Andy Duncan - Beluthahatchie

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BELUTHAHATCHIE

Andy Duncan

"Beluthahatchie" appeared in the March 1997 issue of Asimov's, with

an illustration by Anthony Ban. "Beluthahatchie" was Andy Duncan's

first fiction sale, but he quickly made others, to Starlight, Amazing,

Science Fiction Age, Dying for It, and Weird Tales, as well as several

more sales to Asimov's. In 2000, his acclaimed story "The Executioner's

Guild," an Asimov's story, was on both the final Nebula ballot and the

final ballot for the World Fantasy Award. The first collection of Duncan's

work, Beluthahatchie and Other Stories, has just appeared. A graduate of

the Clarion West writers' workshop in Seattle, he was born in Batesberg,

South Carolina, and now lives in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, with his new

bride, Sydney.

In the lyrical, wry, and scary story that follows, he sends us to Hell on

a very slow train. Be careful what stop you choose, though!

Everybody else got off the train at Hell, but I figured, it's a free country.

So I commenced to make myself a mite more comfortable. I put my feet

up and leaned back against the window, laid my guitar across my chest

and settled in with my hat tipped down over my eyes, almost. I didn't

know what the next stop was but I knew I'd like it better than Hell.

Whoo! I never saw such a mess. All that crowd of people jammed

together on the Hell platform so tight you could faint standing up. One old

battle-hammed woman hollering for Jesus, most everybody else just

mumbling and crying and hugging their bags and leaning into each other

and waiting to be told where to go. And hot? Man, I ain't just beating my

gums there. Not as hot as the Delta, but hot enough to keep old John on

the train. No, sir, I told myself, no room out there for me.

Fat old conductor man pushed on down the aisle kinda slow, waiting on

me to move. I decided I'd wait on that, too.

"Hey, nigger boy." He slapped my foot with a rolled-up newspaper. Felt

like the Atlanta paper. "This ain't no sleeping car."

"Git up off me, man. I ain't done nothing."

"Listen at you. Who you think you are, boy? Think you run the railroad?

You don't look nothing like Mr. George Pullman." The conductor tried to

put his foot up on the seat and lean on his knee, but he gave up with a

grunt.

I ran one finger along my guitar strings, not hard enough to make a

sound but just hard enough to feel them. "I ain't got a ticket, neither," I

bit off, "but it was your railroad's pleasure to bring me this far, and it's my

pleasure to ride on a little further, and I don't see what cause you got to be

so astorperious about it, Mr. Fat Ass."

He started puffing and blowing. "What? What?" He was teakettle hot.

You'd think I'd done something. "What did you call me, boy?" He whipped

out a strap, and I saw how it was, and I was ready.

"Let him alone."

Another conductor was standing outside the window across the aisle,

stooping over to look in. He must have been right tall and right big too,

filling up the window like that. Cut off most of the light. I couldn't make

out his face, but I got the notion that pieces of it was sliding around, like

there wan't quite a face ready to look at yet. "The Boss will pick him up at

the next stop. Let him be."

"The Boss?" Fat Ass was getting whiter all the time.

"The Boss said it would please him to greet this nigger personally."

Fat Ass wan't studying about me anymore. He slunk off, looking back

big-eyed at the man outside the window. I let go my razor and let my hand

creep up out of my sock, slow and easy, making like I was just shifting

cause my leg was asleep.

The man outside hollered: "Board! All aboard! Next stop,

Beluthahatchie!"

That old mama still a-going. "Jesus! Save us, Jesus!"

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