Quent Cordair
April's Justice
First published by The Atlantean Press, 1994.
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The point of focus was four-and-a-half feet above the ground, forty yards away, centered between the deep wagon ruts of the frozen dirt drive where it crested the hill. There was nothing at that point, nothing but the chill gray December air. The air was held steadily on the tip of a thin metal blade, which was couched snugly in a square "U" notch—the rear sight of a 1903 Springfield 30-06. The little lead ball inside was waiting to spin madly out of the rifle's biting, spiraling grooves and, in a twentieth of a second, hiss across the short distance. Should a man happen to be walking up from the main road, it would be his misfortune to cross the path of the metal ball, with his chest.
The thought gave her satisfaction, but she didn't smile. Her cheek was pressed hard against the varnished walnut stock. The occasional snowflake that landed on her face melted there, unnoticed. The cold well-oiled barrel lay steadied across the top of a neat stack of firewood. Since summer, she had bruised her shoulder again and again as from varying distances she had blasted jars and tins to smithereens. The bruises were yellow now, and the powerful rifle had become familiar, a constant companion, like the quilted blanket she had carried with her everywhere as a child.
She had been putting the animals away when she heard the sound of an approaching motorcar on the main road, which would have been acceptable but for the sudden cessation of the engine's noise. Her house was the only one along the desolate nine-mile stretch of winding West Virginia road, and no one stopped here, not anymore.
She waited now behind the firewood, unmoving, watching the tip of the sight for something to step into the condemned empty space. The horse in the shed behind her snorted restlessly. With her thumb, she slipped the rifle's safety off.
A hat appeared in the center of the road, then a head beneath it. She was unprepared for the other two hats, one on each side of the road, outside the ruts. Okay, first the middle one, then the left, then the right. The magazine held five rounds; she could afford to miss only twice. She practiced the move, sliding the front sight only an inch each way. No, it's better just to go straight across—left, middle, right. She practiced it twice, then held the rifle on the place where the left man's chest would be in about two seconds.
A shimmer of silver flashed from the middle man's chest. She recognized the sheriff. The man on the left turned out to be Caleb, one of his deputies. She didn't recognize the man on the right, but judging by the similar hat, he was a deputy too. She practiced the move again—left, middle, right.
"April?" the sheriff hollered. "April?" he called again, warily. The trio slowed as they neared the house. They hadn't spotted her yet. Caleb and the other deputy looked as though they expected ghosts to fly out of the house. The three stopped a good twenty yards from the front door. The sheriff noted the wisps of blue smoke coming from the chimney.
"April? This is Sheriff Holsapple. Come on out—I need to talk with you for a minute."
She had never liked the way Caleb watched her when she was in town, with that lewd twist sneaking up at the corner of his mouth. She sighted in on the spot and wondered what his face would look like without it. The familiar resistance of the trigger pressed against her finger. With the rifle still trained on Caleb, she slowly stepped out from behind the woodpile. The blood drained from the faces of the deputies. The three men stood as frozen as the pines behind them.
Sheriff Holsapple swallowed, thinking with small consolation that, if she were going to shoot Caleb first, he might have a chance to draw. Maybe Tommy would be second. He regretted the sense of responsibility that had made him come up here. They should have just left the girl alone.
"Come on now, April," he ventured, "I'm only here to help."
"I don't need your help."
"This is important. Look, at least lower the gun. It's too cold out here to be sweatin' like this. We'll just stand right here, and you can stand right there, and I'll say my piece and leave. Okay?"
She lowered the gun and, watching Caleb's eyes, walked to the house and stepped up onto the porch from the side.
"Come on in. You must be thirsty."
"Thank you, ma'am."
She turned to open the door, and Caleb—with no little relief—gave Tommy, the new deputy, a look that said, "See, I told you she was nuts!" It was a shame too, he thought as he watched her. Even through the thick winter clothes you could see the girl was thoroughbred filly.
The front door opened into the room that served as living space, kitchen, and dining room. A sturdy all-purpose table sat to the right. A fireplace and wood stove were against the back wall. To the left was a closed bedroom door which was seldom opened. April still slept in the loft.
She leaned the gun against the hearth and from a kettle on the stove poured three cups of hot apple cider. The men sat at the table. She served them silently, with reflexive graciousness, then backed away to the wall, near the gun, and watched them drink. She could feel them watching nervously out of the corners of their eyes.
