Night Birds, The by Thomas Maltman

to. She wore the brown-checked dress along with a lavender-lace shawl my mother had given to her. She peeled back the bonnet and gave August Schilling, busy pushing a corn-husk broom behind the counter, a hesitant smile. He glanced once at her, his thick black eyebrows arching above his spectacles, and then looked away again. He continued to sweep even after she said his name. “Excuse me,” she said, much louder, “but the boy and I have come to purchase supplies. We want a case of amber mason jars and two jugs of whiskey. Your cheapest kind.”
     
    When it became clear that Aunt Hazel would not be ignored, he cast her a sidelong glance. “I don’t sell hard spirits to womenfolk.”
     
    She swallowed, shrinking before the glare he sent her way.
     
    Julius stood, pulled up his sagging denim britches, and said, “C’mon. We’ll finish this game later.”
     
    Mr. Simons also stood. He had a long scholarly face with a down-turned mouth. He wore a white shirt with a pin to pinch closed the sleeve of his missing arm. His brown eyes were owlish behind his wire-rimmed glasses. “We’re only three moves from checkmate,” he said.
     
    Julius knocked down his king to signal surrender. “Not my day again, I see,” he said. “Let’s go.”
     
    “You go on,” Mr. Simons said. “I haven’t been properly introduced to this lady.”
     
    “Suit yourself,” said Julius, sagging toward the doorway. I wondered then what other stories had spread through town about Hazel. Maybe it was just the same old story, that she loved being with Indians better than her own kind.
     
    Mr. Simons crossed the room and bowed slightly when he was close to her. His thin chestnut hair was parted to hide a balding place on top, but for a schoolteacher wounded in the War, he remained fairly athletic, and was the subject of a certain amount of gossip regarding his marital prospects. “Good morning, Mrs. . . . ?” he said, though he knew full well her name.
     
    “Miss Hazel Senger,” she said. “I thank you for your concern.”
     
    “It’s early in the morning for whisky, don’t you think?” he said, smiling.
     
    “The boy and I are making a concoction. We are in the ginseng business.”
     
    “Ah,” he said, including me now in the smile. “Young Asa, maker of elixirs. That’s why you need the mason jars.” He turned to the shopkeeper. “Well August, fetch forth those supplies.” He raised his good hand and snapped his fingers.
     
    Mr. Schilling remained steadfast, frowning sourly. “I won’t do business with such as her,” he said. “Have you not heard what happened to Custer and the Seventh at Little Bighorn? A terrible day for our nation. And now this woman comes in here. Escaped from an asylum no less.” As he spoke his voice increased in volume. His cheeks were splotched by his anger. “They should have hanged you along with him that day,” he said. “You should never have come back here.” His voice lowered to a menacing baritone. “I choose my customers. I won’t do business with such as her.”
     
    I expected her to flinch before his anger, the way he spat those words at her. Her cheeks were plum-colored and her eyes glittered. “It was the Dakota that did this?” she said.
     
    “It was Indians that did it, doesn’t matter the tribe,” said Mr. Schilling. “But there’s some that say Inkpaduta was there.” When he saw her mouth drop open, he added, “Yes, you know that name, don’t you?”
     
    “It can’t be,” she said. “He would be an old man by now.”
     
    “The old killers are the worst,” he said.
     
    Aunt Hazel had managed to hold her own, but now her face fell. Mr. Simons had turned on August and was berating him for speaking so to a lady. Hazel glanced once at me, her eyes brimming, and then gathered her long dress and rushed out of the store. She fled without looking back, past the gray-hairs playing cards, past the children singing their terrible rhymes, past the old