“I OBJECT!”
The Sheriff scratched his chin reflectively.
Up to a moment ago there had been no doubt in his mind that, of the three men facing him in that circle, the wearer of the silken neckerchief was the criminal of the three. The criminal of the entire four, to be exact—counting the man still fast asleep on the ground well back of the green-flannel-shirted, silk-neckerchiefed protester.
But now the Sheriff found himself bewildered, perplexed. By the sheer audacity of the man across from him, wanting to “explain” himself after he had been caught “dead to rights,” so to speak. And the objectivity of those headlines the other had speciously conjured up were just now as real to the Sheriff as though he were actually viewing them.
Could it, the Sheriff asked himself morosely, come to pass, by any fool idiotic chance, that identically such letters as were in those mentally viewed headlines could—might—would—appear on all the papers of America tomorrow morning? Screaming forth the complete gist of a story beneath them—a story in which his name would appear at quite no point in a favorable light? Why—the net results of such a story as that would be—would be—
The Sheriff pondered deeply.
Intently.
The while nobody broke the silence that hung over this inexorably shrinking island—a silence which would have been complete, utter, had it not been for the irritable purling water nearest the group. And reason enough, no doubt, that none broke it! For all three men facing the Sheriff plainly could see that the latter’s patience, so far as arguments were concerned, was practically at an end. And two could see that if, by some chance the Sheriff did allow himself to listen to lies, explanations, or whatnot, their own ownership of their belts would be in some wise affected. While, manifestly, the other man must have been able to see that if the Sheriff’s patience suddenly snapped—nothing the other might want to say would even be listened to. But a grim look on the face of the man in the Mexican costume—and an almost identical look on the face of the man in the rural habiliments—bespoke that something new had come into this situation. For each look said, plainer than words: “If he’s allowed to talk, he can talk till the cows come home—but he’ll get my belt only over my dead body. Since it’s easier to die from a lead slug than to drown to death!”
And now the Sheriff himself broke that profound silence.
“Supposing Hart, that for pu’poses of pure jestice on’y, I was to give you 5 minutes—jest 5 minutes—do you think you could keep yo’re plea for mit’gation o’ sentence—fur that’s all it would technycally be; with on’y two life belts an’ one blow-up vest fur four men, they ain’t no mit’gation o’ sentences around hyar!—well, do you think you could keep yo’re technycal plea down to them 5 minutes? Mind you, I ain’t promising noth—”
“Five minutes is all I ask,” said the other hurriedly.
The man in the Mexican costume turned toward the Sheriff.
“Good Christ, Sheriff,” he bit out, “you—you don’t mean to say you’re going to listen to a man who’s been convicted by pure elimin—”
“You—you can’t listen to him, Sheriff,” the man in the yellow derby almost shouted. “Because he’s a goddamned crimin—”
“Come, come—both o’ you fellers,” said the Sheriff, tolerantly for one who had been told his own business, “what do either one o’ you care ef’n he shoots off his mouth fur—say—300 seconds? The dam ain’t busted yit—so fur’s us here on Bleeker’s Island goes. So—”
“Who the hell can know,” bit out the man in the yellow derby, “whether it is—or whether it isn’t? The goddamned advance waters from its busting could be, right now, no more than a half-mile away. And by Jesus Chri—”
“I’God, Hick,” commented the Sheriff, under beetling brows, “ef’n you ain’t spouted more profan’ty in the last 3 minutes than the hull time you b’en on this island, I’ll be a—a son-of-a-gun! Ef’n I wasn’t moughty dead shore of yo’re story, I’d say you wa’nt no kentryman from Bad Axe, Michigan! And—however, as to the p’int yo’ve raised. Of co’se nobody hyar knows how fur off—ef, that is, the dam was busted right now!