Part 10 (1/2)

Viridis made a sort of laugh and stopped drawing. She looked Sull in the eye. ”Then maybe you'll explain why you shot Waymon Chism in the back.”

All of the men tried to speak at once, but the sheriff's voice was loudest: ”G.o.ddammit, it was self dee-fense!”

Viridis ignored him and continued looking Sull in the eye. ”Waymon Chism was shot in the back,” she repeated herself, ”by the same pistol that fired four shots at me in the Buckhorn Hotel.”

”It was pervoked,” the sheriff said lamely. ”I mean, naw, you didn't pervoke him, and thar weren't no excuse for thet Buckhorn misbehavior, but Waymon Chism sh.o.r.e enough incited and aggervated and brung it on hisself.”

Viridis turned and looked coldly at the sheriff, but she pointed her finger at Sull. ”Why isn't this low-life coward in jail?” she demanded.

”Ma'am!” said the sheriff. ”Watch who yo're talkin about! He's the county jedge! We aint about to put him in no jail!”

Sull said, ”Duster, why don't we put her in jail like we was fixin to?”

”Now, now, boys,” Judge Villines said. He was saying ”boys” the same way everybody does in this part of the country, meaning any male even eighty or ninety, but I couldn't help feeling these ”boys” weren't any older than me; they certainly weren't behaving any better than rowdy children. ”Let's us not be rude to a representative of the Arkansas Gazette. Don't we want to show ourself in the best light and present a favorable front to the rest of the world? We caint go around arrestin gentlemen and ladies of the public press.”

Sheriff Snow said, ”We jist come over yere to git Rindy Whitter fer a little talk, Jedge. That's all we come over fer, but then this yere lady started makin trouble.”

Judge Villines asked Viridis, ”Couldn't these men simply have a few words with little Miss Whitter here, ma'am?”

”Not him.” Viridis pointed at Sull again.

”Why, how come, ma'am? He's got a personal interest in this matter too.”

”He certainly does!” Viridis said. I had the feeling she was losing her temper, and then, sure enough, she lost it. ”He viciously tricked Dorinda Whitter into submitting herself to a s.e.xual a.s.sault which he performed upon her himself, and he inflicted unspeakable pain upon her, and then forced her into blaming innocent Nail Chism for what he had done!” Not a word or utterance of reply was made to these words by anybody, not by the accused, not by the accused's confederates. The only sound to break the silence, finally, was a small, stifled sob from Rindy.

At last Judge Villines spoke up. ”That's a very serious charge, ma'am, and it's totally unsubstantiated, and it's pint-blank hearsay, and I would be very careful before I'd go around sayin things like that.”

”It will be said in the pages of the Arkansas Gazette as soon as I get back to Little Rock.”

”Duster, you'd better th'ow her in jail!” Sull said. ”It's too late to shut up Rindy. We better jist th'ow this b.i.t.c.h in jail and keep 'er thar!”

Judge Villines, such a mild man, lost his temper then. ”Shut yore fool mouth, Sull! Aint you done made enough trouble already? Jist shut up, afore ye go and make it worse!”

”Yeah,” said Sheriff Duster Snow. ”Yeah, Sull, you heared the jedge. Let's us jist simmer down and shush it up.”

There was a shuffling of feet as the men waited to see which of them would make the first move to leave. The old woman got the last word: ”It will be so pleasant when all of you b.a.s.t.a.r.ds have removed yourselves from my porch.”

All the b.a.s.t.a.r.ds got off the porch.

Viridis and Rindy left Stay More early the next morning. I was there to see them off. I hated it. My best friend, off and on, terribly off for the longest time but now back on again, going away to the big city, where I'd love to go someday, any day. We cried. ”On't ye come wif me?” Rindy said. ”Caint,” I said. ”Ess ast Miss Monday kin ye,” she suggested. ”No, there's not no room no way,” I said. And there wasn't, atop that poor mare, Rosabone, who'd be loaded down a-carrying the two of them. Much, much later, when I learned all about the trip, I knew they had dismounted from Rosabone on the hills and ridden her only downhill and on the level places, and still she was a brave old mare to take them both plumb to Clarksville. Rindy had on a pair of one of her brothers' pants so she could ride astraddle behind Viridis, and Viridis had put back on those jodhpurs that she'd never had a chance to let anyone see her wearing except us.

Viridis and the old woman had a talk while Rindy and I were saying our good-byes. After I had said all I could to tell Rindy I hoped she would have a good time in Little Rock and how much I admired her and all, there was nothing more to say, so I listened to Viridis and the old woman. The old woman said she was sorry that Viridis had not received a more favorable impression of Stay More. Viridis a.s.sured her that the people of Stay More were just fine. The old woman said she hoped Viridis would want to come back. Viridis said there was no doubt whatsoever that she would be coming back. She wanted to come back in the spring, and in the summer, when all the shades of green would be in their glory and she could paint them. The old woman said that any time Viridis wanted to come back she would be very welcome to stay here at this house.

