Alexander Key
Black Bayou
Short Novelet

You’ve killed a man. You’re sick and afraid, and you take to the swamps like a hunted animal. Then you wake to the sound of a girl’s voice singing. And you set your course with a shotgun...

    I
    Some o’ this I got from young Ranny himself, though I’ll not say how. An’ some come from Dad Hunter an’ Bonnie Fox, an’ others I’ll not mention.
    A lot of it, sure, is plain fancy spun from fact. It couldn’t be no other way.
    Now, I’m not tryin’ to excuse anyone, but you know how it is when a man comes ashore after a hard trip on the snapper banks. For a couple weeks it’s been wind an’ squalls an’ heavin’ blue water, with sharks an’ fouled lines to worry him, an’ a hot Gulf sun fit to burn him down.
    Out there he gits to feelin’ that life is a heap too short, so when he unloads the catch he wants to collect his money an’ spend it. He’s bone tired, but he’s all strung up tighter’n a weather lanyard, an’ rarin’ to bust loose an’ do something.
    He wants a lot o’ likker an’ music, an’ for a little while he ain’t got no more sense than a fool puppy dog.
    That’s the way it is with young Ranny Beale when the Flying Fish comes in.
    Ranny, he can’t hardly wait to dress up in his good clothes an’ head for Dad Hunter’s place. He don’t aim to git in no trouble. It’s just that he’s needin’ a drink bad to make the ground stop rollin’ under him, an’ he’s crazy to kick up his heels an’ have some fun.
    An’ in his pocket he’s got a present for that little redhead who waits on tables.
    He’s done forgot all about Sleede Purdy. He goes up to the bar an’ slaps down a buck for a bottle o’ likker, an’ he don’t even notice Sleede. It’s a warm spring night an’ the place is crowded, an’ everybody is havir’ a good time. The radio is playin’ something hot from Cuba, an’ over in one corner there’s a bunch o’ Greeks off a sponger, high as hoot owls.
    Ranny he stows a long drink an’ stands by to watch ’em, for there ain’t nothin’ funnier than a bunch o’ Greeks with too much down the hatch. The hairiest one has climbed the table an’ is gettin’ ready for a dive. He thinks he’s still out on the Gulf after sponges.
    Ranny is lookin’ for his cute little redhead when the Greek waves his arms an’ sails head-first off the table. He lands with a big crash that shakes the whole place. Everybody howls, an’ Ranny digs his elbow into the feller next to him an’ busts out laughin’.
    “Jest look at ’im!” says Ranny. “Now he thinks he’s fightin’ sharks!”
    The feller next to Ranny don’t say nothin’. He just turns around slow an’ grabs Ranny by the shoulder, an’ for the first time Ranny sees it’s Sleede Purdy.
    * * *
    Sleede he’s a sight bigger’n Ranny, lean an’ dark complected an’ quite a hand with the wemmin. At the moment he’s had mebbe a couple drinks, which is a heap too much for a Purdy.
    Ranny never had no use for the breed. Them Purdys got Indian blood, an’ it don’t take much likker to make ’em ornery.
    “You hit me,” Sleede says real soft. “What’d you hit me for?”
    “Why,” says Ranny, “I never hit you. I was jest tickled at that Greek.”
    “You did too hit me,” says Sleede.
    “You tryin’ to start somethin’?”
    “You started plenty when you stole my berth on the Flying Fish.”
    “I never stole nobody’s berth. You was too drunk to go, an’ Cap’n Joe needed a man. Take yo’ hand off’n me!”
    Sleede digs his fingers in tighter. A lot like his brother Jug, is Sleede. Jug kilt a man recent an’ skipped town. Sleede says: “You hit me a minnit ago. Now you’re callin’ me a liar an’ givin’ me orders. What’s more—”
    “Shut up!” Ranny busts out. “You’re jest tryin’ to make a shark out a mullet. I ain’t aimin’ to git in no scrape tonight, but if you keep a-pressin’ me—”
    “I’m a-pressin’ you,” says Sleede. “An’ I’m a-tellin’ you I don’t like the sight o’ yo’ sheep’s face an’ yo ugly yeller hair. An I’m a-tellin’ you to git out o’ here an’ keep a-goin’, an’ never come back.”
    “Oh yeah?” says Ranny, an’ he knocks Sleede’s arm away. He’s all on edge an’ there’s a devil risin’ in him; he knows something’s comin’ now an’ he wants to git away from it. But he’s like a man caught in a strong tide current an’ bein’ carried where he don’t want to go.
    They stand there lookin’ hard at each other without sayin’ a word, an’ you can feel something gittin’ tighter an’ tighter between ’em. The funny thing is that there’s hardly a soul in the place even noticed ’em yet. Everybody’s still laughin’ an’ watchin’ them Greeks.
    All but the little redhead who waits on tables. She’s right there big-eyed an’ takin’ it all in. She looks at Ranny an’ suddenly Ranny sees her, but she just wrinkles her nose at Ranny an’ smiles at Sleede. An’ she says, “Fer Pete’s sake, Sleede, why don’t you hurry an’ hit ’im?”
    “I’ll do more’n hit ’im,” says Sleede. “I’m gonna scale ’im, an’ trim ’im down.” An’ Sleede’s hand goes quick to his pocket an’ comes up with a knife in it.
