The Moonshine War by Elmore Leonard

"I know you have--I mean how come you haven't been down to see us?"

  "You know how it is."

  "Sure, up here drinking your own whiskey. Well, a man makes it as fine as you do, I can't say as I blame you."

  Mr. Baylor gave E. J. Royce a sharp-pointed elbow pushing between him and the man next to him. He waited as Son nodded, then said, straight-faced and solemn as he could, "Son Martin, we have reason to believe you are presently engaged in the manufacture and commercial sale of intoxicating liquor in violation of the Eighteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution. Is that true?"

  "Yes, sir." Son nodded respectfully, going along.

  "Then as sheriff of this county I order you to produce it," Mr. Baylor said, "before all these boys here die of thirst."

  By the way people came in, Lowell could tell if they'd been to the Hotel Cumberland before. If they walked right over to the main desk, knowing it was back of the stairway and partly hidden, they'd been here. If they came in and looked around the lobby and up at the high ceiling and the second floor balcony and weren't sure where to go, it was their first time.

  But the man in the dark suit and hat, carrying the big leather suitcase, stumped Lowell: he didn't walk directly to the desk but he didn't gawk around either. He came in the entrance slowing his stride, holding the bag with a couple of hooked fingers, and seemed to locate the desk without looking for it. He walked over, set his suitcase down, and spread his hands on the counter.

  Coming up next to him Lowell said, "Evening," reaching over then to palm the desk bell, hitting it twice. The man looked at him and nodded. He looked tired and needed a shave and was a little stoop-shouldered the way some tall men carry themselves.

  Mrs. Lyons came out of the office that was behind the main desk. She said good evening in her quiet tone and opened the register. Mrs. Lyons always looked good, her dark hair was always parted in the middle and combed back in a roll without a wisp of loose hair sticking out. She was the neatest, cleanest-looking person Lowell had ever seen. (And he surely couldn't picture her in bed with Son Martin, or anybody.) He watched her now. Her eyes were something; they were dark brown. Sometimes they sparkled when she smiled and had the warmest look he had ever seen. Though sometimes--watching her closely when she was talking to another person--her face would smile, but her eyes would tell nothing: as if she were looking at the person from behind her smile, or maybe thinking about something else. Whenever he talked to her for any reason, Lowell would have to look over somewhere else, once in a while. She was a lot older than he was, at least thirty, and he didn't know why he'd get the nervous feeling.

  The man didn't take his hat off. He bent over and wrote slowly Frank Long, Post Office Box 481, Frankfort, Ky. Mrs. Lyons dropped her eyes and brought them back up and asked Mr. Long if he was staying just the night. He shook his head saying he wasn't sure how long he'd be; maybe just a few days. Mrs. Lyons didn't ask him anything else--if he was a salesman or here on some business or visiting kin. The dark eyes went to Lowell as she handed him the key to 205.

  Lowell bent over to pick up Mr. Long's suitcase, then put his free hand on the counter as he straightened--God, like there was bricks in the thing. Mr. Long was watching him. He didn't say anything; he followed Lowell up the stairway.

  In the room, putting the bag down and going over to the window, Lowell said, "You got a nice front view." He leaned close to the pane, seeing his own reflection over the lights and lit-up signs across the street. Frank Long was looking at himself in the dresser mirror, feeling his beard stubble.

  Lowell said, "Can I get you anything else?" "Like what?" Mr. Long asked?

  "I don't know. Anything you might feel like." He waited as the man took off his coat and tie and started unbuttoning his shirt. "Did you want anything to drink?"

  Mr. Long looked at him, pausing a second and holding the button. "Are you talking about soda pop or liquor?"

  "Either," Lowell said. "Or both."

  "You can get whiskey?"

  "Maybe. There's a person I could call."

  "Don't you know selling liquor's against the law?" He pulled off his shirt; a line of black hair ran up from his belt buckle and spread over his chest like a tree. His skin was bone white and hard muscled.

  "I'm not saying I'd get it. I said maybe there was a person I could call."

  "How late's the dining room open?"

  "Till eight. You want something you'll have to hurry."

  Mr. Long pulled a fold of bills from his pocket. He handed one to Lowell. "Tell them to dish up. I'll be down in ten minutes."