"So, what's your business, Sheriff?"
Sheriff Holsapple set his cup on the table and considered his words carefully.
"Yesterday afternoon, about three miles from here, a man got away from a Mercer County deputy who was taking him to the Charleston prison. Several posses have been searching the hills all day, but he must have holed up somewhere. Now, I doubt you've heard, but there's a blizzard blowing in—"
"I know."
"Well, yes, you would. Anyway, this fella's only wearing prison cloths, no coat or boots, and we figure that if he wants to live through the night, he'll have to come down out of the storm and find shelter."
"And you think he might come here?"
"Well, no, but here's as good a place as any."
"So what did he do?"
The sheriff hesitated and looked nervously at the deputies. "Well, he hasn't been convicted yet, but if it's serious enough to take him to Charleston then you should—"
"Sheriff, what did he do?"
The sheriff sighed, "It doesn't really matter—"
"It was murder, wasn't it?"
"Yes. Yes, it was murder...."
"And what else?"
The sheriff looked her in the eyes, apologetically. April turned away and looked out the window. The snowflakes were bigger now and starting to fall more thickly. She put some twigs of kindling on the glowing embers in the fireplace.
Shoot him, April. Shoot him now!
Caleb chuckled, "Well, the fella's swearing they've got the wrong man, but—don't they all say that?"
The sheriff looked at him hard. The boy just didn't know when to shut up. Caleb was good with a gun, but one these days his mouth was going to get him killed.
She picked up the rifle and turned to them. "Will that be all, Sheriff?"
"Uh, yes, April. Come on boys, we oughta get back to town before the road gets too bad."
He was following the deputies out when he turned at the door and spoke quietly enough that the other two couldn't hear.
"You know, I've got a daughter your age still at home, and she would love some company. You're more than welcome to spend a few days...." He studied her face. "Well, you know where we live if you change your mind. You take care now, April."
Caleb meanwhile was having his own thoughts. "Miss April, I'd be more than happy to stick around tonight and keep an eye on things for you—"
"—said the fox to the hen," mumbled Tommy.
"Shut up and walk, both of you," barked the sheriff, and he followed them towards the road.
"What's he look like?" April asked.
The sheriff turned. "The prison shirt is black-and-white stripes, but if he's managed to steal some clothes, they say he's got some kind of bird tattooed on his left forearm."
She watched them walk back over the crest of the hill, the sheriff's hat disappearing first in the middle, then the deputies' on the outside. The car engine started and faded away into the distance.
It was late afternoon and the low sky was coming in dark and fast from the north. The storm was going to be a bad one. The horses had sensed it. Blackie had almost thrown her this morning. She slipped the gun's safety on, took Blackie from the shed and led him to the barn. She put out extra hay and water for the horses and cows, enough to last three days. The snow could drift so bad up here that it might take a whole day to dig from the house to the barn. From the barn she dragged a heavy four-by-four plank and wedged it upright beneath the middle of the chicken coop's roof. The coop had been built only last spring and had yet to be tested by the weight of snow. She wasn't taking any chances. The chickens and pigs were given extra feed. She double-checked the fastenings on the doors and shutters of the sheds. When she closed the door to the coop, the chickens cackled as though they'd been buried alive.
The well was next to the house. She tied a burlap bag over the hand pump so that it wouldn't become encased and frozen up by ice and snow. There wasn't really anything to be done for the house itself, except to close all the shutters. The sealed logs and thick planks of pine were impregnable to the harsh mountain winters. The doors and windows were tight. There wasn't a single draft. April had felt completely safe in this house, tucked away in her little bed in the loft, though the storms had howled only a few feet above.
She stood on the porch and looked beyond the yard to the scraggly woods. Dead pale-brown needles carpeted the patches of pine. The needles still on the trees absorbed what winter light they could, their dull opaqueness a faded memory of summer's vivid hue. The hardwoods stood bare, each lonely amidst its neighbors and naked to the freezing breezes that portended the slashing winds to come.
She heard a sharp crack. A branch tumbled from somewhere above, slapping and twisting across the lower branches until it hit the ground. April reached out and touched the porch post. In her other hand she felt the weight of the rifle. Let the storm come. Let the man come. She was ready.
She took a last look at the woods, then went into the house and slid the heavy iron bar across the door.
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