"I'm a-gonna git me some o'that money."

She was fretful, glancing back over her shoulder at big nosy Shonda Gay. But Thomas Braxton had her under his spell.

"You cain't jist leave," Tizzy spooked, scowling at Matthew's map. The motor died. "This is yer daddy's pickup and you cain't jist steal it."

"Well that's what I'm gonna do!"

"Yer all wrong, Matthew--"

"I ain't yer fool's fool--"

"Yer jist--jist--"

"--ain't no dip Dobber Magee, huntin bear with a b.u.t.ter knife."

"Well I cain't respect n.o.body that don't respect their mama and daddy. This truck don't belong to you."

"Big deal, they ain't nothin in Cayuga Ridge er anywheres else what belongs to me. Not yet."

"You cain't jist leave, Matthew," she whined. "Ain't we in love?"

He got shifty, uneasy in his seat.

"Sure we are," he snorted. "But they's some thangs ye cain't git shed of. I got my worldly fate to thank about. You oughta thank about yer own worldly fate oncet in a blue moon. Course, who knows if a shirttail thang like you even got one yet."

Tizzy couldn't think right now, she balked, she refused, she kept wondering about those c.o.o.nlets in their nest. Why was her brain's blood so cloudy? "I cain't go with you, Matthew. This ain't a good time."

But Matthew already had her pegged. He recranked the ignition.

"I ever ask ye to go with me, huh?" his grin was rash.

"No."

He took a grubby flask of liquor from betwixt his cods. She watched him swill the mess then replug its cork.

"Then don't." Matthew wrestled his gearstick for punctuation and gave her the walleye. "Fareyewell mama, I'll see ye in the funny papers."

Tizzy stood stockstill. Matthew Birdnell drew his fingerbead on her like a pistol, soft chuckles, gunning the engine. His pickup lurched ahead--baaarooooom!---Matthew raced down the asphalt to the end of the schoolyard. Everybody stopped and saw blue smoke when he hit the brakes, squealing the truck around. It came rolling back towards Tizzy. As he coasted past the girl, Matthew leapt from the cab and ran to her. He kissed her hard, shoving his tongue deep into her mouth. Just as suddenly he was releasing Tizzy, dashing back down the road. He caught the truck a hair's breadth from Miss Rebekah's mailbox. The tires were weaving wildly as he pulled himself into the driver's seat, regaining control, he punched the horn then sped away.

Tizzy threw a quick glance at Shonda Gay, pretty Courtlynn, and smooth Tom laughing over this shameless spectacle. Tizzy turned back to see the last of his rattling Studebaker roll out of sight.

Bye-bye, my Matthew, she thought, as an unfettered yearning arrived late and strange upon her soul.

Morning's lessons had begun. Later still, as first recess approached, Tizzy sat in her desk and mooned away Miss c.o.c.kelbay's history lesson. While their stout maiden teacher made proper tones--something about Yankee lies and Colonel Nash Renfrew--there was a little ring-tail-tooter named Ludlow crouched in front of teacher's desk, just out of her sight. He kept peeking underneath at her personal business then gawking back at the cla.s.s. Snickers rippled through the room, but Tizzy was too busy fretting over Matthew, and herself, and sneaking eyes of wanderl.u.s.t out the window. Time stood still now. Tizzy's life was wasting. n.o.body cared. Tobe McCoy took a cough drop. Raven-haired Courtlynn had introduced herself during show and tell, and now sat plucking her widow's peak. Around here, mostly Choctaw hawk-spirits were said to possess the widow's peak. As Miss c.o.c.kelbay broached the nigra question, Tizzy spied her father. He strode intently down the empty road past the school. His head bent, the Preacher was homing back toward the Church; his long face and legs were driven, Bible under one arm. She knew he must be returning from serious affairs, an expiring parishioner or settling accounts at the Mercantile. The Preacher didn't fiddle around.

Suddenly a burst of churlish laughter broke Tizzy from her stupor. Teacher had discovered the nasty antics under her drawers and now had the boy by his ear. The cla.s.s was in uproar.

"Lud Prather!" Miss c.o.c.kelbay was shrieking, "--you perverted little thang! Git up offa this floor. Git up! Yer penitentiary-bound boy!" Raising Lud by the ear, she got a hank of hair and the boy finally stood, yelping. "Yer gonna carry yerself down the hall to Mr. Wainwright's office and tell him to give you thirty swats with his elem cane. You tell him! Er I'll make it forty---Tizzy Polk!--"

Tizzy blinked.

