The Trouble That Came To Erwin Baldridge

Erwin Baldridge lived in a run-down house on Caney Creek. Each week he went to Mt. Ster­ling to buy more beer. He put it in burlap sacks in his truck bed and drove back as casu­al­ly as if he were tak­ing his wife out for a Sun­day dri­ve (back when his wife was around for him to do such things).

He nev­er got pulled over.

His sec­ond cousin, Joe Hamm, was coun­ty sher­iff. Not to men­tion Erwin had earned him­self a medal over in France. There were always gonna be boot­leg­gers, the gen­er­al feel­ing was, bet­ter a war hero than some bum.

As a rule, nobody caused Erwin Bal­ridge any trouble.

For one thing, he packed a pis­tol on his hip every­where he went. For anoth­er, he had a big dog named Jack who would turn from the lazi­est mutt to a froth­ing tank of fur and teeth with a sin­gle “Chere!”

More­over, most peo­ple just liked him. He did­n’t talk much but he smiled often and he would give you the shirt off his back if you asked him. The only thing any­one could say against Erwin Bal­ridge was that his breath stank.

Course, no one said that to his face.

Erwin let whole rooms of his house go after his wife left him. The place, orig­i­nal­ly his dad­dy’s, slumped on a knoll that over­looked the dirt road that ran beside the creek.

There were two win­dows on the porch.

The one on the right looked into the kitchen, which was the only room that Erwin real­ly used any­more. He slept on a cot in the rear of the room and washed in a tub behind the house and kept his clothes and per­son­al items in the cel­lar with the canned goods and extra beer.

The win­dow on the left looked into the old bed­room. The bed and dress­er in it were cov­ered in a thick lay­er of dust. The floor was a maze of emp­ty cans and rusty tools, bro­ken plows and filthy quilts, sil­ver­fish-eat­en books and emp­ty car­tridge boxes.

Erwin did­n’t go in there any­more. No one did. He had blocked it off with the ice­box that he kept his beer cool in.

A vine had worked its way into the old bed­room. It climbed along the walls and win­dow like a creek through the hills, split­ting off into small­er trib­u­taries that wormed their way around ancient pic­ture frames and rust­ed nails.

In the fall, his cus­tomers knew that if they could­n’t find Erwin at his house that he’d be out in some neigh­bor’s field help­ing bring in the har­vest. You just had to ask around to find out whose. 

No one had ever dared let them­selves into his ice­box when he was gone. And no one would have bragged about it if they had.

All told, Erwin Bal­ridge had­n’t had any trou­ble at all, not in years, not since his wife left him, until the day the grapevine man came.

#

Maud Wal­lace bor­rowed her dad­dy’s Mod­el B Ford. He let her take it because he thought she was too fat and ugly to get pestered by any boys. He nev­er con­sid­ered the pos­si­bil­i­ty that she might be the one doing the pestering.

Her father could­n’t see it but there was a cer­tain hand­some charm to Maud. Her hair was dark and fine with light curls in it and her eyes were brown and warm with lit­tle shards in them and her lips were full when not hurl­ing a half-smil­ing insult.

Of course, Maud knew well she was­n’t the rea­son Harold Bran­ham and Ike Mid­dle­ton were rid­ing around with her. That was Kathy Mag­gard’s draw. She was the pret­ty one.

The nicer one, too. 

But Maud had the car and the where­with­al plus she was the one who actu­al­ly would­n’t have mind­ed to screw.

Maud picked up the boys before she picked up Kathy because Kathy lived on the far side of the coun­ty. If Harold and Ike had tossed a coin to decide which one of them would have to sit up front with Maud, she would­n’t have been offended.

Both of them were pret­ty ugly themselves.

They had one quick stop to make before they went to pick up Kathy. Erwin Baldridge’s place was­n’t exact­ly on the way but it was the sort of place and had the sort of things in it that was worth mak­ing a detour for.

Maud flew down Caney Creek so fast that the wind almost yanked the cig­a­rette out of her mouth. Beside her, Ike Mid­dle­ton was rolling his own. In the back­seat, Harold Bran­ham sat with his hand laid flat on the right cushion.

It was almost like he was already grab­bing Kathy Mag­gard’s ass. Not that he’d like­ly dare.