—the crest o’ them released waters is—no more than they even know ef the dam is busted. But the advance waters from sich released waters ain’t giving nobody here chilblains—no more than is the released waters them-sevves choking nobody to death. And so—” He looked from the man he was speaking to, to the man in the Mexican sombrero, which article of wear was now tipped blusteringly far back on the other’s head—even brazenly tilted to one side of the back, and again the Sheriff’s eyes narrowed a bit bewilderedly. “—and so—so fur’s letting this damned robber an’ gal-killer what’s setting acrost from me, shoot off his lyin’ mouth fur 300 sho’t seconds, jest what, atter all, kin th’ee dead men—plus one sleepin’ man what ain’t even on Bleeker’s Isle ’tall!—do with their time, anyway? Fur—” And the Sheriff gave a quizzical gesture with his two hands. “—sartinly him what’s asleep yander ain’t on this island! Fur ef his Buffalo Managing Editor has investygated thar in New Yo’k, and found him missin’—why!—he’s jest out som’eres workin’ out some other angle on that em’rald story! While the man what sent him out hyar is fast asleep on opium—and more of it! While the man what put him out hyar today, seed, ’ith his own eyes, as that tenBrockerville had b’en t’uk off! So, as I say, he jest ain’t on the island, that’s all! While we four as is on it, ain’t on it, nuther, bein’—” And again the Sheriff gave a quizzical gesture with his hands. “—bein’ dead men! And as conclusively as ever, in all hist’ry, four dead men was four dead men! Fur we b’en seed on this island, don’t fergit—the hull four of us—one—two—three—four!—and with my po-leece launch clost by—at 9:40 this mo’ning; then, at 10:01, they cotched a defnite signal showing I’d def’nitely t’uk off in my boat—and cleared the island o’ trespassers to boot; then, still later, we b’en seed ’way down-river ag’in—and ag’in, four of us!—one—two—three—four!—and travelin’ in that same identical launch; and then, still later, we b’en found—by the way that still same and identycal launch is upturned and snagged on Old Antler Head—to be drownded—dead as four doornails—garfish food! So what, mebbe, I ask again, Mex—and you Hick—can three dead men do—than ent’tain theirsevves watchin’ a fo’th dead man lie hisse’f into Hell?”
“But he’s a cunning liar,” said the man in the sombrero viciously, “and before he gets done, he’s likely to have you belie—”
“He won’t have me doin’ nothin’,” retorted the Sheriff gruffly. “And even ef’n I was dumb as a bat—which I don’t think I am—don’t you ’spose that ef’n he flung fo’th the tiniest misstatement what had to do with fields sech as Hick here knows well—like farmin’, or what-have-you?—that I’d expect Hick to promp’ly jerk him up then and thar? Or ef’n he flung any misstatements that deals with yo’re fields—whether ’twas newspaper work—or some o’ the brands of champagne you drunk back when you was in the money—don’t you expeck I’d expeck f’r you to show then and thar where he’s the liar he knows he is?” The Sheriff at this juncture noted, from the corner of his eye, the eyes of the man in the silk neckerchief narrow. And was himself satisfied. “Ain’t nobody can lie nohow—with three pair of ears to check his words! And so be yo’rese’f, Mex. We’re four dead men—and a sleepin’ man what ain’t even hyar!—on a non-ezistent island!—and with nothing to do on that non-ezistent island but—wait—wait—wait! Oh, yes—’tis non-ezistent! Fur ef’n this island right now had a bonfire of one hundred dry two-by-fours cracklin’ and burnin’ on it, it couldn’t register itse’f—through this fog—on dry land no-whar; fact is, that in this partic’lar fog—which we all hearn was due to lay all day and all t’night—fact is, that with even sech a bonfire as I described on it, this island couldn’t even be found by a stern-wheeler that was a-lookin’ fur it—and was no mor’n one hundred feet off. A stern-wheeler bein’—le’ me tell you inlanders—the on’y kind of a boat that kin stand still ag’in a swif’ current, and nose around a bit. And even still less could this here island be found by a flood-control boat—all o’ which are jest as plumb blind in a deep fog—and, wuss, so danged light that when one tries to nose in, fur a mooring, at Memphis, it’s mo’ likely than not to find itse’f tyin’ up at Vicksburg—and no foolin’, nuther! P’int is, once more again, that this island couldn’t be found now by a stern-wheeler that was a-lookin’ fur it—and no mo’n one hundred feet off. Which stern-wheeler ain’t off nowhar’—and ain’t goin’ to be off nowhar—not in these speeding waters!—no mo’ than is the big bonfire I described cracklin’ away—and no mo’n is the fog thinner; it’s thicker, by God! So this island is plumb non-ezistent, to all practical intents and pu’poses. As are we! And so—being dead men on a non-ezistent island!—we mought jest as well ent’tain oursevves listenin’ to a lie as—as worryin’ about su’merged stumps downstream—and whirlpools—sech as we’ll hatter encounter once we take off. We—”
