“But I want him to see my Santa Claus outfit,” Charley protested.
“He can see it in the morning, early,” Ruby promised. “It’s like a miracle that you came home for Christmas.”
“I rode the rails from K.C. to Wichita,” Charley said. “I been here more than two weeks. I’ve been keepin’ an eye on the house, making sure the law didn’t come by and pay you a visit.”
Then they heard footsteps, and Dempsey appeared. “I thought I heard Daddy,” he said when he saw the Santa Claus beard on the face of a man who otherwise looked just like his daddy.
“Ho, ho, ho, little boy,” Charley said. “Have you been good all year?”
Dempsey was sleepy, and confused—he began to cry a little from the confusion. He remembered wetting the bed once or twice; he didn’t know whether that counted as being bad or not. Also, he felt uncertain about the man with the beard. He wanted him to be Santa Claus, but even more, he wanted him to be his daddy.
When Charley saw Dempsey crying, he immediately took off the beard and hugged his son. Dempsey sobbed for a minute; then he noticed the huge heap of presents piled in the room.
“Where’d all those presents come from?” he asked.
“Well, Daddy brought them,” Ruby said. “Maybe he’s been up at the North Pole all this time, visiting Santa Claus.”
“The North Pole?” Dempsey said, his eyes widening. “Did you see the elves?”
“You bet, and I rode a reindeer,” Charley said. “Its horns were as wide as I am tall. An Eskimo caught it for me. It was a flying reindeer, too. I followed old Santa right down through the sky.”
Dempsey thought his father might be pulling his leg. But the packages piled up in the room looked real. The packages interested him more than anything happening at the North Pole.
“Can I open these packages now?” he asked.
“It’s more fitting to open them in the morning,” Ruby said. “In the morning is Christmas.”
“Can’t I open just one?” Dempsey asked.
“Aw, let him, honey,” Charley said. “Nobody’s gonna care if he opens one.”
After some deliberation, Dempsey chose a long, skinny package. He tore into it wildly and came out with a .410 shotgun, a small double-barrel. Dempsey was so excited he could scarcely keep his feet on the floor. He began to race around the house, pointing the gun at everything—Charley had to take it away from him and explain that it was a real gun, not a toy gun; he was never supposed to load it inside a house, or point it at anything he didn’t intend to shoot.
Ruby was shocked when she saw the gun—it took some of the lift off her mood. Charley noticed, and tried to get her back in the right humor by making her open one or two of her presents. The first one was a wonderful warm coat with a fur collar, the kind of coat Ruby had given up on ever being able to afford. Charley had brought a bottle of champagne, too. When Dempsey finally settled down and fell asleep, his shotgun in the bed beside him, Ruby helped Charley drink the bottle and forgot her little pique about the shotgun. She would just have to make strict rules about the .410.
“Hey, you didn’t notice any shells for it, did you?” Charley said, when Ruby chided him mildly for giving Dempsey a dangerous weapon.
“No, but what good’s a shotgun without shells?” she asked.
“No good—that’s the point, honey,” Charley told her. “He’ll get the shells when he learns how to handle it safe.”
“Okay,” Ruby said. If there was one thing she didn’t want to do, it was quarrel with Charley on Christmas Eve. She had been making up scenes in her mind for days, scenes in which Charley showed up and brought Dempsey wonderful presents. She imagined they had a nice Christmas dinner together and enjoyed the holiday, just like a normal family. She knew they weren’t a normal family, but she kept hoping anyway. She wished Dempsey could have just one Christmas like other kids—with a tree, and presents, and his father and mother both at home. She had wanted that for Dempsey so bad, she could taste it. And now it was more than just a pipe dream.
When it was all still just weary hopes, Ruby had gone to the jewelry store and had the old jeweler order her a cameo ring with her likeness and Dempsey’s on it. She spent twelve dollars on the ring, nearly half her advance money from the road show. She meant to give it to Charley the next time she saw him. Even if it wasn’t at Christmas, it could still be her Christmas present to her husband, late or not.
