Finding Faith. C. E. Edmonson

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СКАЧАТЬ nozzle into the neck of the gas tank. He started the gas flowing just as a V8 Oldsmobile sedan pulled into the station. The passenger-side door opened almost before the car stopped and a man got out, leaving his companion behind the wheel.

      The man was tall and lean, with muscular arms that he folded over his chest. He wore a gray cap pulled down across his forehead, which was low to begin with, and his left cheek bore a long, jagged scar. Faith watched from inside the pickup as he ran a finger along the scar. Though the man didn’t speak, not at first, his bad intentions were obvious. The look on his face was scornful in the extreme.

      Ben pumped five gallons of gas into the pickup, and then went inside for a water can. He returned and opened the hood, never so much as glancing at the Oldsmobile sedan or the man who leaned against it.

      “Hey, Hiawatha, you been on the warpath lately?” The man brought his fingers to his mouth and let out a whoop. “You scalp any peaceable settlers?”

      Very carefully, Ben took a rag out of his back pocket and removed the radiator cap, unleashing a plume of white steam. He stepped away from the car and shoved the rag into his pocket.

      “Not talkin’? Oh, yeah, now I remember right. You’re one of them silent injuns. Lemme hear you say, ‘Ugh.’” Overcome by his own wit, the man began to laugh.

      Faith listened in disbelief. The tension she felt was completely unfamiliar. Was this what it meant to be an Indian? Why didn’t Ben respond? Even her mother was responding; she had rolled down the window and stuck her head out with her sternest stare, which had always worked on Faith—no words necessary.

      Faith could feel the outrage. Ben had done nothing to provoke this attack. But even now, as he poured water into the radiator, his features were composed. If the man’s taunts were reaching him, he gave no indication.

      “I got it, injun. Lemme hear you say, ‘How.’” Pleased with himself, the man repeated the word, dragging it out: “Howwwww!” That brought another laugh. “Say, I hear there’s work for ya down in Cresco. Ol’ Karl Stamford’s decided to go into the cigar business. You could be his cigar store injun. Oh, but wait, you injuns don’t like work, ain’t that right? You all just wanna run through the woods, shootin’ squirrels and such. Mighty warriors.”

      Faith felt like she couldn’t breathe. She watched Ben as he replaced the radiator cap and carried the water can back into the station. he reached into his pocket, came out with a handful of coins, and handed them to an older man who was busily repairing a tire. Ben was on the way back when the man leaning against the Oldsmobile spoke again.

      “Guess you’re doin’ right well these days.” The man paused long enough to glance at his companion in the car before delivering the punch line. “But I do gotta say that you’re gettin’ too long in the tooth, old man, to be totin’ around two squaws. Seems like one’d be enough.”

      Faith felt her heart drop. Somehow, without her knowing it, she’d become an Indian. And this, apparently, was how Indians were routinely treated.

      Faith’s mother had spoken about choosing to live in the American way, about how Aunt Eva considered her a traitor. That was ridiculous. The surprise was that anybody would choose to live as an Indian.

      Still, Ben didn’t react, not until the man took a step toward him. Then he reached calmly into the pickup’s bed and withdrew an axe handle. The handle was split on the end that would have held the axe head, but it was perfectly suited to the task at hand. Ben held the wooden handle with both hands at a diagonal across his chest. He didn’t speak, but his expression hardened. That he’d made a decision to fight was as obvious to Faith as it was to the man with the scar, who stopped in his tracks.

      “What you gonna do with that?” he asked.

      “Put your hands on me, Crease Marron, and you’ll find out.”

      The man inside the car broke the tension. Faith couldn’t see him, but his voice carried across the open lot.

      “Get back in the car, Crease. Now.”

      That was all the excuse that Crease Marron needed. He spit on the ground, a lot closer to his own feet than to Ben Hightower’s, before rejoining his companion. A moment later, the Oldsmobile sedan disappeared around a curve in the road.

      “I’m sorry, honey,” Margaret whispered to Faith as Ben got into the truck. “I’m sorry for dragging you into this. I had no idea.”

      Faith almost spoke the words on the tip of her tongue, but she checked herself at the last minute. She wanted to ask, What choice did you have? But she knew the question would only make her mother feel worse.

      Ben started to put the Chevrolet in gear, but Margaret twisted the key in the ignition, shutting the truck down.

      “Don’t think you can just drive off without an explanation, Ben Hightower,” she said. “Because I won’t have it. This was no random encounter.”

      Faith marveled. Her mother rarely disagreed with her husband, and when she did, it was only in the most careful and measured tones. Though Faith was still trembling, she realized, dimly, that there were aspects of her changed circumstances that she might be able to live with.

      Faith, like most of her girlfriends, didn’t relish the prospect of spending the rest of her life trying to please a man, but there just didn’t seem to be any way out of it. At least in the world she’d left behind.

      “I’m thinkin’ you’d best hear the news from Eva,” Ben said. He started the truck and shifted into first gear, but didn’t take his foot off the clutch. “That man who come out of the Olds, Crease Marron, he’s deputy constable for the township. The other one, his name is Abe Hoskins. He’s the constable. Crease is a mean son-of-a-gun, but his boss is the dangerous one.”

      Faith spoke up first. New York City was divided into five boroughs. Township was a totally unfamiliar concept. “What’s a township?” she asked.

      “Pennsylvania is divided into counties,” Margaret said, “and the counties are subdivided into townships. We’re in Albemarle Township, which is part of Monroe County.”

      “And a constable is like a policeman?”

      “There’s a county sheriff, but he spends most of his time in Stroudsburg. That’s the biggest town, where most of the tourists go in the summer. Constables only have authority in the townships,” her mother explained.

      “How many constables are there in...Al-be-marle Township?”

      “One constable,” Ben said as he revved the engine of the Chevrolet pickup truck, “and one deputy constable.”

      Now it was Margaret’s turn. “So, all right, Ben, out with it. Why did that deputy constable challenge you? Why did he talk to you that way?”

      Ben shifted gears, taking his time, and the engine roared as the little truck accelerated, giving him another excuse for delay. Finally, he said, “It’s the same old story, Margaret. If an Indian has somethin’ white people want, they take it.”

      “What do they want this time?” Faith asked.

      “Land, same as usual. The land we been livin’ on for a hundred years. My parents and grandparents are buried on the shores of Wildwood Lake. Me, I always planned to join ’em there.”

      “And СКАЧАТЬ