The Dirty Parts of the Bible (15 page)

Uncle Will came up from behind and put his hand on our shoulders. “What’s wrong? You two look like you’re standing over a grave.”

“We are,” Craw said. “Mine.”

Wilburn laughed. “Chin up! Moping never got nobody nowhere. Besides—ain’t nothing a beer can’t fix.” He walked back to his truck door, rummaged around inside, and returned with three brown bottles.

Craw’s face lit up and he snapped his derby back on his head. “Friends, Texans, countrymen—lend me a beer!” When Wilburn tossed him a bottle, he popped off the cap with his bare teeth.

Uncle Will started to hand me a bottle, then pulled back. “I suppose you won’t want one of these, being a good Baptist and all.”

Truth was, I’d never tasted beer. But at the challenge, I grabbed the bottle out of his hand, put the cap in my mouth, and chomped down. My two front teeth about cracked in half. Thankfully, Uncle Will had a bottle opener in his bib pocket, and he popped it for me.

I was thirsty as the devil, so I pressed the cold bottle to my lips and took a great swig. It smelled like moldy bread, but it went down fine. Then, somewhere between my throat and my stomach, it started foaming up. I felt it foaming higher and higher, till it exploded out of my nose in a shower of suds.

Uncle Will slapped my back. “Easy there, pardner!”

Craw held up his bottle to toast. “You know what our nation’s great founding father, Benjamin Franklin, said? ‘Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy.’”

“Amen to that,” Wilburn said. “But if God made beer, why don’t preachers drink it?”

“Good question.” Craw rubbed his chin. “They ought to—it’s a very spiritual beverage. One of the saints said that, in the middle of heaven, there’s a great lake of beer where Jesus and the redeemed drink for all eternity.”

Uncle Will leaned in closer. “Who said that?”

“Saint Brigid of Ireland.”

Wilburn laughed. “Irish—that explains it.”

My head felt tired and fuzzy, in a good way. For someone as skinny as me, I thought, it must take only a few drinks to get sloshed. I had to concentrate to make sure my words came out straight. “Why would God want us to be happy? According to my father, he wants us to be miserable.”

Craw took another swig. “Imagine if you were God—a stretch, I know. But would you want your creatures to grovel around your feet all day, or enjoy all the gifts you’ve given them? Jesus himself drank wine—it’s right there in the Bible. Hell, he couldn’t stand the taste of water. When they brought him a barrel of the stuff, he turned it into wine. He spent so much time in taverns that the Pharisees called him a drunk.”

“Damned if that don’t beat all,” Uncle Will said. “I never heard that in any church.”

“The problem with a lot of church people,” Craw said, “is that they’re trying to be holier than Jesus.”

Why did alcohol help Wilburn and Craw relax, but it drove my father crazy? Maybe it was because Father saw it as a temptation from the devil, instead of a gift from God. Anyhow, the beer was working wonders for Uncle Will and Craw—they’d never gotten along so well.

“Say, Cornelius,” Wilburn said, “what did you say your family name was?”

“The great Scottish clan of McGraw.”

“Funny—you don’t look Scottish.”

Craw slurped the last drop of foam from his bottle. “You’ve never seen me in my kilt.”

Wilburn laughed and put his arm around Craw’s shoulder. “Well, Brother McGraw, you ought to be a preacher. Cause the way you talk about Jesus, he sounds like somebody I’d like to have a drink with.”

CHAPTER 20

T
HE
next Saturday was market day in Glen Rose, and Wilburn gave Craw and me a new assignment that not even we could mess up—or so he hoped. We loaded up the Ford wagon with eggs and butter, Millie’s fresh-baked bread and pies, canned jams and fruit preserves, and several barrels of the season’s first apples. At the last minute, though, Uncle Will thought twice about sending us alone. Maybe he didn’t trust Craw with his money, or maybe he didn’t trust me to keep all the prices straight, or maybe he didn’t trust either of us to find our way to the courthouse square. Whatever his reasons, I was glad—because a few minutes later, Sarah came walking up the dusty path.