“And that’s—that’s just it,” put in the man in the silk neckerchief, eagerly—manifestly desperately so. “You three have nothing to do anyway. So—so you might as well let me entert—hrmph—present my plea that will establish me as having just as much right to being sav—”
“Yo’re plea, Hart,” proclaimed the Sheriff sternly, “cain’t establish nothing—sartinly when, as you say, you ain’t got—an’ won’t have—nothing to back it up with. Yo’re plea cain’t be nothing more than a fu’filment of the int’rests o’ local jestice. And—but you pipe down. I’ll come back to you in a minute.” He turned to the man who had represented himself as being a newspaperman—well, no, not a newspaperman—just a neophyte who wished to be one! “The real p’int is, Mex, that while we’re all dead now—and dead atop a ab’slutely onfindable and onregist’rable spot in the Unyverse, to boot!—we won’t allus be that way. No! Fur when—‘clud-in’, pray God, me!—an’ him now sleepin’, straggle out’n this water late tonight—or before dawn tomorrow—we’ll be at spots which, if they don’t rep’sent civylization, c’n prob’by be connected thereto immedjitly with phone wires! Nor will we be dead no more—neither. That being a manner o’ my sayin’, Mex, that you—bein’ a would-be newspaperman—and tenBrockerville—bein’ the same—are goin’ to tell this whole story to yo’re editors by wire. Cert’n’y he is—sence he’ll be wantin’ to give his editor the big scoop ’bout Cassius Callaban, the Negro actor, havin’ b’en found to be dead. While Hick—who ain’t no newspaperman nor even would-be newspaperman—is going to be readin’ that brief I give him—and readin’ the story of what took place out hyar—to the newspapermen who’ll be calling up the place whar he gits out, once the news is phoned from it that one of the four men as was on Bleeker’s Island has actu’lly b’en contacked. And thus, ef’n I don’t listen to this man’s goddamned lies, it will be said, a’right, that a Fed’ral co’te—fur in the case of a place like this island, cut off by flood, or famine, or what, it becomes a United States Deestrict—it will be said that the Co’te of United States Deestrict Bleeker’s Isle was held onjudicial and onconstitutional and—”
“But,” expostulated the man who had called himself Hick, “being Al Hart, he’s a super-liar; and I tell you he’ll end up by—”
“Now, now, Hick,” said the Sheriff gently. “Between the three of us—with a combined life-exper’ence of—let’s see?—30 and 30 and 41—that’s 101 years!—I calc’late we ought to be able to find the holes in a very large sieve! This fellow yander has b’en getting away with murder in the past—layin’ his stories about hisse’f either in Chycago—when he knows his hearer ain’t never been thar—or in a steel mill, what pract’cally nobody knows nothing about; and slapping in, on them latter-laid tales, with a heavy bresh, local color what nobody, onfortunately, could know whether ’twas paint—or mud! But now we got him whar we want him. Fur he cain’t lay his story in Chycago whar we know he’s never b’en, ef fur no other reason than that you, Hick, have b’en thar—and seed plenty whilst you was! So Chycago’s out—fur him. Nor kin he lay his facts in no steel mills—no—nor drag in nothin’ ’bout otpics—nor—nor ’bout chemicalry—as per them books as was found!—kaze by any o’ them subjec’s he proves hisse’f tharby to be the very man he’s denyin’ he is. And today’s he’s talking fur his life—so he thinks! And not jest peddlin’ b.s. to some chanct acquaintance. So—with him driv’ off’n all the terr’tory he knows, we got him hawgtied.” The Sheriff sounded exultant; he was exultant. And he turned to the other triumphantly. “Hyar and now,” he demanded, “I order you—before anybody here spills anything more about his own past life—to say whar yo’re calc’latin’ to lay the facts that account for you bein’ whar you air right now; and I warn you, mo’over, that when you do start to talk—ef’n I let you!—you’ll keep ’em thar—or be cut plumb off. And fur good. So—and put yo’rese’f of record, hyar and now!—whar is them ‘facts’ of yor’n going to be laid?”
