The Homecoming of Samuel Lake

by Jenny Wingfield

  The schoolhouse was in Emerson, with grades one through twelve all scrunched together in one building. Swan had plenty of experience enrolling in new schools where she didn’t know anybody, so that didn’t bother her. What bothered her was that she didn’t know who she was anymore. She didn’t even know what to write on the school admission form next to “Father’s occupation,” so she just left the space blank. Her father had lost his identity. And she’d lost hers. Being a preacher’s kid may have had its drawbacks, but it was something. Now she was nobody. At least she didn’t have to worry about anybody making fun of her feed sack dress. There wasn’t a dress in sight that could match Willadee’s handiwork.

  Bienville fared better than Swan. He was there for the books. If nobody paid any attention to him, so much the better. That just left more time for reading. And if anybody gave him a hard time? He’d ask them questions they couldn’t answer about some topic they’d never heard of, until they either left him alone or got curious enough to ask him questions that he could answer, in which case, he’d hold forth. At length.

  Noble fared worst of all. Maybe it was the thick glasses that gave the school bullies the idea he’d be an easy mark. Or the way his voice squeaked when he had to stand up and introduce himself to the class on that first day. Anyway, he was no match for the backwoods boys—and Becoming a Tree proved to be an unworkable tactic. By the time noon recess was over, a couple of bruisers had knocked him down and dragged him around the school yard by his heels. He arrived back at Calla’s that afternoon with a black eye and patches of hide scraped off both arms.

  “The most manly thing to do,” Samuel counseled him at supper, “is to walk away from a fight.”

  Noble stared at his plate. He had spent the afternoon in his room, too humiliated to show his face.

  “You can’t walk away when somebody’s dragging you by your heels,” Swan pointed out. She was hot under the collar about the whole thing.

  “The idea is to prevent it from happening,” Samuel said. “There’s always somebody spoiling for a fight. If we sink to their level, we’ll get to be just like them. You don’t want that, do you, Noble?”

  Grandma Calla heaped some extra roast beef and mashed potatoes onto Noble’s plate and smothered it all in gravy. “You eat,” she said. “Put some meat on your bones. Bullies don’t pick on anybody they think might mop the floor with them.”

  Samuel shook his head gravely. “Now, Calla, that’s not the answer. No matter how big he gets, there’ll always be somebody bigger.” And to Noble he said, “What I’m telling you, Son, is that the place you need to be strong is on the inside.”

  Noble gripped his fork tightly and stabbed at his roast beef.

  “I don’t think me being strong on the inside is going to keep those boys from stomping my guts out,” he said. “They’ve decided to get me, and they’re going to do it.”

  Samuel was not to be swayed. He had a way of looking at the world that worked for him, and he was convinced that it would work for all mankind.

  “I imagine they got that out of their systems today. The thing you’ve got to do is find some good in those boys. That may not seem possible, but if you look for it, you’ll find it. And once you do, I guarantee you their attitudes will change.”

  Toy got up from the table. So it wouldn’t look like he was leaving because he disagreed with Samuel (although he was, and he did), he rubbed his belly and told Willadee that was a mighty good supper, he just hoped he hadn’t hurt himself eating so much. As he walked behind Noble’s chair, he gave the boy’s shoulder a good, hard squeeze.

  “You have any time one afternoon this week, I need to pull the motor on your granddaddy’s truck, and I could use some help.” He wouldn’t presume to tell Samuel how to raise his son, but he could damn well treat the boy like a man.

  Noble actually lifted his eyes. “Yessir,” he said. “I’ll make time.”

  Chapter 28

  The first thing Toy did after he got to his mama’s house the next afternoon was start taking the hood off Papa John’s old pickup. He had the first bolt out and was about to go after the second when the school bus pulled to a stop out front. Toy glanced up, expecting to see Noble hotfooting it over to join him, but the boy was walking with his head down and his shoulders hunched. He wasn’t even watching where he was going. Swan, Bienville, and Blade trailed silently along behind him, all of them obviously unnerved. Another good look told Toy why.

