Chris Offutt - The Good Brother

“Now, no.”

“Half, then,” Joe said. “It’s in that poke setting on top of the woodpile.”

Orben propped his rifle on a log and opened the sack. He ate most of the sandwich in three bites before offering the rest to Joe, who shook his head.

“You got to,” Orben said.

He passed the food to Joe and poured coffee into the plastic lid of the thermos. He lit a cigarette.

Joe changed the position of his legs and reached behind his back. The pistol grip was cold in his hand. He began easing it free of the holster. He thought of the holes in Rodale’s face, of Morgan living alone like an animal in a lair. He’d killed Rodale for his brother, but he couldn’t kill for himself. He released the gun and sat straight.

“Back bothering ye?” Orben said. “I know how that is. I slept outside the last two nights. There’s a knot in my hip like somebody drove a nail in.”

“I got something for you,” Joe said. “It’s in my pocket, so don’t get nervous.”

“Shoot, takes more than you to make me nervous.”

Joe tilted sideways and pushed his hand in his pants pocket and removed the belt balancer that Morgan had given him. It was the last thing he owned of the hills. He tossed it to Orben.

“Know what that is?”

“Belt balancer,” Orben said. “Uncle Shorty made a many till his eyes went. This is a nice one. Poplar, my opinion.”

He threw it in an arc that landed in Joe’s lap, Joe held the piece of wood in his palm, surprised that it had returned so rapidly, like a boomerang.

“Reckon what I’ll tell them in Blizzard,” Orben said.

“I don’t know. Maybe the truth.”

“Yours or mine?” Orben said. “Damn, this coffee’s good.”

“Best way is not to say nothing. They’ll think the worst for a while, then they’ll forget about it. You can’t get in no trouble that way. I used to think a good lie was close to the truth. Now I think it’s not saying a word. That way they make up their own lies.”

“They always said you was smart, Virgil.”

Orben placed the thermos on a stump and stood. He lifted his rifle until its barrel aimed at the sky.

“See you, Virge,” Orben said.

“Don’t run off.”

“Anybody you want me to howdy for you?”

Joe shook his head. Orben walked to the edge of the clearing. Joe slowly stood.

“Hey,” Joe said.

Orben turned, his expression wary. The rifle lowered slightly. Joe wanted to memorize the way he looked, a final image of home.

“What was it Boyd did,” Joe said, “that made Billy shoot him?”

“I don’t know,” Orben said. “I surely don’t.”

He stepped into the woods and disappeared among the brown trunks and drooping lower boughs of the trees.

An immense loneliness settled over Joe. He was both exhausted and exhilarated from the talk with Orben, as though he’d suddenly gone home for a day. The events that had transpired in his absence lay like unsorted lumber in his mind.

The sky was streaked by smoke. His eyes burned and he wondered if they needed to evacuate. The sound of aircraft echoed off the river. He walked up the slope past tumbleweed piled against the broken fence line. He had no idea how much time had passed. Orben’s accent still roared in his head. He felt as if the hills of Kentucky were walking away from him.

In the house the kids were sitting on the couch. Abilene sucked his finger and held Dallas’s hair, who cocked his head toward his brother’s grasp.

“Coop’s mad,” Dallas said. “He said if we came in his room, he’d shoot us.”

“Nobody’s shooting anybody around here,” Joe said.

Joe went to his old room, where Coop slumped over the radio like a cardplayer in an all-night game. Botree held a finger to her lips. A new map lay on the table, unmarked save for a single black circle among the whorls of elevation. Inside the circle was the letter F like a cattle brand. The CB squealed and Frank’s voice crackled over the air.

“Hear this, you jackbooted thugs? Hear it?”

There was the quick noise of scraping metal and a louder sound of something ramming into place.

“That’s full-auto rock and roll. Camp Megiddo is waiting. My army of patriots has fifty-caliber machine-gun emplacements. We have antitank artillery. We have surface-to-air missiles. The man who kills me is only following orders. The Bill of Rights is dead. If the government excludes itself, why must I then abide? Bless them, Father, they know not what they do.”

The transmission stopped abruptly. Coop’s face was slack and haggard, but his eyes gleamed.

“Does Frank really have that stuff?” Joe said.

“I don’t know,” Botree said.

“It might be more of his bullshit.”

“Coop picked up people on the scanner. I heard it, too. You can tell it’s official.”

“Probably firefighters.”

“It sounds like Feds,” she said. “ATF or somebody. Other people in the valley heard them, too. Frank’s been calling for volunteers all morning.”

“I hope Johnny didn’t go.”

“I got word to him at the Wolf. Asked him to come home. Then he radioed in and said there was a roadblock a few miles north of the ranch. He said he was going to leave the truck and follow the river home.”

Joe studied the topographical map. The black circle was ten miles from the ranch, accessible only by a narrow draw. It reminded him of Morgan’s place — one way in, one way out. Morgan had lasted forty years. With the weapons Frank claimed to have, he could repel all but the most fierce attack. The Bills would have to be overrun, bombed, or burned out.

The scanner sputtered and Coop turned slowly, his body moving like a machine that needed to be taken apart and cleaned. He squelched the noise and adjusted the scanner’s controls until a different voice came.

“White Dog to Delta. What’s your sitrep?”

“The approach is in our control. Repeat, the approach is in Delta control.”

The voice gave way to a buzz of static, Botree was right, it sounded like a military operation rather than firefighters. Joe realized that White Dog was the command post while Delta was a ground force moving into position.

Coop leaned over the map and drew a small line with a pen. There were other marks that Joe hadn’t noticed, tiny black dots that progressed up the draw. The last one was at the top of the hill near the F in a circle. Joe understood that he was seeing Frank’s holdout, and the advance of the attacking force. He wondered how many people had joined Frank.

From the CB came Frank’s voice again.

“Come and get it, heathens,” he said. “Your day of calamity is at hand. Thomas Jefferson warned us two hundred years ago—‘The strongest reason for the people to keep and bear arms is to protect themselves against tyranny in government.’ ”

The transmission ended, leaving a sudden silence in the tiny room. Joe hoped each side was attempting an elaborate ruse designed to make the other surrender. The attackers might have superior firepower, but the Bills knew the terrain and wouldn’t be bluffed.

Coop reduced the volume on the scanner and began changing channels on the CB, revealing scraps of talk along the valley as he moved slowly down the band.

“… won’t let you drive past the Jackson place…”

“… a trick, I’m telling you. They wouldn’t…”

“… plenty of water and ammo, what else…”

“… she thinks it’s Armageddon but I say the FBI…”

Joe felt as if the walls of the tiny room were compressing him. He left the room, feeling empty as last year’s bird’s nest. Missing his mother’s funeral was the worst blow of all.

The sound of gunfire startled Joe, three quick shots. He thought it came from the radio until Botree ran down the hall.