The Auctioneer

“Out of the goodness of my heart,” Perly said, standing straight now and lifting his shoulders in the beginning of a shrug, “I took responsibility for some other man’s child.” He leaned toward the people, his voice gaining momentum. “I said I’d find a home for it. And now you’re—”

“He never said he was a goin’ to sell her,” wailed Sally’s mother, a broad pale woman, flushed now with anger. “Poor babe. Poor tiny girl. She fell sobbing against her husband’s shoulder. He didn’t move. Sally sat erect, her dry eyes firmly fastened on Perly.

“And was it you got the money, child?” asked Ma.

Sally turned to Ma. “Me?” she said. She looked back at Perly and gave a short laugh.

“Not a cent,” said Dan Rouse, standing slowly in his place. He was a tall man with a heavy stoop as though he had spent his life with his head bowed to keep the sun out of his eyes. “Not a cent,” he repeated. “And he used his power over the child to make us keep contributin’.” He spoke slowly. “I’m a fool. I should have let him shoot me. I thought I could save Sally, somehow. But now that’s gone, I say it out. The man’s a devil. Sally ain’t the only one as did his bidding. Scarce a soul left in Harlowe can call hisself a man.” And Dan Rouse stood in his place, looking at Perly from under his brows.

Perly cocked his head to one side and said casually, “Sit down, Dan. You’re making a fool of yourself.”

But Rouse remained standing.

This time Perly fixed his eyes on him and commanded him. “Sit down.”

Rouse didn’t move. Slowly, Sally rose to stand beside her father, her head thrown back as if to avoid the curiosity of the townspeople. She was almost as tall as her father, and her figure, under blue jeans and a loose shirt, was still full from childbirth. Her mother tugged at her shirt but she didn’t move.

Then Sam Parry rose, his figure straight even at his age. “They half got me once,” he said. “Let them finish me now.”

Mudgett had his hand on his gun.

“How would you have had me dispose of the child?” Perly asked, almost in annoyance, his eyes darting over the crowd.

“Oh Emmie. Poor Emmie,” moaned Agnes Cogswell.

Without a word, Frank Lovelace pulled himself to his feet. And John tugged at Mim’s elbow to make her stand too, with Hildie in her arms.

And people noticed that the doctor was still standing in the back where he had been all along, standing casually with his arms folded, watching the proceedings.

Sam Parry began, slowly, to smile.

The silence stretched. Dan Rouse stood bolt upright, his brown eyes on Perly. His wife switched from side to side in her chair. Finally she stood up and cried, “He never gave her nothin’ for all her pain—nothin’ but that child itself, and used that agin us too. And soon’s she was born, he took her too.”

The crowd began to whisper.

“He come in here,” the mother went on, “with that animal way of his. And he fastened his eye on Sally, her only just fourteen and headstrong. Nothin’ ever to suit that child. And he come in here with all that power and money and a knowin’ full well what he wanted. Well, our Sally, she went a dancin’ off after him like he was the Pied Piper. Ain’t like we didn’t try to teach her right...”

Perly stood on his toes, his chest thrust out and his head back, his mouth open with his answer before the mother finished. “Wait a minute. Wait a minute. Let’s get one thing clear. That’s not my child,” he said. “I came to this town exactly two hundred and eighty days before that baby was born. Count for yourself. The doctor here can tell you the human gestation period is two hundred and eighty days. You give me too much credit. No man on earth could arrive in town, search out Sally Rouse, seduce her, and conceive a child at the first shot—all between sunup and sundown. I’m flattered you think I could, but it’s not humanly possible. And that child was eight and a half pounds—full term or over. This is one accusation that just isn’t feasible. You’ll have to dream up something better than that.”

Perly shrugged, mischief spreading across his face. “Not that I deny that I’ve had my times with Sally Rouse. A tough little number she was too, whatever her age. Not much I could teach her. Look at her.”

Some of the townspeople turned and looked. Sally forced her head back further still and held her blue eyes hard on Perly, though now the color was rising through her fair skin.

Look at her, Perly repeated. “What red-blooded man could possibly refuse?”

Mrs. Rouse stood in her place. “And then... And then...” she screamed, unable to finish.

Perly shook his head and frowned. “Still, my fault or not, I offered to do the honorable thing—”

“To kill the helpless babe, not marry her,” shouted the mother. “Evil upon evil.”

“No girl ought to marry a man nearly thirty years her senior,” Perly said softly.

There was a muffled undercurrent of talk and motion in the hall.

Perly stood perfectly still beneath the town shield, watching.

With the help of her canes, Ma got shakily to her feet and leaned against the chairs in front of her.