    Ranny stares at that redhead an’ he just can’t believe his ears. For a couple weeks he’s been thinkin’ about her an’ dreamin’ about her, like a man always does at sea, an’ all evenin’ he’s been just itchin’ to give her the present he’s got in his pocket. Now it’s just like she’d stabbed him in the heart an’ twisted the blade around.
    All at once there’s a red-hot thing a-stingin’ his arm. It’s Sleede’s knife. An’ Ranny lets out a hoarse cry an’ leaps back, an’ something snaps loose in him like tight riggin’ in a blow.
    * * *
    For about a half minute he goes plumb crazy. He jerks out his own knife an’ tears into Sleede like a wildcat, an’ Sleede don’t hardly have time for another lick. Ranny gives it to him hard an’ fast an’ deep, an’ Sleede hollers an’ drops his knife an’ goes down.
    It happens just like that, quick, an’ then it’s over. An’ there’s Sleede Purdy sprawled on the floor, one foot jerkin’ like he’s tryin’ to git up. Only he ain’t never goin’ to git up.
    Somebody screams, an’ for a second afterward the place is dead quiet save for that fool radio up on the bar. It’s still playin’ the same Cuban piece. It was sweet music when Ranny first come in, but now it’s just a noise an’ he can’t stand it. He smashes it with his fist an’ starts for the door, an’ then all hell breaks loose in Dad Hunter’s place.
    The redhead gits in Ranny’s way; he sees only a nasty little scut with a beer bottle, an’ he slaps her down. He runs out into the night, an’ he keeps a-runnin’ till he begins to realize what he’s got himself into.
    The whole thing makes him sick to the marrow. His knees don’t work right, an’ he’s tremblin’ all over. He happens to look down an’ sees he’s still holdin’ his knife. It’s something a feller always carries when he goes to sea, an’ ashore he don’t feel right without it. He never cut a man with it before.
    Now he’s done gone an’ done it, an’ the thing he’s done is a low, ornery thing – an’ the law calls it murder.
    He throw’s than ugly knife away an’ runs fast to his room. He ain’t got no idea what to do now; an’ with his paw dead an’ gone these six months, he can’t think o’ nobody to go to for advice.
    An’ he keeps a-sayin’ out loud, “Oh Lordy, I never aimed to do it! ’Tain’t right I should die for it. But if they ketch me—”
    It’s not till he reaches his room an’ strikes a light that he sees how bad he’s hurt. He tears off his shirt an’ wraps some handkerchiefs around his arm, an’ he’s tryin’ to button on another shirt when he hears voices, an’ people comin’ in a hurry along the street.
    It frightens him, for all at once he realizes that he’s no longer as he was; that he’s stepped out o’ the light into the darkness, an’ that now he’s shut off forever from his kind. All because a devil got loose in him that he couldn’t hold back.
    He gives a low cry like his heart is broke, an’ suddenly turns an’ spreads a tarpaulin on the floor an’ begins dumpin’ things into it. Then he grabs up the corners an’ slips out to the alley.
    It seems like all the world must be watchin’ an’ followin’, but when he reaches the water front there’s not a soul seen him.
    He ain’t got no plans, but he remembers there’s a feller up the river a way who is known as Chicken, an’ that people often go an’ see this Chicken when they git in trouble, An’ beyond Chicken there are the swamps.
    So Ranny crawls down under the pilings an’ steals a bateau an’ motor he knows about; an after paddlin’ quiet ’way out to the middle o’ the harbor, starts the motor a a’ heads upstream. He ain’t got no use for a sneakin’ boat thief, but he aims to send the owner of it some money when he’s able.
    The river is like a sheet o’ pale silver under the stars; he looks back once and sees the lights o’ the town dancing like jewels in the water. He near breaks down an’ cries, for it’s there that he was born an’ raised, an’ now he knows he can’t ever go back to it.

    II
    Chicken’s place is up on a creek where the salt marsh meets the swamp. The gas runs out as Ranny nears the creek, an’ he has to paddle. His left arm is nigh useless; an’ though it’s slick tide, it’s all he can do to keep the bateau movin’.
    He’s mighty near all in when he reaches a little pier an’ sees, dim against the swamp, the outline of a shack built high on pilings.
    He tries to crawl out on the pier but he’s too weak to make it. A hound dog starts barkin’, an’ up above him a screen door creaks an’ a light dashes down.
    “Yeah?” says Chicken’s voice. “What is it?”
    “You alone?” Ranny asks.
    “Mebbe,” says Chicken.
    “I gotta see you,” Ranny tells him. “I’m hurt a little.”
    Chicken grunts something an’ comes down on the pier an’ helps Ranny up to the house. He’s a round, stumpy feller with a bald head an’ a flat face, an’ little slate eyes sorta like a shark’s. The Lord only knows why they call him Chicken. He deals in likker an’ ’gator hides, an’ he takes care o’ boats durin’ the hurricane season.
    He don’t ask Ranny no questions. He takes one look at the bad arm an’ puts on water to boil, an when it’s hot he cleans the wound an’ sews it up with an ordinary needle an’ thread, good as a doctor would.
    Ranny is takin’ a drink when he happens to look up an’ he sees there’s somebody watchin’ him from the door o’ the back room. It gives Ranny a terrible jolt, ’cause it’s almost like seein’ a ghost.
