“It’s the only way people can make any money these days. I got this place for a song.”

I nod. Arson has always been a mainstay of the free enterprise system.

She tells me to wait for a moment and disappears behind a curtain and soon returns with a small yellow canister filled with ice cubes I decide not to inspect too closely.

“The machine outside hasn’t worked for years,” she explains without apology.

“Are you a salesman?”

It is probably pointless even to think about privacy.

“I’m a lawyer involved in the murder case that was filed here a couple of days ago.”

“You’re that old boy who used to live here,” she says excitedly, “who’s come back to defend that nigger charged with killing that old Chinaman!

You think that Paul Taylor would a hired somebody?”

Maybe I should drive on to Forrest City and stay at the Holiday Inn tonight. I don’t know how much of Betty I can take. On the other hand, I better get used to people like her.

“I don’t know,” I say, innocently.

“What do you think?”

Happy to be asked, Betty smooths her hair down with her right hand, raising an ample breast in the process.

“Hell, no. These niggers here are just power crazy-that’s what I think. Yet I’m not so sure your guy is guilty either. It could of been that old man’s wife. She’s the one who found him. You don’t really know what goes on between those old people. You never hardly saw them out together except in the store. The young ones are fine, pretty much like the rest of us.”

“How long have you lived here, Betty?” I ask, wondering if there is any negative feeling about the Chinese in Bear Creek. When I was growing up,