“Harold Bran­ham,” Maud called back to him. “You get your hands off that invis­i­ble girl and get your wal­let out. We’re com­ing up on Erwin’s place.”

Harold blushed, laughed, and shook his head. “We’re still gonna go half and half, right, Ike?”

Ike raised up his hat and scratched under­neath it. His hair was fad­ing into a wid­ow’s peak. He still had a smudge on his right fore­head that prob­a­bly was coal but just as like­ly could have been smeared manure.

“I reck­on that’s only fair,” he said. “Since Maud pro­vid­ed the auto­mo­bile and all. Or her dad­dy did.”

“Not to men­tion the gas,” she said. “And I did­n’t get that from my dad­dy, I got that from work­ing at Ned Keg­ley’s place.”

Maud took a wide turn in the road. The Ford dipped into a shal­low spot, popped up over a rut, and then got scratched by the stretched branch­es of scrub­by trees hang­ing side­ways off a rock cliff.

On the far side of the road was a bank that climbed to a field. Atop that bank stepped a man.

He flung his arms wide as Maud passed him. She looked over to him and in that brief look she fig­ured him for a hobo. He wore dusty boots and tat­tered pants and an old gray shirt with one miss­ing breast pocket.

He had some­thing around his neck.

Then he was gone, passed up, obscured by a grove of pine, before Maud Wal­lace could get a bet­ter look at him. “Was that a rope around his neck?” asked Maud.

“What?” asked Ike. He had had his head turned back, too, but he had been too busy yap­ping at Harold (George Ball near­ly talked him­self into a fist­fight at work today) to notice the man on the bank.

“There’s no use explain­ing,” Maud replied, after con­sid­er­ing explain­ing for a sec­ond. “You just missed it, is all.”

She tossed her cig­a­rette butt out the win­dow and let off the gas as her dad­dy’s car turned anoth­er bend. Straight­en­ing out again, she spot­ted Erwin Bal­ridge’s farm­house atop a small hill to the left of the road.

Maud glanced back at Harold. “You been here before, ain’t you, Branham?”

“Sure, I been here.” He shrugged. “My broth­er Jim­my took me here when I was ten years old.”

“Good,” said Maud. She turned into Erwin Baldridge’s yard. She parked in a dirt patch next to his old truck. “Because I am grown thirsty.”

She turned off the engine, ran her hands down her green dress to pull the hem fur­ther down her rather prodi­gious thighs, and looked over at Ike Middleton. 

“Well,” she said, “Erwin won’t sell beer to no woman my age, so why don’t you two go on and run the hell inside.”

Ike looked from Maud to Harold in the backseat. 

“I reck­on I might just stay here with you,” he said. She knew he was­n’t about to make a pass by the way he cleared his throat after. She smiled. Some­times when she smiled she felt like a tough ol’ catfish.

“You don’t have to be scared of Erwin Baldridge,” she told him. “I’d go up, shake his hand, and not think twice about it except he would­n’t let me take any beer with me when I left. Sor­ta old fash­ioned that-a-way.”

“I ain’t scared of no boot­leg­ger,” said Ike Mid­dle­ton. “I just bust­ed my hind end at work today and am feel­ing pret­ty com­fort­able here and don’t see the need for both of us to go in when one can do.”

“Yeah, I bet you put in a good day’s work for once in your life,” Harold said. “I know you’re plum exhaust­ed and all but do you think you can man­age to raise up off your poor sore ass long enough to let me out of this jalopy?”

He punc­tu­at­ed his remark by push­ing the back of Ike’s hat up so that the front tipped down over his eyes.

“This ain’t no jalopy, you hear,” Maud said. Ike adjust­ed his hat, grum­bled, and got out of the car. “It ain’t no rich man’s lim­ou­sine but my dad­dy worked hard for this ride.”

Harold slid out onto the dirt patch. “No dis­re­spect intend­ed,” he said. 

Then he looked up at the farm­house. Jack was pant­i­ng on the porch beneath the win­dow into the long unused bed­room. The mutt was get­ting rounder and gray­er by the day.

Ike sat back down beside Maud as Harold start­ed towards the house. He eased the car door shut, looked over at Maud, saw her left elbow hang­ing out her open win­dow in a casu­al man­ner, and stuck his right elbow out his.

“Baldridge and my dad­dy have had their prob­lems,” Ike said, by way of explanation. 

