“Sounds fair,” Noah said. Not being good with figures, he had always accepted whatever offer was given. A dime for a fish even seemed high to him.

“Don’t let him bait you, friend,” Whitlow said cheerfully. “Fishing’s been off around here for a few years. Hunting, too. All them fellows working on building the dam just about cleaned us out. You not knowing the river, I’d say you’d be wasting your time. You make a dime on that deal, you’ll be lucky.”

“He said it was fair,” the eye-patch man said in an easy voice.

“It is,” Noah told him.

“Well, there you go, friend,” Whitlow said cheerfully. “You been here five minutes and already got you some business.”

Noah made arrangements to deliver the fish to the eye-patch man, then went into the store with Whitlow to buy his coffee.

Taylor Bowers was a tall, middle-aged man of handsome features—a strong face carrying a small scar over his left eyebrow, dark blue eyes, a shock of rusty hair having the tint of dried corn silk, and like the man named Whitlow Mayfield, he had a permanent smile cut deep into his jowls, giving the two men a blood-link look. He was the kind of man who seemed familiar to anyone who met him, and Noah wondered if he had seen him in another place on his travels. He was behind the counter, leaned over, making sums in a ledger. “Adding up the day’s take, I see,” Whitlow said in a joyful bellow that was meant as humor.

“Trying to see how much you stole from me last month,” Taylor replied. His voice was strong, friendly, matching the look he carried on his face and having a sound much like Whitlow Mayfield, but deeper in tone.

“A man running for sheriff don’t have to steal,” Whitlow said.

“I forgot,” Taylor said. “When a man running for sheriff takes it, it’s called a political contribution.”

Whitlow laughed. He made introductions, calling Noah a handyman and a traveling fish seller who might stay around long enough to be in the fishing contest, giving Littleberry Davis a reason to worry, and then he launched a story about the only year there had ever been any trouble at the fishing. He had had to break up a fight between two men quarreling like boys over lines being crossed in the river. He named the names, gave the count of blows exchanged, the degree of blood coming from cuts. It was funny in memory, Whitlow said. Not so funny when one of the men left and returned later with his shotgun. “Had to bust him up a little bit before the fellow who was trying to be sheriff that year got there,” Whitlow said. “But I wound up taking him a catfish supper to the jail. Me and him, we’re good friends to this day.”

Noah said nothing during the telling of the story. He listened patiently, nodded appreciatively, as men did in such situations. He could also hear the laughter of the men on the porch, knew they were telling other tales—repeated ones, likely—that held some pleasure.