    But it ain’t no ghost. It’s Jug Purdy. Jug looks a heap like his brother Sleede. About the only difference is that Jug’s older, an’ mebbe a little more ornery.
    It never even occurred to Ranny that Jug might be hidin’ up here near Chicken.
    Jug comes in the room. “Who cut you, Ranny?” he says.
    “I ain’t askin’ you no questions,” says Ranny.
    Jug chews on a match; he spits it out an’ starts chewin’ on another. He spits the second one out an’ says: “Sleede come up to see me last week. He says you stole his berth on the Flyin’ Fish.”
    “Yeah?” says Ranny.
    “Yeah,” says Jug. He chews on a third match an’ spits it out. “He also tole me you been playin’ around with that little redhead o’ his’n.”
    “Yeah?”
    “Yeah.” Jug starts worryin’ the fourth match. He spits it out an’ says: “You done hurt somebody or you wouldn’t be up here. You been fightin’ Sleede?”
    “Never mind who I been fightin’. I ain’t askin’ you no questions.”
    “Damn you, I know you been fightin’ Sleede! If’n you’ve kilt him—”
    Chicken looks hard at Jug. “Don’t start nothin’ up here.”
    * * *
    Jug’s long fingers keep openin’ an’ closin’. “No, not here. But when I find out—” Suddenly he turns an’ slides out the room. Ranny hears him run down the steps to the pier, an’ a minute later a big motor comes to life an’ whines away in the night.
    “Was it Sleede?” says Chicken.
    “Yeah.”
    “News travels pretty fast along the water,” Chicken says slowly. “How you feelin’?”
    “Tolerable.”
    “Then you better start movin’.”
    Ranny is thinkin’ the same. “But first I gotta have gas an’ grub.”
    “Okay. Gas is a dollar a gallon. Oil is a dollar, an’ beans is fo’ bits a can. The sewin’ I done on you is ten bucks.” Chicken don’t even blink when he says it.
    “Okay,” says Ranny. He’s got to pay it or paddle, an’ he sure can’t paddle. He gits a can o’ gas mixed with oil for the outboard, an’ a couple cans o’ beans. It takes near all the money he’s got. As he hands it to Chicken something hard falls to the floor. It’s the present he was goin’ to give that redhead. He picks it up quick an’ puts it back in his pocket.
    “That looked like a pearl,” says Chicken. “If it’s a pearl—”
    “It’s jest a slug,” says Ranny. It’s really a pearl, an’ he got it out a big broad-lipped conch he caught. Mebbe it’s worth a heap an’ mebbe it ain’t, but it’s better for Chicken not to know it.
    Chicken helps him into the bateau. “You got any place to go?” he asks.
    Ranny shakes his head.
    “Then you’re in a hell of a spot,” says Chicken. “You got to go some place, fast. Ever hear about them people up in the Dean Lakes country?”
    “Yeah, I know about ’em.”
    “Ever hear of a feller called Snake-bird?”
    “Yeah, he used to load cypress on my paw’s river boat. He’s a bad ’un.”
    “No he ain’t. Jest funny like the others. You go up to a section called Black Bayou an’ look for Snakebird. He owes me a favor.”
    Ranny winds up the motor an’ heads full speed back to the river.
    * * *
    A man called Snakebird. A place known as Black Bayou. Lost people livin’ in a lost place, ’way back in the swamp’s core.
    Once, maybe, they were a Creek tribe: but that was a long time ago. The Spanish come, an’ then the Scotch, an’ each left their blood an’ their mark.
    Yet they live on where they always did, in a water whirl where a thousand creeks an’ sloughs an’ bayous lie in tangled green lanes under the gray moss. Where the Chattahoochee spreads seaward in a great flood, an’ six rivers lose themselves in nine hundred square miles o’ darkness before they reach tidewater.
    Oh, it’s not like the Glades or the Okefinoke. It’s nearly all black jungle.
    An’ Black Bayou? Not really a bayou  – just a name that you’ll have to find by compass. Ranny’s heard his paw mention it, an’ that’s about all.
    As he nears the river Ranny throttles down the outboard, then shuts it off. While he listens he takes his shotgun out the tarpaulin, loads it, an’ lays it across the seat. Over in the sawgrass the frogs are jingling an’ the ’gators are bellowin’ like bulls. He can’t hear Jug’s motor yet.
    Ranny hurries on, keeping in midstream an’ runnin’ the outboard fast for awhile an’ then stopping it quick to listen. He’s far up in the swamp before he hears another motor comin’. Now he eases the bateau under a tangle an’ stretches out on the bottom, tryin’ to sleep.
    His arm bothers him so that he can’t sleep, an’ all night it seems he can hear motors whinin’ up an’ down in the saw-grass lanes an’ racing on the river. In the quiet o’ dawn he starts out again.
    There’s a fever burnin’ in him now, an’ his arm feels like it was afire. When he stops to make a sling for it with some handkerchiefs, he thinks he hears Jug Purdy’s motor behind him, comin’ fast. But it’s only the locusts whinin’ up in the cypress trees. He curses the sound an’ goes on, but the whinin’ stays in his ears.
    The gas runs out late that afternoon an’ he tries to paddle. It’s hard to paddle with only one arm, an’ with the weight o’ the outboard on the stern. He unfastens the motor an’ tries to pull it over the seat; only his strength has left him an’ the motor slips away an’ splashes out o sight in the black water. It makes him sick to lose it, but it’s no good without gas.
