Joe Lansdale - The Best of Joe R. Lansdale

“Sure faster right now,” Frank said.

As they rode up, they saw Old Man Torrence on the front porch with his wife and three kids, two boys and a girl. Torrence was a fat, ruddy-faced man. His wife was a little plump, but pretty. His kids were all nice looking and they, unlike Leroy’s kids, had their hair combed, and looked clean. Coming closer, Frank could see that none of the kids looked whacked on. They were laughing at something the mother was saying. It certainly was different than from his own upbringing, different from Leroy’s place. Wasn’t anyone tripping anyone,

cussing, tossing frying pans, threatening to cripple one another or put out an eye. Thinking on this, Frank felt something twist around inside of him like some kind of serpent looking for a rock to slide under.

He and Leroy got off Dobbin and tied him to a little hitching post that was built out front of the house, took off their hats, and walked up to the steps.

After being offered lemonade, which they turned down, Old Man Torrence came off the porch, ruffling one of his kid’s hair as he did. He smiled back at his wife, and then walked with Frank and Leroy out toward the mule pen, Leroy explaining what they had in mind.

“You want to rent my mule? What if I wanted to run him?”

“Well, I don’t know,” Leroy said. “It hadn’t occurred to me you might. You ain’t never before, though I heard tell he was a mule could be run.”

“It’s a good mule,” Torrence said. “Real fast.”

“You’ve ridden him?” Frank asked.

“No. I haven’t had the pleasure. But my brother and his boys have. They borrow him from time to time, and they thought on running him this year. Nothing serious. Just a thought. They say he can really cover ground.”

“Frank here,” Leroy said, “plans on entering the mule race, and we would like to rent your mule. If we win, we could give you a bit of the prize money. What say we rent him for ten, and if he wins, we give you another fifteen. That way you pick up twenty-five dollars.”

Frank was listening to all this, thinking this purse I haven’t won yet is getting smaller and smaller.

“And if he don’t win?” Torrence asked.

“You’ve made ten dollars,” Leroy said.

“And I got to take the chance my mule might go lame or get hurt or some such. I don’t know. Ten dollars, that’s not a lot of money for what you’re asking. It ain’t even your mule.”

“Which is why we’re offering the ten dollars,” Leroy said.

They went over and leaned on the fence and looked at the great mule, watched his muscles roll beneath his chocolate flesh as he trotted nervously about the pen.

“He looks excitable,” Frank said.

“Robert E. Lee has just got a lot of energy is all,” Torrence said.

“He’s named Robert E. Lee?” Frank asked.

“Best damn general ever lived. Tell you boys what. You give me twenty-five, and another twenty-five if he wins, and you got a deal.”

“But I give you that, and Leroy his share, I don’t have nothing hardly left.”

“You ain’t got nothing at all right now,” Torrence said.

“How’s about,” Leroy said, “we do it this way. We give you fifteen, and another fifteen if he wins. That’s thirty. Now that’s fair for a rented mule. Hell, we might could go shopping, buy a mule for twenty-five, and even if he don’t win, we got a mule. He don’t race worth a damn, we could put him to plow.”

Old Man Torrence pursed his lips. “That sounds good. All right,” he said sticking out his hand, “deal.”

“Well, now,” Frank said, not taking the hand. “Before I shake on that, I’d like to make sure he can run. Let me ride him.”

Old Man Torrence withdrew his hand and wiped it on his pants as if something had gotten on his palm. “I reckon I could do that, but seeing how we don’t have a deal yet, and ain’t no fifteen dollars has changed hands, how’s about I ride him for you. So you can see.”

Frank and Leroy agreed, and watched from the fence as Torrence got the equipment and saddled up Robert E. Lee. Torrence walked Robert E. Lee out of the lot, and onto a pasture atop the hill, where the overhang was. The pasture was huge and the grass was as green as Ireland. It was all fenced in with barb wire strung tight between deeply planted posts.

“I’ll ride him around in a loop. Once slow, and then real fast toward the edge of the overhang there, then cut back before we get there. I ain’t got a pocket watch, so you’ll have to be your own judge.”

Torrence swung into the saddle. “You boys ready?”

“Let’er rip,” Leroy said.

Old Man Torrence gave Robert E. Lee his heels. The mule shot off so fast that Old Man Torrence’s hat flew off, and Leroy, in sympathy, took hold of the brim of the seed salesman’s hat, as if Robert E. Lee’s lunge might blow it off his head.

“Goddamn,” Leroy said. “Look how low that mule is to the ground. He’s goin’ have the grass touching his belly.”

And so the mule ran, and as it neared the barb wire fence, Old Man Torrence gave the mule a tug, to turn him. But, Robert E. Lee wasn’t having any. The critter’s speed picked up, and the barb wire fence came closer.

Leroy said, “Uh oh.”

Robert E. Lee hit the fence hard. So hard it caused his head to dip over the top wire and his ass to rise up as if he might be planning a head stand. Over the mule flipped, tearing loose the fence, causing a strand of wire to snap and strike Old Man Torrence just as he was thrown ahead of the tumbling mule. Over the overhang. Out of sight. The mule did in fact do a headstand, landed hard that way, its hind legs high in the air, wiggling. For a moment, it seemed as if he might hang there, and then, Robert E. Lee lost his headstand and went over after his owner.

“Damn,” Leroy said.

“Damn,” Frank said.

They both ran toward the broken fence. When they got there Frank hesitated, not able to look. He glanced away, back across the bright green field.

Leroy scooted up to the cliff’s edge and took a gander, studied what he saw for a long time.

“Well?” Frank said, finally turning his head back to Leroy.

“Robert E. Lee just met his Gettysburg. And Old Man Torrence is somewhere between Gettysburg and Robert E. Lee… Actually, you can’t tell which is which. Mule, Gettysburg, or Old Man Torrence. It’s all kind of bunched up.”

When Frank and Leroy got down there, which took some considerable time, as they worked their way down a little trail on foot, they discovered that Old Man Torrence had been lucky in a fashion. He had landed in sand, and the force of Robert E. Lee’s body had driven him down deep into it, his nose poking up and out enough to take in air. Robert E. Lee was as dead as a three-penny nail, and his tail was stuck up in the air and bent over like a flag that had been broken at the staff. The wind moved the hairs on it a little.

Frank and Leroy went about digging Old Man Torrence out, starting first with his head so he could breathe better. When Torrence had spat enough sand out of his mouth, he looked up and said, “You sonsabitches. This is your fault.”

“Our fault?” Leroy said. “You was riding him.”

“You goat fucking bastard-child, get me out of here.”

Leroy’s body sagged a little. “I knew that was gonna get around good. Ain’t nobody keeps a secret. There was only that one time too, and them hunters had to come up on me.”

They dug Torrence out from under the mule, and Frank went up the trail and got Old Dobbin and rode to the doctor. When Frank got back with the sawbones, Torrence was none the happier to see him. Leroy had gone off to the side to sit by himself, which made Frank think maybe the business about the goat had come up.