"You go with him to Mr. Wainwright's office and make sure he gits there. Hear this, Ludlow T. Prather: I've had my fill o'you young-un! You and me er gonna come to terms. Now git on down there."

Tizzy left her desk while the boy made goon faces for his crowd. When Tizzy pa.s.sed, Shonda Gay Biggs blew some loud smooches. Tizzy shot back a wilting go-drink-your-strychnine look before leading Lud out the door.

"Y'all shut up!" the teacher railed.

As soon as they were alone, that towheaded ring-tail-tooter tried to wipe his finger on Tizzy's dress.

"s.h.i.ta.s.s," he hissed, grabbing under her skirt. "Hee-her-hee-hee!"

She shoved him away. "Ludlow quit it--!"

The front schooldoors were open, casting twin columns of grey light down the short, dark hallway. They made slowly for the princ.i.p.al's office, but without let-up, Ludlow kept his runny nose in her face.

"Is it true preacher's gals do nothin but praise Jesus while yer a-puttin it to em?"

"Shut up, Ludlow. I'm gonna tell my daddy what you jist said."

"Yeah and I'll burn down yer gotdam house--"

"I'm gonna tell Mr. Wainwright."

"Wainwright kin chaw on my willie."

Lickity-split, they stood at the princ.i.p.al's door, the one with frosted gla.s.s bearing his name. P R I N C I P L E - Q.L.Wainwright, Jr. . They both took pause, hesitant to go the next step. Tizzy felt squeamish and wondered why. For once, she wasn't the persecuted. Ludlow was. But, in short order, Ludlow recovered his true colors, swiping his finger at her with a snit. He turned the k.n.o.b.

Inside, the room was cool. Outside, was harvest frost. Inside, Mr. Wainwright was sweating anyway, an electric fan whirring atop filepapers on his cluttered desk.

"You knock on that door before you open it, buster." The princ.i.p.al sat baldheaded with furious eyebrows and a string tie. He kept rubberbands on his sleeve at all times. Unbridled stinginess was known to run in the family.

"Mizzz c.o.c.kerbay sent me down," the boy stammered, meek as a tadpole.

Mr. Wainwright considered him for a fatal moment.

"Good. Git back to cla.s.s Tizzy."

Tizzy exchanged dire eyes with Ludlow. She turned quietly and slipped from the room, closing the cool door behind her.

Outside she waited and listened. She heard nothing. After a moment's hush, she gazed down the darkened hall. There was the murmur of eight cla.s.srooms, shafts of light streaming the floor. And through the double frame at the far end of the hall--Matthew's pickup pulled into view. It came to a stop, square in the schoolhouse doors.

Whack!

Slowly, she c.o.c.ked her head and began moving, helplessly down the hall. Behind her, the whack-whack of a whipping cane tickled her ears. After the first harsh swats, Ludlow began to repent, loud. But no matter. Whack! Tizzy ignored this as she came toward the light. Whack! Reaching hallway's end, she moaned, then found herself on the front steps. Things dark and vile were boiling in her blood. Serpent things. Tinglings. It was clear morning. There sat Matthew, idling, grinning gently from the window of his truck. Whack. The whipping elem cane was an echo far behind her. Stop. Distant howls of pain. Don't. For Tizzy the spell was cast.

Tizzy came off the steps and struck a trot briskly across the schoolyard, covering the distance like an antelope. She rushed up to his pickup and pounded Matthew's dangling arm. He winced but took it. The school bell began to ring.

"I hate you---I hate you, boy."

Tizzy ran around the truck and leapt into the pa.s.senger seat. Matthew set crazy eyes on her. Brrrriiiiing-iiing-iiing.

"Git!" she shouted.

Matthew cackled with glee, the pickup was screeching away. He punched the horn again, a long pealing ruckus as children poured from the schoolhouse, children in his dust. The bell kept ringing and ringing.

Shonda Gay saw their blue fumes from the step while kids squealed, pushing past her. His m.u.f.fler was cracked, his pipes were loud.

