Tim Watson is one of those good old country boys I grew up with in the summers at my Grandaddy Al’s in Tennessee—inbred, stupid, slow, meaner than a snake. I smiled back at him. I remembered a story my mother liked to tell about my father. He was a Yankee; she was born in Norfolk, Virginia. After they married, they lived for a year or so in Tennessee in a house belonging to Grandaddy Al. In that part of the country at the end of a visit, the host routinely says as you are leaving, “Y’all come and stay the night.” My father did not understand that this meant goodnight and that it was simply a remnant from the time when farms were far apart. My father did not know how to refuse and would spend the night although the host didn’t want or expect him to. It was in this way that I understood Tim Watson. I squeezed his hand back before letting go of it.

“I don’t want to go to a store, honey. I want to do business with people I know. And who know me. What have you got for me?”

His eyes narrowed and I could see him thinking about how much he could take me for. I let him ruminate, exciting himself with the idea of money.

“Now, a little lady like you—”

“I want it small, light and cheap.”

He frowned.

“Look, Tim, I don’t have all day. I’m in a hurry. I got cash and if it’s not enough I’ll give you a freebie the next time you get busted.”

“Why, Miss Whitney, I won’t be getting busted again. I gone straight.”

“Right, Tim, glad to hear it. Two priors. You’re looking at Folsom next time.”

His face cracked into a big grin and he laughed his big disturbed idiot laugh as he walked toward the rear of the bar and pushed open the back door of the poolhall. “Miss Whitney, you are one all right girl.”

The sun was blinding after having been indoors. Tim Watson lurched over to an old Pontiac covered with bumper stickers and Grateful Dead decals. He opened the trunk. Although he stood between me and the open trunk, I saw a black canvas bag inside, which he unzipped and from which he took a gun. He whirled toward me with it pointing right in my face.

“Looks like what I want, Tim. How much?”

He laughed again. As a boy he had probably tortured cats. He handed me the gun. “Little .22 automatic. Just right for a lady. Only $65.”

It looked rusty. “Does it have bullets?”

Tim Watson turned back to the black canvas bag and pulled out a small cardboard box. “They’re extra.”

“Load it for me.” I watched as he pulled out the clip and put the bullets one by one into it. He slapped it back into place and looked at me.