Mad Tales

Chapter 4 - Salvation-1

CHAPTER 4 SalvationWe was all setting out on the porch, it being evening and after dinner and all, and everybody was sipping tea and telling stories. There was me, of course, my sister Bonnie and her husband Cherish, and Daddy and Mama, and his daddy and Mama, my Grandaddy and Mamaw. Then there was my best friend since we was little, Miranda, and her husband, Joe. Sun was red behind the trees, and in the distance I could hear old John Walters, Mr. Kennedy’s black lab, barking to raise the roof.

Mama said, “Why don’t you tell about that time you found that ol’ bum out by the fence?”

I flapped the fan Daddy made me right up to my face.

“Naw, Mama. I don’t wanna tell it again. Everybody already heard it before.”

Miranda said, “Nonsense girl! You know we all love that story! You go ahead now and tell it.”

Well, rest of them people all started raising their voices and hollering for me to tell it, so I don’t see how I couldn’t have said ‘yes’. And right then was the first time it hit me: I was going to have to tell this story till I was old and gray, setting in a rocker like Mamaw does all day, telling the story telling the story. I took a deep breath and let out a weary sigh.

“All right. I’ll do it. Ya’ll go ahead and stop me anytime, though. Must have heard this about a thousand times.”

Everybody just sort of mumbled along in agreement, staring at their shoes like they did every time, so I went ahead and started telling it.

Y’see, I saw that ol’ Raggity Man first, not Jimmy Walts like he’ll tell you even today if ya’ll ask. I saw that old Raggity Man lying right there in a heap of shredded up Federal soldier clothes. He was curled up on the dead brown grass around the electric fence at the edge of the compound. It was summer of ‘56? ‘57? I can’t remember if I was ten or eleven. Don’t matter.

Anyway, Mama was always telling me to look out for strangers when we was playing out Fence Line way, especially around that time. We had news of all them refugees coming from the north. Federal soldiers. And by God Himself there was one right there breathing right beneath my nose, not fifteen feet from where me and Jimmy and all them other kids was playing ghost in the graveyard! He was laid up against the fence so his clothes pushed through the holes. That meant that the electricity wasn’t working, and somebody had to go and tell somebody about it, and that somebody had to be me.

I stole a look over my shoulder at them other kids.

Fat Maynard was running away from Jimmy, and Jimmy, who was bigger than Maynard, caught him up in about two steps and pushed ol’ Maynard right down on his face in the dirt.

Keeping my eyes on Jimmy, I reared back and kicked that Raggity Man real hard through the fence, hurling my leg into it like I was kicking Jimmy himself. Fence shook and made a jingly noise, but ol’ Raggity? He ain’t move or make a sound or do nothing. Dumb Jimmy was chasing the little kids round with a stick held over his head, and them kids was screaming like he’d bash them straight to hell! Miranda glanced over at me, frowning, so I turned around real quick and glared at the Raggity Man again. I thought he might have been dead, so I kicked him harder. Pretended his rear was dumb ol’ Jimmy’s face. Raggity Man moaned and stirred.

Then Jimmy called out, “What you doing, girl?”

Oh Lord.

If you couldn’t tell already, I hated Jimmy Walts. He beat me up twice when I was little, and he did it just because he could. But he sure was dumb. I mean real dumb. One time, me and Miranda, we saw him tie his shoelaces together and fall down twice before he realized it.

Jimmy and Maynard came on over to where I was standing, and I swear they all let up a gasp like they’d seen Jesus strolling out Savior Bay, a grimace on his face, wrestling a shark.

“What is it?” Jimmy asked.

Fat little Maynard said, “What you think it is, Jimmy? A cat?”

Jimmy shot him a look like he was gonna beat him up, but Maynard wasn’t afraid of Jimmy neither.

“Shut up, Maynard.”

“Let’s see. It don’t look like no cat—”

“I said, shut up!”

I giggled.

“And it ain’t look like no Hoop Snake.”

Jimmy just shot me a look, but he didn’t say nothing. I’d like to say that he was afraid of me because I’d hit him, or because I’d kicked him, or beat him up once, but that wouldn’t be the truth. Truth was it was around that time that I’d cured Missus— of the blisters, and people had already started talking about me. Jimmy wasn’t scared of me. He was scared of The Witch.

I bent over and picked up a stick and poked the Raggity Man through the fence.

“What you doing?”

Maynard said, “She going to wake that fool up, fool.”

Then he picked up a rock and threw it at the fence. Jimmy started kicking the bum, and between the three of us we all finally got the Raggity Man to hollering and crying.

“Leave me be, leave me be!”

We all backed away, and Raggity Man rolled over. His eyes was red and shot through with pain, his face was all scrunched up, and the way he grit his teeth reminded me a dog caught in a trap. I had to force myself not to run while he took us in.

Maynard stepped up to the fence.

“Who you? What you want here?”

Raggity Man’s left leg was all twisted up under him, broke right in two, so he propped himself up on his elbow best he could. Then he pulled that broke leg up from under him an set it out in front, screaming as he done it. He was weeping by the end.

“If I was you, I’d be gone,” said Jimmy. And he was serious. More serious than I ever seen him. It was almost like he was afraid for the man.

