“You must be a kidnapper,” the old man said. “That’s what I told my wife last night. That must be a kidnapper. A woman and a girl and no food and no tent and no nothing. Kidnapping.”
“I’m not a kidnapper. I’m a man who wants a few pieces of buttered bread.”
“We ain’t got enough.”
Russell took a five-dollar bill out of his back pocket and reached over to the table and set it down. Then he opened the loaf of bread and took out five pieces and he buttered them with a plastic knife while the woman stood at the fire yelling and pointing at Russell and then yelling and pointing at the old man to get up and do something but the old man didn’t even turn around in his chair. Russell tore off a paper towel and wrapped the bread and then he told them that the meat smelled like shit and he walked back to the truck. Maben and Annalee were sitting in the cab again. Russell handed the buttered bread to Maben and she said what is that and he said breakfast. He cranked the truck and as they left the campground, the old woman shook a spatula and yelled at him in a gravelly, fading voice and Russell thought she might have a heart attack any second. The old man raised his tin coffee cup again and she smacked him in the back of the head.
At the interstate Russell turned south and Maben told him to let them out at the next town.
“I will,” Russell said. “At the next town when I stop.”
“We need to get on.”
“I know you do.”
The child ate the bread and wiped the butter from the corners of her mouth on her shirt. She offered a slice to her mother and Maben took it. She offered a slice to Russell and he told her to eat it. At the next town Russell ignored the exit. And he did the same at the next and the next and Maben said I mean it. Stop.
“You might as well sit tight,” he said.
“I can’t.”
“Yes you can.”
“No I can’t.”
“You’re gonna have to unless you want to drop and roll.”
Maben folded her arms like an unhappy child. Annalee asked if she could turn on the radio and Russell said yes. In an hour they were in Hattiesburg and he turned west on Highway 98 and in another hour they crossed the Pike County line.
“I can’t believe this shit,” Maben said.
Russell didn’t answer. He turned off the highway ten miles before town and took the back way to his dad’s place. Tractors moved across fields leaving dusty trails and cows stood in ponds. A graveyard at the top of a hill amid mosscovered trees. A dead armadillo in the middle of the road. He came up the highway and turned right and in a quarter of a mile he turned into the driveway and the front end spun in the loose gravel. Maben didn’t talk. Russell parked next to the house and the child pointed at the barn and said I thought barns were supposed to be red.
“Sit here a second,” Russell said, getting out and taking the keys with him. He walked around the house and found his father and Consuela sitting outside on the back porch eating tomato and bacon sandwiches.
“You want one?” Mitchell asked.
“I gotta talk to you.”
Mitchell put his sandwich down on the plate as if that would help him hear better. Then Russell said, “I need the barn. My room. Consuela’s room.”
“For you?”
“Not for me and I only need to hear yes or no. That’s all. I can explain it later and if you don’t like it I can do something else but right now I need yes or no.”
Mitchell looked at Consuela. It wasn’t her room anymore.
“Boyd Wilson find you? He was out here looking this morning. You into something I need to know about?”
“I’ll tell you one day but not today. Yes or no,” Russell said. “That’s all I want to hear.”
“Whatever you got to do,” Mitchell said.
Russell nodded and he walked back to the truck and he waved for them to get out.
“Bring your bag,” he said to Maben and she draped the duffel bag over her shoulder. She helped Annalee down from the truck and she held the child’s hand as they walked toward Russell and he told them to follow him. They walked past the house and out across the backyard and to the barn. At the back of the barn was a door and then a flight of steps and at the top of the steps was one large room. In the room there was a double bed and a love seat and other odd bits of furniture. There was a refrigerator and a small cabinet and countertop and a sink. The floors were wide wooden planks and the ceiling was exposed and a ceiling fan hung in the middle of the room from a two-by-four that had been nailed across the beams. The room was hot and steamy and Russell began to sweat just standing there. He walked across the room and turned on the air conditioner that sat in the window and then he pulled the string on the ceiling fan. He pointed at a door in the corner and said that’s the bathroom. There was nothing in the room that belonged to Consuela and he wondered if she had ever been out there at all.
“It’s hot,” Annalee said.
“I’ll have to get you some towels and sheets,” Russell said. “It’ll cool off in a little while.”
“I ain’t staying here,” Maben said.
“Why not?”