    With the paddle at the stern he’s able to scull an’ keep the bateau movin’. North an’ west toward the Lakes, followin’ the lubber’s line of the old box compass that belonged to his paw.
    Around him now is a deep green twilight, with bottle-necked trees everywhere an’ long moss overhead. Just where he is Ranny don’t knew, an’ he’s past carin’. But the course is north an’ west, an’ all that matters is to keep a-movin’. To git some place where he can’t hear that whinin’ sound of a motor.
    There comes a night an’ another day; an’ once Ranny tries to open a can o’ beans, but he has nothin’ to open it with, not even a knife.
    But it don’t make no difference, for he don’t feel hungry. Just hot an’ full o’ pain, an’ there’s that dreadful whinin’ in his ears. Maybe it’s only the insects an’ the way he’s feelin’, but it could be jug Purdy, followin’.
    The sound grows louder an’ louder till it seems to fill all the swamp’s darkness, an’ before Ranny’s eyes there floats the dead face o’ Sleede; an’ all around it more faces rise, an’ each o’ them is the grim an’ accusing face o’ Jug.
    An’ Ranny cries out in a great fear, an’ he curses them an’ drops his paddle an’ snatches up his gun. Then everything fades in a monstrous blackness.

    III
    There are times when this blackness is broken, when it seems like someone is feedin’ him with a spoon, an’ when he thinks he sees people an hears voices, an’ sometimes a woman singin’.
    She is singin’ when Ranny wakes. It’s a cool sweet mornin’ ar ’ the air is heavy with the smell o’ tupelo an’ magnolia an’ bay. An’ Ranny finds he’s a-layin’ in a hammock under a cedar tree; an’ sittin’ on a log nearby is a great lean man with long black hair, dressed in faded overalls that has a thousand patches; an’ on the man’s head is a big black hat with a rattlesnake band.
    The man is cleanir’ a ’gator hide. “Hmp,” he says, lookin’ over at Ranny. “Ye done come around. How ye feelin’?”
    “Tolerable,” says Ranny, an’ he manages to sit up. He’s terrible weak, but there’s no whinin’ in his head now – only the singin’, which he ain’t sure about yet - – an’ he feels real hungry.
    Beyond him he sees a little cabin half hid under the water oaks, with gourds full o’ flowers on the porch, an’ ’gator hides stretched all over the wall.
    The singin’ is real, an’ it’s comin’ from inside the cabin.
    “My name hit’s Bonnie Fox,” says the man.
    “An’ mine’s Ranny Beale,” says Ranny. “I – I reckon I musta got lost. I sure thank you kindly for findin’ me an’ bring-in’ me here.”
    “’Twas Junie Gal brung ye, couple days back. She’s always a-findin’ something an’ bringin’ it in. That’s her a-doin’ the singin’.”
    “Oh,” says Ranny.
    “Junie Gal!” the man calls. “He’s done come around! Ye better fix him some vittles.”
    “All right, Paw.”
    The singin’ stops an’ in a little while a slim pretty barefoot girl comes out a-carryin’ a big pewter plate. It’s piled with more food than three well men could eat, an’ on it there’s grits an’ bacon an’ fish an’ hot hoecakes an’ jam, an’ Lord knows what else.
    She hands Ranny the plate shyly an’ says, “Hit’s little or nothin’, but mebbe ye kin make out with it.” An’ she sits down on the log beside her paw.
    Ranny he can’t hardly eat for lookin’ at her. After the way the redhead treated him, o’ course, he’s all done with wemmin. But this Junie Gal ain’t like nothin’ he’s ever laid eyes on before.
    * * *
    She’s around seventeen, as tall an’ slender as a young bay tree an’ as pretty an’ graceful as a doe. An’ bein’ a swamp woman, which means there’s fine Indian an’ Spanish blood in her that goes way back to the time o’ the buck-aroos, she’s got skin like pale gold an’ hair that’s as black as midnight. Oh, she is a beauty!
    An’ Ranny gulps an’ says, “It – it’s a mighty fine dinner you fixed for me, an’ all,” – though he’s hardly touched a bite of it – “an – an’ I sure wanna thank you for bringin’ me here an’ takin’ care o’ me. I know I can’t never repay you.”
    “Hmp,” says Bonnie Fox. “She can’t help what she does. The last time she brung somethin’ to home, hit was an ole mud turtle with one leg missin’. She kept a-doctorin’ it an’ a-feedin’ it till the pore thing up an’ died.”
    Junie Gal she looks at Ranny quick, an’ then down again, blushin’; an’ Ranny sees her eyes are a deep gray-blue – like all the swamp people has, for some reason nobody knows – only Junie Gal’s eyes are a heap deeper an’ bluer than any he’s ever seen. An’ they remind him o’ something, though he’s too flustered to think what it is.
    Then Ranny recalls that it’s a lot safer to leave swamp wemmin alone, an’ that he’s done with wemmin anyhow. An’ he remembers why he’s here.
    “I – I got to be gittin’ along soon’s I kin travel,” he says. “Mebbe you all kin tell me where I kin find a feller named Snakebird?”
    “That man—” says Junie Gal, an’ gives a slight shudder.
