The Moonshine War Read online

  Son leaned back against the grain sacks under the window. Looking up at the ceiling he lit a cigarette, wondering if Frank was having a good time, wondering how long he'd be up there.

  When Miley came down, she put the coffee pot on the fire and asked Son if he'd like a cup. He nodded and watched her turn to the stove.

  "You want to go back to Taulbee?"

  He saw her shoulders move. "I guess so. I mean, where else is there to go?"

  "What if something happens to him?" "I don't know."

  "Do you think about it?"

  "Sometimes."

  "What do you think you'd do?"

  Miley turned toward him now. "I guess I'd look around, wait for an offer. Are you making one?"

  "I was just asking."

  "Do you want to go upstairs?" Watching her, Son shook his head.

  "Why, what's the difference between right now and the other day?"

  "Do you see a difference?"

  "I guess so. Or I wouldn't have said it like that."

  "You want to shock me," Son said.

  She nodded, slowly. "Do you know why?" "I'm not sure."

  "Because if you ever made an offer, no matter what it was, I'd probably take it. But you're never going to make an offer. There," Miley said, pausing, then turning to the stove again. "You can take that and do whatever you want with it."

  Son got up from the window. "Pour me a cup," he said. "I'll be back directly."

  Up in the bedroom, Long was sitting on the bed facing the window where the BAR leaned against the sill. He looked over as Son came in. "You want me to clear out?"

  Son went to the window. He stood next to it looking up at the slope. "You remember last night," he said, "you got a shot at the guy by the grave?"

  "I mentioned it was a good idea," Long said, "but would only work once."

  Son looked at him. "What if I got Taulbee and the whole bunch to line up right there." "How?"

  "Tell them where the whiskey is."

  "He wouldn't believe it."

  "I'd go up there and start digging. They see the shaft entrance and the first barrels, they know it's true."

  Long nodded. "While they're standing there I open up with Big Sweetheart."

  "How's it sound?"

  "You're standing there too, buddy."

  "I wait till they're looking in the hole, then I make a run for it."

  "Maybe."

  "As I take off, you open up."

  "I'd have to hit them the first time, wouldn't I? If they get to cover, you're dead."

  "You hit that boy last night."

  "I think I did."

  "But you'd have to be sure I was out of the way."

  "Come on, buddy, you think I'd fire while you was standing there?"

  "I just mention it, Frank."

  Long nodded, squinting as he looked at the later afternoon light filling the window.

  "It would be shooting the works, wouldn't it?

  If I don't hit them, they got the whiskey." Son shrugged. "I don't see any other way." "My, it's a chancy deal though, isn't it?"

  You want to try it?"

  "How do we get the word to him?"

  "Send Miley."

  "I was just getting to know the girl." "You don't have to shoot her."

  "I was hoping not."

  "She'd go out just a little way and call to them I'm coming."

  "Well," Long said, "if you got the nerve, I got the gun."

  Son frowned, making a face. "I hope I got the nerve. Maybe I'd better think about it a little more."

  "What'd you tell me about it for if you don't want do it?"

  "I want to be sure, is all."

  "Well, it's not something anybody can be sure of. Listen, we don't do it soon there won't be enough light. I want to be sure too."

  "Let me study on it awhile."

  "If you don't want to go up there," Long said, "I won't hold it against you, don't worry about that. But if you do want to go, we got to act quick. I mean it's your idea, buddy; it's up to you. I'll tell you what though. I think you can pull it off."

  Son stared out the window, thoughtful. After a moment he said, "Why don't you go down and get some coffee. Let me think about it."

  He remained at the window until the sun was behind the ridge and a shadow lay across the slope and darkened the sandstone wall above the grave. He waited until Long climbed the stairs again and stood in the doorway looking at him.

  Son turned from the window, "I'm ready if you are."

  "You want to do it?"

  "I just made up my mind as you came up the stairs."

  "Just a little too late," Long said.

  "Why? It's still light out."

  "Not over on the slope."

  Son looked out the window. "You can see the post, the grave."

  "But not clear; there ain't enough light."

  Right now, Son told himself and looked over at Long again. "You know what you just said? Not enough light?"

  Long was nodding, beginning to smile. "I was thinking the same thing. There's a light up there. All I got to do, as you start to run, is turn it on."

  "You see any problems?"

  "Not after that," Son answered.

  He waited on the porch, leaning on a shovel, while Miley went out to the edge of the hard-pack, where the path started across the pasture, and called out to Dr. Taulbee.

  She would point to the house and yell out as loud as she could, "He's coming out! He wants to talk to you!" There was no response from the hillside, no sign of movement, but Taulbee must have heard. Miley's voice carried across the pasture, each word hanging sharply clear in the evening stillness.

  Son looked over at the window, at the barrel of the BAR sticking out, at Frank Long and Aaron watching him. "I'll see you," he said, and jumped down from the porch and started off, the shovel pointing up his shoulder. Miley came toward him as she returned to the house.

  "Take care of yourself, all right?"