Then Viridis turned to say good-bye to me. She shook my hand. I guess tears were running down my face. And I didn't cry easy. ”Latha, I'll miss you,” she said, and I knew she wasn't just being polite. ”You were a wonderful help to me, and I'll never forget it. You be good to yourself, and I'll see you again in the spring.”

”Miss Monday-” I tried to say, choked.

”Oh, please just call me Viridis, or Very,” she said.

”Very...Viridis...” I tried, but it didn't sound natural or mannerly. ”You are the nicest lady I've ever known.”

On.

One minute he is looking at the best girl on this earth, the next minute he is face to face with the worst one. Nail could not look at her. He looked at the guard for help, or some sign of fellow-feeling, but the guard, a white trusty called Bird, just looked bored and stupid, and had no idea that Nail's visitor was none other than the selfsame little trollop whose lies had put Nail in this h.e.l.l.

She wasn't looking at him either. She had given him just a glance and then was watching the door behind him as if she were still waiting to see the person she was expecting to come in through that door. She didn't even know it was him. She don't even recognize what she's done to me, he realized. She just stood there uncertain and scared-looking, waiting for somebody who looked like what she remembered Nail Chism looked like, but that guy never showed up, so after a while her eyes came to rest on him long and careful, and then she just said one word, in hardly a whisper: ”Nail?” He didn't nod his head or say anything to her. But she finally must have got it through her silly head that it was indeed him, because the next thing she did was to fall down on her knees and clasp her hands together as if she were praying to him. ”Oh, Nail!” she wailed, the way some ladies at a revival holler, ”Oh, G.o.d!”

He didn't say a word. He just looked down at her there on her knees. Somebody had spent some more money on some more clothes for her. She wasn't wearing that white thing she'd worn at the trial, that had made her look like her own idea of an angel. Now she had on a real nice wool coat, dark-green, and even a little hat on her head like she would wear to Sunday school, and a little purse in her hand, and fancy shoes that went up her legs. She even looked older than what she had been. Well, maybe she had done turned fourteen since that summer that seemed so many years ago. Nail realized that Viridis had brought her here, and that she had put her name on that pet.i.tion, which meant that she was ready to admit that she had wrongly accused him.

”Nail, oh Nail, Nail, Nail,” she said. ”Please fergive me. Say you'll fergive me, please please oh please.” The tears were running down her face and messing up the powder and rouge that somebody had put on her face.

He honestly did not know what to say, so he didn't say anything. Bird threw him a curious look as if he'd done something awful to the poor girl to make her get down on her knees and bawl her eyes out like that. He wanted to say to Bird, This here little old girl is the reason I'm in The Walls-now watch and hear her tell me she's sorry she done it. But he honestly did not know what to say.

”Oh, what have I done to you?” she squalled. And because he wasn't making any response to any of her words, she seemed to give up trying to talk to him and started in to talking to herself: ”Oh, see what ye've done to him, you bad bad girl! Oh, look at his pore haid! You ort to be kilt yoreself, you big eejit! You ort to jist trade places with him!”

She kept on babbling to herself like that until finally Nail said, ”Git up, Rindy.” The sound of his voice at last seemed to jolt her back to the real world, and she looked at him as if he'd said something wonderful and nice to her, and she got one of those fancy shoes up under her and began to rise up.

She stood up, although she didn't stand straight. She was hunched in the back like she didn't have any right to hold her head up anymore. She stood bent over like that and said, ”I done tole Very everthing the way it really was, that it was Sull and not you who done it.”

”What did Sull do?” he asked.

”Ever last thing I tole in court that you had done, jist lak I tole it, on'y hit was him, not you.”

”But you let him,” Nail said.

She shook her head. ”Naw. He tuck me. He tole me to play-like you was him, so's I'd know how it felt.”

Nail slammed his hand against the screen separating them, as if he could knock it down. ”The son of a b.i.t.c.h!” he said.

Bird waved his shotgun barrel. ”Hey, watch it there, big fella.”

Nail turned his back to Bird and Rindy so they could not see his anger. He walked toward the door leading out of the visit room but, on reaching it, turned and walked back to the screen, and said to her, ”Did he hurt you?”

”Uh-huh, a lot,” she said. ”A whole lot.”

”Then how come ye to...how could ye...Rindy, for G.o.dsakes, why did ye do a favor for him?”

She hung her head. ”They paid me,” she said.

”They?” he said. ”They who?”

”The sherf and them,” she said.

”How much?”