The White Road-CP-4 Read Free Page B

will be the last one you ever take.”
    “Sorry,” said Virgil. He tried to force the offending word from his brain, but it came back each time with renewed force. He began to sweat.
    “Sorry,” he said again.
    “Well, that’s all right. You finished down there?”
    Virgil nodded.
    “Then put it away. An owl might figure it for a worm and carry it off.”
    Virgil had a vague suspicion that he’d just been insulted, but he quickly tucked his manhood into his fly just in case and wiped his hands on his trousers.
    “You carrying a gun?”
    “Nope.”
    “Bet you wish you were.”
    “Yep,” admitted Virgil, in a burst of sudden and possibly ill-advised honesty. He felt hands on him, patting him down, but the gun stayed where it was, pressed hard against his skin. There was more than one of them, Virgil figured. Hell, there could be half of Harlem at his back. He felt a pressure on his wrists as his hands were cuffed tightly behind him.
    “Now turn to your right.”
    Virgil did as he was told. He was facing out onto the open country behind the bar, all green as far as the river.
    “You answer my questions, I let you walk away into those fields. Understand?”
    Virgil nodded dumbly.
    “Thomas Rudge, Willard Hoag, Clyde Benson. They in there?”
    Virgil was the kind of guy who instinctively lied about everything, even if there didn’t seem to be any percentage in not telling the truth. Better to lie and cover your ass later than tell the truth and find yourself in trouble from the start.
    Virgil, true to character, shook his head.
    “You sure?”
    Virgil nodded and opened his mouth to embellish the lie. Instead, the clicking of the spittle in his mouth coincided perfectly with the impact of his head against the wall as the gun pushed firmly into the base of his skull.
    “See,” whispered the voice, “we goin’ in there anyhow. If we go in and they ain’t there, then you got nothin’ to worry about, least until we come lookin’ for you to start askin’ you again where they at. But we go in there and they sittin’ up at the bar, suckin’ on some cold ones, then there are dead folks got a better chance of bein’ alive tomorrow than you do. You understand me?”
    Virgil understood.
    “They’re in there,” he confirmed.
    “How many others?”
    “Nobody, just them three.”
    The black man, as Virgil had at last begun to think of him, removed the gun from Virgil’s head and patted him on the shoulder with his hand.
    “Thank you…” he said. “I’m sorry, I didn’t catch your name.”
    “Virgil,” said Virgil.
    “Well, thank you, Virgil,” said the man, then brought the butt of the gun down hard on Virgil’s skull. “You been great.”

    Beneath the black oak, an old Lincoln has been driven into place. The red truck pulls up beside it and three hooded men climb from the bed, pushing the black man onto the ground before them. He lands on his stomach, his face in the dirt. Strong hands yank him to his feet and he stares into the dark holes of the pillowcases, crudely burnt into the fabric with matches and cigarettes. He can smell cheap liquor.
    Cheap liquor and gasoline.
    His name is Errol Rich, although no stone or cross with that name upon it will ever mark his final resting place. From the moment he was taken from his momma’s house, his sister and his momma screaming, Errol had ceased to exist. Now all traces of his physical presence are about to be erased from this earth, leaving only the memory of his life with those who have loved him, and the memory of his dying with those gathered here this night. And why is he here? Errol Rich is about to burn for refusing to buckle, for refusing to bend his knee, for disrespecting his betters.
    Errol Rich is about to die for breaking a window.
    He was driving his truck, his old truck with its cracked windshield and its flaking paint, when he heard the shout.
    “Hey, nigger!”
    Then the glass exploded in on top of him, cutting his face and hands, and