    “Hush,” says Bonnie Fox, then looks hard at Ranny. “Snakebird, he ain’t around no more. He a friend o’ yourn?”
    “No. I – I was jest told he’d help me. I’m from down the river, an’ – an’ there’s people liable to come a-lookin’ for me, an’ I got to go some place where—”
    “Shucks,” says Bonnie, “If’n that’s all, then ye needn’t worry. Ain’t nobody gonna find ye here. An’ none o’ the folks hereabouts is gonna bother ye. We kinda figgered ye wouldn’t wanna be goin’ back whar ye come from, so Junie Gal she passed the word around that ye was to be let alone.”
    “There’s others livin’ near?”
    “Oh, not near; we-uns don’t like things too cluttered. Reckon that’s what’s wrong with the people outside. Hit makes for a sight o’ wickedness, livin’ like that. Got so many laws they can’t turn around ’out breakin’ one, Man can’t e’en make his own likker, or kill hisself a buck when he’s hungray. Pshaw!”
    “Well,” says Ranny, “mebbe you’re right, I dunno. All I know is I can’t go back, an’ I don’t see how I kin make out with what little I got. I’m about out o’ money, an—”
    “Hmp!” snorts Bonnie Fox. “Ye sure got a heap to lain. What’s a man want with money when there’s fish for the catchin’, an’ turkey an’ hawg an’ deer for the shootin’?
    “I declare! An’ when ye need bought’n things, like mebbe clothes an’ ca’tridges an’ such like, all ye have to do is trap a few coon an’ otter in the winter, or shoot ’gators in the summer. Then somebody takes the hides over to the settle-mint an’ trades ’em in.”
    “I was jest a-thinkin’,” says Junie Gai. “Why couldn’t he live in Gre-gran’pa’s place over on the Bee Gum? Nobody’s a-usin’ hit now, an’ hit’s so well hid ye could paddle right by an’ never know ’twas there.”
    “Hit ought to do,” says Bonnie. “We could help ’im patch the roof an’ fix up the garden fence to keep the varmints out. Them bears ’bout tore hit down. An’ I reckon we could loan ’im some vittles an’ things till he kinda gits a-goin’.”
    So that’s how it comes about that Ranny Beale goes to live in a little cabin on the Bee Gum, which is a dark creek in the heart o’ the Black Bayou land.

    IV
    It’s plain terrible at first, this cabin on the Bee Gum, Ranny, he’s a Gulf man, with the sal sea in his blood. An’ he’s used to space an’ the wind’s whip, an’ the sound o’ water that’s never still.
    Up on the Bee Gum he can’t even hear nor smell the sea, an’ he feels choked in the tangle. Oh, there’s water enough - – there’s water near everywhere, an’ no end to its wmdings. But it’s black an’ still, an’ always in shadow.
    It’s at night when it’s really bad. At night the limpkms sound like ghouls, an’ a man’s thoughts begin to crowd in on him. An’ when a cat squalls or a panther screams, it’s like the soul of a murdered person cryin’ out in hate an’ torment. Like the ghost o’ Sleede Purdy.
    Ranny tries to keep himself busy. His arm is near healed now, an’ there’s plenty to do. There’s the fireplace to be mended with sticks an’ blue clay; fish traps to be made from split saplings; an’ the high fence around the tiny garden spot built higher an’ stronger to keep the varmints out.
    Bonnie helps plant the garden an’ loans him tools till Ranny can make or buy some; an’ it’s Bonnie that shows him how to trap wild hogs for his bacon, an’ go ’gator huntin’ at night with a fat pine torch. It’s a sight to watch Bonnie shine a ’gator’s eyes in the dark, an’ sneak up an’ catch the rascal with his bare hands an’ kill ’im with a knife. It saves bullets that way.
    An’ so Ranny learrs, an’ manages to git along. An’ there are times, especially when Junie Gal’s around, when he almost forgets Sleede Purdy.
    A man can forget near anything when Junie Gal sings. She’s got a mockingbird beat, an’ when Ranny hears her, things stop weighin’ so heavy on his mind.
    Maybe it’s just for this reason that Ranny takes to spendin’ a lot more time than he should over at Bonnie Fox’s cabin. Hardly a day goes by now but Ranny paddles the three miles from Bee Gum, bringin’ a choice mess o’ bream or a brace o’ summer ducks as an excuse to stop an’ talk awhile.
    It’s seldom, though, that he has more than a word or two with Junie Gal, for Bonnie is always near.
    An’ if Bonnie Fox becomes more an’ more thoughtful, an’ says less an’ less to Ranny each day, Ranny hardly notices it. Ranny can’t notice anything else these days when he’s looking into Junie Gal’s eyes. Her eyes, he has discovered, are just the color o’ the Gulf when the cloud shadows sweep the water.
    * * *
    There comes a mornin’ when Ranny is sittin’ on his steps, mendin’ a fish trap; he looks up all of a sudden an’ there’s Junie Gal at the landin’, a basket under her arm. It’s the first time he’s ever seen Junie Gal alone.
    “I brung ye a berry pie,” she says. “Paw, he’s off a-huntin’.”
    “Golly!” says Ranny, “I’m that glad to see you, I could—”
    “An’ I come to tell ye,” Junie Gal hurries on, “that mebbe ye’d better not come over no more.”
