There’s something else inside my head now, an image in vivid colors:
My hands around his throat.
But all I say is this: “Beat it.”
Roof nods at Burt.
“Because you’ve got him with you?” Roof says. “Isn’t there something in the law someplace about the right to free assembly or something like that?”
“Wow,” I say. “You did pay attention in school once in a while, until my father told you that you were no longer welcome there, of course.”
“I have as much a right to be standing here as you do,” Roof says. “We all do. Kind of hurts our feelings that you didn’t invite Lynyrd and me to the big meet.”
“Is that so?” I say mildly.
We’re even closer now. Nothing aggressive in my posture, just proximity. I’m here. He’s right there. And Burt is right behind me,letting the scene play out, for now. He doesn’t know what EJ had said about Roof Crockett because I haven’t told him. I haven’t told anybody.
“Hey, nobody’s more concerned about this time than my daddy and my brother and me,” he says. “Despite the shit you’re running around saying about us.”
“Isthatso?” I say, my eyes still firmly fixed on his.
“You tell him, Roof,” Lynyrd says.
“Shut up, Lynyrd,” Roof says. But his own eyes stay on mine. “This is between the Big Nothing and me.”
“Works for me,” I say.
“What you seem to keep forgetting,” Roof says, “is how much our family has invested here.”
“Sure,” I say. “But what are you doing here right now?”
I have to hand it to him. He’s managed to stand his ground this time, maybe because he doesn’t want to look scared in front of his buddies.
“You frankly don’t want trouble from either one of us,” Burt says, “especially now that Nash Hader isn’t around to roll over and beg every time your father tells him to.”
“Isthatso?” Roof asks.
Not looking at Burt. Still looking at me.
Now Burt is the one saying, “Beat it. All of you.”
“Fine with me,” Roof Crockett says. “But since I am here, I’ll deliver a message, to both of you.Bothof you stop talking shit about the Crocketts.”
“That’s it?” I ask. “The whole message? You practice it before you drove over?”
“You’ve been warned,” Roof says.
“Or what?” Burt asks.
“That’s for you to find out, isn’t it, Deputy Dawg?”
Roof turns to walk back to his truck. But then he stops, and turnsaround, and looks up to where Taylor is standing near the front door to the hall.
“You take care, Mrs. Webb,” he yells up to her. “You hear?”
Burt starts to step forward, but I stop him with my arm as Roof opens the passenger door, Lynyrd already behind the wheel.
Roof turns around one last time then, to address me.