#

Harold Bran­ham sure did­n’t rush into Erwin Baldridge’s place. He took his sweet time. 

In his own way, he was as scared of the man as Ike Mid­dle­ton was. Unlike Ike, though, Harold knew that his fears were unfound­ed. They were just so long-held that they were hard to shake off.

When Harold was in fifth grade, his broth­er Jim­my, then sev­en­teen, hav­ing at that time left school and got­ten a job at Roy DeHart’s garage, man­aged to buy him­self a used 1923 Chevro­let Coupe. 

It was black and almost fan­cy. Jim­my even waved from it like a politician.

One day that sum­mer Jim­my reluc­tant­ly agreed to dri­ve his kid broth­er over to their grand­par­ents farm on Elk Fork, where Harold was going to stay for most of the month. 

Harold expect­ed to have to work some but he knew he’d get to fish more and he pret­ty much only took his fish­ing pole and a change of clothes with him. 

But Jim­my did­n’t turn up Nick­ell Hill like Harold expect­ed him to. He went on down to Caney Creek.

Harold did­n’t ask him why because Jim­my had got­ten so that he turned from pleas­ant to mean based on every lit­tle provo­ca­tion. It was pleas­ant enough to ride with the win­dows down in the soft sum­mer heat, anyway.

As the Coupe came around the bend in the road towards Erwin Bal­ridge’s place Harold fig­ured out their des­ti­na­tion on his own. His father, an elder in the Prim­i­tive Bap­tist church, had point­ed it out to him before.

“You’re not to say noth­ing,” said Jim­my, pick­ing up on his lit­tle broth­er’s recog­ni­tion. “I’m a grown man now, I work for my pay, and you don’t know it yet, but whiskey is good and so are loose women.”

Jim­my pulled into the dirt patch in front of the farmhouse. 

“Erwin Baldridge don’t like nosy kids,” he con­tin­ued. “They say in the war he dashed a cou­ple French babies brains in. He was hid­ing from the Huns and they were mak­ing too much noise. It was them or him. That’s the sort of man we’re deal­ing with here.”

He put his hand on his lit­tle broth­er’s shoul­der. “If you tell our folks and Erwin hears about it, he’s liable to beat both me and you to death. You ain’t gonna get me killed over a bit of corn whiskey, are you?”

“No,” said Harold. He inter­locked his fin­gers in his lap. May have shiv­ered. “I’ll keep my word, I swear. I ain’t no rev­enue man.”

Jim­my smiled, pat­ted his head, and went in. Harold remem­bered think­ing he walked pret­ty casu­al­ly into the house of a man who may have mur­dered some French babies. 

Lat­er, of course, and that was a few years, he real­ized the whole thing had been made up.

But no one had made up the gun on Erwin Baldridge’s hip and even if Pro­hi­bi­tion was over and Erwin Baldridge had moved from boot­leg whiskey to boot­leg beer, the few times Harold Bran­ham had come around before, he had still half expect­ed to get his head slammed against the floorboards.

The bot­tom step of the porch creaked as he stepped up. The kitchen door was open, as it most often was. Harold glanced over at the dog, who seemed to be asleep now, and went inside.

Erwin sat in the back in a stained white under­shirt with a bushel of beans on the table and a cou­ple mason jars near at hand. He looked like he had been out in the field all morn­ing for some­one. He was string­ing them.

“Who are you sup­posed to be?” asked Erwin, as he snapped a bean’s back and then peeled off its hinge.

“Delaney Bran­ham’s son,” said Harold. He had bare­ly stepped into the place. He stuffed his hands in his pock­ets next to his chaw and his pock­et knife.

Erwin wiped his fore­head. It was creased and the hair above it was bald­ing. Both his fore­head and his roman nose were red with sun­burn. The pores on his nose were like black­ber­ry seeds. “Which one are you?”

“I’m Harold. Came up here about two months ago with Willie Oney.” He shrugged. “I guess a lot of peo­ple come up here.”

“Sure do,” said Erwin. “But not the sher­iff and do you know why that is?” He dropped a bean into a half-filled jar. “Because every­body who comes up here knows I’ll treat them fair if’n they treat me fair. You look like a rea­son­able fel­low yourself.”

“I like to think I am.”

“Then we can do busi­ness,” said Erwin. 