    “D – don’t you want me to come an’ see you?”
    “Why – why sure I do, Ranny. It – it’s jest that Paw – well, Paw’s actin’ like he did once before. Ye better stay away.”
    “But – but I don’t see why—”
    “Ye’d see why if’n ye knowed what happened to Snakebird. That man – I never had no use for ’im, but he kept a-comin’ every day, an’ makin’ them snake eyes at me. An’ Paw – oh, Ranny, I don’t want nothin’ to happen to ye!”
    An’ suddenly Junie Gal is cryin’, an’ before he knows it Ranny’s arms are around her, tryin’ to comfort her, an’ he’s sayin’ all kinds o’ things to her that he didn’t know was in him.
    Junie Gal looks up at him an’ says, “Do – do ye really mean all them things ye’re tellin’ me?”
    “Honey,” says Ranny, dryin’ her eyes with his sleeve, “there ain’t words enough no place to tell you how much I like you. I—”
    “Oh, Ranny!” An’ her arms go around his neck an’ hug him so tight it near chokes him.
    Then all at once she breaks away with a little gasp. “Oh, Lordy!” she whispers. “Here – here comes Paw!”
    Ranny turns around quick. His heart goes dead in him. It’s Bonnie Fox, all right. Bonnie has a rifle, an’ on his face is a strange quiet look.
    “Junie Gal,” says Bonnie. “Git in yo’ boat an’ start paddlin’.”
    Junie Gal puts her hand in Ranny’s. “I’m stayin’,” she says, so low she can hardly be heard. “I reckon I found ’im, an’ I reckon I’m a-goin’ to keep ’im.”
    “Not yet ye ain’t,” says Bonnie. “Do like I tole ye. Don’t stray far; jest paddle down to the bend an’ wait till I come. Me an’ him’s got business.”
    “Ye won’t hurt ’im, Paw?”
    “Don’t aim to at the moment.”
    Junie Gal gits in her bateau an’ paddles off.
    * * *
    When she’s gone Bonnie Fox says, “I’m sorry to come a-pryin’; but ’twas fitten I should know which way the wind was blowin’.”
    “You know how it’s blowin’ now,” says Ranny.
    “So I do. An’ ’tis fitten I should know some other things. There’s mebbe a shootin’ to be done, but whether ’tis my right or yourn—”
    “A – a shootin’?”
    “Yeah. But first I aim to know why ye’re here, an’ what ye’re hidin’ from.”
    “I reckon,” says Ranny, “that I’m mostly hidin’ from myself. I kilt a man.”
    “Tell me about it.”
    Ranny tells him, every word of it. Even to taking the bateau an’ motor, an’ goin’ up to Chicken’s place, an’ seein’ Jug. An’ as Ranny talks, it seems that a great weight is lifted off his mind.
    “Hm,” says Bonnie, after listenin’ quiet. “What’s this feller Jug look like?”
    Ranny describes him. Bonnie Fox sits quiet a minute, stroking his rifle. Then: “Ye’ll have to figger some way to pay for that boat an’ motor. Otherwise ’twould be stealin’.”
    “I’m savin’ for it now. But – but about fightin’ Sleede—”
    “Oh, that,” says Bonnie. “Hell, what’s worryin’ ye?”
    “The knife part of it, I reckon. It’s ornery to kill with a knife.”
    “I don’t see hit makes no difference how ye kill a polecat, long as ye make a good job o’ hit. Anyhow, them as lives by the knife ought to die that a’way. Around here we don’t waste no time with sech varmints.
    “O’ course, I never liked doin’ some things, but I ain’t never shirked what I thought was my bounden duty. Now, as I was tellin’ ye awhile ago, one o’ us has got a little job to do.”
    “W – what’s happened?” Ranny says.
    “There’s a feller come up from down the river,” says Bonnie. “Been actin’ mighty troublesome. I’m thinkin’ mebbe ye know ’im.”
    “Who – who is he?”
    “I reckon hit must be this Jug Purdy. I reckon he’s come a-lookin’ for ye.”
    * * *
    Ranny swallows hard. “It couldn’t be Jug,” he argues. “Jug, he wouldn’t know where I’d come. Not unless Chicken told him – an’ Chicken don’t talk.”
    “Mebbe there was a reason,” says Bonnie. “Mebbe hit was worth something for Chicken to talk. Anyway, there’s a strange feller here, an’ he’s a varmint. Asked folks where he could find Snake-bird. That would point to Jug.”
    “Yeah,” says Ran ny. “It would.”
    “I don’t like no varmint pryin’ around,” says Bonnie. “Kit makes me oneasy. ’Tain’t that I’m a-blamin’ him none for comin’ after ye’, that’s a man’s right.
    “But the swamp ain’t safe for Junie Gal with him around. He’s been watchin’ his chance. Been follerin’ her about when she goes a-fishin’. She always carries her shotgun, sure, but a man varmint ain’t like a swamp varmint.”
    Bonnie frowns before goin’ on.
    “Been keepin’ my eye on things. The rascal always lights out when I git within gun range, but he don’t stay away. Now I’m done foolin’ with ’im. Would a-settled with ’im before, only hit takes a rifle an’ I been out o’ ca’tridges. Jest got the loan o’ some this mornin’. I knowed ye didn’t have any rifle, so—”
    “Lemme have it,” Ranny interrupts, an’ his voice has a bite to it. “Reckon it’s my right better’n any man’s.”