Ruby decided to wait till morning to give Charley the ring. She was a little drunk and so anxious to be with him in bed that she didn’t want any more hesitating over presents. Part of her couldn’t quite accept that Charley was actually there. She had hoped so much for it that it seemed impossible that hopes so deep could come true. Ruby didn’t know if she would come to really believe it until they were in bed together and she was holding Charley in her arms. Sleeping in his arms, being able to hold him all night, listening to him breathing—that was all she needed for Christmas.
Ruby woke up early Christmas morning. In the night, she had become anxious about the cameo ring—what if it didn’t fit? She wanted their Christmas to be perfect. She slipped downstairs in her gown, got the ring, crept back up the stairs, and slipped back into bed beside Charley, who was sound asleep and snoring lightly. Ruby pulled his hand out from under the covers, and carefully slipped the ring onto his ring finger. It went on without much pushing, but she was still worried. She turned on the bed light to check it. To her relief, it fit just fine—their Christmas would be perfect. She switched off the bed light.
There was just the faintest grey in the window, and a tint of red in the east. Ruby lay with her head on Charley’s shoulder, watching his face while he slept. In his sleep, he looked so much like Dempsey—or Dempsey so much like him—that it brought a catch to her throat. A lock of his hair hung over his forehead, just as Dempsey’s forelock hung over his small forehead. Charley’s breath smelled of tobacco. He had smoked a cigar last night while they were having drinks. Charley had a very small wen on one of his eyelids, and as soon as the light improved, Ruby bent close and checked it carefully, to assure herself that it wasn’t getting larger. His whiskers grew quick; he had stubble on his chin. Ruby rubbed it with a finger—it felt like sandpaper.
“You could give me a shave as a Christmas present,” Charley suggested, his voice still heavy with sleep. He managed to open one eye.
“I ain’t a barber, what if I cut you?” Ruby asked. “Besides, I already got you a present. It’s on your hand.”
Charley had to blink a few times and rub sleep out of his eyes before he could get a good look at the cameo ring.
“Turn on the bed light,” he said, holding up his hand in surprise. “I got to have a good look at this. I never expected a present this good.”
“Do you like it?” Ruby asked, nervous. Charley had such good taste, and was so finicky about every detail of his suits and his shirts, that she didn’t know if the ring would be up to his standards.
“Aw, honey …” Charley said softly, taking the ring off and turning it over carefully. “How’d you ever afford to get me a ring this nice?”
“Do you like it, Charley?” she asked. “I wanted you to have something to help you remember me and Dempsey, when you can’t be with us.”
Charley’s face looked grave. “I could never forget you and Dempsey, honey,” he said, in a low voice. “Lots of times, you and Dempsey are pretty much all I remember. Sometimes I think about you two all day, and most of the night, too.”
“I guess this is the best Christmas ever, then,” Ruby said, settling into the crook of his shoulder. “It’s the best for me, I get to have both my men at home.”
Charley still had the serious expression, though. He was looking past her, out the window. Ruby hadn’t asked him when he had to leave. Maybe he couldn’t even stay through Christmas Day. Maybe she wouldn’t get to have both her men at home—at least not for all day.
“I wonder if it’s gonna snow?” he asked, after a little w
hile. “If it snows, I might take Dempsey rabbit hunting with his new shotgun.”
Ruby relaxed a little then—maybe he would stay the day. While she was watching him look out the window, Charley turned and slipped a hand under her gown, onto her warm breast. He cocked an eye at the door that led to Dempsey’s room.
“I wonder how long before that punkin’ll be up?” Charley asked. “Do you think we got the time, honey?”
Ruby turned toward him, and put her hand on his cheek. “It’s Christmas morning, Charley—let’s take the time,” she said.
7
The first time Dempsey fired the .410 shotgun, the stock whacked him in the shoulder, causing him to fall back a step.
“I told you to hold it tight,” Charley said. “You didn’t hold it tight enough—that’s why you got kicked.”
Dempsey had fired at an empty beer bottle, which his father set on top of a post. There it was, still on the post. They were walking down a snowy country road, looking for rabbits. But no rabbits appeared, and Dempsey wanted to shoot his new gun so badly that his father finally gave in.