“Why—” said the other, “—where they evolved—and took place, of course. In—in a steel mill. And a steel town.”
“In—in a steel mill?” ejaculated the Sheriff. “Well by God, Hart, I am learning poker this day! I’m learning that, in a big crees-us, you play yo’re hand as it is—even ef’n you give that hand away. Yes, by God, you couldn’t cinch yo’rese’f more as Al Hart than ef, when you spieled yo’re piece, you fished out’n yo’re boots a card representin’ some ingen’ous p’int o’ otpics—and one representin’ a equally ingen’ous p’int in chemicalry—like that perfessor in the Eclaw Club said you ’ventually would!—and played them kyards too! Yes, I am learning poker this day, and that you play yo’re hand as it ’tis—and not as it tain’t. Though atter all, yo’re famous ‘steel-mill’ hand’s the on’y hand you got to play right now. Yes, Hart, I am learning poker.”
“You think you are—but you aren’t. For one thing, you think, if I get my 5 minutes, I’m going to claim to be an electric lineman, don’t you?”
“Quite nothin’ else,” said the Sheriff satisfiedly. “Ef, that is, yo’re to explain that ’lectrical lineman’s getup on you! And which means—”
“Which means that if conclusions were jack rabbits, you’d shoot at ’em before their ears even rose above the horizon. But—Hart or not Hart—I’ll have to lay my facts in a steel mill. And—and the town outside. And if I forget myself and get too—too graphic, call me on it, for God’s sake, but don’t accuse me of laying on ‘local color.’”
“I don’t know nothin’ ’bout local color,” said the Sheriff dignifiedly, “’ceptin’ that we heerd it said today that you allus laid it on with a heavy bresh. But, by God, I’ve a man hyar—a writin’ man, or at least would-be writin’ man! Mex—who will know when yo’re laying on the local color. And he’ll—”
“I’ll damn soon call the turn,” said that individual. “For even if I don’t know the pigment itself—in this case—I know the technique of how it’s slapped on, and—”
“We might even all realize that,” said the man in the neckerchief gently, “having heard your colorful story. And—”
“Why, goddamn you,” bit out the other, “so help me, I’ll—”
“Easy, Mex.” The Sheriff turned to the man in the yellow derby hat. “You ain’t even, I take it, Hick, ever lived in a steel-mill town, eh?”
“Sorry to say, I haven’t,” said the other, his teeth showing. “But the last book I read, on my way up to—to Canada, was a book called 1000 Ways to Trap a Liar. And if I don’t trap this man ten ways going and coming—and show you how he’s lying—well, I’m a poor rube from the countr—”
“Poor rube maybe you are,” taunted the man in the neckerchief.