  "Thank you," Lowell said. "Tonight they got breaded pork chops, chicken-fried steak, or baked ham."

  "Ham," Mr. Long said. He let Lowell edge past and reach the door. Lowell was opening it when he said, "Boy, do you know a Son Martin?"

  Lowell kept his hand on the knob. He came around slowly, giving himself time to get a thoughtful frown on his face. The man was unbuckling the straps of his suitcase. Lowell watched him let the two sections of the suitcase fall open on the bed.

  As the man looked at him, Lowell said, "There's a Son Martin lives about ten miles from here. I don't know as it's the same one you mean though."

  "How many Son Martins d'you suppose there are?"

  "I guess I never thought to count them."

  Frank Long studied him. "This one I know, his daddy was a miner before he passed on. Name John W. Martin. This Son--if it's the one--him and me soldiered together in the United States Army."

  "You were in the war with Son?"

  "In the Engineers if it's the same one." "Well, it sure sounds like it. John W. was his papa's name."

  "You say he lives about ten miles from here?"

  "You go out the county road till you see the sign Broke-Leg Creek, turn left, second road about a mile or so you turn left again. That takes you right up the hollow where he lives."

  The man smiled and it looked strange on his solemn, beard-stubbled face. He said, "Boy, you've been a big help to me." He waited a second and then said, "Hey, you want to see something?"

  "What?"

  "Something I got here." His big hand unsnapped the canvas cover on one side of the suitcase.

  "What is it?"

  "Come take a look."

  It was strange, Lowell wasn't sure he wanted to. He felt funny being alone in the room with this man.

  "I got it strapped in or I'd take it out," Mr. Long said.

  "Strapped in?" Lowell stepped toward the edge of the bed. He didn't know what to expect. Least of all he didn't expect to see a big heavy-looking army gun, polished wood and black metal and bullet clips, the gun broken down and each part tied and packed securely. Laying there on the bed with the overhead light shining on it. God. A real army gun they used in the war right there, he could touch it if he wanted to.

  "God," Lowell said.

  "You ever see anything like that?"

  "Just pictures."

  "You know what it is?"

  "I think it's a BAR rifle."

  "That's right," Mr. Long said. "Browning Automatic Rifle. U. S. Army issue." He let the canvas cover fall over the gun. "I expect not many around here have seen one."

  "No sir." Lowell looked up at him now. He hesitated, then said it quickly, before he could change his mind, "What do you use a gun like that for?"

  "Hunting," Mr. Long said. "For hunting."

  Lowell didn't tell Mrs. Lyons about the gun.

  When he went downstairs he thought about telling her, but he didn't. Maybe it would make her nervous. If he was going to tell anybody, Lowell decided, it would be Mr.

  Baylor. Mr. Baylor would know what to do.

  About a half hour later Lowell saw Frank Long come out of the dining room. He had his hat on and was lighting a cigar as he walked out of the front entrance. He didn't have the suitcase with him.

  Lowell said to Mrs. Lyons, behind the desk, "There sure a lot of people interested in Son Martin lately."

  She gave him a strange look. It was
the closest he'd ever come to seeing something in her eyes.

  Chapter Two.

  There were twenty-three men at Son Martin's place that Saturday night. They were inside the house sitting around the table. They were on the porch where a coal oil lantern hung from a post and where Mr. Baylor's deputies had placed their firearms against the wall. Some were out by the cars. But most of them stayed close to the whiskey barrel that was at the edge of the porch, the spigot sticking out, so that from the ground a man would reach up to fill his fruit jar. They were quiet at first, taking their turns with the jars, sipping the whiskey, tasting it, and thinking about the taste as it burned down to their stomachs. The serious drinkers stood and squatted and spit tobacco on the hardpack at the dim edge of the porch light as though they were waiting for a meeting to start, or waiting out front of a mine company hiring shed: men in broad hats and engineer caps and worn-out suitcoats over their Duck Head overalls.