Tizzy twisted to see out the back window as Matthew's truck careened past the white steeple--The First Reconstructed Church Of Cayuga Ridge--that horn blaring like an angry angel's trumpet.

Within his sanctum, the Preacher Polk lifted a bleary eye, his fruit jar quaking, an ache in his gourd. His sweat pooled on the rectory desk. He sensed the brash and fleeting trumpet and knew all trespa.s.sers were in His Hands now.

S T E P 4.

The truck wobbled. The front alignment was out. Its tires were contrary sizes, but the wheels kept threading, unsteadily, through hills and gaps. Two hearts pounding. This mountain-logged road was all theirs, curve after curve, mile after mile, a lost river of asphalt. One tiny shack gave way to the next, each shack with its small barren field, desolate cornrows littered only by blackbirds and autumn leaf. And morning's frost was burning off as the shadows grew short. Each good day brought a brief respite from these shades, close to noon, when the sun had no more ridges or peaks to climb. But one stubborn hump held the darkness longer than any other. Ahead, on Tizzy's side, it loomed. The highest, black majesty of a peak. The one that most resembled a granite auger with bristle hairs; a mountain that stole the golden light from so many hearts in this rolling country.

Both runaways were mum for awhile, they just kept swaying, watching the rearview mirror. The road split and a sign pointed down the right fork in a scrawling hand: RiDDLe ToP.

They branched to the left.

She played with the radio dial. You couldn't get good reception on any stations up here. So she clicked it off.

"Hill-a-billy boogie, hill-a-billy boogie..." Matthew bopped.

Tizzy began to whistle a very flat sacred tune, at great length. His bopping stopped. Five more minutes and Matthew threw his empty whisky flask out the window.

"I wanna git some Lucky Strikes soon's we git to Shanville," she told him, dead serious.

"Man, that's perty stupid--"

"You are, y'mean--"

His tongue got snide. "They gottum see-gar-ettes in Cayuga Ridge.

"Yer a half-wit," she was fuming, "I want my own gun too!"

He laughed without guile.

"Bulls.h.i.t."

Matthew sped across a covered notch-timber bridge, revving up like a demon.

"Okeedoke. She's right up hyere."

"What?" she asked.

"This is the joint."

"Which'n?"

"I figger we got thirty-four mile to go." He pointed at the gas gauge. "Ye see that?"

"We gotta buy some gas."

Matthew's grin went lopsided. He came out with a funny voice: "We gotta git a job first. Stupid."

The gravel lot was as empty as the road when they wheeled up to the roadhouse. It was low and long, sh.o.r.ed with rusty corrugated tin, tarpaper and beer signs. A busted neon over the door called it Bull's Gladiola Lounge. The roof was flat. A roly-poly sedan sat alone by the woodpile.

Matthew slid to a gravel-slinging halt. He dismissed Tizzy with his chronic smirk, leaned across her, opening the glove compartment. The pistol was inside. He liked the heft of it in his hand. The cylinder was spun and slapped back into place. He winked at her.

"Wait--" she said.

"Daddy can't wait no more."

"We ain't sure--"

"Ain't sure o'whut?"

"We don't know what we're a-doin."

"I know whut I'm gittin ready to do."

They both eyed the windowless club.

"But..."

"I'm a-gonna run in hyere and rob this ole boy. And after that I'm gonna rang up the New York Times."

She felt trapped. "Well I ain't a-goin with you."

At this Matthew kicked open the truck door.

"Ye never was a-goin with me--as I recolleck!--but we-uns is gone!"

He fell from the truck, loping over to the roadhouse door. Tizzy panicked, running her eyes up and down the road in case somebody was on to them.

"No, I'm comin--" She leapt out to join him. He didn't seem surprised and this riled her most of all. But Matthew shushed her with a barrel to his lips, a test of the door found it open. He was inside before she could squeak.

n.o.body stood behind the bar. The long dance floor lay nearly black, not a speck of light and a clamminess that told Tizzy the sunshine wasn't welcome. It smelled of ammonia and dirty mopwater. Upended chairs hung on the tables, Tizzy made out a boar's head over the whisky bottles. Matthew slid a foot forward, feeling the table legs like a mine sweeper as he pressed his luck, waiting for his eyes to adjust. Ahead, behind the bar, the dull outline of a door became visible, it was slightly ajar.

"They're closed," Tizzy was saying.