  Noble’s entire face was swollen, his nose was blue and misshapen, and the front of his shirt was caked with patches of dried blood. Toy felt sick at heart first, mad as hell second, and determined to fix this situation third and last. He went striding across the yard to meet the kids, barking instructions every step of the way.

  “Swan! You take Noble’s books into the house and tell your mama that we’ll be in directly. Bienville, Blade, you boys go do your homework, and if you don’t have any, make some up. Noble—you come with me.”

  No one argued. They didn’t ask questions, either, although they had plenty. Toy headed for the barn, walking stiffer than usual, because he was moving faster than usual, and Noble hurried to keep up. When they got to the barn, they disappeared inside, and Toy pulled the big, faded wood doors shut behind them.

  Swan and Bienville and Blade just stood there, staring.

  “You think Uncle Toy is going to give him a whipping for letting himself get beat up again?” Bienville asked his sister.

  “I don’t know. He sure looked mad.”

  Blade said, “I’ll bet he’s finding out who did it, so he can go do the same thing to them.” And he added, “I think he’s always on our side.”

  Swan and Bienville were pretty sure that their uncle was on their side, too, but they didn’t know what to make of all this.

  Grandma Calla came out of the store, and Willadee came out of the house, and both of them asked the same question at the same time.

  “Where’s Noble?”

  “In the barn,” Swan answered.

  “With Uncle Toy,” Bienville said.

  “Noble got his nose busted,” said Blade.

  Calla and Willadee exchanged a worried look, wondering what would become of Noble if things kept on like this. Willadee wanted to go right down to the barn and see about her son, but Calla wouldn’t hear of it.

  “You let those two alone, Willadee, and I mean it. Some things, a man has to handle.”

  Calla didn’t point out that the reason Toy was handling this was because the man who should have been, wasn’t. She didn’t have to.

  Out in the barn, Noble was perched on the metal seat of an old tractor. Uncle Toy was leaning against the tractor fender, looking up at him.

  “All right,” he said. “Those boys have whupped your ass twice now. And I wasn’t there, but I can tell you this much. Both times, it was because you asked them to do it.”

  “Oh, hell, no, I didn’t,” Noble protested. Swan wasn’t the only one who felt free to cuss around Toy. “All I did was mind my own business.”

  Toy wouldn’t let him off that easy. “We always ask for what we get, boy. One way or another, we ask for it. And one way or another, we get it.”

  Noble flared. Furious. “I guess that means you asked to get your leg blown off!”

  He felt hateful and small for saying that, but life and Toy Moses had pushed him past his limit.

  “You bet I did,” Toy shot back. “And I’d do it again. There’s a lot in my life that’s not the way I’d like, but every bit of it is just what I’ve signed up for. You decide what you want, you get what goes with it.”

  Toy lit a cigarette and smoked silently for a moment, looking off at nothing. Like he was still sifting through all those words he’d just said. After a little bit, he looked at Noble again.

  “What are you gonna sign up for? You might as well decide right now. What do you want, Noble Lake?”

  At first, Noble said that what he wanted was not to get beat up anymore. Toy gave a little gr
unt of a laugh and shook his head. “You sure don’t ask for much.”

  So then Noble said he wanted to be able to beat shit out of anybody who tried to beat shit out of him.

  “Measly,” said Toy.

  Noble jumped down off the tractor seat and stood there facing his uncle, with his fists clenched and his eyes blazing.

  “Well, what the hell am I supposed to ask for?” he bellowed.

  Toy gave him an easy grin. “Well, damn, boy. Ask for something big.”

  Which brought Noble up short. And made him think. Finally, he set his jaw, and looked Toy Moses in the eye, and asked for what he’d wanted all his life.

  “I want—to be formidable.”

  And Toy Moses said, “Now we’re gettin’ someplace.”

  When Toy and Noble came out of the barn an hour later, the two were walking easy and relaxed, and laughing about something. Nobody asked them what had gone on in there, and they didn’t volunteer any information.