  It was a clear night and not too cold and goddamn that Son Martin could run whiskey. He let his mash set a full six or seven days and didn't put a lot of devilment in it, like buckeye beans or carbide or lye, to hurry up the fermentation. Son took his time; he cooked the beer slowly over a low fire; he used pure copper in the works and limestone spring water to condense the vapor and he kept his still clean. The clear moonshine that came out of the flake stand was run again, doubled through the works, and filtered through charcoal before it was put up to age and mellow in charcoal-blackened white oak barrels. Son aged his run two to four months, which he said was bare minimum to give it color. If you weren't willing to wait, you'd have to go somewhere else and drink clear moonshine. It was worth a wait, E. J. Royce said, because good whiskey was kinder to a person and didn't beat your brains out the next morning. The men E. J. Royce was talking to agreed a hundred per cent because they wanted to believe it. Though each man knew if he drank as much as he wanted, he'd feel the pain the next day like a wet leather strap shrinking into his head and his mouth would be stuck together with an awful sour glue taste and he'd drink a gallon of water and six cups of coffee and a couple of bottles of Nehi soda before noon. But tomorrow morning was tomorrow morning. Tonight they'd raided Son Martin's and they were here to drink and confiscate.

  Mr. Baylor set aside five half-gallon jars as sheriff of this county and paid Son eight dollars--just about half the going rate--calling it the confiscation price. Mr. Baylor said he wasn't going to sit around all night with these punkin rollers, so he had his stuff put in a car early.

  Bud Blackwell was here with his dad and his married brother Raymond. Bud said the whiskey was all right, but he'd tasted better. He said to his brother Raymond and to Virgil Worthman and a couple other boys, where they should be with the whiskey was in town, get themselves some girls, and have a real party instead of listening to the old men talking about closed-down mines and flooded bottom land and tight-assed Herbert Hoover and the goddamn banks. There were sweet girls down there in Marlett waiting, Bud Blackwell said. Jesus, sweet and ready. Or they could ride over to this place in Corbin, near the railroad tracks, where there were girls; he'd been over there with his dad one time--hell no, Raymond hadn't gone, not married a year yet. Bud opened his pocketknife and scratched a little circle in the hardpack and began flicking the knife at it sticking the blade every time.

  Uncle Jim Bob Worthman, ten years older than Mr. Baylor, sat on the steps for a while drinking whiskey, then went up and took a shotgun from the porch and, swaying in the coal oil light, taking aim, let go both barrels at Son Martin's barn, saying he'd seen a Yankee up in the loft. Bud Blackwell said, Jesus, put that old man to bed before he starts telling about his war; there have been wars since that goddamn war of his. Virgil took Uncle Jim Bob over to their car and talked to him until he went to sleep in the back seat, telling the old man he'd cut the bluebelly dead center and that it was the best shooting ever seen. I hit my share at Lookout Mountain, the old man said. Virgil said, yes, sir, hoping Jim Bob hadn't shot one of Son's mules or one of his foxhounds.

  Somebody asked Son if his radio played, they could listen to a program from Nashville. Son said, no, it hadn't worked in some time. The man said, you keep a light burning over a hole in the ground but your radio don't play. E. J. Royce told the man, quietly, to be careful talking about Son Martin's papa. Son takes it wrong. E. J. Royce said, he'll kick out all your teeth.

  Then, changing the subject, E. J. Royce wondered that, if Son Martin made the best whiskey, who made the worst? He was just kidding. Moonshiners like the Blackwells and the Stampers and the Worthmans were always making fun of each other's whiskey. One of the moonshiners would say something now and they'd start funning each other. But it was a man on the porch who'd come with Mr. Baylor who said Christ, Arley Stamper; he puts mule piss in a jar and sells it as pure corn. Arley had been in the privy and was coming up the porch steps. He grinned at the man who said it and, as he reached the top step, hit the man full in the mouth with his right fist, took hold of him with his left hand, and hit him again and sent him off the porch. Arley Stamper looked down at the man on the ground and said to E. J. Royce, "E. J., who was that I hit?"

  Bud Blackwell took a good drink of whiskey. Holding the fruit jar in front of him, he stared out at the darkness thoughtfully. Finally he nodded and said, "Speaking of mule piss, I wonder which one of Son's animals give us this run."

  He didn't look up at Son, who was on the porch, but knew Son had heard him. He took another drink and licked his lips slowly, as if registering the aftertaste in his mind. "Either mule piss or John W. Martin whiskey," Bud Blackwell said. "I bet ten dollars."

