar bill out of her pocket and handed it to Ben.

“I still think Jesse should be goin’ with you,” Ben said.

“No! If’n Old Joe isn’t plumb loco, maybe he won’t shoot a girl all by herself. We all go up thar after him and he ain’t likely tah ever come down.”

Following the road to the end of Bent Creek, Rachael stopped for a moment and rested. She refilled her canteen from a cool spring and watered her horse. She veered off the road and headed into an unknown area. The remnants of a trail, over
grown with weeds and vines were barely visible. Halfway up the path, Rachael guided her horse into the thicket.  She bent her head as her horse picked his way through the shadowed forest.  These were the directions Ben had given her and she was hoping he was right.

After another ten minute walk the cabin came into view. She dismounted, took her saddlebag and began walking up toward the side of the house. Finding the big, oak tree, she stood behind it and called his name.  There was no answer. She called again, this time even louder.  The response was a rifle barrel sticking out of a window covered with burlap.  Rachael could feel her heart pounding in her chest.  Taking out a white piece of material she began waving it, hoping to get his atten
tion. It did. A shot rang out scattering the bark of the tree onto her head.

“Damn you, stop shootin’ at me. I jest want tah talk tah you. I ain’t here tah do you no harm,” she yelled out.

The burlap slowly parted and a face appeared in the window. “Ya got a weapon?” came a gravelly voice.

“No. I got some food, but I don’t have a weapon.”  She pulled the gun out of her belt and laid it on the ground behind the tree.

“How many of you?” he asked.

“
Jest me, kin I come closer?” she asked.  “I’ll jest put the food on the stoop and leave.”

“Why ya bringin’ me food?”

“Just take it, okay.  If’n you like it you kin open the door and maybe we kin talk,” she answered.

“Put it by the door and step back,” he growled.

Rachael slowly walked to the front of the cabin and placed the sack in front of the door She ran back behind the tree as fast as her legs would carry her, hoping he wouldn’t take aim at her. She munched on an apple waiting for some response. Two hours later Rachael decided he was not going to come out. She stood up and brushed the leaves off her pants.  Turning to go back down the way she had come, she heard the creak of the door. He waved to her to approach.