Joe Lansdale - Edge of Dark Water

When we finished eating, none of us was eager to get back on the raft, though there wasn’t a discussion about it. We just sat there thinking to ourselves, and not saying anything. Terry took a clean white cloth sack from his goods and opened the box with May Lynn in it, poured the ashes into the bag, and tied it off.

Mama said, “Is that…her?”

“Yep,” I said.

Terry stored the bag and we all went back to sitting and not talking. Then as we sat, we was startled by a voice.

“What are you doing here?”

I leaped to my feet, along with everyone else but Mama, who once she got seated was slow to move.

It was a man standing on the rise above us. He had the sun at his back, so all we could make out was a dark human shape. It was like the light behind him was coming out of him, shooting into the sky.

“Did you build your raft?” the shape asked.

“What was that?” I asked.

“I said did you build your raft?”

“We kind of borrowed it,” I said.

“It looks like that raft upriver,” the shape said. “The one tied out to a stump.”

“It does look a lot like it,” Terry said.

“They practically twins,” Jinx said.

“I’m pretty sure that’s the same raft,” the voice said, and the man moved down the slope toward us. As he did, with the hill at his back, and the sun hanging more above than behind him now, we got a chance to check him over good.

He was tall and thin with that kind of yellow hair that when it grays just looks more blond; the sunlight showed us that his hair had started to do just that, around the temples and at the front. There didn’t seem to be any oil in it, and it had most likely been slicked back wet with water and had sun dried. The wind moved it around on his head like old corn shucks.

He was wearing a white shirt and black pants muddy at the bottom, and some worn shoes that folded over on the sides. He was maybe in his forties and nice-looking. He smiled and showed us he had all his teeth. In my world, finding someone with all their teeth, both ears, and their nose on straight by the time they reached forty was as rare as finding a watermelon in a hen’s nest. Mama was an exception, and of course all three of us kids, but we still had a pretty good hike to go before we made forty, if we did, and Mama was still a few years off of it herself, though she treated her teeth well and was good about keeping herself washed and her few clothes clean.

As he came down the hill he kept smiling. He wasn’t a big fellow, and I figured after what I had seen Jinx do when she was mad, if he got to be a bother, we could just sic her on him with a boat paddle.

When he was down close, he turned his head and looked at Mama. It was like a fire lit up behind his eyes. I looked at her, too. She looked very pretty that morning. Like a goddess on a trip, recovering from an illness. Her long, dark hair was glossy in the sun, her face white as oats. Her head was turned up to look, and except for her sad eyes, she seemed much younger than her thirty-something years. I always knew she was pretty, but in that moment I realized she was beautiful, and I knew then why Don had wanted her, why my father had loved her. I wished I was as pretty as she was.

“We took the raft cause we had to,” Mama said.

“I’m not in the judging business,” the man said. “I think too many people are judged. Though I have to say, ‘Thou shall not steal.’”

“Ain’t nothing says ‘Thou shall not borrow,’’ Jinx said.

The man smiled, and all of a sudden I knew what I should have known right off when I seen what he was wearing and his muddy pants bottoms. He was the preacher that had done the baptism.

He came down closer, and when he did, I eased over close to a pretty good-sized rock that was by the water, measured in my head if I could throw it fast enough and hard enough to bean him a good one on the noggin, if things called for it. But he didn’t show any need for that. He came down smiling and stood by the water and put a hand to his chin and gave our raft a real good once-over.

“It’s hard to steer, isn’t it?” he said.

“A little,” Terry said.

“More than a little,” Jinx said. “It’s as ornery as a Shetland pony.”

“Oh, those Shetlands bite,” the preacher said. “I can tell you that.”

“It’s a raft,” Terry said. “Not a pony.”

“Yes,” the preacher said, “but the young girl and myself were speaking metaphorically.”

“Got that, Terry?” Jinx said. “That’s how we was speaking.”

“I understand that,” Terry said. “But I’m not speaking metaphorically.”

The man turned his smile on Mama. “Are all these but the little colored girl your family?”

“Only Sue Ellen,” she said, and nodded in my direction. “The others are friends of my daughter.”

“And friends of yours?” he asked.

“I suppose they are,” Mama said. “Yes. They’re friends of mine.”

“Well, now, I suppose if they are friends of a lady lovely as yourself, then they should be friends of mine. I’m Reverend Jack Joy. The last name is real. I didn’t make that up for religious reasons, though I certainly see myself as a man of joy, eager to raise a joyful noise in the name of the Lord.”

“I’m Helen Wilson,” Mama said, “and that’s my daughter, Sue Ellen, and the colored girl is Jinx and the young man is Terry.”

“No last names for you two?” he said, smiling at them, which is a thing he did plenty of.

“First names are fine,” Terry said.

I realized then that Mama might have been a little too eager to share, us being fugitives and all.

“It’s turning off a hot day,” Reverend Joy said. “Would you like to come up to my house and have some tea? One of my flock, not a half hour ago, brought me a block of ice that she carried in her car all the way from Marvel Creek, about half of it melting into the floorboard before she got to me. And she brought a platter of fried chicken. Ice and chicken are all laid out in the icebox. If there’s enough ice, I might could churn some ice cream, though I can’t make promises there.”

“What you doing down by the river, then, if you got all that up there?” Jinx said.

“I wasn’t hungry yet, and I came to see if the water was up. I was thinking about a little fishing later, and I wanted to see how the water was.”

“How is it?” I asked.

“High. Come on up and have something. It’s a good reason to get away from the river and the sun for a while. I didn’t really want to fish all that bad anyhow.”

“We just ate,” I said.

“Just the tea, then,” he said.

“We got to be on our way,” I said.

“I understand you being cautious,” Reverend Joy said, “you people not knowing me. But I’ve been a reverend in these parts here for two years, and so far, I haven’t shot or eaten anybody.”

“It is turning off hot,” Mama said, smoothing her hair. “I could have a glass of tea, and hold something to eat in abeyance. Maybe that ice cream.”

I looked at Mama, surprised. She was flirting. I had never seen her do it, but I had seen May Lynn go at it, and she was a master, so I recognized it for what it was. Still, Mama doing it was as strange to me as if I had looked into the mirror and discovered for the first time that I was actually a hippopotamus wearing a derby hat.

“Good, then,” Reverend Joy said. “I’ll just lead the way.”

“We can’t leave the raft,” I said.

“Sure you can,” Reverend Joy said. “It’s tied off good. And after we have some refreshment, I’ve got a bit of lumber and such, and I think we can make you a rudder. You’re going to go down the river, a rudder would make it a whole lot easier to control your craft. Way I figure, the current, which is strong there, pulled you right off the main river. After you have something cold, maybe a bite to eat, you can set right off again.”