Craw greeted her with a flurry of bows, prostrations, and kisses of the hand, while I held back, stealing glances out of the corner of my eye. I wasn’t smitten by Sarah, but I was intrigued by her. This was the third time I’d seen her, and once again she was wearing that same tattered black dress. Had someone died, or was it just the only thing she owned?

Uncle Will had given me the key, but I was out of practice; Father never let me behind the wheel of his new Plymouth. To avoid making a fool of myself, I passed the key to Craw and the three of us crammed onto the hard seat, with Sarah in the middle. “Off we go,” Craw said, jamming the key into the ignition and pumping the pedals. When nothing happened, he started throwing switches and pulling levers.

“Are you sure you’ve driven before?” Sarah asked.

“Course I have!” Craw jiggled the steering wheel with his hook. “I’m not used to these newfangled models, that’s all.”

Sarah crossed her arms and looked out my window. “This thing’s at least ten years old. That may be new by your standards, but—”

Craw pounded his fist on the dashboard. “And I suppose you could do better, little lady?”

“As a matter of fact—I could.” With that, Sarah shoved against Craw and the door burst open; out he tumbled, sprawling in the dirt. She turned the key and pushed a pedal, and the engine then roared to life.

Craw walked around the truck and climbed in through the passenger door, cursing and muttering. “Girls these days, I swear . . .”

“Can’t handle the newfangled ones, eh?” Sarah beamed triumphantly and stomped on the gas.

+ + +

We peeled out of the drive and onto the dirt road, Wilburn’s old truck rocking and teetering. There was no roof on the cab, so the wind and dust whipped against our faces. Every time we rounded a curve, I took a deep breath and hoped that Millie’s pies wouldn’t go airborne.

A couple miles down the road, Sarah slammed on the brakes and sent all the produce and baked goods—and me and Craw—jolting forward. Being the tallest, Craw’s head slammed against the glass. “Shit! What the hell are you trying to do—kill me?”

“Quiet,” Sarah said. “You’ll startle him.”

Craw rubbed his forehead. “
Him
—?”

When the dust cleared, we saw a strange creature sitting in the middle of the road. It looked like a possum wearing a suit of armor. “What is it?” I asked.

“I’ll be damned,” Craw said. “A Hoover hog!”

Sarah hopped out, bent down, and picked up the beast. She brought it back to show me, cradling and stroking it like a baby. “You’ve never seen an armadillo before?”

“I’ve never even heard of such a thing.” I turned to Craw—“You eat these?”

“Nah,” Craw said. “I tried once, but it took all night to peel the shell off and there wasn’t enough meat inside to—”

“That’s disgusting!” Sarah spun around and carried her pet to the side of the road. “Don’t you listen to that mean old man,” she whispered, petting it on the head; then she set down the armadillo and sent it on his way. “There you go, little fella. Run along home.”

As we watched it waddle through the grass, Craw couldn’t resist. “Damn it all—there goes my lunch.”

Sarah just glared at him.

+ + +

It was an awful quiet ride into Glen Rose. Sarah’s cheeks were red with anger, and Craw was afraid to get her riled when she was behind the wheel—he just braced himself against the dash and let out a sigh of relief at every stop sign.

When we got to the courthouse, Craw unloaded the heaviest crates and then left to explore the town. Wilburn had given us our two-weeks’ wages that morning—a nickel for every day we’d worked—and Craw was anxious to spend his.

“It ain’t often I get to buy instead of beg,” he said. “I’m used to getting by on charm alone.”

Sarah looked up from arranging pies. “You must go hungry a lot.”

“There’s something about me the ladies can’t resist,” Craw continued. “Pure animal magnetism, that’s what I call it.”

Sarah huffed. “
Animal
is right.”

Craw straightened his derby, gave a bow, and turned to leave. “Don’t you two try any funny business while I’m gone,” he said. “I’m supposed to be chaperoning.”

There was no chance of that, but my cheeks turned red at the suggestion. The truth was, I was glad to be left alone with Sarah—though not for any reason Craw could have guessed. She was a mystery that I wanted to solve.