“Oh—oh—Christ!” the man in the derby almost screamed, getting beet-red. “If it’s the last thing I ever do, I’ll smash your teeth down your—”
“Easy, Hick, you idjut!” This from the Sheriff. “I ain’t read yo’re lie-trapping book—but I know enough about what Hart’s doing right now to know that he’s gettin’ you two worked up—with high blood pressure—so’s you cain’t jedge his statements—and his words—and all that. That’s his game!” He sighed. And turned to the man in the neckerchief. “All right, Hart. I’m giving you 5 minutes—300 seconds—and nary minute, nary second, longer. And the more you swing that famous local-color bresh o’ yo’rn, what we heerd all ’bout this mo’ning, around th’ lan’scape—” The Sheriff’s voice was contumelious. “—the less time yo’ll have to explain what yo’re doin’ on this island. Which, I take it, you think yo’re going to do!” He pulled out the big silver turnip. “So go to it. It’s now a fraction of a minute sho’t o’ bein’ 8 minutes atter 4:30 o’clock, by this watch o’ mine. Darkness, what falls this time o’ year—with daylight savin’ time ’arly ’long th’ river—at 8 o’clock, is goin’ to fall ’arlier today; ’bout—’bout—let’s see?” The Sheriff reflected sagely. Proceeding thereafter to talk to all, not just one man. “Sence this hyar fog’s a water fog on’y—and no smoke fog like what’s in the cities whar Mis-ter Al Hart has lived!—it’ll drap the fall o’ darkness back by zackly 1 hour; so darkness’ll fall today at 7—stid o’ 8.” Now he directed his words again toward their original object. “But don’t you think fur a minute yo’re goin’ to talk till dark falls—and then figger to grab a belt. Fur you ain’t! It’s a’most 8 minutes atter 4:30 now. And yore goin’ to git cut off at 13 minutes atter 4:30—and no mebbe! And sooner than that, ef’n by any chance that water starts to rise like it shouldn’t ought to. So—git going! With this pure technycality of a plea of yo’rn. Which is all it is. Fur I got to tell you right now, plumb in advance, that atter yo’re done, I’m—”
“After I’m done,” said the other dignifiedly, “you may be considering which one of the two life belts you’ve practically handed out to these two men on either side of me—or that blow-up vest which you’ve left on the man behind me—to give to me.”
Which was a rather confident statement, to say the least, since any story that might perchance be told today on Bleeker’s Island would have, perforce, to he told vastly condensed—if not almost skeletonized!—and with many, many an “I”!—and not, as all stories—false and true—were destined ultimately to be carefully yet colorfully re-told—in various quaint novels about Bleeker’s Island yclept The Portrait of Jirjohn Cobb, Cleopatra’s Tears, and, far from least, The Bottle with the Green Wax Seal—by a professional taleteller—a professional taleteller being one, of course, who can facilely expand an incident into an episode—a person into a character—a colorful objective highlight into a vivid description—a pungent remark and its answer into a dramatic conversation—
But that so-confident statement just uttered was, right now, being answered by the man in the Mexican suit.
“Over my dead body my belt’ll be given you,” he bit out.
“And if mine’s given you, Hart,” snarled the man in the yellow derby, towards the man in the lineman’s costume, “you’ll be unconscious when you get it. You’ll—” And the size of his fist, convulsively doubled up, resembled a ham.
“Unconscious?” raged the man in the Mexican suit. “He’ll—he’ll be dead—if I know how to strangle a filthy—”
“Easy—easy!” commanded the Sheriff. And added, frank admiration in his tones: “By God—but th’ Actor shore can play you two like you was fish! He baits you both ever’time—and you rise like trout.” He shook his head, almost amused. Then turned to the man in the silk neckerchief. “All right—git going. With yo’re last and final plea. And I want to jest suggest, Hart, afore you start off, that the best thing you kin do now is to give us the real lowdown on yo’rese’f so’s the world—and any relatives you may have—and yo’re friends—will have a kinder pikter of you atter yo’re gone. Fur mebbe they is some redeemin’ features in yo’re hist’ry. Ef so, yo’re chance is hyar now to tell us the real facks—’bout how mebbe you shot that gal accidental-like—and who he’ped you to git out’n Folsom—whar you went when you escaped—what you figgered to do with yo’re life—mebbe to reform, heh?—but them’s the things, Hart, that—ef’n you can tell ’em—you’d better tell, instid of a lot o’ bunkalorum. An’ bunkalorum what some danged tricky author, someday writin’ up this place—and these happenin’s—’ll expand, an’ tetch up, an’ embellyish, an’ ornyment to all hell-an’-gone, on’y, at the end of his book, to up and give his readers the full an’ god-danged truth—that yo’re Act-or Hart. So hyar’s yo’re chance! To give the real inside facts o’ yo’re crim’nal life instid of, Hart, a lot of bu—”
“Please,” said the other, with a mirthless yet cryptic smile that was not lost on any man who faced him, “don’t keep calling me Hart. Because my name’s not Hart. My—my—my name is—”