#

Maud Wal­lace and Ike Mid­dle­ton sat in the car for a cou­ple of sec­onds before Maud placed her hand on his crotch. Ike almost jumped out of his seat but he did­n’t move her hand and soon enough she felt him harden. 

“What the hell are you doing, woman?” he asked her.

“Take it out,” she told him. “You ain’t going to get with Kathy, any­way. Harold’s got a bet­ter in there. And it’ll get awful bor­ing sit­ting here wait­ing. Let me make you spill your­self. I can do it.”

“Out here?” asked Ike. “In the open? You — you’re pret­ty god­damned crazy, aren’t you, Maud?”

She sighed. “Put your hat on it if you like. And you can slip it away before Harold gets back.”

Ike licked his lips, shook his head, and undid his pants. He unbut­toned them so fast he near­ly tore off the mid­dle but­ton. Maud dove her hand into the part in his long johns and grabbed at his warmness. 

She tugged its head out into the air.

Ike slammed his hat over her hand.

“I’m going to hell, alright,” he said but he still let her pull him.

Since there was noth­ing to see inside but his pock­marked face, Maud stared out the wind­shield at the porch and wound up focus­ing on the win­dow into the old room that Baldridge had blocked off. 

She could just make out the mesh of a vine spread out across its bro­ken glass.

Ike pre­ferred to watch the hat move on his lap.

Nei­ther of them heard the man com­ing. The first Maud knew of his pres­ence was when he stepped into the edges of her periph­er­al vision. Her hand froze beneath Ike’s hat. She turned her head left.

The hobo she had seen ear­li­er was maybe six feet away. He had stopped in the dirt patch, shoul­ders stooped, unshaven face down and neck turned taut, look­ing into the Mod­el B. 

The sun shone bright into his face from that angle yet he did not squint.

Now Maud could tell that the thing around his neck was not a rope. It was too stiff for rope, and dark­er brown. No, it was knot­ted grapevine, like what her uncle Ezra used to make into wreaths at Christmas.

Ike shift­ed uncom­fort­ably beside her but Maud did­n’t remove her hand. She did­n’t think the man could see where it was, any­way, from his dis­tance and past her shoulders. 

“Can I help you, mis­ter?” she asked.

The grapevine man grinned. His eyes were like rot­ting black­ber­ries. A gnat dart­ed from his ear.

Ike wilt­ed in her hand. 

Then the man looked down at the ground and made a halt­ing series of move­ments past the car and towards the farmhouse.

The grass in the yard was ankle-high. Jump­ing bugs fled, dis­rupt­ed by the impact of the man’s foot­falls. Every step he took was near­ly a stumble. 

“That damned feller is wast­ed,” said Ike.

Maud still had­n’t moved her hand. The man almost made it to the porch steps before Erwin’s dog woke. It clam­bered onto its feet, reared its ears back, and showed its teeth. 

The man with the grapevine neck­lace raised a fin­ger to his lips.

And the dog nev­er snarled. It just laid down and curled up on itself and went back to sleep.

Then the hobo was up the steps and under the door­way and talk­ing to the men inside. 

“I reck­on you bet­ter let go,” said Ike.

Her hand moved, slow­ly at first and then, as he thick­ened, faster. “There’s no need for that,” she replied. “I’m already bored again.”

#

“I got about five brands of beer, some whiskey, and a cou­ple jugs of home­made wine,” said Erwin Bal­ridge. “But I don’t expect you came for that. That takes a more nos­tal­gic drunk.”

There was a creak behind them as some­one stepped onto the porch. Erwin tilt­ed his head to the side to look past the Bran­ham boy and then he frowned. “Can I help you?”

The man was dressed like a boy play­ing hill­bil­ly and he wore a cir­cle of grapevine twined around his neck. He smiled. His teeth were all rot­ted out of his head.

The Bran­ham boy turned and stepped back. He backed up to the stove. The grapevine man stepped into the house.

“I know what I want to drink,” he croaked.

The man looked damned crazy. He had pin­point pupils and an awful smile and he remind­ed Erwin of how Ves Cantrill had looked the last time he had ever seen him.

Ves was still up at East­ern State Hos­pi­tal, the last Erwin had heard.

“You must have me mis­tak­en, mis­ter,” said Baldridge. “I don’t got noth­ing to drink except well water.”

