1934
SHERWOOD ANDERSON sat in the Little Hub Restaurant in Rocky Mount in the late evening, nursing a cup of coffee and watching two bearded men wearing the plain dark clothes of the Dunkard Church eating ham steaks and buttered toast. The Little Hub seemed to Anderson a good spot to lurk and perhaps pick up a whiff of something as the sheriff and most of the deputies frequented the spot, as did the commonwealth’s attorney, Carter Lee, whom Anderson had been unable to gain audience with. He’d been in Franklin County for three months and had accomplished little more than a few notes, his desk at the rooming house littered with scraps of paper, jottings about scenery or people. He had spread nickels and dimes all over the county, most to small boys lurking about the filling stations or lunch counters.
Willie Carter Sharpe? Yeah, I know of her. Never seen her though.
You don’t know? Where you from anyhow?
Anderson did learn that no one around Franklin County called the thing “bootlegging.” That might as well have been a foreign word. You mean blockadin’, sir? What blockades? Nobody ever said “moonshine” either. White Lightning. White Mule. Moon. Stump Whiskey. Mountain Dew. Squirrel Whiskey. Fire Water. He had seen plenty of it over the years in Marion. When building Ripshin his foreman, a seventy-year-old man named Ball, a bear of a man with an outsized belief in his abilities, would take a lark every month. He would hire a car and driver, fill the car with booze and drive around the county stopping off at friends’ places and inviting them to join his roving bender. Once Anderson arrived at Ripshin to find all the workmen drunk, falling from the scaffolding, covered in the white muck of plaster. Most of his friends drank liberally; Faulkner in particular had a true penchant for the stuff and they drank plenty of whiskey together in New Orleans. So what was different about it here? Every other night lines of cars raced through Rocky Mount, the whine of engines working through the walls of his room at the boardinghouse.
Anderson’s connection at The Roanoke Times got him a copy of the preliminary report, issued in July, submitted to the Acting Deputy Commissioner of the Alcohol Tax Unit, which provided the basis for the grand jury investigation “United States vs. Charles Carter Lee.”
In the fall of 1928, Charles Carter Lee, The Commonwealth’s Attorney for Franklin County, Virginia, and Sheriff Pete Hodges called the various deputy sheriffs of Franklin County into the office of Pete Hodges, singly and in pairs, making them a proposition to divide the County up into districts for the purpose of assessing illicit distillers and bootleggers a certain amount (from ten dollars to 25 dollars) per month for the privilege of operating with the protection of County officers.
The grand jury was set to convene in a few weeks, though the location had yet to be set; the papers proposed the trial would likely be outside the county to prevent jury tampering. Several key county law-enforcement officials would be indicted on charges of racketeering and conspiracy, though the coconspirators wouldn’t be named until the actual indictment. In spite of this the blockade runs went on, seemingly unimpeded. Anderson had learned that if he came into certain filling stations and slipped a five on the counter without a word, then stepped outside and waited by his car, in a few minutes a dirty-necked boy would jog around from behind the store and hand him a half-gallon jar of corn whiskey in a paper sack. At one station he handed a slatternly teenage girl a fiver and she turned and scampered up a hill into the bramble and disappeared into the forest. Anderson waited an hour by the road until he figured he’d been hoodwinked in the simplest way, but soon enough a mule came ambling down a trail, a saddlebag bulging with fruit jars of booze. It wasn’t exactly raining from the sky but they were right that the county was full of it. His mistake before was to actually ask for the damned stuff; he found that such transactions were done in the same manner as most in Franklin County, a wordless combination of timing, simple gesture, and mutual assumption. Anderson had six different half-gallon jars in his room at the boardinghouse, lined up along the dresser. It was research of a kind. He had sampled them all and determined that in fact there were some real differences, and he had to admit that some of the stuff was excellent, a layered, complex taste with several discernable characteristics.
Anderson watched the darkly clad figures in the Little Hub Restaurant. A few farmers sat drinking coffee. Temperance folk obviously, Anderson thought, as everyone else in the county surely must be out gallivanting around a bonfire somewhere in the mountains drinking illegal liquor. The counterman folded his arms over his bulbous midsection and smoked thoughtfully. Another man read the paper at a booth with a stub of pencil in hand, hair neatly parted and oiled. He was dressed in a tight suit and bow tie: a salesman passing through. Anderson looked at his own hands and knew that their delicate fineness would immediately indicate an outsider to anyone who bothered to look. The thought that he would need a translator, an introduction into the world of the working class, made him burn with shame and anger. And now the mythical Willie Carter Sharpe: The only man or woman alive who could hold a Ford wide open down Grassy Hill! as they said on the front porches and around the stove.
