James Cain - The Butterfly

By his navel was the butterfly.

When I got back to the cabin both girls were up the road with Danny, saying good-by to a woman that lived up the creek. Jane had on a dress, but Kady had on nothing but shoes and stockings and pants, with nothing over them but a blue checked apron she had slipped on to go out in. I waited while the woman, that was named Liza Minden, told it how she had known all the Blounts before Wash’s father had owned a mine or anything, and how they were wonderful people, and Kady was going to like them fine. And the more she went on, the crazier I got. I took down my rifle and loaded it, and waited some more. Then I went to the window — and leveled it, and drew a bead on her. I meant to shoot her through the heart for what she was, a rotten little slut that would even go to bed with her own father if he would let her, and that had already gone to bed with her mother’s lover, and was getting ready to marry a boy that was no more relation to the child she said was his than a possum was. But when I sighted the gun I couldn’t pull the trigger. I went outside, so I wouldn’t see her any more, and my feet lifted high off the ground when I walked, like I had just been hung and was dancing on air.

“Jess, you’re crazy.”

“No, I’m not.”

“Everybody’s got birthmarks.”

“Wash, if the birthmark was all, I might not pay any attention to it either. But it’s not. Ever since Jane got here and found the boy in his shack, I’ve been trying to figure out why he kidnapped him, and so have you and so has everybody. Ever since Belle came in that night, I’ve been trying to figure out what she was doing there, and since she tried to kill Moke, I’ve been trying to figure out why. So have you, so has Jane, so has everybody. All right, now we know. He kidnapped Danny because Danny’s his child, and he knew it from the birthmark and so did Belle, and so did Kady. But Jane got him back, and then Kady had the chance to marry you, if she could ever keep it dark about this other thing. But Belle knew Moke better than anybody else knew him. She knew if it was the last chance he had, Moke would spill it. And she didn’t have much longer to live anyhow, so she came up here to stop him, the only way she knew. And what the hell do you mean, everybody has birthmarks? How could a baby and a man have a birthmark like that and it not mean anything?”

He was sitting on the edge of the bed in his hotel room, all dressed for the wedding except for his coat, that was on the back of a chair with a carnation in the buttonhole, and two boxes of flowers in the same chair. He lit a cigarette and smoked a long time. Then he said: “Listen, Jess, it just can’t be true. In the first place she’s not that kind of a girl. And if she was that kind of a girl, she couldn’t be that kind of a girl with Moke. And he’s old enough to be her father. He’s almost as old as you are, Jess.”

“He’s thirty-nine.”

“Then she couldn’t fool around with him.”

“Yes, she could.”

“Jess, I say she couldn’t.”

He snapped that at me with a killer light in his eye, and I don’t know what kind of a look I had in my eye when I slung it back at him, but it must have said something, because he staggered back against the wall and said, “Jesus Christ.”

“You think I’m just fooling?”

He lit another cigarette and thought a while, and said: “Then I’ve got to kill him, Jess.”

“That I won’t let you do.”

“I wasn’t asking you.”

“You don’t know where he is and I won’t tell you and even if you did know you couldn’t get to him without a guide. And by the time you find one, if you can find one, he’ll be dead, because I’m going to kill him on my way back.”

“She’s the mother of my—”

He broke off and looked at me, and I think it was the first time he got it through his head, the meaning of what I had told him.

“I really got nothing to do with it, have I?”

“Not a thing in this world.”

“Unless— ”

“You killed her , is that it?”

He didn’t answer me. He just went and looked out the window, but that was what he had started to say. “Well, Wash, I tried it, but I couldn’t.”

“I could.”

“Him, that’ll be different.”

There came a ring on his buzzer and he opened the door. It was his father and mother. His father was tall, like he was, with gray hair and a brown, sunburned face. But his mother was pink and pretty and sweet, and went over to him and kissed him and asked if the bride was here, and where was the baby, and lots more stuff like that. He said who I was, and both of them shook hands, and said they had hoped I’d be able to get to the wedding.

“There won’t be any wedding, Mom.”

“What?”

“Sorry you took the trip for nothing. Now we’re going home.”

When I got near the bend I stopped, hid the truck back of the old filling station, got the rifle out, and crossed the creek on the pillars of the old bridge. I kept on up on the other side, keeping under the cliff and out of sight from above till I came to the path. Then I crept up the mountainside without making any noise at all. When I came to the drift I went in, opened the tool chest, refilled the lamp, lit it, and set it down. I cut off about six feet of fuse, rolled it up, and stuck it in my pocket. I put a box of caps in there with it. I stuck a couple of sticks of dynamite in my pocket on the other side. Then I went on in. When I came to the shaft I laid out powder, fuse, and caps on a scaffold, and put my shoes beside them, tied to a scantling against rats. Then I picked up the rifle and started up the ladder. When I lifted my head out he had moved, with the sun, about six feet away from where he had been before, but that put him facing me more, and made it better. He was eating beans out of a can with his knife, and I let him finish them up before I raised my gun. I drew my bead right on the butterfly. He doubled up when I pulled the trigger, and held on to his stomach, and kicked like a cat trying to shake papers off its feet, and drew his breath in and out fast like a dog in the summer time, except instead of heat that made him do that, it was pain. That suited me fine. I stepped out, picked up his rifle from where he had set it down to eat, and sat down to watch him twitch.

“You dirty son of a bitch.”

“Hello, Moke.”

“God, that would be like you, Jess, to shoot me in the belly and then go on and leave me here to die.”

“Oh, I wouldn’t go off and leave you, if that’s all that’s worrying you. There’s buzzards up there, and I couldn’t have them flying around to tip anybody off.”

“Couldn’t you shoot me through the heart?”

“I shoot you where you got it coming.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“I let you off once, because I thought neither you nor the woman was worth it. But now you went too far, and I got to tach you to lay off my daughter.”

“Your what?”

“You heard me.”

“Say, that’s a joke.”

“I shot you in the butterfly. That’s what little Danny’s got, isn’t it? Isn’t that what you did for your country? Leave a poor little kid that’s birthmarked like you? Well, you don’t do it with my daughter and live to tell about it.”

“Kady never done nothing with me.”

“I’ll attend to her, later.”

“You going to attend to Danny?”

“I’ll take care of him, anyway.”

“You like Danny, don’t you?”

“That’s none of your damned business.”

“The hell it’s not. Yeah, you’ll attend to Kady. You’ll hit her with a harness trace, and put her out, and act just like you always acted, with that religion-crazy disposition you got. But you won’t put Danny out, oh no. You’ll keep him, and let Jane take care of him, because you’re crazy about him. No matter what she done, he’s yours. Kady’s nothing but a woman, and you never knew how to treat one. But Danny, oh yes, I seen you with him up there yesterday, when Belle was dying. You never seen nothing as pretty as he is, did you? He’s yours, no matter what Kady done. He’s your grandchild, ain’t he? Well now you get it, you rotten, belly-shooting, dumb son of a bitch. He’s not yours. He’s mine.”