Cormac McCarthy - Outer Dark

Tain’t bleedin much, he said. Just let me bind him — reaching to his hip and drawing forth in garish foliation a scarlet and blue bandana.

Don’t use that, the woman said. You ain’t got nary othern now. Here. She was bending and ripped loose a long strip of muslin from the bundled quilt in the floor of the wagon.

Give it here then, the man said, reaching backward with one hand. He propped the boy’s knee in his lap, squatting in the road, took the cloth and wrapped it and tied it. The boy hobbled to his feet and inspected the job before easing the leg of his trousers down. They mounted to the box and the man chucked up the sleeping mule and they went on, the boy upright on the seat, pilloried and stoic, the man slumped and brooding, and behind them the five women prim and farcical on their housechairs.

It was near noon when they came into the town, the mule’s thinshod hoofs going suddenly loud on the banked cobbles up to the rail crossing, one clear steel ring of his shoe on the polished bar and down again and again muted and dull in the unpaved street along which stood tethered an assortment of rigs with mules or horses and alike only in their habitude of dust and age and patience, the man now guiding the mule toward them with small tugs at the rein until they veered beneath the shade of what scantleaved trees lined the mall there and came to rest.

Well, he said, we here.

She was first down, holding the bundle to her chest and extending a hand to the grandmother who rose and looked about with disapproval before taking up the amplitude of dress that hung before her, ignoring the hand, gripping the rim of the high rear wheel and coming down it backwards ladderwise and expertly, alighting in the road and brushing down her skirts again and glaring out from beneath her dark bonnet fearfully.

The man had the rope from the wagon and was casting about for something to tie it to. The two girls and the woman were coming down the other side. She adjusted her belongings and spoke to the man:

I sure do thank ye for the good supper and bed and the ride in and all.

You welcome, he said. We just fixin to take dinner now so don’t be in no rush.

Well I best get on and get started.

You welcome to take dinner with us, the woman said.

I thank ye but I best get on.

Well. We’ll be goin back early of the evenin if you want to ride with us.

I thank ye, she said, but I reckon I’ll be goin on.

The man was tapping a loop of the rope in one hand. The woman was holding the quilt in her arms like a child. All right, the woman said, and the man said: Do you ever pass this way again just stay with us.

She entered the first store she came to and went straight down the cluttered aisle to the counter where a man stood waiting.

You seen that tinker? she said.

I beg your pardon?

You welcome. That tinker. He been thew here?

I don’t know, the man said. I don’t know what tinker it is you’re talkin about.

Well, she said. It’s just a old tinker. Have you seen ary tinkers a-tall come thew here.

Mam we got a better line here than any tinker carries and price is more reasonable too. Just what all was it you was interested in?

I ain’t wantin to buy nothin. I’m just a-huntin this here tinker.

Well you won’t find him in here.

You don’t know where he might of got to or nothin?

I don’t keep up with no tinkers. You might try Belkner’s. Some of them stocks there I would reckon. They shoddy enough.

Where is it at?

Cross the street and up about five doors. Big sign, hardware.

I thank ye, she said.

You welcome.

The boy caught up with her crossing the street, limping fast and looking harried. Hold up a minute, he said. Listen.

She stopped and shaded her eyes against the sun.

I slipped off, he said. Listen, you want to go to that show tonight?

What show is that?

Some show they havin. I got money.

How you aim to get back home? Your folks ain’t goin to lay over for no show.

That’s all right, he said. I can get back. I’ll tell em somethin. You want to go?

I cain’t, she said.

How come?

I just cain’t. I got some things I got to do.

You ain’t no schoolteacher are ye?

No.

Well. Do you not hold with goin to shows?

I ain’t never been to nary. I don’t reckon they’s nothin wrong with it.

He had his hands in the rear pockets of his canvas pants. In the powdered dust of the street he had created a small amphitheatre with the sole of one shoe. I don’t see why ye cain’t go, he said. You a widder didn’t I hear ye say?

Yes.

Well. You ain’t got ary beau have ye?

No, she said.

Well.

She watched him curiously. She had not taken her hand from above her eyes.

Well, I don’t see why all ye cain’t go.

I just cain’t, she said.

Won’t, he said.

No.

Looky here. He drew forth from his pocket a deep leather purse, the brass catches grown with a bilegreen crust. He coyly slid a sheaf of bills out and riffled them before her. She watched. She let her hand fall to the bundle at her breast, blinking in the sun. He worked the money. It’s a bunch of it ain’t it? he said. Bet you ain’t never …

I got to go, she said.

Here, wait up a minute.

She mounted the wooden walkway and went up the street.

Hey, he called.

She kept on. He stood in the street with his mouth working dryly and the purse in his hand with the money peeking out.

Yes, the man said. They is one stocks here. Name of Deitch. Is that the one you was a-huntin?

I never did know his name, she said.

Well what did he look like?

I ain’t able to say that neither, she said. I never knowed they was all different kinds.

The man leaned slightly over the counter and focused his eyes for a moment somewhere about her middle. She lowered her arms and looked away toward the sunbright windows at the front of the store.

What was it you wanted with him? the man said.

He’s got somethin belongs to me I got to get from him.

And what is that?

I cain’t tell ye.

You don’t know that either.

I mean I know it but I cain’t tell it.

Well I just thought maybe he could leave it here for ye.

Well, she said, it wouldn’t keep. Sides I don’t know as that is the feller. He ain’t got no little chap with him is he?

I don’t know, the man said. But I don’t see how you goin to find him and you not knowin his name nor nothin.

I reckon I’ll just have to hunt him, she said.

Well, I hope ye luck.

I thank ye.

Yes. Listen, maybe you could leave word if you wanted, write it down and I’d give it to him if it was a secret and then if it was him he’d know and could …

He don’t know me neither, she said.

He don’t.

No sir.

Well.

It’s all right. I never meant to put ye out none. And I do thank ye for your trouble.

Yes the man said. He watched her go, his jaw slightly ajar. Before she reached the door he called to her. She turned, mantled by the noon light that came crooked through the bleary panes of glass.

Yes, she said.

Do you want me to tell him that you’re huntin him? Or that they is somebody huntin him? Or that …

No, she said. I’d take it as a favor if you’d not say nothin to him a-tall.

The cowbell clanked over the door, and again, faint and dimly pastoral in the iron gloom of the shop. He shook his head in great doubt.

When she approached they were all sitting in the wagon eating.

Howdy, the man said. Did ye get your errands run?

Yessir, she said.

Did ye find him?

No sir. He never came thisaway I don’t believe. I ast.