Chapter 12
Is This Cause We Washed the Goats?
Now the new courthouse in Winze was brick on the outside and a promise on the inside.
A man could stand out in the square and admire the red walls, the tall windows, and the proud front steps all he wanted. But once he crossed the threshold, he had to step around stacked boards, lime dust, nail kegs, and two sawhorses that had been promoted regular to furniture.
The courthouse smelled of fresh mortar, cut pine, and ambition.
Across the way, the rock jailhouse was not much more than framed walls and good intentions. Stone had been stacked for it. Timbers had been set for it. Men had leaned on shovels and declared it near done for it.
It was not near done.
That did not keep Chance Dockery from standing inside the courthouse like law had already settled there and hung its hat on a peg.
Joseph Daniel had come to measure a door casing.
That was all.
A man ought to be safe measuring a door casing.
Chance Dockery proved he was not.
Chance did not come at a man sideways. He came straight on, which was worse, for there was no polite place to dodge him.
“You got a minute?” Chance asked.
Joseph looked down at the rule in his hand. “I got a door casing.”
“Door casing can wait. Festival will not.”
Joseph sighed. A man heard the word festival enough times, it started sounding less like music and more like a calf bawling through a fence rail.
“I didn’t make this thing,” Joseph said.
Chance looked at him.
Joseph scratched the back of his neck.
“I helped measure around it.”
“You helped give Thomas McGathery the notion that half the county ought to come watch goats dance, soap get proved on a billy, and a house get moved while an Atlanta photographer makes history of it.”
“That sounds worse said back.”
“It is growing worse by the hour. Goatman has gone home to fetch his wife, his young’uns, and every cake of soap he can lay hands on. I have heard talk of folks coming from Hiawassee, Murphy, and maybe as far as Dahlonega if somebody prints the flyers right.”
Joseph looked out toward the square. “That many folks buy soap?”
“That many folks buy trouble, if it is set out pretty.”
Chance walked to a rough plank table somebody had dragged into the courtroom and picked up a small tin star. It did not shine much. It looked like it had been waiting on better days.
Joseph knew right off he did not care for where the conversation had settled.
“No,” Joseph said.
Chance laid the star back down like Joseph’s answer had not inconvenienced him any.
“I had not yet asked.”
“You was fixin’ to.”
“That is not the same thing.” Chance folded both hands behind his back and looked through the tall unfinished window toward the square. “I need a deputy for Friday and Saturday.”
Joseph shook his head once. “I ain’t deputy timber.”
“You do not know what timber I am needing.”
“I know I ain’t it.”
Chance turned from the window. “Henry Daniel can have a disagreement with a man and still leave him standing. Oscar can remember his manners if somebody reminds him soon enough. Them others—”
“Them others ain’t mine to answer for,” Joseph said.
“No. But they are yours in blood, and that counts harder here than paper law when a Saturday night gets loud.”
Joseph’s jaw shifted. “Do not put my brothers under that star.”
“I am trying to keep them out from under it.” Chance’s voice stayed even. “If Henry sees you wearing it, he will carry his cards farther back in the hills. Oscar will follow because Henry does. Them others will follow because there will be drink and noise where Henry goes. Half my trouble walks itself out of town before sundown.”
Joseph stared at him. “You want me to scare folks?”
“No,” Chance said. “I want you to calm them before I have to scare them.”
Joseph had no answer setting close by, so he looked down at the tin star instead.
Chance let him look at it.
Then he said, almost careless, “Twenty dollars.”
Joseph’s eyes came up.
Chance did not smile. That was unkind of him.
“Ten Friday. Ten Saturday. Paid Sunday morning when the badge comes back.”
Chance tapped one finger against the star. “If it gets too wild and I end up with a jail full, you stay on for seven dollars a day until the circuit judge comes in.”
Joseph rolled his eyes toward one of the tall courthouse windows like he was debating whether a grown man could fit through it without losing too much dignity.
That was a lot of money.
“I don’t arrest kin,” Joseph said.
Chance picked the star up again. “Good. Then we understand each other.”
Joseph blinked. “That was not me agreein’.”
“It was close enough for county work.” Chance folded the star into his palm. “We need a witness to swear you in proper. Two witnesses would be better.”
“I ain’t bein’ sworn into nothin’.”
“You just accepted pay from the town in principle.”
“I did no such thing.”
Chance looked at him in that settled way of his. “Joseph, a man does not argue over the shape of a duty unless he has already laid a hand on it.”
