Pick-a-Lock Pete
Not because he was mean or anything
like that. But because he could pick a
lock – any lock – faster than Harry Houdini.
Nobody ever knew where he learned to do it and they for sure never knew
exactly how he did it. Pete didn't say a whole lot because he
stuttered. And when he stuttered, people
in the little country town of Maysville laughed and made fun of him. You also tend to keep your head down when you
are only three-fifths of a human being – if not in actual fact, at least in the
reality of a small backwater town in the rural South of the 1930's.
Seems strange to taunt that which you
fear, but the simple folk of Maysville weren't given to intellectual
reasoning. If any ever experienced
twinges of conscience, it wasn't immediately apparent to the accidental
bystander. And, in truth, the only
bystanders ever found in Maysville were definitely accidental.
If Pete owned a pair of shoes to his name,
they were never in evidence and the soles of his feet were always clay-red from
walking those dusty roads in and around the town. His best and only friend, since his mama had
worked herself to death cleaning houses and walking the two miles to and from
town for more than fifty years, seemed to be an old yellow dog named Bum. Bum
had been the runt of an unwanted litter out at Ledbetter's farm and since Pete
had saved him from a watery death in the creek three years earlier, the two of
them had never drifted more than 50 yards apart.
Of all the townspeople who eyed Pete
with a contempt born of more than simple distrust, old Barron Jones was the
worst. Jones had a mean streak as big as
Atlanta. He hated Pete – just because he
was black, most people said. But if
truth be told he hated him because Pete bore his affliction and position in
life with a dignity Barron Jones could only dream of possessing. Born with the proverbial silver spoon, Jones
lived big, ate big, was big. But deep down he felt an envy of this young black
man that he could not – and would not – acknowledge. His own smallness of character sniffed around
his rotund edges like a wary dog smelling something rotten and it ate at Jones
like a cancer. To compensate, as only the insecure can, he took every
opportunity to belittle Pete in front of others and to threaten him on those
occasions they found themselves without witness.
Pete bore it all with a resigned and
stoic silence that only served to infuriate Jones the more until one Saturday
afternoon in late summer when "the thing" finally happened.
What happened isn't easily
describable and so cannot be told in that concise tent-revival jargon of seeing
the light, repenting, and being saved.
Not even Jones would have put it in such a manner – if he had had the
wherewithal to describe it at all. In
fact, he never attempted a description of any fashion that one could put
together into a cohesive tale. However,
speculation and fabrication being a part of small town existence, a story did
finally emerge like a fast-growing oak.
Being a careful man when it came to
his own well-being, Jones had outfitted his barn (which was more shed than
barn) with a lock on the door that was keyed from both inside and out. Housed inside the barn-shed and safely
locked away from the prying eyes of the law (and any who might be brave enough
to risk old Barron's ire and inform the law) was a medium-sized whiskey still.
On this particular Saturday
afternoon, feeling lazy and dry of mouth, Jones put key to lock after letting
himself inside the shed, pocketed the key, and proceeded to do a
"tasting." This tasting, which
lasted most of the afternoon, and a lit cigarette, was all it took.
The barn-shed went up in flames like
dry kindling and smoke rapidly filled the room.
Jones got to his feet and fumbled with the key to the locked door all
the while screaming and pounding the walls to be let out. His vision blurred with smoky tears, and
swaying back and forth in alcoholic lethargy, he clumsily dropped the key, then
dropped to his knees in a panicked effort to feel it out and retrieve it.
Perhaps being that close to the layer
of cooler and cleaner air on the floor saved him. Perhaps he found the key and let himself
out. The only thing Barron Jones ever
said was that he knew he was a goner that afternoon and that somewhere close by
he heard a dog bark. However it happened,
the door of the barn suddenly flew open and Jones crawled out to safety.
Not even Jones could explain how that
door got open that afternoon, but no one in Maysville ever heard him say
another word against Pete for as long as he lived.
R.L.M. Cooper is the recipient of
several academic and achievement awards, and a summa cum laude graduate of the
University of Alabama in Huntsville. Her short stories have been accepted for
publication by several online magazines and reviews. Ms. Cooper recently
completed a novel in the thriller genre for which she is currently seeking
representation. She lives in the Pacific Northwest with her husband and a
precocious, well-loved Tonkinese cat.
Tags:
Short Fiction