Beast of the Field Read Free Page A

blonde dress swung open the screen door.  The giant who removed his hat as he followed her inside took up the entire door frame.  Sterno was just now beginning to understand what he’d seen back on that road.
    Donnan said.  "Millie, say hi to Mr. Charlie Sterno, Pinkerton Detective, all the way from St. Louis, Missoura.  He's the man checkin' into Tommy."
    "We saw you already, mister.  Tell me, are you near-sighted?  We waved and hollered and you just drove right past us like we were ghosts.  Walked all the way there to say hello to you.  It's goddamn humiliating."  Her face flashed red going on purple as these last three words trailed off into the room.
    Sterno turned his chair to face her squarely; his expression did not change.  “I saw you, young lady, I saw you.  And let me ask you this, with all these highwaymen, desperate Indians and Okie bank robbers cruising these roads the way they do, you think it’s a good idea to go chasing down cars like a couple crazies escaped from the booby-hatch? You nearly scared me into turning around and heading home.  I thought I’d driven right past Kansas, straight into Bedlam."
    Her eyes wandered to over his shoulder while she thought about this.  "Well…" she started, “…I guess, if…” but could manage no more.
    Donnan slapped the table.  "Well, hum a tune Mother, looks like our little soldier might-a met a match."
    A look from Mrs. Donnan.   Silence again.  She then said, with patience, "Milicent Margaret Donnan, please apologize to Mr. Sterno for your rude behavior, then march directly into that kitchen and wash up.  You're lucky I don't wash your mouth out while you're in there."
    At the sound of her mother's voice, lines returned to the girl's forehead, her mouth became hard as stone.
    "This instant."
    She really had to force herself to do it.  "Sorry, mister," she said, turning, then added, "But sonbitch, what a hell of a long walk for nothing."
    "Milicent!"
    Donnan wiped a chuckle from his mouth, flicked a finger to the big man.  "This little tyke behind you is Braun Jr.  'Junior' works for him."
    "Charlie Sterno.  Pleasure."
    "H-y," he said in a voice like someone teaching a bear how to talk.
    Sterno said, "You pretty near scared the life out of me back there.  Of course, I couldn't see so well with the sun behind you."
    "H-y," he said again.
    "He means he's sorry.  That's all you're going to get out-a Junior," Donnan said.  “The war."
    "Braun," said Mrs. Donnan.
    "To be honest," he continued, "we aint exactly sure if he's saying 'hay,' like the stuff in our barn, or 'hey,' like, 'Hey, how'ya doing today, mister?'"
    "That's enough, Braun," Mrs. Donnan said.  This time he listened to her.
    When Millie and Junior had returned from washing their hands and faces, Mrs. Donnan waited for everyone to be seated, said, "Let's say grace."  Elbows on the table, hands folded at their foreheads, the Donnans mumbled a prayer to the Lord.  There were forks in hands before the last Amen was done sounding off the walls.
    Save for the scraping of these forks on plates and teeth, dinner was silent.  Sterno kept his eye on the mother.  He couldn’t help it; there was a dark hole in the corner of his eye he kept seeing as he was trying to eat and each time he looked up it was her.  She was in a black dress still.  Cooking, cleaning, sleeping, dreaming, living in black.  Sterno had seen a thousand mothers like this since the war, haunting the world with their thousand dead sons.
    Directly across from Sterno was the big man, Junior, they call him, like he was still in dresses.  One of the baskets of biscuits was for him.  He ate with two hands, one on the chicken and one on his fork.  He never looked up and he never stopped eating until half the mound of fried chicken had become a pile of clean gray bones on his plate.  There was something in his eyes that bothered Sterno, a vacancy that could be filled in any way.  He was never comfortable around