    “’Tain’t yo’ right yet,” says Bonnie. “First I got to ask ye something. Raise yo’ right hand.”
    Ranny raises it. “Now,” says Bonnie. “Do ye aim to take Junie Gal to have an’ to hold, an’ never let no man put ye apart?”
    “I aim to,” Ranny says simply. “An’ I’ll never let no man nor nothin’ ever put us apart.”
    Bonnie hands him the rifle. “She shoots a mite high,” he says. “An’ here’s them three ca’tridges. One ought to be enough. I figger Jug’s a-campin’ somewhere in the tupelo back o’ Little Heron. God bless ye, son, an’ good luck.”
    An’ with that Bonnie goes down to his bateau an’ paddles quiet away.

    V
    For a space Ranny stands there, holding hard to the rifle. There’s a hate in him, deep an’ cold, but in his mind is a confusion o’ questions.
    Always the thought o’ Jug has been with him, like some evil knowledge that casts its shadow over everything. Some day Jug will come; there’ll be no knowin’ the hour, for Jug will come quiet an’ lie in wait behind a cypress tree with a gun in his hands. That’s Jug’s way. That’s the way men settle things in the swamps.
    An’ now Jug has come.
    “Chicken must have told him,” Ranny says to himself. “An’ Tug, he must have seen me by now. Couldn’t help seem’ me, watchin’ Junie Gal. But why’d Chicken tell him – an’ what’s been keepin’ jug away from me?”
    Maybe it’s because Jug’s eyes are too full o’ Junie Gal.
    At the thought Ranny snaps a cartridge into the rifle. It’s a single-shot weapon, an’ very old, but there’s a comfort in the way it sets in the hands.
    An’ Ranny takes a deep breath an’ looks about him; at the cabin that’s all his own.
    An’ he smells the sweet smell o’ magnolia an’ bay – not like the salt smell o’ the sea, but mighty near as good. An’ on the steps, lyin’ there like a promise, is Junie Gal’s basket.
    Ranny takes some food down to the bateau, an’ then, think in’ he might have to spend the night out in the cypress, goes back for a blanket. He’s rollin’ it in the tarpaulin when he hears a slight sound outside, a soft step on the cabin porch. He springs up quick, then stands there frozen,
    Darkening the doorway is the lean figure of a man. The man is slowly chewin’ on a match, an’ in his hands is a carbine. The man is Jug Purdy.
    Ranny is caught, an’ he knows there’s not a chance. His shotgun is in the far corner by the fireplace, the rifle out in the bateau. An’ Jug’s eyes are bright an’ dangerous an’ evil.
    “You durned skunk,” says Ranny. “How’d you git here?”
    “Follered them swamp people,” says Jug. He worries the match, then spits it out like he hates it. “Yeah, I seen yo’ ugly face around; never could find where you was hidin’ before.”
    “What difference does that make to you?”
    “Aimed to have a little talk with you, mister.”
    * * *
    Ranny stares at him. With his left hand Jug slides another match between his teeth; he rolls it slowly across his thin mouth and clamps down on it hard. “These swamps,” he says, “they’re hell to live in. I’m gittin’ damn’ tired of ’em.”
    “Ever try leavin’ ’em?”
    “Yeah. There’s only one way to leave. That’s through Chicken. Chicken kin git you out safe on a Cuban boat. But that takes dough.”
    “I ain’t got no dough,”
    “You got the next thing to it. Chicken’ll take anything on trade.”
    “Yeah?”
    “Yeah. I know you got it. Everybody on the river knows it now. The boys on the Flyin’ Fish seen it; they been talkin’. I asked Chicken if he’d seen it. He says he did.”
    “So that’s it,” says Ranny.
    “That’s it,” says Jug. “It don’t make no difference to Chicken; he don’t give a damn as long as he gits paid for what he does. But he says he’ll take the thing in payment for a trip out on a Cuban boat.”
    “What kind o’ deal you tryin’ to make with me?”
    Jug bites through his match an’ spits it half across the room. “If’n I had the money,” he says, “I wouldn’t be foolin’ with you. I’d a-done settled things long ago. But you hand over that conch pearl, an’ mebbe I’ll call it quits about Sleede.”
    “An’ if I ain’t got it?” says Ranny.
    “If you ain’t got it,” Jug says real slow, “that’s just too damn’ bad.”
    “It – it’s in that gourd,” says Ranny, pointing at a round gourd on the wall.
    Jug’s eyes light up suddenly. “Git it for me,” he says.
    Ranny takes the gourd off the wall. It’s fixed for keeping cornmeal in an’ over the top there’s a wooden cover tied on with string. Ranny lifts the cover an’ digs his hand deep into the meal.
    Jug watches him slyly. “I wasn’t sure you still had it,” he says. “You always was a fool about such things. Thought you might a’ gived it to that damn’ little swamp woman. Hell, a woman like that—”
    “You shut up about her!”
    Jug grins. “Sweet on her, eh?” He makes a cluckin’ sound an’ shakes his head. Then, shifting the carbine slightly, he reaches for another match.
    * * *
    Like a strikin’ cottonmouth Ranny’s hand flashes out o’ the gourd, flingin’ meal in Jug’s face. An’ at the same time he makes a flyin’ jump for the carbine.
