Free Tomato Red by Daniel Woodrell Page A

this.” Rod pulled a pistol from his truck. “It might get ripped off if I left it here and shoot some sonofabitch and get me blamed. My luck can run that way.”
    The pistol shined like a Shreveport pimp’s favorite teeth. The fine print on the barrel said OLIVETTI FIREARMS and claimed the caliber was thirty-eight though it had a shape I think of as a forty-five. He had one box of bullets. There’s a song I know that says a pistol is the Devil’s right hand. In my hand it’s oiled, loaded, and in my head it’s already nagging.
    “Where do I put it?”
    “Fuck do I care? Just keep it, that’s all.”
    We got to the door and he says, “Now, you ain’t goin’ to go robbin’ silly places, are you? You look like you’d stick up a Chinese laundry just for the conversation.”
    “Naw, they barely ever say anything.”
    “I know it. Lord knows I know it.”
    Rod wouldn’t eat, but I had a can of beans with a hot dog sliced into it. I acted responsible and switched to beer only. There was butter bread to sop around in the bean juice. Jamalee and Jason thought Rod and me were plastered and went away from our fumes and kept away.

    Rod said, “I never did get nowhere with her.”
    “Who’s that?”
    “Jamalee. I never did get to see if that li’l girl’s cuffs matched her collar or they didn’t. Not even close.”
    “She’s got standards.”
    “She’s got a cob up her ass, is what she’s got. Her hair used to be a normal color, too. Brown, I think. And that Jason, Jesus Christ, my old lady always went on and on like a fuckin’ groupie over how handsome that faggot was. How his eyes was liquid and deep, or some shit of that sort.”
    “He is pretty damn cute.”
    “If his nose was broke a couple of times he’d be a better man. Some sort of man. I thought about helpin’ him that way a few times, too, when my bitch kept sayin’, ‘Jason Merridew is the prettiest boy in the total Ozarks, and the prettiest person , period, in town, here.’ ”
    “You can’t hold that against him .”
    “Nope. I whipped her ass, though. Bitch talkin’ about another man that way, right before my face. ‘ He’s so pretty .’ She left me not long after, took my kids from me, but I reckon I made my point. I reckon she feels my point yet, wherever she’s got to.”
     
    HE GAVE ME a warning in my black Ford. I had to drive him to the jail. He said, “Beverly—you know, I ain’t tellin’ tales out of school, bud—but she snitched on some fellas, once I know of for sure. I wouldn’t care to be lyin’ next to her in bed if them or their friends come callin’. They’re vicious, vicious tush hogs, man—Timlinson’s from Shannon County. They posed as state cops, a few years back, and robbed pot growers all around here, and folks say they shot two or three poor fuckers. Dead. Shot them dead. Bev fucked ’em, then dropped a dime.”

    I didn’t say a word.
    That could easy have been me involved.
    I didn’t trust my voice.
    “Just thought I’d say so, in case you wanted to know.”
    The jail sat way over at the other edge of town. It was a new one, bigger than you’d figure was needed, made of big slabs of concrete curried to look like stone, with long thin windows up high and bright lights.
    I drove the way I was convinced I would if I hadn’t drunk three or four shots of bourbon and a few beers. I held my head straight with concentration.
    “This is my fourth drunk drivin’,” Rod said as I pulled over. He said it with a shrug and a smile, as if this meant he was a real sport, a party-animal fun junkie. “If they catch me the night of the day I get out . . .”
    “That’ll make five,” I said. “I read you clear.”

10
    Spared the Expectation
    WHICH IS THE proper response to a written invitation? When introducing couples what name is given first, the gal’s or the dude’s? When does a man take his hat off, and why is he wearin’ one anyhow? What is the usual hour of the day to start passing the