The man swayed. He looked over at Harold and curled his top lip to the bot­tom of his nostrils. 

“Er-win,” he said. “Er-win. That’s the name that I’ve been hear­ing for near­ly miles. Every­where I goes, every­body knows Er-win Bal-dridge.”

“Maybe they do,” said Erwin. “But I sure don’t know you.”

The grapevine man stead­ied him­self against the ice­box. “What’s on the oth­er side of here?” he asked.

“Nev­er you mind,” said Erwin. He kicked his chair so hard it slammed into his table and sent a small avalanche of green beans spilling. “You don’t have no god­damn right to be in here and I already told you to leave.”

The filthy stranger looked over at the Bran­ham boy. “He nev­er did that to those babies,” he said. “I’ll grant him that much.”

The kid’s eyes went wide. He looked over at Erwin. “I don’t need no beer, after all. I think I’d bet­ter get going.” But he did­n’t move, the grapevine man was still block­ing the door.

Erwin pulled his pis­tol and point­ed it at the stranger. His hand did­n’t shake, not even a lit­tle. “I already told you I don’t want you here.”

The grapevine man just wrapped his fin­gers around the rim of the ice­box. “You keep your cold ones in here, don’t ya?”

He raised the lid.

Even Erwin looked. But it was­n’t the beer he put in there the day before that he saw. It was Lydie. She had always been a small woman, a pret­ty small woman. She lay in her ruf­fled sleep­ing gown with her face turned blue.

There was a big cut in her fore­head where he had hit her with that ax.

The kid screamed. 

The grapevine man laughed.

Erwin shot him.

#

In the back­yard, an old sycamore tree along the wood­line fell over and crashed into the woods, pulling up a tan­gle of roots and dirt behind it.

#

In the front yard, Maud Wal­lace’s hand clenched around Ike Mid­dle­ton’s erec­tion, half-crush­ing it.

#

On the front porch, Jack whim­pered. And died.

#

The bul­let slammed into the grapevine man’s face. 

It chipped off his nose like a piece of clay and then he tipped over back­wards, straight and almost dig­ni­fied, to come down hard in the doorway.

#

A man named Boon Gatlin was rid­ing in his broth­er-in-law Claude Haskel­l’s truck when they hap­pened to hear the gun­shot and see the grapevine man fall and the sycamore falling with him in the back.

“Hell­fire,” said Boon.

Claude slammed the gas.

They rushed off to report the trou­ble so fast that nei­ther of them saw the vicious beat­ing that was tak­ing place inside the Mod­el B Ford parked outside.

#

Erwin looked back at the ice­box. There was only beer in it. Of course, there was only beer in it. He had buried Lydie in the yard as soon as the ground had thawed. He looked at the Bran­ham boy.

“I did­n’t see noth­ing,” the kid said. “It’s just beer, ain’t it?”

“Yeah,” said Erwin. “Get you some. On the house.”

“Thanks,” said the kid. “But I ain’t so thirsty now.”

Then he ran across the room and leaped over the dead man and fled from the house.

#

Run­ning across the yard, Harold saw Ike bent over in his seat and Maud lean­ing against the dri­ver’s side door. He grabbed Ike by the shoul­der through the open window.

“Let me in,” he said.

“She hurt me,” said Ike. “So I hit her.”

Harold looked over his shoul­der at Maud. She was breath­ing, slow­ly, with a dazed expres­sion on her face and a dozen bad bruis­es on her face. Her nose and lips had dry­ing blood around them.

“God­dammit,” said Harold. He looked back at the house where the man lay in the door­way. “Can you dri­ve, Maud?”

She did­n’t answer. She just stared down at the floorboard.

“Maud?”

“I’m sor­ry,” she said. There was none of the usu­al fire in her voice. “I did­n’t mean to do it.”

Harold sighed. He looked at Ike, who was star­ing off into space again. He shook his shoul­der. “Come on,” he said. “Help me put her in the back. We got to get gone from this place. Quick.”

Ike got out. He had to but­ton his pants up. Harold just shook his head and went around the car.

It was­n’t easy to move her. Ike act­ed like he was hurt and could­n’t lift much. He com­plained the entire time. Once she was sprawled out in the back, Harold got in the dri­ver’s seat.

He bare­ly wait­ed for Ike to get back inside before he start­ed the car and backed out as fast as he could.