I could give it right back to them, Anderson thought, give them the character they wanted. Nights at the boardinghouse Anderson sat scribbling at a battered old sideboard table, trying to think of all the things he had seen that day, trying to remember the hands of the men in the fields, the boys in the curing shed, the grim farmwives in the cookhouse, the lines of their faces, the cut of their work shirts, the seams of their shoes. But in all these things he saw very little. It was as if the character of these people encouraged a sort of blank anonymity, so unlike the peoples of the Midwest and their quaint charms and frustrated lives, who seemed to open up like a flower for Anderson when they talked. He could read everything in their flashing eyes, their blurring hands. The wide-open spaces of the Midwest allowed a man’s mind to stretch and think. But the strange confines of Franklin, its long skylines, rolling hills, left him with a feeling of enclosure and confinement, as if something dangerous was contained there and the minds of the citizens had to focus on not letting it out. The way the men slouched in their walk, hips forward, legs kicking out in front of them, slew-footed, shoulders rounded, hands buried deep in the pockets of their coveralls. The way they wore their hats low, eyes down on the red clay. Women who had apparently set their faces in a placid grimace for the rest of their lives, hollow-eyed, always in motion, working, fiddling, never sitting still. The straight, worn shifts and muddy boots, a simple cord around a wrist perhaps, a thin cross on the neck. And nobody said anything.
Then why didn’t he go home? Eleanor? Nobody really knew exactly where Anderson was, including Eleanor, and he thought of this mysterious absence with grim pleasure. It reminded him of the time he walked away from his job in Elyria, Ohio. The Anderson Manufacturing Company, marketing an inexpensive roof coating. He was learning to play golf at the country club that year, 1912. One day he walked out of the office, with nothing but the clothes on his back.
What’s the matter? his secretary had asked him, her face in rigid alarm. She was an intelligent woman, he thought, even more intelligent than himself. A rainstorm drummed on the windows.
My dear young woman, Anderson said, it is all very silly, but I have decided to no longer concern myself with this buying and selling.
You’re sick? she said.
She was right in a sense, and Anderson knew he had to get out of there right away. He felt if he could just reach the door, then it would be okay. His feet would carry him to wherever he needed to go. Did she think he was crazy? Was he? Anderson looked at his feet.
My feet are cold, wet, and heavy from a long wading in a river, he had said. Now I shall go walk on dry land.
As Anderson left the office he knew that it was the words that had lifted him out, and he swore allegiance to them and he passed out of town along a railroad track.
When he reemerged days later, penniless, dirty, and miles away, people said he must have had some kind of breakdown. Temporary insanity, perhaps, related to stress. They concocted all kinds of reasons why he did it, and when he later became a writer, many others began to ascribe his disappearance to his “artistic temperament.” He tried to explain it in A Story Teller’s Story, the rambling autobiographical piece he was paid far too much for, but it too was a failure.
They were all wrong. That episode was about something else entirely, and something far more mundane. A hillside of freshly mown grass that overlooked a churchyard. A train platform where a man in a tuxedo stood with a bouquet of flowers, and a woman weeping in the vestibule. Shivering in the damp dirt of an apple orchard at dawn.
What stories now?
A FAINT HUM in the air of the restaurant, and the man with the paper looked up. The counterman flicked his eyes to the window, then the Dunkards, and Anderson heard it too; the low moan of motors accelerating. A run coming through town.
Anderson stumbled out of his seat and through the front doors. Might as well see the damn thing up close, he figured, and squaring his hat he positioned himself on the front steps, looking south down Main as the engines grew louder. He picked out sets of headlights flashing then disappearing around curves as they wound their way through the southern reaches of Rocky Mount.
The man with the bow tie stood next to him, paper tucked under his arm. Glancing back Anderson saw the Dunkard family standing by the window. Two sets of lights, then three. Then the light pock pock pock of gunfire, and Anderson and the salesman both ducked and raced back into the restaurant. Here they come, the counterman muttered, and Anderson saw through the window a long black Packard roaring up Main Street, swerving side to side, and behind it two cars, the first with a man leaning out the passenger window with his arm extended, pointing a pistol. The Packard thundered past the courthouse and through the intersection of Court and Main, then slowed suddenly, the back end rising up; the chasing cars swerved to avoid collision, one going through a short section of clapboard fence, the other going up on the sidewalk. Anderson could see the hunched forms of the drivers, gray flannel suits, all shoulders and elbows, as they threw their bodies into the frantic steering. At the intersection the Packard locked its brakes and the back end came around sharply in a cloud of smoke, overcorrected, and then the car shot back south on Main, the chase cars extricating themselves with clumsy three-point turns, then back in pursuit. As the Packard passed the restaurant Anderson caught a glimpse of a passenger wearing a small bowl hat, curly hair, a tight smile on dark lips. A woman.
