The pickled pigmeat was kept in murky jars beside the water bucket and ladle, beneath the windowpanes. Mr. Bane took a good long drink, a chaser for his soda pop. He hung the ladle and helped himself to the briny pork. His chin wet with well water, gnawing the grisly socket, the portly stranger wore a newly satisfied smile as he pulled a chair adjacent to J.Pea and sat by the stove. Pretty soon Newburn was straddling a five-gallon bucket, doing the lazy roll on a brown papered cigarette. Lucy played with a lump of coal on the floor. "Who would have anticipated such inclement conditions," Bane paused betwixt bites, sniffing at his rosebud; his voice a thin, almost feminine drawl. "It seemed such a splendid morn for a holiday, exploring old haunts as it were. I do adore these green cathedrals, your clean, healthful mountain breezes..." "We got ailment in these hills, feller. Folks so bad sick ye don't dare to hep..." "Sir, I'm afraid we lack proper introduction." At this J.Pea piped in. "Mr. Bane--Newburn Jackson, he's our elected constable. Duly sworn." Newburn shook his head, ran his tongue the length of the paper. "Nothin like that, now..." he was a dry weed. "Don't fill this man's cabbage with sich as this. I chase run-off kids, livestock, an sign death papers when Nursy Jane ain't aroun." Bane leaned back, brandishing his grisly snack. His lips were sloppy wet as he spake. "Of course. You're no stranger to me Brother Jackson. You first saw light of day over in Cooly Bug Creek, I believe it was, just up the road from my father's house. Aloysius Bane. I recall the day you were born like it was Second Coming. I was two and a half going on ninety-two. They brought you over to my mother's kitchen several times for review." Grandly, he tore at the joint and never let a drip on the finery. He paused to drop the Panama on his linen knee. "Er you sure about that mister?" Newburn was a bit aghast. "The preacher lived up the run there, while I was a-goin to school..." "Oh, I assure you, I assure you. This was earlier than you would remember. There's a large moleskin, a growth almost a crescent moon, but dark and fuzzy. Left of your tailbone. Your sire was a fourth-generation muleskinner, a kindly old soldier. She refused his kisses because he had no teeth." "Ye know," Newburn lit his cigarette with a box match. "There was somethin bout another bunch. There were kids, lotsa kids, then not so many. Before the Polks moved in. Uncle Boog tole me. Stories about a bear, tearin up yer daddy--?" "That's him. Shortly after his passing I was dispatched to Roanoke. Into the vigilant nurture of my benefactor, sweet ferocious Auntie Tam. My mother married poor, but Her Black Majesty; Tam Victoria Bane was old money all the way, my great aunt, actually." Willy was back from the shed, forcing the lid on a crate of 30-30 shells. "Go head, J.Pea. Sang some fer us," he pled, crowbar in hand. "Aw, not now Willy B." Overhead pellets came harder, like a buckshot spill on the tarpaper roof, the salty rainspoor willowing in. Lucrice made coal etchings on the footworn planks. Fish shapes and scarecrows. "Drove that buggy up from the valley, ye say?" "That's right." J.Pea rocked in puzzlement. Newburn did indeed have a crescent mole on his hip. Why, he'd seen it just last Sunday after vespers; Newburn wrestled with Jake for the better part of an hour. In the shallows out back of the house, they splashed and cussed, where Gout River crooked close to the barn. The constable went way back with Jake; schoolmates, they'd been arrested together in the fifth grade. For chicken theft. It turned out, they were running them all back to Papa Shea's barn and hypnotizing the lot. Just lay one hen flat, draw a line from the eyebead straight out in the dirt and, well, she'll lay there all day till you mess the line. It was a law of nature. Responsible for 42 poultry thefts that day, they ran out of floorspace and repented. A local record nonetheless. "Little sister, do you want a sody pop?" exhaled Newburn. "Nome." Newburn winked at J.Pea. "Trust me, lads, it's katy-bar-the-door if I try to pull her off that sugar lick now. Her mama's same way. Fig preserves with a spoon. And black coffee, ye know how it is. I cain't git a handle on it." He worked the cigarette with lazy lids, long tobacco-stained nails. "Prayer, Newburn. You know that's what Jake'd tell ya. Prayer mah boy." A glaring clash of lightning and J.Pea turned his head to see. Out in the touring car, beyond the glass and the rain: two hounds leaned into view. He hadn't noticed them before. Sleek they were, with long noses and a wheat color. They were indistinct from here, some sort of Irish wolfhound or silkie. Both heads leaned forward in the backseat, cocking their snoots toward him in twin accord. "Why gentlemen, I would deny nothing to a lovechild such as this. She would be a rare, cosseted thing. Children are a gift, a delicious gift. Myself, I was deprived at her age. A sickly thin boy, I couldn't seem to keep anything down. A diagnosis of chronic nephritis in the crib, the doctors added an enlarged heart to the litany before my first steps were taken...." The pock-jowl was turned to J.Pea as the stranger rambled; the stranger who'd probably call it something like pursuit of a digression. Betwixt puffs, Newburn would sniffle, blow smoke, and roll his neck. From here, trapped in one windowpane, beyond the windowpane those hounds looked his way. And J.Pea could feel them reaching out. A pain, a gnawing. So much watery disturbance, he almost entered....someone in a cornflower blue bonnet....but he couldn't quite touch them. Two beasts, just barely there... "I've a query for you Master Shea. Where might these distant cousins of mine reside?" "Uh..." J.Pea cut his eyes away from the dogs. "...ooh, let's see...Newburn? Ain't so sure I recall. I've heard tales..." Leaving both out there. In the rainstorm. "This ole boy would probly know better..." J.Pea begged of Newburn. But Newburn offered nothing; cinder-eyed, he stared through his smoke at the fire grate. Lucy sang softly. "...ooh, seems they was somethin bout an elder somewheres on the wayside of Riddle Top. Jist a rumor er two. Don't recollect much else, might have been a lost uncle, don't know. Only Bane that lives round here, is just up Pearlwick Road, up here a zig after the rock schoolhouse. Mizz Sisilse Bane. Use to midwife fer Doc Sax, fer years till he died. She sorta re-tarrd after he passed. And not a twitch too soon. Hell mister, she's over a hunert years old. Got a sod-roof cabin back of Dover Falls, up the trace jist beyond our holler." "Such enlightenment. Deserves reward. I was afraid all were heavenly departed. But simple truth win out. Simple truth that's my credo. And truth is, I'll simply have to drop a note and visit the old dear. One of these days. Would you care for a pungent morsel, my lad? On me." Bane smacked away the last of his, and tossed the stripped cartilage into the woodbox. "Ooh, naw sir. I don't believe I will...not at this time..." In fact, something had turned in his belly. Gone sick and sour. Willy mumbled at a 30-30 shell. "'Round h'yere most suffer from too much feed n'fat or not near enough, seems like." J.Pea looked green.
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