Sympathy for the Devil (43 page)

The rain of blood begins midmorning and continues all day. Under the canopies they have fashioned from the Hellsnake skins, the concrete crews begin pouring. Roy and the sleeping workers are lulled by the patter and hiss of smoking drops on the impervious hides.

By early afternoon Roy wakes. He dons a chemical protection suit to go out into the bloody downpour to check the progress of the pour. They are using a quick-setting formulation of Portland cement and crushed brimstone that would harden even under water; the rain of blood has no effect on it except to tint the topmost layer a bright pink. Roy chats with the workers for a time as they swing the concrete chutes about and level and smooth the slabs. They swap stories of rains of blood past. "I was in a hurricane of blood once in Veracruz...."

"That's nothing! I was in a blood tornado!"

"My
abuelo
told me he was working cattle on a
rancho
near Harlingen once when there was a flash blood flood, and that's how come Santa Gertrudis cattle are red."

By nightfall the blood eases off to a drizzle and by midnight it is over. Felipe reports to Roy that the first aid unit has treated a few burns, and everyone has a headache from the noxious smell, but no equipment has been lost, and they are still on the timetable.

"Rain of blood--
no problemo, Jefe
. Now a rain of frogs--
that
would have been nasty!"

All night and all the next morning the concrete crews pour slabs, while the finishers follow behind smoothing, edging, cutting expansion joints and filling them with asphalt so the concrete can expand and contract through the blazing days and freezing nights without heaving.

The construction teams, having finished making concrete forms, start building the tollbooths and toll plaza.

By the time lunch is over, the concrete work is done, there have been no more problems, and Roy is getting more and more tense as he anticipates some further disaster. Only the finish work is left. The stripers load up with paint and start out at one o'clock. Behind them, crews set the adhesive reflectors to mark the roadway center lines and lane lines. The construction teams finish the tollbooths and the electronics crew installs and tests the automatic toll counters.

We are going to make it
, Roy thinks, as he watches the sun slide down the sky.
We are going to win the biggest payoff of all
.

And then Felipe is at his side. "
Jefe
, we gotta problem."

No
, thinks Roy.
Not now. Now when we were so close.

"It's the striping paint,
Jefe
, the midline yellow. We were running low, so I sent some boys to the depot in Lubbock. The supplier was out, said somebody came in yesterday and bought up every barrel. And there's no time to order some delivered from Houston."

"How much do we need?"

"I figure we'll be short only about a hundred and fifty feet. About two quarts."

One hundred and fifty feet
, Roy thinks.
It might as well be a mile. Or the distance between Paraiso and Infierno.

Roy looks at the sun. The bottom edge of the disc is touching the horizon. A sulfurous wind is rising, and inside his head he hears a vast voice intone softly,
Tick, tock
.

He has never failed to bring a project in on time. He isn't going to start now. "Follow me!" he yells at Felipe as he swings into his pickup and floors it, racing for the striper as it approaches the end of the route. He slams to a stop behind the slow-moving machine and swings up onto the fender. At his gesture, Felipe jumps up beside him. Roy pries the lid off the paint reservoir; the last dregs of yellow paint are draining toward the outlet to the roller. "Steady me," Roy orders Felipe as he yanks his edging tool from his belt. He shoves his arm into the reservoir and slashes open his wrist.

"Keep going!" Felipe yells to the driver as yellow fluid pours out of Roy's arm into the reservoir. Roy wraps his free arm around a handhold and leans over the reservoir. "Whatever happens," he tells Felipe, "don't stop short."

Distant voices float through the blackness.

"
Tio
Roy, can you hear me? Is he going to be okay, Felipe?"

"Sure,
muchacho
. A few days of your
mama's barbacoa
and some
cervezas
, he'll be
bien
.
El tigre
, that's your
tio
."

The blackness is starting to lighten to gray. Roy can feel he is lying down; something cold is being pressed to his forehead.

Then there is another voice, and Roy must, now
must
, open his eyes.

"Well, well, Mr. Sandoval. That was very clever of you. It was something I did not anticipate, and that is saying a lot."

There is a crowd around him, but Roy knows the owner of that voice. "All Sandovals bleed highway-marking yellow,
Senor
. Paving is in our blood. Help me up," he says to his crew. Ramon protests, but Felipe and Kath shush him and haul Roy to his feet.

Roy feels as empty as a broken
pinata
. Someone has bound his wrist tightly with a bandana. He leans on Felipe and raises his eyes anxiously to the horizon--the last sliver of a scarlet sun disappears as he looks.

"Yes, Mr. Sandoval. You have completed the project as per the specifications. Your payment is being credited to your account even as we speak."

Roy straightens and turns to look at the client. The Big Man does not look happy, but now Roy is not afraid.

"And our bonus?" he asks.

