The sheriff took up the drumstick once more.
“Don’t think I’m all bad because I showed her out. It’s just the rules: family only. And even that’s a privilege.”
He stood and continued eating. The rest of the mashed potatoes, seasoned generously and dolloped with butter, disappeared in a few bites.
“You know, the whole patrolling business, I didn’t have a passion for it. But you needed patrollers just like you need boys putting down railroad track, driving drays, tending bar—you get the idea.” He walked over to Prentiss’s cell, sniffed with displeasure, then snorted and spat toward the bucket of piss on the other side of the bars. “Same with sheriffing. See, you smell like a horse’s behind but I’m still over here feeding you like any other prisoner. It’s a job. I don’t play favorites.”
“Maybe ’cause there ain’t no one else to pick out,” Prentiss muttered under his breath.
Hackstedde leaned down, eyes glued on Prentiss, and slid the plate sideways between the bars. Chicken bones fell onto the floor of the cell.
“Those are good leftovers,” he said, and returned to his chair. “You let that food go cold, it’s on you.”
It was garbage, but Prentiss was so ravenous he couldn’t take his eyes off it. A remnant streak of the potatoes, snow white, had skittered across the floor of the cell a few inches beyond the plate; the remains of the chicken still gave off a drift of steam that tempted him. Hackstedde spectated with a single-minded intensity. Prentiss felt his eyes on him, could sense, deep within the man, a dire urge to see his prisoner capitulate.
Prentiss put his nose up, assuming an air of disappointment.
“Went and dropped your trash, sheriff. Best get a broom and clean it up.”
“I’d say it’s up to you to keep your own cell in order, son.”
“I’m fixin’ to die,” Prentiss said. “You can’t make me do a damn thing. So you can pick up that trash yourself. Or if you feelin’ lazy, which you seem prone to, you could wait for that deputy of yours to do it. I hear he’ll be back soon enough.”
The sheriff’s face flashed a brilliant shade of red; his mouth flicked downward, and his double chin began to quiver. Then, like a river undammed, he burst forth, not in anger but in laughter, his whole upper half roiling in delight until he wobbled the legs of his chair. He slammed the table in relief, lit himself a cigarette with a last giggle, and shook his head in satisfaction.
“You are delightfully mouthy,” he said. “There’s nothing quite like a nigger clever with his words.” He took a long drag. “Right and ready for the noose. Yes you are.”
Prentiss sank against the back of his cell. It was darker there and he turned himself so that his face was to the wall and shut his eyes once more.
“There was a fellow who worked alongside me when I was a boy,” Hackstedde said. “He was just like you. His name was Goodwin.”
“I wouldn’t mind some quiet,” Prentiss said. “If you’d do me that much. And it really ain’t much, sheriff.”
“No, now, this is a good tale. I thought ol’ Goodwin was the funniest fellow I’d ever met, black or white, red or yellow. Hell, the boy was so fair-skinned he was almost light as I am. Always had this grin painted on his face. God bless him, he could find the sunny side of a shadow…”
If he focused, Prentiss could hear his brother’s footsteps. A soft patter behind him, like fat raindrops falling slowly from the leaves of a tree. That was all the noise he needed in a day. Not the utterance of a single word. Just the assurance that those footsteps were following his own. He tried to stay with them, but each moment they grew more distant, and he worried what would fill the void when they were gone for good.
“…You can imagine my shock when they told us that fool had run off. ‘We got a deserter’—those were the boss’s words. You could say that was the first time I ever hunted another man. The boss had me tag along with the dogs, and it took all night. I for one was certain he was long gone, was about to tell them as much, but then, in the light of the lantern, you see the folds over those dogs’ eyes lift for a moment, see their eyes spark, and suddenly they’re all barking at the same tree…”
“Sheriff, if I clean up that food will you give me some peace?”
“…Now I’m the only nimble one in the group, still a boy at the time, and seeing as I’d climbed my fair share of trees, they send me shimmying up myself. When I get to the first branch, and they give me a little light, I see Goodwin crouched there, naked as the day. Nearly wet my pants. He smelled so foul I almost vomit. His face was beaming, teeth white as ivory, and I noticed something off. Took me a minute to see it. But around his lips, and on his forehead, and all across his body, he’d gone and smeared himself with shit. Whether it was human or animal shit, I couldn’t tell, but it was smooth, like he’d taken his time, with a butter knife, maybe. Just about the color of the bark, too, so he almost disappeared into the tree…”