  "I'll be back," he said, not pausing, walking out to the pasture, his eyes on the trees and brush and the rock outcropping that towered above the grave, holding the slope in its shadow. He watched for signs of them, but saw no one until he was almost to the grave. Then a figure stood up among the rocks, a man pointing a rifle at him. Son kept walking until he reached the low fence around the grave and stepped over it. He saw several more men in the rocks now, but paid no attention to them. He began digging in front of the headstone. After a few minutes he could hear them coming toward him. Pushing the shovel into the earth with his foot, he looked up. Taulbee was coming out of the trees.

  Son straightened now to wait, the handle of the shovel upright in front of him.

  "I hope you're not pulling something," Dr. Taulbee said. "If you are, you're dead."

  Son watched him come up almost to the fence. "I'm showing you where it is," he said, leaning in then throwing out another shovel of dirt. "I'm going to take your offer, a dollar a gallon, and clear out. Then it's up to you what you do with it."

  Dr. Taulbee was in no hurry. He stared at Son, as if trying to see something else behind his words. "You're telling me the whiskey's buried here, in a grave?"

  "It's no grave, it's a mine tunnel. You'll see." He began digging again, aware of Taulbee's men moving in closer. Taulbee placed one foot on the fence and leaned on his thigh as he watched.

  "All of a sudden you just give up, uh?"

  "I don't see any point in dying for whiskey." "What does Frank say about it?"

  "He doesn't have any say. It's my whiskey." "You just suddenly change your mind." "Do you want to listen to me talk or see me dig it up?"

  "Go ahead," Dr. Taulbee said. "We're all anxiously awaiting."

  After a few minutes the blade of the shovel struck something hard. Son cleared the dirt away and lifted out a board. "Look down in there," he said.

  Dr. Taulbee leaned over the fence. "I don't see nothing."

  "Get closer. Down in there you see part of the first barrel."
/>   Taulbee stepped over the fence now to peer into the dark opening. "It might be a barrel. Take some more boards out."

  "I'm giving you the whiskey," Son said. "I'm not going to dig it out for you. What you see is the end of a ditch that leads over there to the shaft entrance, where the slope gets steeper.

  "I got to see more of it," Dr. Taulbee said, " 'fore I know for sure what you're selling me."

  Son looked right at him. "You got a flashlight?"

  "Over at the house."

  Now Son's eyes raised to the post. "Well, there's a light right here we can use." Taulbee looked up, squinting. "Turn it on." As Son stepped over the fence he said quickly, "Where you think you're going?" Son half-turned. "To get the light put on." "You can't work it here?"

  "No, the switch's in the house. I got to holler for somebody to turn it on." Son started down the slope, feeling Taulbee and the men with the guns watching him.

  "Hey," Taulbee called out. "That's far enough!"

  Son stopped. "They won't hear me less I get a little closer." He started walking again, taking his time, moving steadily down the slope. When Taulbee called again, he kept walking, holding to the same pace.

  "You hear me!" Taulbee yelled.

  Son kept going.

  "Another step, boy, we shoot!"

  Son came to a halt facing the house across the pasture, a deserted-looking house, the two front windows dark squares in the shadow of the porch. He wanted to look around, to see how far he was from the grave. He could feel Taulbee and his men standing by the mound, all of them facing this way. Son didn't look back.

  He called out, "Hey, Frank!" He was aware of the cars and the people on the ridge, way off to the right.

  His eyes remained on the house. He was thinking, if you started running right now--there's a chance.

  But then he said to himself, get your head out of the covers, boy. And he yelled, "Hey, Frank--turn on the light!"

  There was a moment he would remember that stood alone, motionless, in dead silence. The moment ended and the hillside behind him exploded.

  Frank Long's hand was still on the light switch as the sound rocked across the pasture and filled the hollows. As he looked out, the explosion shook the house and he saw the hill blown apart in a jarring string of eruptions that lifted smoke and earth into the air and billowed out to envelop the lone figure on the slope. As he watched, as the smoke thinned and rose against the sky, the first thing Long noticed was the outcropping of rock that crowned the heights of the ridge. Through the haze of dust he saw that the face of the wall was altered. Rock and brush had come sliding down in the explosion and now covered the upper part of the slope. There was no sign of the grave or Dr. Taulbee or his men.

  The figure on the lower part of the slope was looking toward the rocks.

  Long was outside before he noticed the people coming down from the ridge. A few remained by the cars, but most of them had started for the pasture, coming in straggling groups, coming almost hesitantly, but coming.

  They stood looking past Son at the rubble covering the slope, at the place that had been a grassy hillside and the site of a grave. When he turned and walked down the grade toward them, they continued to gaze off beyond him and above him, staring solemnly in the dust haze.

  Bud Blackwell seemed about to speak, looking at Son for a moment, but said nothing.

  Frank Long was the only one who spoke. He said, "After all that work, uh?"

  Son didn't answer. He was aware of Long and the others as he walked past them toward the house. Without looking at anyone directly, he was aware of familiar faces, the Black-wells, the Worthmans, and Stampers; Lowell Holbrook standing awkwardly; Miley Mitchell, alone, watching him; Aaron on the porch, holding onto a post, waiting for him. He wondered if Kay was here, though he didn't look for her among the solemn faces.

  Son walked on until he was almost to the yard. It was here that he stopped and looked back and said, "I got a half barrel and some fruit jars if anybody feels the need."

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