Sharyn McCrumb - Zombies of the Gene Pool

"Don't worry, Marion!" whispered Jay. "I'll handle this."

"Howdy," said the man, easing into the booth beside Marion. "Did you all come for the show?"

"No," said Marion. "Is there one?"

"Well, most Thursday nights a few of us get together to do a little pickin'. Have a few beers." He eyed Jay Omega, who was noticeably paler. "Not too awful many knife fights, though," he added.

"We don't want any trouble," said Jay carefully.

Marion looked solemn. "What's a barbarian like you doing in a nice place like this?"

Jay's jaw dropped. "Marion!" he hissed.

She continued her scolding as if he had not spoken. "I mean, we come all the way from southwest Virginia, hoping for a little decent barbecue or some down-home cooking, and what do we find trashing up the place? A goddamned Joyce scholar!" She threw a hush puppy at him.

The bearded man grinned. "Shoot, Marion! What'd you wanna give the game away for? I really had your friend going there, and you know I just love Deliverance suckers!"

"Very funny, Tobe. What if somebody believed in that hillbilly act of yours? You could be perpetuating a stereotype, you know."

The big man sighed. "I reckon I could come in here in a Savile Row suit and a rep tie, and some people would still think the mountains were full of savages."

Jay Omega continued to look puzzled. "Is this the floor show?" he asked.

They laughed at his dismay. "Jay, may I present Tobias J. Crawford of the English department at East Tennessee State University."

"And one of the best clawhammer banjo players in these parts," Dr. Crawford added without a trace of modesty. "A bunch of us old boys from around here get together Thursday nights to play at the Lakecrest. Straight bluegrass. No ballad singing, dulcimer playing, academic storytelling, or Scottish country dancing allowed. Nobody in the group answers to 'Doc,' and the lawyer who plays bass has to tell people he's a truck driver."

Jay blinked. "You're another English professor?"

"That's right," nodded Crawford. "The woods are full of 'em in tourist season. Mostly they're backpacking on the Appalachian Trail, but a few of them are running around with tape recorders trying to pick up an authentic mountain folk song." He grinned. "I once gave a fellow from Carmel, California a bluegrass rendition of 'Because I Could Not Stop for Death,' and told him it was a Child ballad that my great-great-great-grandpappy had brought over from England. He's probably tried to publish it in a journal somewhere by now."

Marion nodded. " 'Because I Could Not Stop for Death.' Very good. And I suppose you sang it to the tune of 'The Yellow Rose of Texas'?"

"Oh, sure. You can sing quite a few of Emily Dickinson's poems to the tune of 'The Yellow Rose of Texas.' "

To Jay Omega's further dismay, the two English scholars proceeded to demonstrate this literary discovery, amid giggles and spoons tapped on beer mugs for percussion. When the tribute to Emily Dickinson was finished, Marion wiped her eyes and attempted to speak. "You should see Tobe at an MLA conference!" she said between gasps. "But it was mean of him to scare you like that. Tobe, this is James Owens Mega, an electrical engineer who writes science fiction."

Crawford stuck out his hand. "Sorry to startle you," he said, "but when I saw you mime that banjo imitation, I knew you were discussing Deliverance, so I figured I'd come on over. We get pretty tired of that hillbilly crap."

Jay smiled. "I know what you mean. I have stereotypes of my own to contend with."

"Jay is the author of Bimbos of the Death Sun," Marion explained.

Tobe Crawford nodded. "That would take some effort to live down, I expect. Science fiction? Are you connected with that reunion going on in Wall Hollow?"

"Yes. Do you know Erik Giles from my department? It turns out that he was C. A. Stormcock, the author of The Golden Gain, who was one of the Lanthanides back in the fifties. He was invited back for the reunion, and because his health is not good we came with him."

Dr. Crawford looked interested. "Has the reunion started yet? There's been a ton of publicity about it. Newspapers, local television. I even saw an article that said A Current Affair was coming in to film it."

"I believe that's true," said Marion. "Did you see the interview with Mistral in People magazine?"

Tobe Crawford shook his head. "I get my news from the Na tional Inquirer" he said solemnly.

Marion made a face at him. "That's right! Make English professors look bad too, while you're at it! Anyway, I wouldn't expect a Joyce scholar to understand a complex field like science fiction, but these writers are very important in their genre, so all this publicity is to be expected."

"I hear that all sorts of movie types will be there. Have you seen any of those guys yet?"

"The Lanthanides are here, but all the business people arrive tomorrow." Marion gave Tobe Crawford a stern look. "I hope you're not thinking of taking your mountain man act on the road. Anyhow, I haven't seen any gullible city slickers. Tonight the writers are having a private party, so we haven't even met them yet."

"I've met them, but it was a long time ago," said Tobe.

"At a science fiction convention?"

"No. I remember when that bunch lived at Dugger's farm. I was just a kid then, so I didn't know any of them very well, but people used to think they were strange. I worked Saturdays in my uncle Bob Mclnturf's store, stocking shelves and sweeping up, and they used to come in every now and then to buy groceries. I figure that time capsule they buried was the pickle jar I gave them."

"Did they tell you what it was for?"

"Not that I recall. We didn't pay much attention to them, on account of them being so odd and keeping to themselves like they did. We knew Dugger's people, of course, and Jim Conyers is a good old boy-for a lawyer-but back then, people kept shy of them. I remember they set off some fireworks one time that damn near started a forest fire. Folks around here were about ready to run them off."

"I think they've mellowed since then," said Jay Omega. "I didn't realize that you came from this part of east Tennessee, Tobe," said Marion. "So people here didn't know that the Lanthanides buried a time capsule?"

"Nobody would have cared. Those guys weren't famous back when I was a kid, so no one was particularly interested in what went on out there, as long as they didn't burn down the mountain." He grinned wolfishly. "A time capsule, huh? Too bad James Joyce didn't bury one of those."

Marion gave him an acid smile. "He'd probably have dumped a box of Scrabble tiles into the canister and let it go at that."

Jay had begun to be afraid that the evening was going to degenerate into an English professors' version of sniper warfare. In his desperation to think of a new topic for discussion, he said, "You're the first local person we've met so far. What do you think of the drawdown?"

Tobias Crawford looked sad. "People hated that lake when they put it in. One old fellow compared the TVA's taking of our valley to the expulsion of the Cherokees on the Trail of Tears. When they announced the drawdown, I thought we'd all be thankful to see that lake gone, even for a couple of weeks, but now I don't know. It sure has dredged up a lot of memories."

"I wonder how it's going at the reunion," said Marion again. "Imagine-all the titans of science fiction in one little village!"

"Well, if they're as great as you say they are, I reckon they picked the right place to get together," said Tobe Crawford. "What do you mean?"

"Wall Hollow. Haven't you heard how it got its name?" Marion shook her head.

"Okay, I'll give you a hint. The present name of the town is a local corruption of the original. The town was settled in the early eighteenth century by German immigrants. Try saying it out loud. Wall Hollow."