The Devil All the Time

by Donald Ray Pollock

He’d wanted to go to a regular university and study law, but no, not with her money. She wanted him to be a humble preacher, like her brother-in-law, Albert. She was afraid she’d spoiled him, she said. She said all kinds of shit, insane shit, but what she really wanted, Preston understood, was to keep him dependent on her, tied to her apron strings, so he’d always have to kiss her ass. He had always been good at figuring people out, their petty wants and desires, especially teenage girls.

Cynthia was one of his first major successes. She was only fifteen years old when he helped one of his teachers at Heavenly Reach dunk her in Flat Fish Creek during a baptism service. That same evening, he fucked her dainty little ass under some rosebushes on the college grounds, and within a year he had married her so that he could work on her without her parents sticking their noses in.

He couldn’t begin to add up the hours it had taken him, but she was trained as well as any dog now. All he had to do was snap his fingers and her mouth would start watering for what he liked to refer to as his “staff.”

He had discovered lately that he could last twice as long if one of his young conquests read from the Good Book while he nailed her from behind.

Preston loved the way they panted holy passages, the way they began to stutter and arch their backs and struggle not to lose their place—for he could become very upset when they got the words wrong—right before his staff exploded.

His biggest problem with Cynthia, though, was that she no longer believed in Jesus. Preston could abide just about anything but not that. He needed for a woman to believe that she was doing wrong when she lay with him, that she was in imminent danger of going to hell. How could he get turned on by someone who didn’t understand the desperate battle raging between good and evil, purity and lust?

Every time he fucked some young girl, Preston felt guilty, felt as if he was drowning in it, at least for a long minute or two. To him, such emotion proved that he still had a chance of going to heaven, regardless of how corrupt and cruel he might be, that is, if he repented his wretched, whoring ways before he took his last breath. It all came down to a matter of timing, which, of course, made things all that much more exciting.

Yes, Miss Lenora Laferty would do for now, at least until he could get his hands on one of the Reaster girls.

This girl, he predicted, was going to be so easy.

Thank God, thank God, his mother had decided all those years ago that he was going to be a preacher. All the fresh young meat a man could stand if he played his cards right.

he’d never been in a fist-fight, but he could recite the book of Revelation in his sleep.

Five Brothers? Jesus, what sort of person would put their faith in something like that? He’d nearly laughed in Albert’s face when the old man told him it had the power to heal.

As she began to swallow him, he said a little prayer to himself: Lord, just give me six months in California, then I’ll come home and fly right, settle down with a flock of good people, I swear on my mother’s grave. He pushed Cynthia’s head down farther, heard her begin to gag and choke. Then her throat muscles relaxed and she quit fighting it. He held her there until her face turned scarlet and then purple from lack of air. He liked it that way, he surely did. Look at her go.

He had been waiting patiently on Lenora for three weeks now. He’d come to the church nearly every day and opened the door around the time the school let out.

He looked past her for a moment, searching for a suitable response. “I suspect they just jealous,” he said. “Envy tends to bring out the worst in people, especially the young ones.”

It was a safe spot to bring someone. When he shut the car off, he said a little prayer, then laid his warm, meaty hand on Lenora’s knee and told her just what she wanted to hear. Hell, every one of them wanted to hear pretty much the same thing anyway, even the ones full of Jesus. He wished that she had resisted a little bit more, but she was easy, just like he had predicted.

It was always like that the first time with a new one.

Some people might not understand. And I sincerely believe that a person’s relationship with their preacher should be a private thing.”

Last winter, someone had taped a picture from Life magazine of a heap of concentration camp victims to her locker, wrote in ink, “Lenora Laferty,” with an arrow pointing to the third corpse from the left.

She felt bad every time they did it, but she couldn’t tell him no. It was the first time she had ever realized just how powerful sin could be. No wonder it was so hard for people to get into heaven.

I wish that wife of mine loved Jesus like you do.” Then he grinned and pushed her dress up, hooked his thumb over the top of her panties and pulled them down. “Besides, I was thinking about painting something else anyway.”

The old woman had noticed a big change in the girl the last few weeks. One day she was happy, the next day filled with despair. A lot of girls went a little crazy for a while when the blood started flowing, Emma reasoned, but Lenora had gone through all that two years ago. She still saw her studying her Bible, though; and she seemed to love going to church more than she ever did, even though Preacher Teagardin couldn’t hold a candle to Albert Sykes when it came to giving a good sermon. At times, Emma wondered if the man really cared at all about preaching the Gospel, the way he kept losing his train of thought, like he had other things on his mind.

She was going to have a rough row to hoe next fall.

BY THE MIDDLE OF AUGUST, Lenora knew she was in trouble. She had missed her period twice and the dress that Arvin had bought her would hardly fit anymore. Teagardin had broken it off a couple of weeks before. He told her that he was afraid if he kept meeting her, his wife was going to find out, perhaps even the congregation.

“You ain’t supposed to be here,” Teagardin said, though he wasn’t totally surprised. Some of them just can’t quit it all at once.

Maybe he should give her one last good fuck, he was thinking, when Lenora blurted out, her voice cracking and hysterical, that she was carrying his baby.

He looked down at his hands, thick but soft as a woman’s. He wondered, in the time it took him to draw a deep breath, if he could strangle her with them, but he knew damn well he didn’t have the guts for that sort of business.