For the next half hour, I carried baskets and boxes and set them down wherever Sarah pointed. When she wasn’t watching, I studied her. Despite the way Craw acted around her, she wasn’t the sort of girl you’d call pretty. She was small-framed, with gangly arms and legs and freckles all over. Her most striking feature was her crow black hair, but it was chopped short and left to fend for itself.

Business was brisk all morning, so we didn’t have much time to talk. Which suited me fine—I’ve never been much of a talker. But I liked listening to Sarah, even when she was just naming off prices and chatting with customers about the weather. Most Southern girls’ accents are too sickly sweet for me to stomach, but Sarah’s voice had an edge of Texas toughness.

When the clock struck noon, Sarah suggested that we take a stroll around the square. On the courthouse lawn, old men sat at tables, reading newspapers and playing checkers. They spoke in a low rumble that broke into laughter at the end of every sentence, and then trailed off in a hacking cough. Old women sat on benches, sweating and fanning themselves. As we passed by, their conversation hushed to a whisper and they exchanged glances over the tops of their fans.

Outside the Bluebonnet Salon, one woman’s fan in particular caught my eye. On the front, it said “Jesus Saves—Calvary Baptist Tabernacle.” The back said “Garfield’s Tea—Cures Constipation.” I stood mesmerized as these two messages swished back and forth, till Sarah dragged me away by the sleeve.

Next, we came to the pawn shop. A sign in the window caught my eye:

WANTED:

Jewelry, Watches,

Guns, Gold Teeth.

Highest Prices Paid.

I peered inside and saw Craw haggling with the pawnbroker.

Sarah tugged my arm. “Quick—let’s go before he sees us.”

“Craw’s really not so bad,” I said. “He’s just full of hot air sometimes, that’s all.” She didn’t look convinced.

A few stores down, Sarah stopped in front of the apothecary. “Wait here.” A minute later, she emerged with a tall, frosty glass. “A fresh-squeezed limeade—with a real maraschino cherry.” She lifted out the cherry and dangled it in front of my face. “You’ll have to fight me for it.” Before I could say a word, she popped it between her teeth, snapped off the stem, and squeezed her lips shut. As she chewed, a trail of red juice dribbled out the corner of her mouth.

“You look like a vampire.” I wiped it away with my thumb. It was a terrible thing to say to a girl, but I didn’t know what you’re supposed to say when you touch a girl’s face for the first time. My thumb still tingled.

She shot me one of her deadly stares. “You’d better watch out—maybe I am.”

Cold and tangy on my tongue, that cherry limeade was the best thing I’d ever tasted. It went straight to my bloodstream and it chilled me all over. We passed the glass back and forth till there was nothing but ice left in the bottom, then we crunched the ice.

Back at the truck, we devoured some summer sausage and split a pie for lunch. In between bites, Sarah squinted at me and repeated my name. “Tobias . . .
Tobias
. . .”

“What?”

“Oh nothing,” she said. “It’s just that you have a funny name.”

I wasn’t sure whether to take that as an insult or a compliment. “Well, it’s not as funny as Craw’s real name—Cornelius.”

“But it fits him. He deserves it. But you—you don’t look like a Tobias. It sounds like an old man’s name. Doesn’t anyone ever call you Toby?”

I winced. “Not since I was a kid—and I hated it even then. At least Tobias sounds dignified.”

Sarah took another bite of apple pie and smiled. “I like Toby. I think it’s cute.”

“
Cute
—that’s exactly the problem. Puppies are cute. Kittens are cute. I don’t want to be cute.”

“Well, puppy or not—I’m going to call you Toby.”

First the Remus Kid, now Toby the Puppy. This was not a good year for nicknames. I chewed my pie, racking my brain for a way to get her back. “You do that,” I said, “and I’ll call you Magpie.”

Sarah frowned. “I hate my hair.”

“Sorry—I was only fooling.” I’d forgotten how touchy girls could be. “Really, I like black hair.” It was the truth, but it didn’t help.