Rooster squinted his eyes, looked down the track, saw the train coughing along, growing bigger as it came. He stepped back into the line of trees, and when the train was making the curve, it slowed considerable, almost to a crawl, and he began running. He frightened a couple of doves in the bush as he ran, and they scattered skyward, startling him, but he kept running, and he made the train, got on it with one leap, edged his way between the boxcars and rode there, jiggling with his feet on the boxcar connection. At the water stop he thought maybe he could slip down, find a car open, or open one himself. Then he could ride inside, lay back and travel right on out of this life. Ride until he wanted to get off. No set place to go. Just ride till he couldn't take it anymore.

He thought about Sunset, her not knowing, not expecting what was coming, and he figured Plug and Tootie, they'd go along easy with whatever McBride wanted, same as him. Briefly, he considered jumping off, going back to warn her. But no. He didn't even have the guts for that. He felt as if McBride would know he was running away, that somehow he would sense it, come looking for him, or most likely, send Two. He didn't want to be near Holiday or Camp Rapture, or East Texas for that matter, when McBride found out he was gone. Louisiana might be too damn close. A guy like that, he could hold a grudge for most anything.

Rooster watched the trees speed by, saw the ground rise up on either side of the train, momentarily throwing shadow over him, then the hills were gone again and there was a speckle of pines, a scattering of houses. He took a deep breath. When he let it out again, he said, "Good luck, redhead."

The train blew its whistle, rolled around the bend with a rumble and a squeak, then ducked out of sight, taking Rooster with it.

When Clyde drove up into the yard he sat behind the wheel of the truck, not wanting to get out. He noted Sunset's car was gone, and he was glad of it.

A stocky man and Marilyn were sitting in chairs out front, shelling some peas Marilyn had brought with her. They were shelling them into sacks. A boy was sitting on the hood of Marilyn's truck eyeing Karen, who was sitting beneath the oak shelling peas into a shallow pan. Clyde tried to figure who the hell the man and the boy were, but they seemed to fit, so he didn't get out and ask. He never wanted to get out.

The stocky man saw him, got up and came over.

He stuck a hand through the window. "Lee Beck. Marilyn says you're Clyde."

Clyde shook the hand briefly, said, "I'm what's left of him."

"What happened to you?"

"I got beat up."

"I can see that."

Marilyn, Karen, and the boy came over.

"Clyde," Karen said, "are you okay?"

"My pride is beat up the most," Clyde said. "Well, actually, I think me and my pride got about an equal beating. I got a chipped tooth too."

"Who did it?" Karen asked.

"That's the worst part," Clyde said, opening the truck door, getting out, feeling woozy. "That goddamned pretty boy. Hillbilly."

Karen burst out crying and ran into the tent.

"I didn't know she cared," Clyde said.

"I think it's Hillbilly she cares about," Marilyn said.

"Well, she need not worry about him. He's as perky as a goddamn guinea hen. Though he might have bruised a knuckle or two. Damn, I thought I was a tough sonofabitch, but he was something. I hope she doesn't think I hurt him."

"Karen just recently found out Hillbilly's a turd," Marilyn said. "She's carrying his baby."

"Damn," Clyde said.

"Thanks, Grandma," Karen said from the concealment of the tent. "Thanks a lot."

"People are gonna know soon enough, dear. And this here is family and friends."

"Feared as much," Clyde said. "Thought it might be, but I didn't say nothing cause I didn't want to do no guesswork. I should have, though."

"You're talking about me," Karen said. "I'm here, you know."

"You want to get in on this," Marilyn said, "come out of the tent."

"You don't fret none, baby," Goose said. "I'll take care of you."

"You don't even know me," Karen said, and this time she poked her head out. "I don't even know your name."

"Goose," said the boy. "And I know all of you I need to know. You're the prettiest thing I ever seen."

Karen made a sound that was unfriendly, pulled her head back inside.

Lee said, "Goose, that's my granddaughter you're talking to."

"And I don't mean nothing but respect," Goose said.

"Where's Sunset?" Clyde asked.

"She went to the town meeting," Marilyn said. "They're talking about removing her."

"Ain't this the perfect day?" Clyde said.

29.

Marilyn hadn't offered her house for the meeting this time, so it was held at the church. Marilyn said she'd go with Sunset, thought she could wield some power, but Sunset asked her not to. She wanted to go alone, had some things to say.

Sunset got out of the car, shifted her holster until it was comfortable, stood in the shadow of the leaning church cross for a time, watched a crow on one end of it drop its load onto the church roof. She took a deep breath of sawmill stench, went inside the church.

