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"Because you thought time had run out for you, didn't you?"
"Yes, I knew it had."
"We should have died there but we held them. Our thirst was terrible. We drank rainwater from the hoof prints of livestock. Then that night we tied sticks in the mouths of our wounded so they wouldn't cry out while we slipped out of the woods and joined the rest of our boys."
The wind began blowing hard in the trees outside the window. Last fall's leaves swirled o
ff the ground and blew against the house.
"I sense resentment in you," he said.
"I already paid my dues. I don't want—"
"You don't want what?" He pared a piece of dirt from under his fingernail.
"To be the only man under a flag."
"Ah, we never quit paying dues, my friend. I must be going now. The wind's out of the south. There'll be thunder by this afternoon. I always have a hard time distinguishing it from Yankee cannon."
He made a clucking sound with his tongue, fitted his campaign hat on his head, took up his crutch, and walked through the blades of the window fan into a spinning vortex of gold and scarlet leaves.
When I finally woke from my sleep in midafternoon, like rising from the warm stickiness of an opium dream, I saw Alafair watching me through the partly opened bedroom door. Her lips were parted silently, her round, tan face wan with incomprehension. The sheets were moist and tangled around my legs. I tried to smile.
"You okay, Dave?"
"Yeah, I'm fine."
"You were having a dream. You were making all kinds of sounds."
"It's probably not too good to sleep in the daytime, little guy."
"You got malaria again?"
"No, it doesn't bother me much anymore."
She walked into the room and placed one hand on the bedstead. She looked at the floor.
"What's the matter, Alf?" I said.
"I went to the grocery down at the four-corners with Bootsie. A man had the newspaper open on the counter and was reading something out loud. A lady saw us and touched the man on the arm. Then both of them just stared at us. Bootsie gave them a real mean look."
"What was the man saying?"
"A lady got shot." Her palm was cupped tightly on the knob of the bedstead. She stared at the floor, and there were small white discolorations in her cheeks like slivers of ice. "He said you shot the lady. You shot the lady, Dave."
I sat up on the edge of the bed.
"I had some trouble last night, Alafair. Somebody fired a pistol at me and I shot back. I'm not sure who fired at me or what this lady was doing there. But the situation is a lot more complex than maybe some people think. The truth can be real hard to discover sometimes, little guy."
"Did you do what they say, Dave?" I could see the shine of fear in her brown eyes.
"I don't know. But I never shot at anybody who didn't try to hurt me first. You have to believe me on that, Alf. I'm not sure what happened last night, but sooner or later I probably will. In the meantime, guys like you and me and Bootsie have to be standup and believe in each other."
I brushed her bangs away from her eyes. She looked for a long time at the whirling blades of the window fan and the shadows they made on the bed.
"They don't have any right," she said.
"Who?"