He went tear­ing around the bend in the road so fast that they crashed head-on into the deputy sheriff.

Harold Bran­ham bashed his brains against the steer­ing wheel. Ike Mid­dle­ton flew out one wind­shield and land­ed askew in anoth­er. Maud Wal­lace was the only one, includ­ing the deputy, who survived. 

She did­n’t break noth­ing that was­n’t already broken.

#

Erwin Baldridge crossed the room and looked down at the ruined face of the grapevine man. The man had died with a smile on his face.

Then he frowned.

His eyes shift­ed in his head and locked on Erwin Baldridge. His shirt was rip­pling. It was like a sack of eels. It split apart at the but­tons and ten­drils of grapevine snaked out and latched to Erwin’s arms in a flash of twist­ing brown.

The boot­leg­ger was picked up plum from his feet and slammed into the ceil­ing so hard the pis­tol fell out of his hand. More grapevine was flow­ing out of the dead man.

A thick ten­dril flew up and wrapped itself around Erwin Baldridge’s neck, tight­en­ing so hard that he could­n’t utter a sound.

It would­n’t have made much good to scream then any­way. His near­est neigh­bor was a quar­ter mile away and noth­ing would have been heard over the rack­et of grind­ing met­al that explod­ed in the car crash just then.

The grapevine man stared up at the man it held dan­gling in the air with the slack face of the dead.

Its grapevine limbs came back to it, releas­ing their holds around Erwin’s arms and legs, and crawl­ing back inside its woody chest. All except for the one around Erwin’s neck.

That dropped but did not give way.

It was now dan­gling from the ceiling.

Hang­ing him.

He clawed at the wreath around his throat. He kicked futile­ly. The grapevine man, still lying on the floor in the same posi­tion he had fall­en in, smiled again.

He did­n’t stop smil­ing until Erwin Bal­ridge stopped kick­ing. It did­n’t take long.

#

Sher­iff Joe Hamm did­n’t get a chance to go to Erwin Baldridge’s house for some time. He had to deal with the car crash first. Ben Wells was dead and so were two of the boys in the oth­er car. Leland Wal­lace’s girl’s face was all bloody and her nose looked bro­ken but oth­er­wise she seemed healthy enough.

He and Deputy Lam­bert helped her out of the car and onto her feet and led her over to rest against the deputy’s cruis­er. She stared at the mess of crum­pled cars and bro­ken glass in some­thing like wonder.

“What hap­pened up at Erwin Bal­ridge’s place?” Joe asked her.

“I ain’t sure,” she said. “I was­n’t think­ing too straight.”

“Did those boys you were with start some trouble?”

“Them?” Maud laughed. “They would­n’t have hurt a fly.”

The sher­iff looked at Lam­bert. “You best stay with her and wait for the hearse to arrive. We ain’t gonna be able to get a car through here till this mess is cleared. I’ll walk on up to the house.”

“You sure you want to go up there by your­self?” asked Deputy Lambert.

“Erwin’s kin,” said Joe. “I reck­on I’ll be alright.”

He walked through the wreck­age and along the bot­tom of the wood­line and around the curve. He spot­ted the dead man in the door­way of the house from the road. He pulled his sidearm.

The dog who lay beneath the win­dow on the porch was­n’t mov­ing, either. But Sher­iff Joe Hamm did­n’t spare Jack much thought. Not once he got close enough to see the shape hang­ing in the kitchen.

Erwin Baldridge dan­gled with his arms and legs slack. His tongue had rolled out of his mouth and he had void­ed his bow­els in the end. There was a length of what looked like grapevine around his neck, tied to anoth­er bit that was tied to the ceiling.

Joe looked from his dead cousin to the pis­tol on the floor to the dead man in the door­way. He was dressed like a bum. His shirt was open and his hairy chest showed through. There was a red ring around the flesh of his neck.

He must have had a rash of some kind.

But that was­n’t what killed him. The bul­let in the face did that.

The smell made Joe a lit­tle sick. He went through the kitchen and out the back­door and was light­ing a cig­a­rette when he noticed the sycamore tree top­pled over near the wood­line. It had pulled a bunch of roots up with it.

He approached, smok­ing, and idly glanced into the hole the tree had freed in its fall.

And saw the corpse of Lydie Baldridge half-decayed in the dirt.