Free The Witch of Hebron by James Howard Kunstler

that.
    Brother Jobe was on a journey to Steven Bullock’s plantation, several thousand acres of fruitful bottomland and upland five miles outside town at the place where the Battenkill joined the Hudson River. He had business to discuss with Mr. Bullock, the grandee of the county, with his vast holdings, his many faithful servants, and his personal hydroelectric outfit. To start with, there were certain urgent matters of the law that required the attention of Mr. Bullock as Union Grove’s elected magistrate. But mostly, Brother Jobe wanted to inquire about getting a stallion to replace Jupiter. Bullock was raising big German Hanoverians for the saddle. America was dearly short of horseflesh, so rapid had been the descent out of the old times into the new. Wasn’t it odd, then, Brother Jobe mused to the soft rocking gait of Atlas the mule, that his daddy had owned the leading Ford dealership in Scott County, Virginia, back in the twentieth century?
    Brother Jobe had come about halfway to his destination when, lost in musing about back home, he saw a lone figure up ahead on the road. As he drew closer, the figure began to wave its arms in a broad gesture that reminded Brother Jobe of a railroad grade-crossing signal from the old times. He instinctively reined in Atlas. The lone figure strode forward confidently. The closer he came, the more his appearance resolved from that of a grown man into something more like a gangly, overgrown boy. He was perhaps twenty, with curly yellow hair and a scraggly blond beard that, if he ever took to shaving regularly, would hardly require the razor twice a week. His cheeks were sunken as if he had not been getting regular meals. He was carrying a bulging leather shoulder sack, which he now took off and tossed aside to the edge of the road.
    “What’s up, stranger?” Brother Jobe said.
    “And good afternoon, to you, too, sir.”
    “A fine day to be rambling.”
    “I’m a rambler and a gambler—you’ve got that right.”
    “That so? Are you knowing the Lord, son?”
    The young man dipped his whole upper body in a guffaw. “Not yet,” he said.
    “Would you like to?”
    “I hope not to meet up with him for some time yet. I like it here on earth, rambling and gambling as I do.”
    “You can be born again in this world and know the Lord.”
    “I’ve had enough of birthing, sir. I’m enjoying my prime. Would you like to hear some of my song?”
    “Your song… ?”
    “Yessir, the ‘Ballad of Billy Bones.’”
    “That’d be you? Billy Bones?”
    “Yessir. The very same.”
    “Well, I don’t have time for no song and dance, son.”
    “There ain’t any dance to this. Not yet, anyway.”
    “Mind if I pass on the song, then?”
    The boy unbuttoned his brown leather coat and drew it open to reveal the butt of an automatic pistol tucked into the waistband of his striped trousers and something that looked like a two-foot-long brush knife in a scabbard on his other hip.
    “Give it a chance, sir. You won’t regret it.”
    “Along about now the only thing I regret is not bringing a firearm to entertain you with.”
    “So much the better then, because neither of us will get hurt. Are you ready for my song?”
    “Fire away.”
    “Here goes:
“When first I came to New York State
My fortune here to find
I followed reg’lar upright ways
Was always nice and kind
     
But as I rambled round the state
A bandit I became
I plied the roads with gun and sword
And plundered many a man.…”
     
    He sang these verses in the style of a mournful dirge. During the second verse, he drew the automatic pistol out of his waistband and held it aloft in an emphatic manner.
    “I think I get the picture,” Brother Jobe said.
    “I ain’t done. There’s lots more verses.”
    “I heard enough. If you got yourself a ding-dang ukulele, folks might stand it better.”
    “You know where I might find such a thing?”
    Brother Jobe felt his patience melting away. “Lookit here, son, I