Go With Me by Castle Freeman Read Free Book Online Page B

watches her,” said D.B.
    “Follows her around,” said Coop.
    “Stalks her,” said D.B.
    “Like she said,” said Coop.
    “She ought to have left town when Kevin did, it looks like,” said D.B.
    “She ain’t as smart as she thinks she is,” said Coop.
    “She’s dumb, is what she is,” said D.B.
    “Edie didn’t think she was dumb,” said Whizzer. “When she worked there. Edie thought real well of her. She got the place organized. Customers liked her. Edie thought she was a real bright girl.”
    “How bright could she be,” D.B. asked, “getting together with Kevin?”
    “But you see that over and over, here, don’t you?” said Conrad. “I was saying before.”
    “See what?” Coop asked him.
    “Where?” D.B. asked him.
    “Here,” said Conrad. “Around here. Women, young women, who are more or less bright, cleaned up, straight shooters, capable, strong. Want to work. Anyplace else, they’d end up with good solid young guys, guys just like them. But around here they go for guys who are the opposite, who are going nowhere except jail, who are nothing but trouble. They end up with guys who are trouble on skates. You see that a lot. Why?”
    “Something in the water,” said Coop.
    “Winters are too long,” said D.B.
    “The young guys have this special aftershave they wear,” said Coop.
    “They don’t want to be alone, the girls,” said Whizzer.
    “If that’s what it was,” said Coop, “it worked for What’s-her-name.”
    “It worked too well,” said D.B.
    “Lillian,” said Whizzer.
    “Well,” said D.B.,“whatever it is she wanted, I don’t see why she thought she’d find it here. Thinks she’s so smart. You people. Cat named Annabelle. What kind of name’s that for a cat? What’s she doing around here in the first place?”
    “She likes it here,” said Whizzer.
    “Just like Con,” said Coop.
    “But not so much,” said Whizzer.
    “No,” said Coop.“Nobody likes it around here as much as Con. Ain’t that right?”
    “Nobody,” said Conrad.
    “Well,” said Whizzer. “I don’t know whether she’s dumb or whether she’s smart or whether she likes it here or she don’t, but either way, here she is. And I’ll tell you something else: It looks to me as though Blackway might have picked on the wrong girl this time.”

7
     
    THE DIAMOND JOB
     
    Fitzgerald’s job was on Diamond Mountain. His crew had been up there for three months. They had cleared out half an acre for the landing and built a lane into it for the trucks. Every day another truck, another two or three trucks, came out of the woods loaded as high as a house with fresh-cut logs. You would think there couldn’t be a tree left standing on the mountain — not a tree in the town, in the state. And yet the woods were everywhere, untouched, unchanged, as though the abstracted logs, and the workings that produced them, were a magician’s illusion.
    Lillian, Lester, and Nate found the truck access to the landing, and Nate started to turn off the road.
    “Back it in,” said Lester.
    Nate put the truck in reverse and backed into the log lane until they could see the landing.
    “That’s good,” said Lester. Nate stopped the truck, stopped the engine. The three of them sat, with Lester turned around on the seat so he could see out the rear window.
    “Is he there?” Lillian asked Lester.
    “Don’t see him,” said Lester.
    “Are you going in?” she asked.
    “In a minute,” said Lester.
    He was watching the landing. There was a man there. He had seen them. He pointed to their truck. A second man joined him, then a third.
    “How many of them are there?” Lillian asked.
    “More than that,” said Lester. To Nate he said, “Do you want to go ahead?”
    “Yo,” said Nate. He opened his door and left the truck. He began walking in toward the landing.
    The landing was like a muddy amphitheater with the woods standing close all around. Its scarred, ruined earth was cut with deep ruts and tracks.