Free The Bible Salesman by Clyde Edgerton

cats talk?” asked Henry.
    “We might have to wait a minute or two,” said Mrs. Albright. “That’s Isaac, and that’s John. The big John. Not John the Baptist. He’s inside. Isaac, do you have something to say?”
    “I thought you were
killing
Indians yesterday, boys,” said Isaac.
    Henry looked at Isaac. “We were, but today we’re Navajo braves.”
    “Things switch around, I reckon, yes sir,” said Isaac. “Do you boys know what the Germans are doing in Europe?”
    “No,” said Henry. He looked up at Mrs. Albright. “No sir.”
    “It’s a shame,” said Isaac.
    “Well, well, well,” said John. “Not everybody thinks so.” John’s ear twitched twice. He looked to the weeds at a butterfly and knelt, stalking.
    Carson and Henry hid in ambush in the woods, then rode sidelong on pretend, gaudy-painted ponies, rising up at the last minute in terror-provoking splendor to shoot arrows — nails embedded in the ends of dried water reeds — into pine tree stumps, then whooped and hollered and charged into the bloody melee and scalped half-dead and stupefied soldiers with homemade tomahawks. Then rode off as reinforcements rode after them. They outran the reinforcements, hid, and slaughtered all of them too. And then scalped them.
    The next afternoon Carson was Tom Mix and Henry was Johnny Mack Brown. They joined the U.S. Cavalry and sat in a tree and shot their air rifles and murdered over a hundred Indians, picking them off one by one, Indian braves who had foolishly camped in a narrow ravine.
    Henry told Carson about the Electra, about all the lights, the big group of men who could every one play a musical instrument.

1950
    I n a wooded area just off a wagon path, Clearwater knelt on one knee, digging a hole with a broken jar. He’d just driven the Chrysler, while the boy, Henry, drove a stolen Oldsmobile a good distance ahead of him. They’d come from Cloverdale Springs Resort in Georgia to this spot near Treadlow, Georgia, clearly marked on a hand-drawn map. Henry was working out fine.
    Henry felt good about his new job. It was easy, for one thing. Mr. Clearwater picked up the car from the criminal while Henry waited somewhere in the woods, or maybe behind a warehouse. Mr. Clearwater would drive up and get out of the stolen car, into his own car, and then Henry drove the stolen car, following a map to a place in the woods. They would bury stuff, switch license plates on the new car, transfer equipment, just like the regular thieves would have done. Mr. Clearwater knew a lot of hiding places and how to camouflage things. He’d been trained in the army and in the FBI and he kept records, maps, and all. And then they sold the car and Mr. Clearwater mailed the money to the FBI. Henry was paid in cash because they were undercover.
    Henry was feeling kind of rich, and kind of comfortable, but still concerned about his Bible discoveries. And there was something not quite right about making money, a lot of money anyway, without working hard. It wasn’t Christian somehow.
    Mr. Clearwater finished digging the hole, then buried a billfold, papers, pencils, and two pairs of gloves from the glove compartment of the Oldsmobile.
    The real robbers doing the actual stealing were sometimes in too big a hurry to do the little things that had to be done. Mr. Clearwater’s job, and Henry’s, Henry was learning, was to do exactly what criminals would do, else he and Clearwater might get caught, not by the law, but by somebody in the car-theft ring. The police would be no problem, of course, since Mr. Clearwater was in the FBI — they’d just let them go — but the criminals could get nasty.
    Clearwater packed dirt with his hand, smoothed over the small mound with his fingertips, scattered leaves and pine straw over his work, stood and dusted the knees of his pants.
    Henry leaned against the Olds, his hand on the fender, waiting, sport coat sleeves too short, hair still standing up on top in back. “There’s no tool