It was stuffy in there, and Henry Shelby and the town elders were sitting in a pew at the front. A stout man wearing a bowler hat and a nice gray suit was up front leaning on the preacher's podium, looking bored. She had never seen him before. He was maybe sixty, almost good-looking. Still solid, had a thick mustache and was red-skinned and robust. His hands were draped over the top of the podium and they looked like two huge white spiders resting. When he lifted his head and looked at her, she felt as if she had been dual stabbed all the way through to the back of her head. And when his eyes moved, she felt those stabs in the groin.

As she came in, the men in the pews turned their heads and looked at her, watched her carefully as she walked down the aisle.

"We didn't think you'd come," Henry said. "We thought you'd send your mother-in-law to talk for you."

When she was standing at the pew, Sunset said, "Henry. You and me, we need to talk. Alone."

"There's nothing to be said, Sunset," Henry said. "This is a formality. We're removing you."

"We need to talk alone."

"You said that."

"I want to talk to you about some land with oil on it. A big pool of oil."

Henry just looked at her.

"This land has a house on it, and the oil on the land is the same that was on Jimmie Jo."

The big man behind the podium laughed.

The elders looked at Henry. Henry's face had lost its color.

"All right," Henry said. "Maybe me and her should talk alone. It's important, I'll let you know."

The elders looked at one another. One said, "Henry, this isn't the way we do things-"

"It is today. Y'all wait outside for a while. Go over to the store, get something to drink." He dug in his wallet, gave one of the men a few bills. "It's on me."

"What about him?" Sunset said, nodding toward the man leaning on the podium.

"He don't want a Coke. He doesn't go."

"Henry," said one of the elders, "are you sure?"

"I'm sure."

They were slow about it, but the elders got up and went out. McBride came out from behind the podium, sat in the same pew with Henry, crossed his legs, leaned back as if waiting for someone to serve lunch.

Henry studied Sunset, said, "This had better be good."

"I think you already know it's good. But not for you."

"This sounds like some kind of blackmail."

"Maybe."

"It didn't work for Pete and Jimmie Jo, it ain't gonna work for you."

She tried to figure what Henry was talking about, sort of got it. Pete and Jimmie Jo had tried to outflank Henry and this guy, but it hadn't worked.

Another thing hit her. If they were stealing Zendo's land, there were probably others. Plenty of blacks who couldn't read, or could and wouldn't say anything for fear of sticking to tar and feathers, dangling at the end of a rope, becoming a gasoline-soaked torch for white sheets to dance by.

"Me and Pete are different," Sunset said.

"I can tell that," Henry said. "Any man can tell that."

"Hear, hear," McBride said.

"You're different, all right," Henry said. "You're different from other women. You're a looker, Sunset. And you're a tramp. Pete married you because you're a tramp. Then he found himself a bigger and a better tramp."

"You don't know anything about me," Sunset said.

"I know a tramp when I see one."

"And I know a thief when I see one."

"You're a tramp pretending to be a man, going around with a gun on your hip. Does that gun make you feel like you got something you don't got? You know, a Johnson?"

"Henry, my guess is, even with me not having a Johnson, mine's bigger than yours."

McBride laughed again. Henry looked at him, then back at Sunset. "Get on with it."

"Sure you want this fella to know what I'm going to say? Not that I care. It'll all come out soon enough."

"He knows lots of things already. You say what you got to say, little lady. And I use the term lady loosely."

"Most of it don't need to be said. You're cheating Zendo out of his land, you and the mayor were, before he went off-he didn't go off, did he?"

"He's not here," Henry said.

Sunset looked at McBride. "That's why you brought this guy in, isn't it? To get rid of the mayor? Strong-arm people. Keep you out of it."

"I didn't say that."

"Mayor's probably in some hole somewhere, like Jimmie Jo and her baby." Sunset studied McBride. "But you know about that, don't you?"

"I don't put people in holes," McBride said. "I don't like digging. And I don't like babies hurt."

"Who is this guy, anyway?" Sunset asked Henry.

"McBride," McBride said.

"He's an associate," Henry said. "From Chicago. I knew him through a fella."

"Weren't there enough thugs around here?"

"Listen here, Sunset," Henry said. "I don't like you. But I tell you what, I'll cut you in for what Pete was gonna get, you hadn't shot him."

"What was Jimmie Jo's share? A dose of oil and a thirty-eight slug in the back of the head?"

"A thirty-eight slug?" McBride said.

Sunset worked up a fierce gaze. "The baby was cut out. That's as low as it gets. That your work, McBride?"

"I didn't know she had one in the oven," McBride said. "That's a bad break for the kid, that being done. I didn't know about the kid."

Sunset thought McBride looked surprisingly sincere.

"Don't say so much," Henry said to McBride.

"Nothing's been said that matters," McBride said.