    The carbine roars over his head, but in the next instant Ranny has his hands tight on the barrel, an’ Jug is tumbling backward out the doorway, choking with hate an’ tryin’ to wipe the meal out his eyes.
    Ranny pumps a fresh shell into the carbine. “Git up!” he snaps. “Git up an’ run! ”
    Jug sways to his feet. “You ugly yeller-haired so-an’-so,” he says through his teeth.
    “I told you to run,” says Ranny. “When I count ten I’m gonna start shootin’.”
    “You – you gotta give a feller a chance,” pleads Jug.
    “I’m a-givin’ you a durned sight bigger chance than you was gonna give me. Yo’ pussy-footin’ wasn’t foolin’ me none.”
    “Wait – wait a minnit,” says Jug. “Honest to Gawd, I got somethin’ to tell you. I got a real deal to make with you this time.”
    “Yo’ deals ain’t worth a damn.”
    “You – you better listen to me,” urges Jug. “I know somethin’ you’d give yo’ right arm to know.”
    “Yeah? What is it?”
    “You promise you’ll gimme a chance to reach my boat an’ git a-goin’?”
    “All right. You got my promise. But you’d better make it good.”
    “It’s good,” says Jug. “I got it from Chicken. Mebbe you don’t know it, but Sleede’s been in trouble before. He kilt a Greek down at Tarpon Springs.”
    “That ain’t helpin’ me none,” says Ranny.
    “Yeah, it does,” says Jug, takin’ a step backward. “The Tarpon sheriff sent word for ’em to hold Sleede, that night you fought him down at Dad Hunter’s place. Next day the sheriff come to town, an’ him an’ Dad Hunter did a heap o’ talkin’ in front o’ the coroner’s jury. I reckon Dad Htnter seen it all, for he told plenty.”
    Jug pauses an’ looks around. He’s halfway down the steps now.
    “Not so fast,” says Ranny. “Let’s have the rest of it.”
    “You kin guess the rest of it,” says Jug. “Dad Hunter swore ’twas all self defense on yo’ part – though I know damn’ well it wasn’t.
    “But when the jury got through listenin’ to him, an’ listenin’ to the Tarpon sheriff, they decided they might as well save the state some money an’ let you go.”
    An’ with that Jug hits the ground, movin’ fast, an’ disappears in the woods.
    “Well I’ll be damned!” says Ranny.
    He stands there in a daze, starin’ at the spot where Jug has gone. For a few seconds afterward he can hear Jug movin’ through the palmettoes along the creek, When the sound fades away he starts slowly down the steps.
    All of a sudden he jerks up straight, listenin’. From down on the creek comes a shout, an’ right afterward the roar of a shotgun.
    * * *
    In two jumps Ranny is across the yard an’ plungin’ through the timber, but he’s gone only a little way when he sees Bonnie Fox a-comin’ on the run.
    Bonnie stops dead in his tracks. He blinks hard at Ranny, then a shadow seems to lift off his face.
    “Law’, son,” he says, shakin’ his head, “‘when I hyeared that rifle shot awhile back, hit shure gave me a turn! Knowed ’twasn’t my rifle. Didn’t sound right. I come a-paddlin’ back quick – an’ then I seen that feller a-tearin’ through the bushes. I jest knowed he’d got ye. So I didn’t waste no time cuttin’ loose on ’im—”
    “You – you kill ’im?” asks Ranny. Bonnie twists his mouth in high disgust.
    “Naw!” he snorts. “Didn’t have nothin’ but my shotgun – an’ hit loaded with birdshot. Hardly did more’n singe ’im a little. I hurried ashore, but before I could git in another crack at ’im he’d hopped in his boat what was hid down there in the slough, an’ was paddlin’ like hell off through the cypress. Didn’t ye have no chance at ’im?”
    “I did,” says Ranny. “But I let ’im go.”
    “Eh? You – you let ’im go? How come ye to do that, son?”
    Ranny tells him on the way to the cabin. They sit down on the steps an’ Ranny says, “I couldn’t shoot ’im after what he told me.”
    Bonnie nods slowly. “I reckon ye done right, son. I reckon hit warn’t meant for the blood o’ both o’ them to be on ye.” He sits there silent for a space.
    “I think I hear that kid o’ mine a-hurry in’ back,” he says presently. “She must a-hyeared them shots, an’ she’ll be plum’ scared to death about ye. Now, that makes me wonder; she’s swamp bred an’ this country’s home to her. An’ you, well, after what Jug tole ye—”
    “That don’t make no difference,” says Ranny. “I thought it did for a minnit, but I see now it don’t. I don’t feel like Jug does about these swamps. I did at first, but I ain’t like I was. Anyhow, I done laid my course, an’ I’m a-holdin’ to it. I got a heap here I never had before, an’ I wouldn’t give it up for nothin’.”
    “I hoped ye’d say that,” Bonnie tells him. “I’m mighty glad to have somebody in the family I kin see eye-to-eye with. Mm....” Here she comes, so I’ll be gittin’ on. Reckon I’d better foller that varmint an’ keep ’im headed down the river.
    “Pshaw! If’n I’d only had somethin’ better’n birdshot....”

    1939
    (Argosy, vol. 295, #2, December 2, pp.72-83)

>>