  At supper that night, Noble ate like he’d been hauling hay all day, and he held his head up like a champ. His daddy, dismayed at the shape his face was in, asked him what had happened.

  “Ran into something,” Noble said, cracking a grin that had to hurt.

  “The same boys?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Samuel blew out a frustrated breath. “I may have to go to that school and talk to the principal.”

  “No, sir. You won’t need to do that.”

  Samuel studied Noble’s face for a moment. You could tell he felt partly responsible. “You sure? Looks like they worked you over pretty good this time.”

  “They did, for a fact,” Noble agreed. “I reckon I wasn’t looking hard enough for the good in those boys.”

  After that, Toy made it a point to be on hand when the kids got off the bus every afternoon, and he and Noble always disappeared into the barn immediately. An hour or so later, they’d emerge, sweaty and limping. Both of them. A couple of times, Samuel arrived home from work while their sessions were going on, and both times, the “little kids” (as Noble now referred to Blade, Bienville, and Swan) started playing Cowboys and Indians in a heartbeat. Blade would let out a bloodcurdling war whoop, and the others would set in yelling the magic words.

  “There he is! There’s the chief! Riding into camp!” Then they’d yell a lot of other stuff to throw Samuel off, just in case the warning had been too direct. “How!” and “Me Friendly!” and “Gottem Wampum?”

  There was an unspoken conspiracy, and Samuel never suspected. When he’d see Toy and Noble coming out of the barn minutes later, with their hair plastered to their scalps, and their clothes plastered to their bodies, he just figured the man had been getting some work out of the boy.

  Around the place, Noble had now started pitching in with the work, especially the heavy lifting. Anything that would build a muscle. The best part, though, was the way he handled himself these days. The way he stood up straight and looked relaxed at the same time. And never seemed to be moving fast but always looked as if he might—without warning. He was going from awkward and gawky to graceful and sure, right before the family’s eyes. And it was more than a physical thing. He was doing what Samuel had advised—getting strong on the inside. Just not quite the way that Samuel had intended.

  “What’s got into Noble?” Samuel asked Willadee one night, when they were getting undressed for bed.

  “Maybe he’s coming into his own,” she replied.

  She didn’t bother to tell him the rest—that Toy was taking their son in hand and showing him how to survive. Or that she was so blessed glad. She was well aware that whatever lessons Noble was learning could someday get him hurt. Or worse. But so could walking away from a fight, she thought. So could walking across a street. The main thing was, if he learned the right lessons, and learned them well, he’d be facing whatever came at him head-on for the rest of his life. He’d never have to hang his head ever again.

  Noble’s test came six weeks later, which was sooner than he’d hoped, but it turned out he was ready. The way Swan told it that night at supper, a trio of husky farm boys had cornered Noble behind the schoolhouse, and informed him that he could lick their boots or eat them. His choice.

  “That’s what they said,” she babbled excitedly. “‘You can lick ’em, or eat ’em. Your choice.’ And Noble said, ‘Got any salt?’”

  She let out a hoot of laughter and pounded the table so hard the dishes rattled.

  “Cross my heart,” she howled. “Those were his exact words.” She made her voice low and, well, formidable—like Noble’s must have been. “He said, ‘Got any salt?’ Like that.”

  Everybody except Samuel had been hearing this all afternoon, and they were laughing, too. Noble wasn’t, of course. He was sitting across the table, very nearly as bunged up as he had been the last time this happened, only this time, he was soaking up praise.

  Samuel looked at the happy lot and listened without a word.

  “And then they lit into him,” Bienville announced. This was too good a story to let Swan do all the telling.

  Blade jumped up from the table and made as if to be Noble, dodging farm boys.

  “Only he wasn’t there!” he exulted. Dancing. Darting. “All they were doing was running into each other.”

  Bienville said, “Hard.”

  “When it was over,” Swan bragged, “Noble was the only one standing.”

  Blade pretended to be a farm boy, falling down. In pain.

