Nicola Barker - Behindlings

Jo grabbed a hold of Utah Blaine and turned to the back cover where she inspected the synopsis, keenly. (Nah. This was just too easy. This was just… this was silly.)

Okay. Set in a town called Red Creek where some poor bastard called Joe Neal had been lynched by a nasty bunch of land-grabbers… then… Utah Blaine, a stranger, rolls into town objecting to the misuse of vigilante law… Bad guys, locals mainly, are led by some greedy, low-down, cowboy killer called Clell –

Clell?

— Clell Miller…

Blah, blah, blah

— Nothing particularly riveting. All standard, hard-knuckled Western fare, basically.

Jo frowned, turning the book over. Inside flap?

Nope. Paperback. So where would L’Amour’s biographical details be? First page? Preface?

She inspected the first page. Another brief plot summary… No biographical details to speak of… Only –

Uh…

— second page in, next to the copyright, some vague reference to how L’Amour first published under the pseudonym Jim Mayo –

Jim Mayo?

Jo casually perused the front preface again. Hmmn. Some pretty average writing interspersed by the occasional striking description of — say — an angry cowboy with a face ‘red as a piece of raw beef–

Yik

— making threats against Blaine…

Blah, blah…

— more stuff about Joe Neal’s ranch; the 46 Range…

The…?

Oh Fuck

She glanced up, guiltily. Did anyone…? Did…?

Bollocks. Hooch

— Hooch was staring at her.

Had he…?

Jo closed the book and rapidly turned to the next one. She picked it up, inspected it, thumbed through it, began reading, randomly, smiling to herself, goofily, as if she got some real thrill out of all this cowboy twaddle.

Glanced up again –

Bugger

— Hooch was coming over. He was clutching his own paperback which he’d already flipped through, twice, in a desultory manner. Jo rested her right elbow on the front cover of Utah Blaine. She began talking, even as he approached her.

‘I notice L’Amour initially published under the pseudonym Jim Mayo,’ she said (as if keen to exchange everything, like a real team player).

Hooch wasn’t taken in. He scowled as he pulled out a chair at the tiny table but then thought twice about sitting down on it.

‘Mayo? You think that means something too?’

Jo shrugged, ‘Who’s to say?’

‘Well I’m not getting anywhere with this.’

Hooch showed Jo his own paperback: Showdown at Yellow Butte.

Jo half-smiled, ‘ Yellow Butte? That’s some purdy title you got yourself there, Hooch.’

Used his name

Hooch was neither disarmed nor amused. ‘I think you probably pronounce it boot. It’s a geographical location.’

‘Nah…’ Jo took the book from him and flipped through it, casually, ‘… it’d be like the butt of a gun, surely?’

‘That doesn’t have an e.’

‘Are you certain?’

He was certain. ‘In actual fact,’ he continued (she grinned, internally), ‘the word probably has its earliest application in the form of a large Roman cask, or butt — as in water butt — then subsequently in the guise of the mound or hill behind a target — another common usage — which, presumably, leads on to the notion of a person being the butt — of a joke, or whatever. In other words, they are the thing behind the target. The mound. The hillock. Or in that particular instance, the object behind the joke…’

‘… The fool, the pillock…’

Jo smiled, winningly. Hooch frowned, snatching the book back again, ‘In terms of etymology, pillock’d probably have its origin in pillory. But that’s an entirely spontaneous guess. Don’t quote me on it.’

She pursed her lips. This man was hard work.

‘So, did you find anything of further interest in your…’

Hooch craned his neck to try and inspect the scope of Jo’s L’Amour bounty.

Jo removed her elbow from Utah Blaine, turned it onto its back, and read out brief sections from the synopsis in suitably disengaged tones… ‘Man called Joe Neal is lynched by land-grabbers in a town called Red Creek… uh…’

She quickly moved on to the other two books and did the same again.

‘What we need,’ she continued — on finishing — and slightly more emphatically, ‘is some kind of biographical insight into L’Amour’s life. But does such a thing even exist, I wonder?’

‘You reckon?’

Hooch’s enthusiasm was already waning.

‘Doc, I noticed,’ Jo continued, ‘has a copy of L’Amour’s first book, Hondo, and it’s in hardback, which means it’ll probably have more biographical stuff on the back jacket flap. Then there’s always the internet, obviously…’

‘I guess so.’ Hooch shrugged, boredly, turning to stare at Doc — who was perched on a stool, in the corner — then at Wesley, who was, that very moment, throwing down a pen, pushing a slip of paper over the counter-top towards the librarian, bending down to stroke the dog, then turning, waving, leaving.

Jo watched too. She watched the librarian. The librarian seemed rather agitated. She was reading whatever it was that Wesley had written onto the slip. She seemed surprised. Involved. Taken aback. Jo wished she might take a peek at the message herself. The librarian’s hands were shaking slightly as she quickly shoved it under the counter. It was plainly something fairly electrifying.

What could it be?

‘See how much that dog dotes on him?’ Hooch murmured, not focussing on the librarian but on Wesley — always on Wesley.

‘Pardon?’ Jo turned back to face him again.

‘Straight behind him — see? — out of the library. Always does it. Worships him. Terriers have no loyalty. I hate that. I loathe dogs, actually…’ Hooch paused, then slowly pronounced the word canine, under his breath, his lips pulled back from his teeth like an anxious chimpanzee. It was exceptionally unappealing.

Jo frowned, then peered after Wesley. Sure enough, the dog had followed him, stuck tight to his heels through the swing doors and disappeared without even a cursory backward glance towards his master.

Doc was still busy reading Hondo, but he’d noticed. He closed the book, pushed it away, waved at Hooch, then did a finger-walking motion with his left hand. He seemed unperturbed by Dennis’s inconstancy. Hooch nodded, throwing his own book down onto the table and strolling off to grab his coat from the back of his chair.

Jo was watching Eileen, as she carefully assisted Patty in filling out his form. She glanced furtively around her, grabbed Utah Blaine, stood up — the book still in her hand — and slid it slowly — almost distractedly — down the fabric above her pocket. Good… good… The book was sliding in. It was slipping in, it was almost… it was very nearly…

Damn

She was just about home-free, when something stopped her. Or someone –

Shoes

— the bloody Geordie, of all people — had suddenly materialised behind her, his plump, dirty hand had slipped around her wrist and firmly wrested the book from her fingers.

‘That’s no way to go about things,’ he whispered softly, (his breath on her neck, the scratch of damp mohair on her wrist), ‘not in a small community like this. The Behindlings have a code of… well…’

He spoke louder, ‘I’m getting a couple of these out on loan. You can always borrow one later if you feel the need.’