Joseph opened his mouth, found no clean road through that sentence, and shut it again.
Chance nodded once, like the matter had come before a judge and been disposed of. “Go fetch your mother.”
That got Joseph’s head up. “Ma?”
“A first appointment ought to be witnessed by blood if blood is close at hand.” Chance’s eyes flicked toward the square. “And if we collect another honest witness on the way back, I will not object.”
Chance knew what that would mean to Frankie Daniel, though he had too much sense to say so out loud.
Joseph had come to Frankie late in life, the last boy, the quietest boy, and the only one she had never once had to push toward a church door. He went because she asked, and most Sundays because he meant to.
Chance was nearer Henry’s age than Joseph’s, old enough almost to have been the boy’s daddy if life had bent different. But Frankie Daniel had given Chance better counsel through the years than his own folks had known how to offer, and she had done it without ever making him feel small for needing it.
If town business could hand her one proud day, Chance meant to hand it over proper.
Joseph carried that order out of the courthouse like it weighed near as much as the star.
He found Frankie Daniel not at home, but at the old watering hole, where the quilting frame had been set close enough to the window that Katie McGathery could watch stitches and street traffic both.
Frankie had one needle in her hand and three conversations within hearing when Joseph stepped through the door.
She looked up the way a mama does when her child is grown full-size but still enters a room with news on him.
“What’s broke?” she asked.
“Nothin’.”
That worried her worse.
Joseph shifted his hat from one hand to the other. “Chance wants you at the courthouse.”
Every needle close by slowed just enough to prove not a one of them women wasn’t listening.
Frankie set her needle flat against the quilt. “What has one of mine done now?”
That question had worn a path through her life. More than once, a neighbor had come running for Frankie Daniel before they went running for the law. That was how a body kept a son from shame, if the Lord moved quick and his mama moved quicker.
But nobody had ever come fetch her because one of her boys was about to stand on the law’s side of the room.
Joseph looked at the floor. “Chance is swearing me in deputy.”
For a second, Frankie did not move.
Then her mouth softened in a way Joseph had not meant to cause and did not know how to answer.
“My baby boy,” she said, and there was enough pride in it to make Joseph wish the courthouse window had been nearer.
“It’s just Friday and Saturday,” he said quick.
Every woman around that quilt frame stood up near at once.
Joseph lifted both hands fast. “Now hold on. That dusty courthouse don’t need you all trapsin’ through it. Just Ma.”
The women sat back down slow, not because Joseph had commanded it, but because Frankie had not yet stood all the way up.
Miss Shelia, who had somehow been standing without anybody noticing when she got there, did not sit.
“Joseph Daniel,” she said, “you can boss around anybody here that lets you, but the only way I ain’t going is if your Ma tells me I cain’t. If she says yes and you say no, I got a rock for you too.”
Doris held out her hand without looking surprised.
Shelia sighed and dropped a smooth little creek rock into Doris’s palm.
Frankie looked from the rock to Shelia, then over at Joseph.
She had seen something in that girl already. Something quick and troublesome, sure enough, but something bright too. And more than that, she had seen Joseph get quieter in a different way whenever Shelia was near.
“Give Doris the rock,” Frankie said, “and you can come too.”
“I already give it to her.”
The trip back to the courthouse would have been a good bit faster had Miss Shelia been setting the pace instead of Ma Daniel.
Shelia had the kind of walk that wanted answers before the road got done asking questions. Frankie Daniel had the kind of walk that had already buried a husband, raised boys, outlived noise, and did not hurry just because young folks believed time belonged to them.
Joseph walked between them for the first little stretch, then fell half a step behind because Shelia had commenced asking questions out one side of her mouth while Frankie answered only the ones she felt deserved daylight.
“Do deputies get to carry pistols?” Shelia asked.
“No,” Joseph said.
“You don’t know that.”
“I know I ain’t carryin’ one.”
“Can they arrest women?”
“Not today,” Joseph said, “but don’t go thinking of reasons.”
“Is this ’cause we washed the goats?”
“For sure.”
“You be deputy for good and you’d be moved into that room they built in the new courthouse.”
“Don’t been asked done turned it down.”
Frankie stopped. She starred at Joseph. Then she decided to enjoy the moment and not to push her opinion. She started up the courthouse steps.
Chance Dockery saw them coming from the tall courthouse window and let himself smile wide where nobody but the unfinished walls could catch him at it.