"Here." The client hands over a thick sheaf of documents. "'Get Out Of Hell Free' passes for everyone on your crew. And their families. Now I suggest you had all better be going, while I am still in the mood to honor our contract."

The heavy equipment and RVs are waiting for Roy's signal. The first souls are already lining up at the tollbooths. As each passes through, a sepulchral wail rings out.

Roy turns to leave, then turns back. "If I may ask one question,
Senor
."

The client glowers. "One."

"Why a divided six-lane superhighway? There's not going to be any return traffic,
no
?"

The Big Man regards Roy as dispassionately as though he is just another mote already broiling in Hell's infernos. "I appreciate the irony, Mr. Sandoval." He turns to watch the ever-lengthening lines at the tollbooths. "I expect my... guests... will appreciate it also, though not perhaps with the same pleasure. Now go." He stamps a hoof and disappears with a sulfurous blast.

"
Vaya con Dios, Senor
," Roy whispers, "though you would not thank me to hear me say it."

Roy turns to his crew crowded around, and his heart swells with pride in these men and women. "
!Vamanos con Dios, amigos!
" he cries, lifting the sheaf of passes into the air. Cheering, whistling, and clapping greet his announcement before the crew scatters to their vehicles.

The conga line forms up again, heading back to civilization. Roy limps to Felipe's pickup and climbs wearily into the passenger seat. As the truck joins the end of the line of departing machinery, Roy turns to take what he trusts will be his last look at the entrance ramp to Hell. Someone on the crew has taken the time to erect the customary project notification:

THIS CAPITAL IMPROVEMENT PROJECT COMPLETED BY:

SANDOVAL PAVING CO.

ROY SANDOVAL, PROP.

YOUR TAX DOLLARS AT WORK

Someone has crossed out the "Sandoval" before "Paving" and carefully lettered "
Buenos Intenciones
." Roy laughs, and Felipe raises an eyebrow at him. "Want me to fix it,
Jefe
?"

"Hell, no!" Roy says. "I think I'll change it permanently!"

Felipe grins. "
!No problemo!
" he whoops and floors the accelerator.

Nine Sundays in a Row

Kris Dikeman

If you wanta learn you somethin', go on down to a place where two roads cross. Get there Saturday 'round midnight, and wait there 'til Sunday morning--do that for nine Sundays, all in a row. The dark man, he'll send his dog to watch on you while you wait. And on the ninth morning, the dark man will meet you. And he will learn you--anything you wanta learn. But you remember this: that dark man, he don't work for free.

First Sunday

I'm hunkered down in the tall grass, tail down, ears back. She leans back against the oak tree, wiggling her toes in the grass, big ugly boots beside her, moonlight throwing up shadows all around. Sat herself right in the center of the hard-packed and pebbly crossroads the better part of an hour before the soft weedy patch by the roadside and the oak's wide trunk wooed her over. That makes her luckier than that fool boy from Kansas, that one who nodded off three Sundays in. Never heard that turnip truck coming, stupid little bastard. Smashed flatter than flat, and all those turnips spread across the road to hell and breakfast and the driver dead with his back broke.

I hate turnips. Nasty mealy things.

She starts rummaging in that bag of hers, leather bag still reeking of dead cow's fright. Other bad smells too, stinky things, and plastic things. Mebbe a sandwich down close to the bottom, but not a meat sandwich. Good brown bread smell, but no meat. Not a bit.

She comes up with a conjure bag, and even hunkered way back here in the verbena my nose can twitch it out: store bought. The girl has brought a store bought conjure bag to the crossroads. I take a long whiff. No graveyard earth; no dead man's piss; no John the Conqueror root; no blood from a lady's monthly. Just some tired old oregano and a little mustard powder. Bag isn't even flannel.

Silly girl. Ugly thing, short hair like a boy, little scrawny body, looking like no girl I ever saw. Can't hardly tell she's female. I got better to do than sit here babysitting. Nine Sundays is a long time, and she don't have near the tenacity it's gonna take to see this through. Waste of my time.

The night is full of good smells; honeysuckle and butterfly lilies, lantana and night-blooming jasmine. There's a breeze from the river and the fireflies are all bunched up in the oak tree, moving through the leaves, little flicky-flick candle flames. Go home, girl. I've got my own business. There's a fox down by the river needs me to show him who's in charge.

She sets the conjure bag aside and pulls out the sandwich. Nope, no meat in there, not a speck. Tomatoes mostly, and green things. Waste of good brown bread. She settles back further against the tree, takes out a thumbed-up old book and starts reading by moonlight. I settle into the verbena. It's a long ways 'til sunrise.

Second Sunday

She's back under the oak tree, I'm back in the verbena. No breeze tonight, it's hot and close, and Mr. Moon is half the fella he used to be. She's got a lantern, makes a little circle of light, drawing every skeeter in ten counties, big cloud of buzz and bother. She's all over coated up with some unguent from a plastic bottle. Nasty smellin' stuff, and not hardly working by the way she's cussing and slapping.