“Leg’s broke,” Raggity Man groaned. “I ain’t going nowhere but here. I’m gonna die here lest you youngins go an get me some help.”

I said, “Ain’t nobody going to help you here.”

Raggity Man fixed me a look, and he said, very patient, like I was deaf or stupid, “Girl, I broke my leg. I’m in a horrible pain. Now one ya’ll go an get your mammy before I climb that fence and give you a whopping.”

Jimmy’s back was already ramrod straight, but now he puffed out his chest, and his eyes set hard. Me and Miranda shared a glance, but Maynard, he seemed to relax a little. His eyes softened.

“You ain’t know where you at, do you?”

Raggity Man didn’t said nothing after that, just sat there, thinking. After a while he lay back down in the leaves.

“What we gonna do?” Jimmy hissed at me.

“I know what I’m going to do. I’m going to run on back an get Mama, and we going to get some people out here.”

“Now you’re talking, little girl,” Raggity Man called out, still on his back. “You go on and get your mama. Get me some people out here.”

“You ain’t telling yo mama,” Jimmy said. “Get all the credit. You ain’t going to watch. Nuh-uh, I’m going to tell my mama. I’m going to get all the credit.”

And then he was off, and that’s when the race started.

Out Fence Line way it was all winding dirt roads and pine trees. Us kids’d cut paths through the woods at certain spots for short cuts, and me and Jimmy knew them pretty good. But we ain’t never run through them before, and now we knew why. Branches whipped our faces and hands with every step, and Jimmy and me was grunting, crying out every time a branch switched across our cheeks. Two times Jimmy just ducked out the way of a low, thick one, and two times I got hit in the eye with pine needles.

When we finally bust out onto Ring Road, we was so bloody and covered in bruises you would of thought we’d been tangling with a pack of wild dogs. We was both tired out from the run, and we both bent over right then, chests heaving, agreeing to a unspoken truce so we could each catch our breath.

Jimmy said, “Which way you going?”

I stood up, my heart still beating hard, my lungs burning. I could see what he meant. To the right was Ring Road. It circled round The Ring about two miles, then brought you straight into town, right smack up to Main Gate. But that wasn’t the only way, cause in front of us was The Ring itself.

Both of us knew all the old stories about The Ring. How they was hants in there, old dead zombies from the Battle of The Ring, how there was quicksand and bugs the size of a dog with stingers that’d lance you right through. None of us kids ever dared cut no paths through it cause of them old stories, even if we all knew it was the fastest way from the Fence Line into town. When Jimmy asked me which way I was going, he meant, ‘Are you going through The Ring?’ And it wasn’t no polite question, neither. He meant it as a dare, as a challenge.

Well, I was young enough and stupid enough to be offended by it, and I was too proud to back down. So I drew myself up, took a deep breath and said, “You can take the long way ‘round, you scrawny little redneck. I’m going through The Ring.”

And I didn’t even wait for his reply, I just bust on through the brush and straight in.

I was fine at first. Found one of them old paths, probably something the soldiers used in the battle, and even though it was weedy and grown over, it was there, so I ran down it. The air grew heavy and strong, and the trees blocked out the light of the sun. I knew it was the middle of the day, but it felt like the middle of the night.

I ran along pretty good, only a few scrapes and scratches here and there. The trees didn’t grow close to the path, and they were too tall and mangled and gnarly anyways. Wasn’t a sound neither but the thump thump thump of my feet hitting the ground, and I thought to myself, ‘I’m gonna cream Jimmy by a half hour, at least!’

Of course, just when I was thinking that, my shin hit a log hidden in the brush, sending me straight out in the air for a hundred feet. Well, that’s how it felt. I hit an open patch of path with a thud, right on my chest, knocking the breath straight out of me. I skidded for another foot, skidded on my face, skidded forever, the gravel and rocks and dirt ripping my lip open and blinding my eyes and I felt like it wouldn’t never stop but then finally I did.

I waited for the pain to hit, and when it did it swelled up and over my face, pulsed in my chest and belly, and knotted up in my shin. I rolled over on my back, moaning, barely able to breathe. My ribs felt like someone had hit them with a sledge, and my lungs was paralyzed. I struggled for breath, eyes bugging out, until finally I was able to take a deep one. Ain’t no feeling in the world like getting the wind knocked out of you.

And that’s when I heard the growling.

I sat up straight right then, staring around the clearing with wide, white eyes.

The thing was behind me.

I slowly turned my head back around, my breath coming in quick bursts. The growls increased in volume, and I stared down at the leg that’d hit the log. A bruise the size of a horse swelled up on my shin, and I wondered if I’d be able to run. Where’d that ugly old monster come from in the first place? Then I remembered: the electricity in the fence was down, probably had been for a while. Nasty little devil probably dug underneath it and holed up in here, living off the birds and swamp frogs and lizards and such.

I rose up off the ground as carefully as I could, and as I did the growling got louder, gruffer, meaner. I leaned on my left leg and slowly turned around to face it. My leg was tender, and painful, but I could put my weight on it. If I wanted to live, I’d have to run. Even if I couldn’t, I’d have to.

The thing was all nasty fur and boils and clotted blood and raw skin. Its mouth was sharp teeth and drool; in its black eyes I saw death. Then I heard its voice, clear as a bell in my mind.