Anderson was about to say something but the salesman was already out the door and running for a parked Dodge sedan, his neatly folded paper fluttering to the sidewalk. Anderson bolted after him, shambling in his greatcoat.
Hey, Anderson yelled. Hey!
Anderson sprinted over and pulled the passenger door open and slid onto the seat and was confronted by a revolver barrel poking into his cheek.
What the hell you doin’? the man demanded.
Anderson gestured weakly at the disappearing headlights, gasping for air.
I think I know that woman, Anderson said.
Seeing the cars dip around a corner the salesman dropped the revolver into his lap and punched the throttle and they lurched forward, the seat throbbing as the Dodge picked up speed. The salesman hunched up close to the wheel, peering out the windshield, saying nothing. Anderson steadied himself against the door as the curve threw its weight at them and the car lost traction for a moment, wheels hopping, then righted itself.
My name’s Anderson.
Anderson held out his hand and realized the futility of a handshake when traveling nearly sixty.
Watch it! shouted Anderson.
The salesman jerked the wheel and they swung around a square metal can lying in the road. Turning on Seventh Street they came upon the three cars. The Packard was up a short grassy bank and over on its roof. The two chase cars flanked it and four men stood in the headlights pointing pistols at the overturned car. A telephone pole was snapped neatly off at the base, the wires sparking on the street, dancing and popping like bullwhips. More metal cans spilled out the open rear door of the steaming Packard, wheels spinning blindly.
Shit, the salesman hissed, and yanked the car to a halt. He jumped out and jogged toward the accident. Two of the men immediately turned around and covered him with their pistols, shouting at him to stop. Anderson climbed out of the car and stood waiting. The salesman pulled out a badge. Richards, he said, sheriff’s deputy, and after looking it over the men turned their attention back to the Packard. Anderson sidled forward. There were a few houses and shops along Seventh Street, but the porch lights remained off; no one came to the doors. The front of the Packard was badly smashed, the grille folded neatly where it struck the pole, the windshield shattered.
Easy boys, Richards was saying. We can take care of this.
Elmore, one of the men yelled, go check the door.
Easy now, Richards said.
Elmore peered into the smashed window and then yanked open the passenger door. A body slumped out, loose and flaccid and bending in unnatural ways. Anderson quickly looked away, then back again. The face was badly crushed, but they could all see it was a woman. The driver’s door was pulled open and then they were dragging out another body and laying it on the grass. It was also a woman; she had on stockings, and her crushed hat had a large daisy pinned to it. She appeared to be all right and she covered her face with her hands, her body heaving with sobs, her dress wadded up around her waist. Richards was bending over the dead woman and muttering to himself. Anderson stepped closer, trying to get a better look at her.
Who’s this?
One of the four men, the one called Elmore, was gesturing with his pistol toward Anderson.
Well, Richards said, who are you?
Name’s Anderson. I . . . thought I knew this woman. Is that Willie Carter Sharpe?
No, Elmore said. What’s your business here?
Another man approached them.
We got to git this here lady to the hospital.
Okay, Elmore said, take Wilkins with you.
Elmore turned to Richards.
The damn woman was throwing full cans at us. Near smashed up several times. Sheriff, you gonna get your boys out here?
Yes, yes, Richards said, we’ll get it taken care of.
I need to ask you to back up, sir, Elmore said to Anderson.
You are federal agents? Alcohol Tax Unit? Anderson asked, slowly backing up.
Richards pulled out his pistol and leveled it at Anderson’s head.
You better git on back down that road. Ain’t nothin’ here for you to worry about.
ANDERSON WALKED BACK down the road to where a can lay half crushed in the gutter. A square five-gallon can with a simple twist cap. He could smell it before he got within ten feet: the rich, heady aroma of rotten corn mixed with a trace of burnt sugar. Anderson pushed it with the toe of his boot. It was the same kind of can he had seen scattered along the roadsides, piled in the gullies all through Franklin County. Once he saw a group of children playing with a pile of them, kicking the cans about an alley in Rocky Mount. Anderson stood on the sidewalk behind a tree and watched the men at the crime scene; it seemed that Richards just wanted the ATU agents to leave and let him handle it, but they were insisting on something.