He had to put that smile away before Joseph came through the door, but he kept it one breath longer for Frankie.
She was wearing the same pride in her eyes that she had worn the day Chance himself stood in another courthouse room and raised his hand. Frankie Daniel had witnessed his oath too, back when he was young enough to believe a badge was mostly shine and authority.
She had looked at him that day like she expected him to become the man the oath described, and, more than once, that look had done more to keep him straight than fear of any judge.
Frankie reached the doorway first, slow and steady. She did not say what she knew. Chance did not say what he remembered. But their eyes met, and the old debt passed gentle between them.
Then Joseph stepped in behind her, wearing the face of a man who had been fetched to his own hanging and was expected to admire the rope.
Miss Shelia slipped in last, eyes bright, mouth ready.
Frankie turned her head just enough.
Shelia pressed her lips together with both hands folded in front of her, and for once in her life looked like she had swallowed a church bell whole and meant not to ring it.
Chance set a worn Bible on the rough plank table and laid the tin star beside it.
“Joseph Daniel,” he said, and his voice changed into something rounder, older, and fit for the room, “come forward.”
Joseph stepped to the table.
“Place your left hand upon the Holy Scriptures and raise your right hand before Almighty God and these witnesses.”
Joseph looked once at his mother.
Frankie nodded.
He put his left hand on the Bible and lifted his right.
Chance unfolded a paper from his coat pocket, though Frankie noticed he did not need to look at it near as much as a man might if the words were new to him.
“Do you, Joseph Daniel, solemnly swear before Almighty God, upon these Holy Scriptures, and in the presence of these lawful witnesses, that you will faithfully, honestly, and impartially discharge the duties of Deputy Sheriff for the town of Winze and such parts of this county as may lawfully fall under your charge during the term of your appointment?”
Joseph drew breath.
Chance lifted one finger without looking up. “Wait until I have completed the oath.”
Joseph let the breath go through his nose.
Shelia’s lips pressed tighter. Frankie did not have to look at her twice.
Chance continued, “Do you swear that you will support and defend the Constitution of the United States, the Constitution of the State of Georgia, and all laws and ordinances rightly made under their authority, so far as the same are committed to your care, and that you will bear true faith and allegiance to the peace and lawful order of this community?”
“Do you swear that you will act without fear, favor, affection, malice, partiality, reward, or hope of reward, and that you will not use the authority placed upon you to settle any private quarrel, advance any personal interest, shield any man by reason of kinship, friendship, wealth, or standing, nor bear harder upon any man by reason of poverty, dislike, weakness, or low estate?”
Joseph’s eyes slid toward Chance at the word kinship.
Chance read on like he had not put it there on purpose.
“Do you swear that you will keep and preserve the public peace; prevent disorder where disorder may rightly be prevented; suppress riot, affray, drunken violence, unlawful gaming, and disturbance of lawful assembly; give aid in the apprehension of persons lawfully charged or suspected of crime; guard prisoners committed to your care from escape, harm, cruelty, or unlawful treatment; and protect, according to your ability, the persons and property of citizens, travelers, merchants, widows, orphans, strangers, and all others who may come within your notice and authority?”
Miss Shelia’s eyes widened at widows, orphans, and strangers, like deputy work had suddenly grown into a whole sermon with a jailhouse attached.
But she held her tongue.
Chance’s voice gentled without losing its form. “Do you further swear that, while wearing this badge, you will remember that authority is not given for pride, but for service; not for anger, but for restraint; not for the raising up of yourself, but for the protection of those placed in your path by Providence?”
Frankie lowered her eyes then, and Chance knew she was praying. Not loud. Frankie had never needed volume to be heard by God.
“Do you swear that you will obey all lawful commands given you by the Sheriff now holding office; report faithfully such matters as come to your knowledge; conduct yourself soberly, peaceably, and with the dignity becoming an officer of the law; and, when force may be required, use no more than is needful under law and conscience?”
Chance paused then, not for paper, but for memory.
He remembered his own hand on a Bible, remembered Frankie Daniel standing witness when his own mother had been too sick and his father too hard to look pleased at anything. He remembered wanting to be thought worthy and fearing he never would be.
Frankie looked up right then.
The glance they exchanged was small enough that Joseph missed it and plain enough that Shelia, who missed very little, stored it away for later.
