Twilight by William Gay Page B

squatted before him like some great ungainly bird. He didn’t speak.
    Ezell, Sutter said after a time.
    Part of Ezell’s jaw had been shot away and surgically reconstructed and the plastic surgery hadn’t taken properlyso that he looked like a partially healed escapee from some mad scientist’s laboratory.
    I heard something you’d maybe be interested in, he finally said. There was a curious vibration to his voice, his disfigured jaw lent it the residual hum of some stringed instrument strummed gently and laid aside.
    Sutter was paring his nails with a switchblade knife. He did this in silence a time. Then he said, Well, are you going to tell me, or are we playin guessin games? You’d give some kind of a hint might make it easier. Just somethin to let me know what general area it pertains to.
    You remember that state prosecutor you got into it with at your trial? Schieweiler, from over at Ackerman’s Field? He’s trying to get you a new trial, and get it moved out of the county. Maybe at Ackerman’s Field.
    Hellfire. They can’t try me again on that. They done triedme on it. It done got thowed out.
    Well. They claimin jury tamperin. Perjury too, what I hear.
    Jury tamperin? I never tampered with a one of them son of a bitches. Never had to. They was already scared shitless.
    I just told you what come down. Like I always do. He’s workin with Sheriff Bellwether, over at Ackerman’s Field.
    Sutter took out a bag of Country Gentleman and rolled himself a cigarette. He lit it. I appreciate you warnin me, Ezell, he said, his voice slightly furred from the smoke.
    Ezell was silent a time. Finally he said, I’m takin a chance just tellin you. It’ll be my ass they ever catch me out here.
    Well. I said I appreciated it.
    Still the deputy sat. Sutter was tempted to just wait him out, to see would he sit hunkered there while darkness fell and be there still when dawn broke, his Adam’s apple bobbingevery time he swallowed.
    Was there somethin else?
    Well, Ezell buzzed. Last time you gave me a little somethin.
    Sutter took out his wallet. Peered inside. Just how little was this somethin I give you?
    Last time you give me forty.
    If I did it must of been good news, Sutter said. This only qualifies for twenty. Hell, by all rights you ought to be payin me.
    Ezell rose and took the proffered bill. By some sleight of hand it disappeared into his khaki pocket. Just whatever, he said. I’m always lookin out for you.
    He crossed the yard to the car and got in. Lifted a hand farewell and drove away. Sutter went on sitting. Everbody’s always lookin out for me, he said. He thought of Schieweiler.His bulging earnest eyes. Of Bellwether, the sheriff who wasn’t for sale. An anger that would not dissipate seethed somewhere inside his chest.
    All these son of a bitches, he said aloud.

    His old mama died in the madhouse, you know. Died huntin a butcher knife she swore she’d hid and couldn’t find. She’d get up in the mornin and hunt all day like a man puttin in a day’s work. She’d’a hunted all night if they hadn’t of strapped her in.
    They’ve always told that when Granville was a boy he woke up one time in the middle of the night and she was settin on the side of the bed watchin him and she was holdin a butcher knife. Said she was watchin him, but it was like shewasn’t really seein him. He laid awake the balance of the night waitin to see what she’d do, then he took to sleepin in the woods or in the barn. Just wherever. She’d set up all night like she was studyin about somethin. They took to hidin all the knives.
    Then finally she tried to kill old Squire Sutter. They kept her locked up awhile, and when she got to be more than they could handle, they put her in the crazyhouse. They was funny folks, them Sutters. The last time Granville even seen his mama was the day they come and hauled her off, and if he ever regretted not seein her before she died, he never said so.
    Then later on when the old man took sick and