“I missed,” Dempsey said, keenly disappointed. He had not expected to miss; in the movies, people almost never missed.
“You still got the second barrel,” Charley told him. “Step a little closer to the post, and lower your head a little more. Look right down the barrel.”
Dempsey edged closer, until he was only about five feet from the post.
“That’s close enough,” Charley said. “If you hit it from any closer, you might get glass in your eye.”
He was beginning to question the wisdom of buying the boy a shotgun. A lot of things could go wrong with a shotgun, even a little .410. But it was too late to back-track—Dempsey was as proud of the gun as could be. He got plenty of other Christmas presents: boxing gloves, a punching bag, a sled, a toy train, and a new bridle for Chuck, his pony. But those things were just normal presents. The shotgun was magic. Dempsey would hardly stop holding it long enough to play with his other toys, or to eat his Christmas dinner, either.
At five feet, Dempsey blasted the beer bottle. Glass flew everywhere, but none went in his eyes.
“I hit it!” Dempsey said. In his excitement, he didn’t notice that the shotgun had whacked him solidly in the shoulder again.
“You sure did, bud,” Charley said. “You got the makings of a dead shot. The cottontails and jackrabbits had better watch out now.”
The fields of corn stubble where they hunted had a thin coverlet of snow. Dempsey shot several times at cottontails, and once at a racing jackrabbit, but the pellets merely kicked up snow. A hawk soared and dipped over the cornfield, a dark spot against the gloomy sky. Dempsey’s ears got numb, and his feet were like icy stumps, but he kept plodding along, his shotgun at the ready, with the safety on—just as his father had instructed.
As the two of them were walking back to the car, Charley spotted a small covey of quail under a red haw bush. The birds were bunched under the skinny bush, and they were well within range.
“Here’s your chance, son,” Charley whispered, pointing at the covey. “Just slip the safety off, and let ’em have it.”
“But Daddy, there’s so many—which one do I shoot?” Dempsey asked.
“Shoot right into the middle of them—this is pot hunting we’re doing,” Charley said. “I’d love a couple of fat quail for breakfast.”
Dempsey squinted down the barrel and tried to pull the trigger, but the trigger wouldn’t pull.
“You forgot to take the safety off,” his daddy said.
Dempsey unfastened the safety. The quail began to walk through the corn stubble, more or less in a line.
“Daddy, they’re getting away … what do I do?” Dempsey asked.
“If I was you, I’d shoot,” Charley said.
Dempsey pointed the shotgun at the line of small birds, and pulled the trigger. Most of the birds flew away, filling the air with their loud buzz. But two birds lay on the snow. One kicked a little; the other lay still.
“You got ’em!” Charley said. “Good shot, son!”
The dead quail had soft, brown feathers, with grey and white at their breasts. One had a tiny bead of deep red blood by its eyelid. The quail that had been kicking slowly stopped kicking; it lay on its back, its thin feet in the air. Dempsey approached them hesitantly.
“Pick ’em up, son,” Charley said. “They’re your birds. Wait’ll Mama sees them.”
Dempsey wasn’t sure he wanted to pick up the two birds. He wasn’t sure he wanted his mother to see them, either. Their eyelids hid their eyes; the little bead of blood by the eyelid of the one bird made Dempsey wish he hadn’t done it.
“They were walking in the snow with their friends,” he said. “It makes me sad that they’re dead.
“I want to go home,” he added, after a moment.
Charley picked up the quail. To Dempsey’s horror, he pulled their heads off, then pitched the heads out into the snow.
“No, I don’t want to take them—put their heads back on, Daddy!” Dempsey said, his voice shaking.
Charley put his hand on the boy’s shoulder.
“We didn’t just kill them to kill them, son,” he said. “We killed them to eat. They’ll keep better with their heads off.”
“I don’t want to eat them,” Dempsey insisted. “I don’t want to take them home.”
“Nope, we’re gonna eat them—that’s the point of hunting,” Charley explained. “When you eat a chicken, somebody’s had to kill it first. When you eat a beefsteak, somebody had to kill a cow.”