She cusses like a man, and she's wearing those big old boots again. I expect she wishes she were beautiful. That's what I'd wish for, if I was an ugly woman.

A skeeter lights on my ear and I take a scratch. She stops reading and looks back at where I'm hiding.

"Is someone there?" she says. She holds up the lantern. The skeeter cloud rises up with it, like the mist around Mr. Moon.

"Hello?" she says. She sounds small.

I stay still as still, still as death. Nobody here but us bad things, sugar.

She listens to the night noise for a while, then settles back down, slaps at the skeeters, eats her sandwich. Brown bread again, and eggs this time. I like eggs. Raw is better, but cooked is fine too.

The dawn comes, finally. I'm achy all over from lying still so long. She packs up her stinky bag, looks back at where I'm hiding, walks down the road towards town, scratching at her arms.

I start for home. I'm almost to the shack when Red Rooster steps out of the grass in front of me.

Hear you got a task, he says, strutting up and down like he does. Since the Dark Man gave him those fighting spurs, Red Rooster thinks he's the prettiest trick around.

I'm keeping watch on a girl at the crossroads, I say, trying to slip past him. Keep her from harm, just in case she lasts all nine Sundays.

You think she'll make it? Red Rooster juts his head out and back, up and down, and shakes his big haughty tail. In the dawn, his feathers glow like foxfire. He swaggers a little ways past me and turns back, like he's giving me a show.

The skeeters like to eat her alive tonight, I tell him. I don't know if she'll be back.

And what is it to you, I want to say, but I've got to stay on his sweet side. The Dark Man, he loves Red Rooster, and I'm not allowed to chase him, or bullyrag him, or nothing.

You better leave off that scratching, unless you want to frighten her away, he says.

You spying on me? I ask, and my hackles rise up. The Dark Man set me to watch over her. You mind your own business.

The Dark Man's business is my business, dog. Remember that. And he turns and struts back into the five-finger grass, impertinent as you please, and I go on home. I am not allowed to chase Red Rooster.

Third Sunday

Three Sundays in a row, that's more than some, less than many. I don't scratch the skeeters when they come, and she does not hear me.

She'll stop soon.

Fourth Sunday

It's pissing down rain and the skeeters are all off somewhere. She's wearing some outlandish thing, great big piece of plastic with her head poking through the middle. No sandwich tonight, just an apple while she huddles under the oak, lamp in the grass at her feet. Down by the river, something big splashes into the water and she jumps.

Bet you have a nice warm home to go to, I think. The rain is soaking in my fur, and the verbena patch stinks, a skunk having expressed her vehement displeasure somewhere very near. Here we both sit, wet and miserable, because what you have is not enough, you want more and won't work to get it, you want the Dark Man to just hand it over to you. Greedy thing.

Sunrise comes, and she gathers up her things slowly and starts back to town. I go home.

The Dark Man is there, fussing around in the cupboard.

She's still waiting for me, he says.

Yes, boss, I say. This one's not giving up easy.

You're keeping her safe for me, he says, and takes down a mason jar, wipes off the dust with a grubby old rag.

Yes, boss. No harm comes to her.

You are a good dog, he says, and my tail thumps against the table leg.

He holds the jar in the candle flame, tipping it to and fro, watches what's inside beat against the glass.

Red Rooster struts on in.

You stink of skunk, he says to me, and the Dark Man laughs.

I know what that means. I go on out of the shack and crawl underneath the porch to a spot where it's mostly dry. Red Rooster comes out and sashays back and forth a while, those spurs clickety-click on the tired gray boards above my head. The Dark Man calls him inside and shuts the door.

Fifth Sunday

She's sick.

Snuffling and hacking like an old hound, standing up a ways from the lantern. The skeeters have returned, and brought all their kin besides. The verbena still stinks, so I've changed my hiding spot, still downwind of the oak but across the road now in a clump of switchgrass, catty-corner like. She's racked with coughing now, bent over double with little ropy strings of bad-smelling nastiness jumping out of her. My vigil's over soon. She'll go back to her warm house, I'll go back to chasing rabbits and worrying that fox--

Something stealing through the grass. Something low and sly. Rattlesnake. Diamondback, by the smell. Ireful and ill-tempered, moving right to her with murder on its spiteful little mind.

I know where it comes from. I know who sends it. He's looking to reshuffle this deck, steal her away from my master.

You are keeping her safe for me
, I hear the Dark Man say, and I tear on out of the high grass and across the road like perdition's flames. The girl sees me coming and lets out a scream, so high and sharp it pains my ears. The rattler sees me too, and lets fly as I come up, but he is just a sorry crawling vermin and I am the Dark Man's Good Dog, and I catch him behind his head and crush his bones in one bite. I whip him back and forth a bit, 'til I'm sure he knows he's dead, and drop him in the road. Then I look around.

