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Surely, I thought, this would result in a flood of anger… but it brought only another surly little grunt. He didn’t even argue about having to take the Model T to school, although he said the other kids made fun of it, calling it “Hank’s ass-breaker.”
“Son?”
“What.”
“Are you all right?”
He turned to me and smiled-his lips moved around, at least. “I’m fine. Good luck at the bank tomorrow, Poppa. I’m going to bed.”
As he stood up, I said: “Will you give me a little kiss?”
He kissed my cheek. It was the last one.
He took the T to school and I drove the truck to Hemingford Home, where Mr. Stoppenhauser brought me into his office after a mere five-minute wait. I explained what I needed, but declined to say what I needed it for, only citing personal reasons. I thought for such a piddling amount I would not need to be more specific, and I was right. But when I’d finished, he folded his hands on his desk blotter and gave me a look of almost fatherly ster
“Wilf,” Mr. Stoppenhauser said, “you’ve had a little time to get over your wife leaving the way she did-pardon me for bringing up a painful subject, but it seems pertinent, and besides, a banker’s office is a little like a priest’s confessional-so I’m going to talk to you like a Dutch uncle. Which is only fitting, since that’s where my mother and father came from.”
I had heard this one before-as had, I imagine, most visitors to that office-and I gave it the dutiful smile it was meant to elicit.
“Will Home Bank amp; Trust loan you 35 dollars? You bet. I’m tempted to put it on a man-to-man basis and do the deal out of my own wallet, except I never carry more than what it takes to pay for my lunch at the Splendid Diner and a shoe-shine at the barber shop. Too much money’s a constant temptation, even for a wily old cuss like me, and besides, business is business. But!” He raised his finger. “You don’t need 35 dollars.”
“Sad to say, I do.” I wondered if he knew why. He might have; he was indeed a wily old cuss. But so was Harl Cotterie, and Harl was also a shamed old cuss that fall.
“No; you don’t. You need 750, that’s what you need, and you could have it today. Either bank it or walk out with it in your pocket, all the same to me either way. You paid off the mortgage on your place 3 years ago. It’s free and clear. So there’s absolutely no reason why you shouldn’t turn around and take out another mortgage. It’s done all the time, my boy, and by the best people. You’d be surprised at some of the paper we’re carrying. All the best people. Yessir.”
“I thank you very kindly, Mr. Stoppenhauser, but I don’t think so. That mortgage was like a gray cloud over my head the whole time it was in force, and-”
“Wilf, that’s the point!” The finger went up again. This time it wagged back and forth, like the pendulum of the Regulator. “That is exactly the rootin’-tootin’, cowboy-shootin’ point! It’s the fellows who take out a mortgage and then feel like they’re always walking around in sunshine who end up defaulting and losing their valuable property! Fellows like you, who carry that bank-paper like a barrowload of rocks on a gloomy day, are the fellows who always pay back! And do you want to tell me that there aren’t improvements you could make? A roof to fix? A little more livestock?” He gave me a sly and roguish look. “Maybe even indoor plumbing, like your neighbor down the road? Such things pay for themselves, you know. You could end up with improvements that far outweigh the cost of a mortgage. Value for money, Wilf! Value for money!”
I thought it over. At last I said, “I’m very tempted, sir. I won’t lie about that-”
“No need to. A banker’s office, the priest’s confessional-very little difference. The best men in this county have sat in that chair, Wilf. The very best.”
“But I only came in for a shortie loan-which you have kindly granted-and this new proposal needs a little thinking about.” A new idea occurred to me, one that was surprisingly pleasant. “And I ought to talk it over with my boy, Henry-Hank, as he likes to be called now. He’s getting to an age where he needs to be consulted, because what I’ve got will be his someday.”
“Understood, completely understood. But it’s the right thing to do, believe me.” He got to his feet and stuck out his hand. I got to mine and shook it. “You came in here to buy a fish, Wilf. I’m offering to sell you a pole. Much better deal.”
“Thank you.” And, leaving the bank, I thought: I’ll talk it over with my son. It was a good thought. A warm thought in a heart that had been chilly for months.
The mind is a fu
I just stood there for a moment, half in and half out of the T, one hand on the side of the cab, the other reaching under the seat, which was where we kept the crank. I suppose I knew why Henry had left school and made this swap even before I pulled his note from beneath the makeshift paperweight and unfolded it. The truck was more reliable on a long trip. A trip to Omaha, for instance. Poppa,
I have taken the truck. I guess you know where I am going. Leave me alone. I know you can send Sheriff Jones after me to bring me back, but if you do I will tell everything. You might think I’d change my mind because I am “just a kid,” BUT I WONT. Without Shan I dont care about nothing. I love you Poppa even if I don’t know why, since everything we did has brought me mizzery. Your Loving Son, Henry “Hank” James
I drove back to the farm in a daze. I think some people waved to me-I think even Sallie Cotterie, who was minding the Cotteries’ roadside vegetable stand, waved to me-and I probably waved back, but I’ve no memory of doing so. For the first time since Sheriff Jones had come out to the farm, asking his cheerful, no-answers-needed questions and looking at everything with his cold inquisitive eyes, the electric chair seemed like a real possibility to me, so real I could almost feel the buckles on my skin as the leather straps were tightened on my wrists and above my elbows.
He would be caught whether I kept my mouth shut or not. That seemed inevitable to me. He had no money, not even six bits to fill the truck’s gas tank, so he’d be walking long before he even got to Elkhorn. If he managed to steal some gas, he’d be caught when he approached the place where she was now living (Henry assumed as a prisoner; it had never crossed his unfinished mind that she might be a willing guest). Surely Harlan had given the person in charge-Sister Camilla-Henry’s description. Even if he hadn’t considered the possibility of the outraged swain making an appearance at the site of his lady-love’s durance vile, Sister Camilla would have. In her business, she had surely dealt with outraged swains before.
My only hope was that, once accosted by the authorities, Henry would keep silent long enough to realize that he’d been snared by his own foolishly romantic notions rather than by my interference. Hoping for a teenage boy to come to his senses is like betting on a long shot at the horse track, but what else did I have?
As I drove into the dooryard, a wild thought crossed my mind: leave the T ru