The radio show went to a commercial break, a man talking straight to other men about problems he had with low testosterone, finding vitality from a breakthrough pill boosting energy and stamina. Skinner rolled down the busted road filled with potholes, narrow, with no shoulders and a steep drop on either side, on up toward the Vardaman lodge. He had plenty to discuss with the senator about helping him get rid of the last vestiges of that old rascal Johnny T. Stagg. This was a long time coming, and the state legislator—soon to be governor—sure had to understand that. When Stagg had been running the show, taking over from Skinner when he’d suffered his first heart attack, there’d been compromises made. Stagg was a businessman who catered to truckers’ needs, with an old-fashioned inkling those needs included not only a decent chicken-fried steak and a full tank of diesel but a primal release for some godless men.

He’d figured once Stagg and ole Larry Cobb got caught bleeding out the county till, they could take a backhoe to the old Booby Trap and shovel the remains into the county landfill. So many good men in Tibbehah County had gone into that place for the smell of liquor and the devil’s grip of a woman’s clawed hand. Skinner had no doubt at all Satan was real and that he walked in the form of a redheaded, big-busted woman named Fannie Hathcock, arriving through the sulfur and smoke.

The road twisted and curved through the rolling hills of Tibbehah County, the tires of his big truck rolling slow over crushed rock and dirt.

Skinner had his talk with Vardaman prepped and ready. The bed of his truck was filled with yard signs for the senator, VARDAMAN FOR OUR MISSISSIPPI VALUES, him never missing an opportunity to shake a hand and tell folks about the fella who was going to stand tall for their state.

“I’ve served you well, sir,” Skinner would say. “And now I’ve come asking for a favor.”

A man like J. K. Vardaman wouldn’t take a request like that lightly. He’d take Skinner into his great room at the lodge under all the wild beasts Vardaman had shot and killed over the years: boars, African kudu, rhinos, and wildcats. The man once telling Skinner he’d been born with steel in his hands. God had given man dominion over the animals and nature. Skinner knew it, too, logging nearly a third of Tibbehah County, making money on the ancient tall oaks and knotty old cypress in the swamps.

Skinner had faith. But he also knew a man had to make compromises. And Senator Vardaman had brokered the peace between those gambling people down on the Coast, one of them who held the leash on that hellcat Fannie Hathcock.