She's crouched down behind the oak tree, staring at me, eyes all wide and frightened. She starts in coughing, holding on to the oak to stay upright. I sit down in the road. No point in going back to the high grass now.

"You're his dog," she whispers when her breath comes back. "The black dog. You're real. It's real."

Stupid woman. Why you been sitting out here five Sundays in a row, catching your death of the ague if you don't believe? People only believe the things they can see, and touch, and have. Like that man, that fool from Memphis, handed the Dark Man his guitar and then grabbed his arm, squeezed him like, just to see if he was solid.

The Dark Man don't like to be touched.

She coughs some more, then pulls out a bottle, honey and cold tea and cheap whiskey. She hunkers down beside the oak, swigging and coughing and staring at me, and we spend the rest of the night that way, she and I and the skeeters, and come the dawn I pick up the rattler and go home and her still sitting there, stunned-like.

Sixth Sunday

The Dark Man pours the powder out of the packet. It sifts down into my fur, spilling all around me on the porch. I can smell all the things that went into it, and my nose wrinkles up. Sweet and kinda spoiled, like honey and curdled milk mixed up.

Remember, she can hear you in there, so no talking, he says.

Yes, boss.

He runs his finger across the diamond-patterned skin tacked out on the door, gives the rattle a flick with his finger, and smiles. It's just a little smile, but he knows I see it.

Go on now, he says.

I take off out the shack and down the road. It's close on to midnight. Mr. Moon is still fat and bright, and my shadow chases me all the way to the crossroads.

It's a hot night, muggy like, but she's all wrapped up in a raggedy shawl. She coughs, and it racks her. There's circles under her eyes, and she's all pale and peaked, a sight thinner than she was when all this started. That cold is a long time going. She leaves off coughing, catches her breath, looks up and sees me.

"Dog," she says. Then she stretches out her hand, waggling her fingers. "C'mere dog."

Usually they don't touch me right away. One time, this boy from Charleston wouldn't even let me near and I had to chase him through the grass, all the way to the riverbank. That was a treat.

I go on over and sit near her and I don't put my ears back or growl or show my teeth or nothing. She puts her hand right on my head. She's not a bit afraid.

"Good dog," she says, and my tail thumps in spite of me. "Good dog that saved my life." Her hand moves to the back of my ears. I turn my head a little, and she runs her hand down my spine. Then she finds a sweet spot on my shoulder and commences scratching, and my mutinous left hind foot starts to dance, tappity tap against the dirt.

She rummages around in her stinky bag, comes up with a sandwich.

"You want some of my chicken sandwich?"

Stupid woman. I grab the sandwich out of her hand, gulp it down so fast she don't see it go. Chicken is good. Best when you catch it yourself, but good any way you get it.

"Hey!" she says, and I duck my head away from her hand. She laughs, and scratches behind my ear again. "That was my supper, dog, but I guess you earned it, killing that bad old snake."

Supper? That little bit of chicken and brown bread?

She yawns, and leans back against the tree. "I'm so sleepy," she says. "But I guess I can rest a while, with you here to watch over me." And she with her hand on my back, she closes her eyes and drifts away, down into dreamland, and I go with.

We're standing outside a little tottery tarpaper house. Raggedy curtains drooping in the front window, front yard all mud and junk; an old water pump, a pile of car tires, door off a chicken coop. Clothes on the line, tired sheets and towels and a pair of man's coveralls, ripped and faded. Somewhere here, someplace not right now, I can hear a child crying.

She's beside me in the road, and she looks different. Stronger, more meat on her bones. Ugly boots gone, good walking shoes on her feet, big backpack, all shiny and new-smelling hooked on her shoulder. And something else, something I can't determinate.

"Here I go," she says, and turns her back on the house. She starts down the road, big long steps, and she doesn't look back, but I do. There's a face staring at us from that front window, looking angry and sad both at once, and then the tatty curtains twitch, and the face is gone.

"Dog! You coming?" she says, and I run to catch up.

We walk a long time. Mr. Moon lights the way. There's honeysuckle in the air, thick and sweet, and the further we get from that house the happier she is. Her step gets lighter, like she's shucking off some burden, and she starts in laughing from time to time.

We walk on and on. I flush a fat rabbit and chase it a while. She takes a big meat sandwich out of her bag and gives me half, and we drink our fill from a spring running by the road. She picks up an old stick and throws it as she walks along, and I bring it on back and she throws it again.

By and by the road under our feet changes, from hard-packed dirt to blacktop, smooth and oily and smelling from tar. The sky is changed now, the wind is dry and hot, the trees and brush all gone. And it's a puzzlement to me; I can smell the desert spread out all around us, sand and heat and open sky, but there's water up ahead too, a powerful lot of it.