Chance finished, “And do you swear that you take this charge freely, with full understanding that you may be called upon in danger, discomfort, inconvenience, and public complaint; and that you will answer for your conduct before the laws of this state, before the judgment of honest men, and, in the last account, before Almighty God?”
Joseph swallowed.
Chance saw Joseph’s eyes flick once toward the window and nearly smiled again.
Bringing Frankie Daniel had been the wiser half of the ceremony. Joseph might have argued law, wages, duty, and kin clear into supper, but he would not shame his mother by climbing out a courthouse window.
Frankie would have skinned him for the attempt before Chance ever had to chase him.
Chance lowered the paper a fraction. “If you so swear, answer, ‘I do.’”
Joseph looked at the Bible, then at the tin star, then at his mother.
Frankie Daniel stood straight as Sunday truth, pride shining quiet in her face.
Joseph sighed through his nose.
“I do,” he said.
Chance held his gaze. “So help you God?”
Joseph’s voice came quieter that time, but steadier. “So help me God.”
Chance folded the paper and set it beside the Bible.
For all his careful words, he did not make a speech over the star. He only picked it up, stepped around the table, and pinned it neat to Joseph’s shirt.
“Deputy Daniel,” Chance said.
Joseph looked down at the star like it had bit him.
Frankie did not ask permission.
She took two steps and gathered her youngest boy up in both arms, badge and all.
“I’m proud of you,” she said, soft enough it was meant mostly for him and God.
Joseph’s shoulders held stiff for one breath, then another. Then they lowered.
Chance saw it and looked away, giving the both of them the mercy of not being watched too close.
Miss Shelia had waited through Almighty God, constitutions, widows, orphans, prisoners, kinship, Providence, and a fair portion of public complaint.
She had earned her turn.
“Well,” she said, “ain’t you something now.”
Joseph had just enough time to lift his head before Shelia stepped in and hugged him too.
It was not the sort of hug a polite girl gave a newly sworn deputy in front of his mother.
It was a little too much arm, a little too much cheek against shoulder, and a little too long after common sense would have stepped back.
Frankie noticed.
She noticed something else too.
Joseph did not go stiff inside Shelia’s arms.
If anything, he relaxed there in the smallest way, like some burden had found a resting place he had not known to look for.
Shelia stepped back then, though not near quick enough to fool Frankie Daniel.
Once her arms were empty, Shelia did not seem to know what to do with them. She folded them. Unfolded them. Brushed at her skirt though there was no dust on it worth mentioning.
Then, being Shelia, she talked.
“Well, if throwin’ a rock at you is assault on the law now, I reckon I’ll have to choose careful.”
Joseph looked at her. “You got another rock?”
Shelia lifted her chin. “David picked up five smooth stones before he went after Goliath.”
“I ain’t Goliath.”
“No,” Shelia said. “But you are taller than me, and you got promoted sudden.”
Frankie held out her hand.
Shelia looked at that hand, then at Joseph, then back to Frankie.
“Ma’am, Scripture is on my side.”
“Scripture did not tell you to put one in your pocket after Doris collected the first,” Frankie said.
After a long, disappointed sigh, Shelia handed over another smooth creek rock.
Frankie suspected the girl still had at least three more on her, but a girl did have a right to defend herself.
They left the courthouse with the brick front catching late light and the inside still smelling of dust, Bible leather, and fresh-cut boards.
Chance stayed in the doorway long enough to watch them cross the square: Frankie walking steady, Joseph with the new star riding strange on his shirt, and Shelia already leaning his way like she had a pocket full of questions to spend before supper.
“If a man steals a pie, do you jail him or make him pay for it?” Shelia asked.
“Depends on the pie,” Joseph said.
“What if he stole it hungry?”
“Then somebody ought to have fed him before he got low enough to steal pie.”
“That ain’t an answer.”
“It is if you ain’t hungry.”
“Can a deputy arrest a sheriff?”
Joseph looked at her sidelong. “You already planning that far?”
“I like to know where the fences are before I climb one.”
Frankie walked just ahead of them and did not turn around, though a smile tugged at one side of her mouth.
All the way to Frankie Daniel’s house, Shelia fired questions at Joseph about fines, jail cells, drunken men, stolen chickens, Sunday disturbances, and whether throwing a rock counted worse if the person struck happened to be wearing town authority.
Joseph answered every one of them patient as a creek wearing down stone.
He had not wanted the star. He still did not want it.
But by the time they reached his mama’s gate, it had already given him one thing he liked better than he meant to.
Chapter 13