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Ninety Days Inside The Empire: A Novel by William Appleman Williams

Maggie and Mr. Hank

Page 5

"That helps a lot!"

Mr. Hank suddenly popped up, overturning his chair. "Maggie, I forgot Pappy Blake."

She smiled, caught his arm with her hand. "Almost makes me think you love me."

He fetched the gun, knocked the light, locked the door and came back to the table. "Sorry about that. They come in after you?"

"No guts."

"You talk silly, woman! What stupid shit!"

"Don't I know!"

"Yeah, I'm sorry. My stupid shit."

She nudged his knee. "I know, I'm still jumpy too. But this time, Mr. Hank, we got to do something different."

"You want me to go back to walkin' to meet you with the gun?"

"We tried that and they just watched until you had to work late out there."

"I'll get you a nice little gun."

"That'll just get Maggie killed. I can't shoot nobody."

"We got to pay for the house before we get a car."

"I know."

"So?'

"Maggie is goin' to The Reverend."

Henry Calhoun Blake did not like that. He did not believe in God of the Immaculate Conception of Jesus Christ or that The Meek Would Inherit the Earth. His Holy Trinity was Maggie, doing his job better than anybody else on the flight line, and a well cared for 12 gauge shotgun given him by his father. Those were the only things that gave him peace of mind and a sense of grace, and he treasured them.

"Shit!"

"I's told you I know all about that. Stop it."

"Yeah, yeah! Ok! But the good Reverend ain't goin' to help us out of this mess."

"Nothin' else has."

She knew she had cut him, and she was sorry. But she was weary. Not just tired. Weary.

Mr. Hank got up to refuel the booze.

She sat there breathing heavy enough to open the robe over her breasts. No time for more sex. She pulled it back up to her throat.

He stood, came around the table and kissed her firmly in the hollow behind her ear. "Got to walk a bit on this." And moved out to the back yard.

Maggie touched the spot, smiled, and began to rummage with the dishes. The clock over the sink told her it was comin' along to six on Saturday morning. She had been up and down and around for a long time. But she was no longer weary. Just tired. Wanting to go to bed to sleep.

-- Oh, yes, Harriet, just to sleep.

Mr. Hank first coiled the hose. Then he began to walk. The yard was maybe big enough for serious ping-pong not counting Maggie's flowers. He remembered marching-in-place during boot camp.

-- What the hell do I say to the man at dawn on a Saturday morning?!? I must be fool. No room to walk back here. I must be a fool.

Mr. Hank was not a fool. If his skin had been the color of his bones, or his hair as straight as his soul, he would maybe have been helping to manage the empire. Well, maybe. Let it go. But he did understand how the system worked and had decided that the best thing he could do on any given day was to shove it up its ass. Not with guns, not with knives. Just bein' so good at his job that the white man couldn't function without him. He liked that.