The Hunt Club_ A Novel - Bret Lott [51]
I pushed open the door, let Unc in first.
There, leaning against the front of his desk, arms crossed, head tilted to one side, stood a man with hair as boofed out as the woman’s, only his looked shellacked into place. He was tan, had on a pink button-down and striped tie, black pants, leather suspenders. Slowly he shook his head, smiling.
“Brought the Cub Scouts today, I see,” this Delbert Yandle said, and laughed, like he’d actually said something funny.
Unc walked to the middle of the room, stopped. He let the stick touch the ground, and I turned, pushed the door closed.
And heard a commotion, papers tossed, something heavy hit the floor, a grunt and tussle. I turned around, saw Unc had Delbert Yandle on his back on the floor, the stick across his throat, Unc sitting on Yandle’s chest, his knees pinning down Yandle’s shoulders.
Unc’s face was right down in Yandle’s, the bill of his cap jammed into Yandle’s forehead. “You get your boy and Thigpen out of my affairs now, or I’ll kill you,” Unc hissed, and I could see Yandle’s face screw up, him trying to get air.
I took a couple steps toward them, wondered what it was I was supposed to do. Unc’d told me not to say a word. But now Yandle’s face was turning too red, the sound he was giving out something past a gasp.
I said, “Unc. He’s not breathing.”
“Seems a personal problem to me,” Unc said.
“Unc,” I said. “This won’t get Mom here.”
Unc held him there, held him. Then, finally, he eased off, but only a little, and Yandle drew in shallow breaths. “I don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about,” he whispered.
“I’m talking about Eugenie,” Unc said, his voice all normal now, calm.
“I don’t know what you mean.”
Unc put the stick into his throat again, leaned again into it, maybe even a little harder. “Eugenie Dillard,” he hissed again. “Eugenie.”
And now Delbert Yandle was looking at me, and here came that red again. Only this time there wasn’t even any sound coming out of him, not even that sound past a gasp. Nothing, and the color was going to purple now, and then a kind of blue started in.
I don’t know, I don’t know, he mouthed again and again.
“Unc,” I said, touched his shoulder.
Unc held him that way a second more, then let him go altogether, stood up, all in a second. He took the tip of the stick, put it straight to Yandle’s jaw, jammed it in the flesh beneath it.
Yandle only lay there, arms flat on the floor, his chest heaving in and out. He whispered, “All’s I want to do is buy your fucking property, Leland. I offered you a good deal more than it’s worth, and that offer still stands.” He grabbed another breath. “Even if you come in here and try to kill me over my own dickhead of a son. And I know a dozen Thigpens.”
“Where’d you get money?” I said, and Unc jerked a little toward me, surprised at my voice. But here was the man wanted to buy Hungry Neck, and Unc had him by the throat. How many more chances would I have?
“Where’d you get all this money,” I went on, “when all you sell is trailers?”
Delbert Yandle glanced at me, couldn’t move his head for the tip of the stick at his jaw.
He swallowed, or tried to. “Investors,” he said, and swallowed again. “Want to make it a preserve. Want to make it a wildlife refuge and a—”
Unc jammed the tip a little deeper.
“Want to make it another Hilton Head,” Yandle whispered. “Like what they’re doing to Daufuskee. Golf courses, condominiums.”
Unc looked at me over his shoulder. “Does anybody ever have a new idea about what to do with land, except pave it over?” He turned back to Yandle. “And who might these investors be?”
“I don’t know,” he whispered. “I get faxes from Nashville, Atlanta, Miami, Charlotte.” He pulled in a breath again, whispered again, “I don’t know,” then, “Ain’t you ever seen a patsy before?”
Unc leaned the tip a little harder into him. “One more time. Does your son have Eugenie, and where are they?”
“I disowned him three years ago,” he choked