“I had my fill of this stuff.”
“Shut up and do like he says,” Billy Jo said.
Brother Samuel picked up the ball of hair. He took a kitchen match from his denims and scratched it across the sole of his work boot. He held the flame to the ball and waited for it to catch. A wisp of yellow-black smoke came up, and the sweet-rotten odor of burnt hair made the men draw back. He stood up and hurled the ball of flame into the air, where it burst apart in a myriad of fire. Pieces of burnt hair floated slowly to the ground.
“It’s over. I set him free,” Brother Samuel said.
Jeffry got up and walked across the clearing, his legs held close together.
“Where are you going?” Billy Jo said.
“To the goddamn latrine.”
The whistle blew for the lunch break to end. The men filed past the back of the pickup and dropped their plates and spoons into a cardboard box. Toussaint and Avery went back to work on the trench.
“Does that go on all the time?” Avery said.
“That’s the first time I seen him do any conjuring. He’s usually talking about the Word and soul-saving.”
“He stuck the snake’s fang right in the center of the cross.”
“I seen that done down home before. I knowed a man that did the same thing to get rid of a sickness. He said when he died he could pass on his powers, but it had to be to a woman. A man can only give them to a woman, and a woman only to a man.”
“He puts on a fine show.”
“He’s a good man. He don’t do nothing unless he thinks he can help somebody,” Toussaint said.
“He didn’t do much good for Jeffry. He’s still on latrine duty.”
Evans came over to watch the work. The width and length of the trench were dug out, and Avery had spaded the depth down to a foot. Evans chewed on a matchstick. He rolled it from one side of his mouth to the other with his tongue.
“We want it finished this afternoon,” he said. “Put in a little less talk and more work.”
“We was talking about this fellow Belial.”
“What?”
“This is the place where you can get the spirit run out of you, the camp latrine.”
“What the hell are you saying, Boudreaux?”
“You’re the only hack in camp with a conjuror on your gang.”
Avery threw a load of dirt to the side of the trench and didn’t look up.
“You got no sense. You could be smart and do easy time,” Evans said.
That would put you out of a job. You wouldn’t have nobody to lock up in the box.”
“You got a lot more years to pull. You ain’t going to make it.”
“Don’t put no money on it.”
“You’ll break down,” Evans said. “I seen bigger guys than you crack. Some of them went to the bughouse at Pineville. You ever see anybody go nuts from stir? A stir nut is something to see.”
“How deep do you want the trench?” Avery said.
“I told you before, three feet.”
“It looks deep enough now.”
“You better learn something now. You do like you’re told in the camp.”
“I thought I might give a suggestion.”
“Don’t.”
“All right.”
“This man you’re with is trouble. Buddy with him and he’ll get you time in detention,” Evans said.
“I didn’t ask to dig latrines with him.”
Evans stared at Avery as though he were evaluating him. He flipped the chewed matchstick into the trench. The butt of his revolver and the cartridges in his belt shone in the sun.
“Do your stretch easy. It’s the best way. Don’t give me no trouble.”
He left them and went to the trees.
“You didn’t need to do that,” Toussaint said.
“I didn’t do anything.”
“Don’t think you ever got to take pressure off me.”
“I got tired of listening to him talk.”
“I don’t want you putting your neck out for me.”
“Why did you start that stuff with him?”
“I thought it might pick up the conversation.”
“He’s right. You’ll never make your time,” Avery said.
“You believe what he said about cracking a man down?”
“I don’t know. A few years of this. Jesus.”
“You think he can crack you?”
“I don’t ask for trouble.”
“It don’t matter if you ask for it or not. You got one to three years of it when you walked through that front gate,” Toussaint said.
“Free will.”
Toussaint looked at him. “It’s a joke the brothers used to teach us,” Avery said.
The sun went behind a cloud and the clearing fell into shadow. The breeze from the river felt suddenly cool; the sky was dark. A dust devil swirled by the trench and spun into the air. Its funnel widened, whipped by the wind, and disappeared.
The afternoon wore on, and at five o’clock the men climbed into the trucks and were taken to the barracks. The trucks rolled down the gravel roads over the railroad tracks and through the fields of green and yellow grass with the sun’s dying rays slanting over the pines. The men showered and changed into fresh denims and lined up outside the dining hall for supper. They sat at the wooden tables and benches and ate the tasteless food that still seemed to smell of the carbolic and antiseptic that was used to clean the kitchen. They went back to the barracks and lay exhausted on their bunks, listening to the sounds of the frogs and night birds in the woods. Then it was nine o’clock and the lights went out and someone struck a match to the candle and the poker game began for those who were not too tired to play.
Toussaint’s bunk was two down from Avery’s. The army blanket on it was stretched and tucked so tightly across the mattress that you could bounce a quarter off it. The pillow was laid neatly at the head, and his foot locker was squared evenly with the base. He had a cardboard box fixed to the wall above his pillow, where he kept his razor, soap, toothbrush, tobacco, matches, and cigarette papers. He sat on the side of his bunk and reached up to get his package of Virginia Extra. He rolled a cigarette and popped a match on his thumbnail. He dropped the burnt match into a small tin can that he kept under his bed.
The poker game was being organized on the floor between the two rows of bunks. Jeffry’s foot locker had been pushed out into the aisle to be used as a table, and an army blanket was spread over the top. The men played with pocket change, although it was against camp regulations for any inmate to have money. A visitor would slip a prisoner a few crumpled, hand-soiled bills, and they would eventually circulate through the entire camp by way of poker and dice games and bribes to the trusties and guards for favors. Billy Jo ran the poker game in Toussaint’s barracks on a house system, by which he took a nickel out of every pot for the use of his candles and cards. He would cover any bet up to five dollars, and allow credit if the player could put up security.
“We need two more guys,” Billy Jo said.
“We got four already,” Benoit said.
“We need a couple more. You want in, Claxton?”
“Will you give me something on next tobacco ration?”
“You already owe it to me. What else you got?”
“Nothing.”
“Brother Samuel.”
“I ain’t a gambling man.”
“Who wants to play. We need two more guys.”
“Get Jeffry.”
“He’s in the latrine.”
“You ain’t doing nothing, Toussaint.”
“I only got a quarter.”
“That’s enough. Move over and let him sit down, Benoit.”
Toussaint sat down on the floor in front of the trunk and changed his quarter for five nickels.
“Start dealing,” Benoit said.
“We need another guy. You want to play?”