The Ruby. Leland Nichols
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take. His gaze shifted to Billie as he wiped his palms on his thighs. Angrily, he said, “Billie, effen I’ve told ya once, I’ve told ya a thousand times, we don’t need any travelin’ salesmen ’round here.”
“His car broke down. He ain’t sellin’ nothin’.”
“You git on in the house and help yer ma.”
“But, Pa…”
“You heard me.”
Billie turned and walked toward the house. She glanced back over her shoulder at Dorian. Perhaps a last look before her father sent him away.
“We don’t take kindly to strangers snoopin’ ’round these parts. There ain’t nothin’ you need here, so be on yer way.”
Clyde was always troubled by the presence of strangers, and he did not trust them, mostly because of the moonshine still he operated in one of the hollows behind the house. He always suspected any stranger on his property, fearing that they might be Federal Revenue officials that could close down his operation and send him off to jail.
“I was hoping you could help me,” Dorian said.
Clyde ignored him and went on about his business.
“You see, I have a problem,” Dorian continued.
Clyde looked around on the ground, then at the shed, and said, “Sonny, fetch that long piece of pipe over there.”
Sonny was Clyde’s oldest son. At twenty years old, he was a rugged young man, stout as a bull with big arms and broad shoulders as wide as a door frame. Most of his size was sheer muscular mass. In his jaw, he had a large lump of tobacco that made quite a bulge on the side of his face. Sonny’s real name was also Clyde; being the first born son, he was given the name of his father. But he did not like being called “Junior”. Because of that, and so there would not be any mix-up when their name was brought up, they had decided to call him Sonny.
Sonny turned and picked up a large piece of pipe about eight feet long. His muscles bulged from his open shirt as he heaved the heavy pipe. He kept looking at Dorian, studying him from the ground up. There, in front of him, was a very strangely dressed person, like nothing he had ever seen before.
“Put it right dare, under the axle,” Clyde said. “Andy, git over here and help yer brother.”
Andy was sixteen, a tall, gentle-looking young man, meek and mild, somewhat childlike and shy. Slender-framed, he walked with a limp, and had only one useful arm. He carried the other arm clutched at his side; it was smaller and narrower, with limited movement, the hand locked in a ridged position pointing straight down. He was a cripple since the age of two and, unknown to himself or his family, a victim of polio.
Andy pulled a sliver of twig from his mouth and joined his brother and father beside the tractor. Sonny slid the piece of pipe under the rear axle to use as a pry bar. Clyde rolled a large stone under the tractor to use as a fulcrum, as Sonny positioned the pipe as a lever. Sonny and Andy pried one side of the tractor off the ground. Clyde crawled under the tractor, a wrench in his hand.
Dorian moved closer to Clyde, who was lying on his back tugging at a rusty bolt under the tractor. “I’m a stranger here, just passing through.” Dorian squatted down, looking at Clyde working away under the tractor. “If I could just take a few moments of your time?”
“I got my own problems. Fields to plow, no ’quipment to work with, and not enough time to do either.”
Sonny looked down at Dorian, becoming distracted by the unusual clothes the stranger was wearing. Suddenly, with the sound of rock crushing, then a dull metallic thud, the pry bar slipped. Sonny, unconsciously, put his hand on the rolling bar to steady it on the rock, pinching two fingers on his left hand that had become lodged under the bar. With a wince, he withdrew his hand and looked at the jagged wound. The flesh was torn, rather than being cut cleanly. The agony of pain registered on his face.
Clyde managed to roll out of the way barely in time, as the tractor slammed into the ground. He got to his feet, shooting Andy an angry look.
“Damn it, Andy, I told ya to help yer brother!” Clyde was always hard on the boy, not knowing, or not wanting, to accept his limitations.
He watched as Sonny backed away from the tractor, moaning with pain. Sonny slung his badly bruised hand up and down, and then cuddled it next to his body, clutching the torn finger tips. He gritted his teeth and doubled over in pain.
Clyde shouted furiously, “See now what ya done?”Clyde strode over to Andy, and in a fit of violent anger, slapped him open-handed across the face. Andy stumbled under the hard blow. He looked meekly at his father, blinking rapidly, his head almost touching his chest.
“Sorry, Pa.”
“Look here what ya done to Sonny.”
“I done all I could.”
“You could do a lot better, effen ya weren’t so damn lazy.”
His anger spent, Clyde stepped over to Sonny and put his hand on his shoulder. “Are ya hurt bad, son?”
“I’m alright, Pa, the pry bar got me. It weren’t Andy’s fault too much.”
“Get on in the house and warsh up,” Clyde said.
Sonny headed for the house as another of Clyde’s daughters approached them.
“Pa, supper is ready,” she said, tugging at the neckline of her thin summer dress.
“Alright, Amber, in a minute.”
Amber was eighteen, flower-like, with light-brown hair braided on both sides, fastened at the ends with strips of cloth. She was an overwhelming beauty, with a touch of wildness in her face. She made eye contact with Dorian and grinned mischievously at him, taking her bottom lip between her teeth, studying him.
Clyde turned to walk toward the house and noticed that Dorian had not left yet. In a somewhat exhausted manner, he looked Dorian in the eye and said, “Sorry, boy, I ain’t got time to help ya.”
Dorian turned to look at the lonely road, which seemed to lead to nowhere. He felt he had lost contact with the only people he knew, feeling cold and alone again. He glanced back at Amber again to find her green eyes still staring at him, a small smile parted her lips.
Amber perked up, her bright eyes set against a suntanned face, kept Dorian in their sight, “You can’t jes’ send him away without eatin’. Can’t he stay for supper?”
Clyde mumbled to himself, “Damn outsiders, comin’ ’round here tryin’ to git everything I own.” Then he cleared his throat and said, “Be on your way.”
“I won’t trouble you anymore,” Dorian said, as he turned and walked toward the road. “Thanks, anyway.”
Clyde took off his cap and raked a hand through his hair. He became tentative, as if having second thoughts as he watched Dorian leave.
“Car broke down, huh?” he called.
Dorian turned and faced him. “Not exactly.”
“Well, we ain’t got much, but you can come in and join us if ya like, before ya leave.”
Dorian smiled back at him, “Thank you. I’d be glad to join you.”
They started to walk across the yard, and Amber hurried to Dorian’s side, taking his hand as they went toward the house.
Billie and her mother prepared to serve supper as the family entered the kitchen. Billie wiped her hands on her apron as her mother opened the white enamel oven door of a black, wood-fired range with heavy chromed trim. She pulled out a cast-iron muffin pan of hot cornbread. Billie removed the stove lid, and a plume of carbonaceous smoke rose to the ceiling that tumbled and rolled to find the boundaries of the room.
Dorian