Pummeling the door with his fists at the Searights Tollhouse on Cumberland Road, Jolly then breaks into pieces the wooden sign that had been hanging there. 

“Closed!” Jolly bellows and kicks at the broken wood. “Widow woman! Hey! Somebody’s always in there! You gots ten miners boarding in your upstairs hellhole ‘round the clock. Ain’t none you sons-a-bitches can move this iron barrier gate?!” He kicks the door once more before stomping to his buckboard wagon. 

Jolly weighs every man by the scale of his own soul. “Nobody ever there when you needs ‘em. Ain’t that the way!” The toll house, an octagonal one-room, two-floored tower-structure with truncated north and east wings, is making some southwestern Pennsylvanians feel comfortable, even civilized in 1839. It has made some feel SO comfortable that they are taking shifts eating and sleeping and God knows what else IN there. 

On this crisp wintry day, Jolly wants to tear it down, brick by brick—-and its gate—-because he needs to travel over this ungodly road on this night and because he feels someone is after him. 

Splattering slush as he steps, he mutters, “That widow was ‘of service’ before. Women. Not ever there when you needs ‘em. Ain’t that the way.” He shakes his head, wipes his nose on his

hand, runs his fingers through his horse’s mane. Petting her, Jolly says, “Shehera, we might’ve used her. Again. In another manner. She could’ve hid us. We may not gets out of this one, Shehera. No toll but . . . a price. Ain’t that the way.” 

Sometime earlier that morning, though Bishop looked nothing but gaunt in the saddle and did not even own the horse he’s riding, he’s as fast as rolling grease on one. Bishop had tracked Jolly to Bowman’s Trading Post on the Monongahela River. Entering there, his clothes hanging upon him like a rake’s teeth, Bishop smelled the air sourly and planted his feet. 

“I’m in pursuit of the man called ‘Jolly.’ I believe the ne’er-do-well was here.” 

Worker Pete, mumbling his worried thoughts, poured coffee into a tin cup, and offered it to Bishop, who knocked it to the ground, the tin ringing against the floor and stone walls as if a death knell. 

Pete’s voice shook with his body. “Mister, I don’ know who ‘xactly you’re talkin’ ‘bout.” 

Because Bishop had no heart within to weigh him down but was filled with the hot air of his temperament, he bellowed, “Ahhhh!” and upended a table of wares. Pete shrieked.

Bishop said, “I know there’s word of his reputation. Why would you even entertain his service! He visited my sister. He stole something valuable!” 

“Towards the mountains is the way any visitor today headed. Honest to God.” 

“I’ll take that ax,” Bishop said and paid, the wind off the river whipping through his clothes and the open door. 

Jolly tells Shehera as they struggle with their 

turn-around, “I don’t likes government or people. But I loves you.” All is now repositioned in the mud. 

From the wagon Jolly pulls off the hemp cloth covering his supplies. In a cage stands the biggest raven Jolly has ever seen. “I likes you, too, P’Henry.” 

At his name, the bird screams, “P’Death! P’Death!” Jolly answers, “P’Caw. P’Caw! ‘P’Henry.’ What jackass names anything P’Henry?” 

Jolly opens the cage and P’Henry in all his fullness steps out. Jolly says, “P’Henry, we releases you of your captivity. Fly! P’Henry, fly!” And the bird does. “Ain’t that the way.” Jolly then goes and seats himself on the wagon. 

Back down the road Jolly just traveled are the Stone Tavern and scattered habitats. To the darkness falling upon him, Jolly

shakes his fist. “Maybe you’ll lies upon me, Night, like the dirty whore you are.” 

Inside the tavern, he finds not a soul and wails, “What the hell is happening?!” Outside, Jolly hears great commotion beyond a willow close by. Nearing it, he recognizes people—the widow, some miners, the locals—-gathered at a stone well. They yell, “Can you help? We’ve got a good man down here.” 

When Jude, the local magistrate, known as “the “just justice,” entered the tavern for his after-a-day’s-work beer, the barstool locals presented him with a dilemma. 

“It’s them confounded willows,” one drinker said. “Too close to that well,” said another. 

“The solution’s obvious, kill them trees.” 

“That’s not it. Roots. They invaded the well. Got to cut them out. Restore the water source.” 

“Who in God’s tarnation’ll do that?” they asked and then sipped in silence. Drinkers always have solutions but not always actions. 

“I’ll go,” Jude said. “I‘m ready to answer the call.” And that’s how Jude found himself in the well, cutting roots with improper tools.

When Bishop rides upon the scene with Jolly’s wagon nearby, he jumps from his mount, running with his ax overhead. “Jolly! You son-of-a-bitch! You stole my bird!” 

The crowd gapes at Bishop until the miners wrestle down his flailing arms. Overrun, Bishop shouts, “Alright, alright. But THAT man’s a thief!” 

Just then, P’Henry perches on the Bishop’s arm. 

“P’Death,” he squawks. 

“That bird?” a miner asks, shining his light in Bishop’s face. 

“Fight later,” the widow says. “His horse got ropes tied to yank some roots out.” 

“Nothin’s cuttin’ through,” a miner says. 

“Hey? Can we try your ax?” asks another. 

Helping Jolly release Shehera and retying the bucket, Bishop places the ax in the bucket, and they begin to lower it down. P’Henry flies but settles on the well. 

“Almost here!” Jude calls. But the bottom of the bucket catches on a root, tipping the ax out, so that it falls and plants itself in Jude’s head. 

“P’Death!” the raven announces. 

“Ain’t that just the way,” Jolly says.