He told her that he had heard of cases like hers, where the person was so deluded and sick over something they had done, some sin they had committed that was so terrible, that they started imagining things. Why, he’d read about people, just common folks, some of them barely able to write their own name, who became convinced that they were the president or the pope or even some famous movie star. Those kinds, Teagardin warned in a sad voice, usually ended up in a nuthouse, getting raped by the orderlies and forced to eat their own waste.

“That’s part of it, the book says, not understanding. But you think about it. How could I be the daddy? I’ve never touched you, not once. Look at you. I’ve got a wife sitting at home that’s a hundred times as pretty and she’ll do anything I ask, and I do mean anything.”

“I’m saying that you must be crazy to come into the Lord’s house and talk such trash. You think anyone’s gonna believe you over me? I’m a preacher.”

He had to get rid of this wench fast, or his whole afternoon was going to be ruined. “My advice to you, girl,” he said, his voice turning low and hateful, “is you figure some way to get rid of it, that is, if you even are knocked up like you say. It would just be some little bastard with a whore for a mother if you keep it. If nothing else, think of that poor old woman who’s raised you, brings you to church here every Sunday. She’ll die from the shame of it all. Now you get on out before you cause any more trouble.”

She could still see the church, the one she had gone to all her life. She had felt the presence of God there many times, but not once, it occurred to her now, since the new preacher had arrived.

No, she thought, no. I can have this baby, God. I can just leave this place, go away like my daddy did. I can just disappear.

Hell, she was the most religious person I ever seen.”

Hell, we couldn’t even get that new preacher to—”

“We couldn’t get him to say no words at the funeral, that’s all.” “Well, some people have strong views on things like that.”

Three months along. For sure, it hadn’t been some boy from around here got Lenora pregnant. Arvin knew everybody, and he knew what they thought about her. The only place she liked to go was church. He thought back to when the new preacher first arrived. That would have been April, a little over four months ago. He recalled the way Teagardin got all excited when the two Reaster girls walked in the night of the potluck. Other than himself, nobody had seemed to notice except the young wife. Lenora had even put her bonnets away not long after Teagardin showed up. He had thought she was finally sick of being made fun of at school, but maybe she had another reason.

He didn’t know what he was looking for yet, but he had an idea of where to find it.

He went to his bedroom and got the German Luger from the bottom drawer of his dresser. It was the first time he’d touched it since Earskell had asked him to put it away over a year ago.

They had buried Lenora beside her mother. The monument man hadn’t put the stone up yet.

Though he was certain in his gut that Teagardin was the one, he had to be sure. He began keeping track of the preacher’s every movement. Within a week, he had watched the bastard fuck Pamela Reaster three times in an old farm lane just off Ragged Ridge Road.

It was Teagardin’s custom to hustle the girl away as soon as he was finished with her. He liked to dawdle a bit alone under the tree, relieving his bladder and listening to bubble gum music on the car radio. Occasionally, Arvin heard him talking to himself, but he could never make out the words.

The next week, the preacher added Pamela’s younger sister to his roster, but the meetings with Beth Ann took place inside the church. By then, Arvin had no doubts, and when he woke up Sunday morning to the sound of the church bells tolling across the holler, he decided the time had come. If he waited any longer, he was afraid he would lose his nerve. He knew Teagardin always met the older girl on Mondays. At least the horny sonofabitch was regular in his habits.

“You sure are good to me, boy,” the old man said. Arvin had to swallow several times to keep from crying. He thought about tomorrow. This was the last time they would ever share a bottle.

He went inside and got Emma, and she sat with them for a while with her Bible and a glass of ice tea. She hadn’t been back to the Coal Creek Church of the Holy Ghost Sanctified since the night that Lenora died.

marking her place in the book with a bony finger

He hated himself for deceiving her, pretending everything was going to be all right. He wanted so much to be able to tell them goodbye, but they would be better off not knowing anything if the law came hunting for him.

When Teagardin showed up, easing his car down the rutted road slowly, she didn’t jump in like she had always done in the past. Instead, she stood a few feet away and waited for him to shut the engine off. “Well, get in, honey,” Arvin heard the preacher say. “I got a full sack for you.” “I ain’t staying,” she said. “We got problems.” “What do you mean?” “You were supposed to keep your hands off my sister,” the girl said. “Oh, shit, Pamela, that didn’t mean anything.” “No, you don’t understand,” she said. “She told Mother about it.” “When?” “About an hour ago. I didn’t think I was going to be able to get away.” “That little bitch,” Teagardin cursed. “I hardly touched her.”

“What did she say exactly?” “Believe me, Preston, she told everything. She got scared because the bleeding won’t stop.” The girl pointed her finger at him. “You better hope you didn’t do something so she can’t have kids.” “Shit,” Teagardin said. He got out of the car and paced back and forth for several minutes, his hands clasped behind his back like a general in his tent planning a counterattack. He took a silk handkerchief out of his pants pocket and patted his mouth. “What do you think your old lady will do?” he finally said. “Well, knowing her, after she takes Beth Ann to the hospital, the first thing she’ll do is call the fucking sheriff. And just so you know, he’s my mom’s cousin.”

Teagardin let go of her and leaned against the car. He looked out over the field before them. He wondered why nobody was farming it anymore. He imagined an old two-story house in ruins, some rusted pieces of antique machinery sitting in the weeds, maybe a hand-dug well of cool, clean water, covered over with rotten boards. Just for a moment, he pictured himself fixing the place back up, settling down to a simple life, preaching on Sundays and working the farm with callused hands through the week, reading good books out on the porch in the evenings after a nice supper, some tender babes playing in the shaded yard.