A few minutes later the Dunkards from the diner came down the road in an old Ford Model T truck. They pulled up short by Anderson and the older man who sat in the front passenger seat leaned out.
Is they all right?
No, I’m afraid not, Anderson said. One of them’s dead, the other is gone to the hospital.
Who is it?
Not sure, Anderson said. Two women.
The driver spoke up.
That’s Pearl Hoover’s car. I’d seen her in it yesterday.
The old man fixed Anderson with a steely gaze. His unshaven upper lip was full and wet, a trace of gravy in his beard.
White lightnin’, he grunted.
What’s that? Anderson asked.
Whiskey trade, the driver answered.
The old man stared hard at Anderson’s face, his gray eyes milky with cataracts and Anderson figured he couldn’t see him too well in the fading evening light.
My name’s Sherwood Anderson.
Tazwell Minnix, the driver said. This is my father R. L. Minnix.
Be not conformed to this world, the old man mumbled, fingering his beard.
What’s that, sir?
His vague pupils gazed up at Anderson.
Blackwater station, he hissed.
The driver put his hand out and placed it on the old man’s shoulder. The old man spit the words at Anderson.
Them boys there. Them Bondurant boys. The worst bunch to ever hit Franklin!
Another car motored down the hill from downtown, swerving around the Dunkards and pulling up just behind the wreck. Three men got out, including a stocky middle-aged man in a gray suit who emerged from the back of the car and strode over to the ATU men with the others in his wake.
Who’s that fellow? Anderson asked.
We better be gettin’ on, the driver said. Have a good day, sir.
And with that Tazwell Minnix threw the old truck into gear and they pulled away.
The man in the gray suit had pulled Jefferson Richards aside and had him by one of his lapels. They argued in hushed tones, Richards gesturing down the road, the man in the gray suit close to his face. Liquor from the smashed car had seeped into the road and now ran down the gutter by Anderson’s feet in a rippling stream. The ATU men were covering the dead woman’s body with a coat.
ANDERSON WALKED BACK up the hill to the Little Hub Restaurant and paid his bill. Describing the man in the gray suit to the counterman he learned that it was likely Carter Lee, the commonwealth’s attorney. He made a note that he must speak with Mr. Lee as well as with the sheriff, a man named Pete Hodges. And this Jefferson Richards fellow? Anderson also got directions to the Blackwater station in Burnt Chimney. The counterman, a small paper cap perched on his pointed head, eyed him warily. Then in a very sincere voice suggested that Anderson stay away from that place.
Ain’t the kind of place for a city gentleman.
I grew up on a farm, sir, Anderson said. I’m no city slicker.
I’ll tell you what, the counterman said, they ain’t gonna ask you about your family history at the Blackwater station.
BACK IN HIS ROOM that night Anderson took a couple bolts of mountain whiskey and lay on his bed. The whiskey made him feel safely constrained, like he was curling into himself. I can understand how men might favor it, he thought. A bit hot on the throat, and it kept burning in the gut like a ball of coals. But the warmth and flush was immediate and his muscles relaxed for the first time in days. White lightning.
Anderson knew that many people in this part of the world still believed there were two kinds of lightning, one being blue-red and the other white. The difference was that a fire started by white lightning couldn’t ever be put out: It would burn until it ran out of things to consume. This was the lightning of the great sweeping summer forest fires, the roaring demons that consumed everything. White lightning was the kind of drink that brought your hand to your pounding heart after each swallow, as if to hold it in your chest, because you knew that fire couldn’t be put out.
As the liquor warmed his body and brain Anderson thought that the situation here was familiar: the rising tide of industrial greed that pushed men away from their workbenches and their craft to become part of the machine. Progress. It turned them into simple parts, expendable, replaceable, cheaply made as if their hearts were constructed of tin with shears and paste.
Hell, Anderson thought, that seems to be an appropriate thing to drink to, and he raised the glass to his lips and downed the last sip. When he closed his eyes for a moment he saw a great shape in a dark field, above him in the indeterminate emptiness. Its force and mass were terrifying, its slow, descending sway. By the time he got his shoes off and lay back down the whiskey crept up his brain stem and took him, dead asleep before he laid his head down.