  Some of the others looked over, knowing what Bud was leading to. They looked up at Son as a stillness settled in the yard, then moved in closer as Son came down the steps toward Bud Blackwell. Bud handed Son the fruit jar and now they watched him raise it and take a long pull, wondering how much he'd already drunk. Nobody was sure what Son could hold; the only thing certain, no matter how much he put away, nobody had ever seen him talkative or loud or open with his thoughts. One time before it was Bud Blackwell who'd said, "The son of a bitch, he could get shitfaced and fall off his porch five times an evening and never say more'n ouch." But maybe this time was different and Son would open up. The word passed into the house Bud was fooling with Son and Mr. Baylor and the others at the table, including Bud's dad, came out to watch. Bud's dad was twisting his mustache and chuckling and shaking his head like it was all in fun, though inside he was nervous and hoping to hell Bud wouldn't get knocked on his ass.

  Bud took the fruit jar from Son and held it up to the coal oil glow, facing the audience on the porch. "You claim you run this, is that right?"

  Son was patient, knowing what was coming. He said, "I should know, shouldn't I?"

  Bud cocked his head, studying the amber inches of whiskey in the jar. "Son, was you taking this to the vet?"

  That got some sounds from the people. Mr. Blackwell laughed out loud and then shut his mouth. Son kept quiet.

  "Yeah, I see specks of some in there," Bud said. "Like little bugs. Them bugs, Son?"

  There was nothing for Son to get angry about, but there was no reason to stand grinning at Bud Blackwell either. He said, "What you're saying, it was either a sick mule run it or else my dad." Son spoke mildly, but it was clear he was laying it out between them and taking Bud head on. He said, "You either want your skull busted or you want to rile me into claiming my dad made the best whiskey in east Kentucky. Once I do you say, if that's true, prove it. And I say Bud, how can I prove it if he's dead in his grave?"

  Bud Blackwell grinned. "That's getting us there. Then I say--go on, you're doing fine--what do I say?"

  "You say let's quit talking about the whiskey and drink it."

  "Pig's ass I do."

  "You say I must be getting drunk cause I'm sure running off at the mouth--I think my daddy better tuck me in bed."

  That got some sounds with E. J. Royce saying, "Tell him Son," and Mr. Blackwell giving
E. J. a dirty look. They were watching Bud Blackwell to see what he'd do now, with his mouth tight and no sign of it curling into a grin. But Bud never got his turn.

  Aaron appeared out of the darkness, moving through the group in the yard, not saying excuse me or anything until he was next to Son. There he was, barely giving them time to wonder where he came from or what he wanted. Aaron said, "Somebody coming in a car."

  Frank Long was aware of the whole scene at once, like walking into a dark, room and having the lights go on and everybody yelling surprise. He came up out of the hollow and there were the cars and the house and the men gathered in the dim glow of the porch lamp. The difference was nobody yelled surprise. They stood waiting for him, not making a sound. Long sat in his car a few moments, aware now of the spot of light up on the hill over a mound, over something; he didn't know what it was or much care right now. The men were waiting and if it was a party it surely wasn't in his honor. He couldn't back out now and turn around, so he got out and walked between the cars and when he was in the open, spotting the whiskey barrel now, he said, "I'm looking for John W. Son Martin, Jr. Am I at the right place or have I interrupted a church meeting?"

  As a couple of them moved aside there was Son.

  Long stopped before he reached the light. He let an easy grin form as he said, "Hey, Son, don't you recognize an old buddy?"

  Son couldn't see his face in the dark, but he said, "Frank Long," and saw the man from another time, Frank Long in uniform and leggings and the brim of his campaign hat curling up in front.

  Son wanted to act natural and glad to see him; he wanted to raise his voice to match Long's and get that friendly sound in it and hand him a jar and slap him on the shoulder a couple of times and say, "Frank, you old son of a bitch, it's been four years, hasn't it? Summer of 1927, Camp Taylor"--and act like nothing better could have happened than Frank Long appearing out of the dark. Except that the moment he heard Long's voice and felt his stomach knot up, he knew why the man was here.

  Son said, "Frank, step over where we can see you."