“I still don’t want to,” Dempsey said, looking down at the ground.
“Let me carry the gun till we get to the road,” Charley said, taking the shotgun from Dempsey. “You got one for you, and one for Mama. Maybe I can get one for me.”
A minute later, he did. There was a sudden whirr of brown wings. A quail was just curving over the fence, when his father shot it. The whirr stopped; the quail fell like a softball. After helping Dempsey over the fence, and reminding him how important it was to unload the shot gun before crossing a fence with it, Charley found the third quail and popped its head off.
That night, Dempsey didn’t sleep with his shotgun, as he had on Christmas Eve.
He asked his mother to put it in the closet.
8
“I’d rather you brought us a side of beef, or a shoat we could butcher,” Bob Birdwell said, looking at the pile of Christmas presents Charley had brought for her and the three kids.
“We might get through the winter, if we had a side of beef,” she added. Her face was thinner since the last time Charley had seen her.
The kids didn’t feel that way. They were ripping into the packages like little coons, scattering wrapping paper all over the kitchen floor, their eyes bright as buttons. But their mother’s eyes were dull and sad.
“Good Lord, I had no idea you was so low on cash,” Charley said. There was nothing at all to eat in the Birdwell house, except a sack of dried beans and a little cornmeal. There wasn’t even any coffee.
“Where would I get cash?” Bob asked. “George gave me fifteen dollars when he left on his last trip. Fifteen dollars don’t last forever.”
All the kids had coughs and snotty noses. Bob was shivering in a threadbare robe; the house was ice-cold.
“Is the stove broke?” Charley asked. “I’ve been in icehouses that wasn’t this chilly.”
“The stove works, but the axe broke,”Bob informed him. “All I got left to chop firewood with is the hatchet. I get tired of choppin’ wood with a hatchet.”
Charley went outside and chopped an armful of fire-wood with the old hatchet. When he got the stove going and the kitchen warm, he drove eight miles to a general store in Lawton, bought a new axe, and filled the back seat of the car with foodstuffs. The old man who owned the store did some butchering, and so Charley arranged for a side of beef and a fat shoat to be delivered to the Birdwell smokehouse as soon as poss
ible.
He unloaded the groceries, sharpened the new axe, and chopped two weeks’ worth of firewood, while Bob sat in her kitchen drinking a bourbon toddy Charley had fixed for her. The toddy had lots of molasses in it; he had always heard that molasses and bourbon were good for coughs—and Bob had a nasty cough. The children were fighting over the toys Charley had brought. Bob drank toddy until she was drunk, but her spirits didn’t improve much that Charley could tell.
“You got to snap out of it,” Charley told her. “You got three tykes to look after, Bob—you need to do a better job of lookin’ after yourself.”
“Shove off, bud,” Bob said. Two red spots showed in her thin cheeks. “Don’t sit there in your pretty suit tellin’ me what I need to do.”
“Why, it was just a suggestion,” Charley said—he was taken aback by Bob’s sudden belligerence.
“No it wasn’t, it was a goddamn lecture,” Bob said. “I won’t tolerate bein’ lectured, Charley—I lost my man—if I had my way, I would’ve died when George died.”
“I tried to talk him out of robbin’ that nigger bank,” Charley said. “I knew the minute we got to town that it was a mistake.”
“I wasn’t talkin’ about that,” Bob informed him. “Listen to what I’m sayin’, or get out: I don’t need your damn charity. I’d rather die, but I can’t. And my kids are doin’ fair—they got snotty noses, but they ain’t starved, and they ain’t homeless. Sometimes fair’s just the best a person can do.”
Bob took a long swig from her toddy.
“I lost my man—don’t ask me to get over it overnight,” she added.
Charley knew Bob loved George, but he hadn’t expected her to be quite so affected. She had seemed to have her own life, to pay only minimal attention to George in his frequent comings and goings—but now Charley realized that he’d been mistaken.
“How do you think Ruby’s gonna feel when they finally shoot you down?” Bob asked Charley, the red anger spots still on her cheeks. “You don’t think about her no more than George thought about me.”