  Samuel said, “Blade. Get back to the table.”

  Blade climbed back into his chair but fast.

  Samuel focused on Noble. Only on Noble. “I guess you’re feeling pretty good right now.”

  Swan said, “Well, it’s not like he started it. When there’s three against one—”

  Samuel lifted a finger in her direction, never taking his eyes off his eldest.

  “You’d rather I’d licked their boots?” Noble asked. He’d never used that tone with his father before.

  “I don’t think you should have egged them on.”

  “They were coming on, Daddy. Me saying that just threw them off a little. Gave me an edge. Right, Uncle Toy?”

  Samuel’s face froze for a split second, not even his eyes moving. Then he looked over at Toy, who was looking back. Unapologetic.

  “I’ve been giving the boy some pointers,” Toy said.

  Everybody watched Samuel, holding their breath. And now he understood. The way he’d been shut out and overruled. Even by Willadee. He felt all at once that he was in a room full of strangers, and it was all he could do to keep sitting there. Sitting there feeling useless and impotent and betrayed.

  He wanted to tell them, bitterly, that it was good to know how much his opinion mattered. He wanted to let loose with the fiery temper he used to have but had been dampening for years. Wanted to just leave. But he couldn’t say or do any of that, because whatever he said or did would prove whether everything he’d already said to Noble had been empty words or words a man could live by.

  When he finally spoke, it was to Noble—his voice sounding loud, because the room had been quiet for so long.

  “I’m glad you’re all right,” he said.

  Later on, when Willadee and Samuel were in bed, she apologized for helping to keep him in the dark about Noble and Toy.

  “I imagine you did what you thought was right,” he said.

  “No, I didn’t. I thought it was right for Noble to learn to look out for himself. But it was wrong to hide it from you like that. I should have just argued with you. There’s nothing wrong with a good healthy argument.”

  When he didn’t answer, she said, “I didn’t mean for you to be hurt.”

  “I know you didn’t.” Those were his words. What he was thinking was, You didn’t mean for me to find out.

  Willadee put her arms around him and held him close. “I won’t do anything like that again. I promise.”

  They lay there silent for a moment, then he gently
shrugged out of her arms and turned over on his side, facing away from her. She kissed his back. Spooned him.

  “Are we okay?” she asked. “You and me?”

  He said, “You know how much I love you, Willadee.”

  For Sam Lake, every day just got harder. He didn’t say a word to anybody about his sense of defeat. Didn’t let on that it bothered him to witness the deepening bonds between Toy and the kids. Truth be told, he was glad for Toy. That childless man, who had suddenly become a hero to all of Samuel’s children. And one of Ras Ballenger’s.

  Some mornings, Samuel woke to find that Toy had already gotten the kids up and had taken them down to the pond for a little fishing. Sometimes he came home in the afternoon to find the kids raking the yard with Toy. Burning leaves with Toy. Having a weenie roast with Toy. Or coming out of the woods from some trek they’d all been on. He saw Toy growling at them and bossing them and loving them, and he sensed that an emptiness inside the man was being filled. Knew that Toy was sharing with those children things he hadn’t been able to share with anyone since his younger brother’s death. The woods. The water. His world. He was glad for Toy, all right. It was himself he wasn’t glad for. Himself he was feeling bad toward, for letting everybody down. Himself he stared at in the mirror and didn’t know anymore.

  Samuel had no solace. He took his fiddle down to the swimming hole and sat on the bank listening to the wind in the cottonwoods, and when he pulled his bow across the strings, the music skimmed over the water and swooped through the woods and always came back to him sobbing. Samuel never shed a tear. His fiddle did it for him.

  Chapter 29

  Ras Ballenger didn’t think much of people in general, and he loathed the Moses family in particular. Over the months since that thing with Odell Pritchett, business had fallen off considerably, not to mention Ras had noticed folks talking behind their hands when he’d go into town to buy feed for his livestock. The hatred he felt for his neighbors had grown into a poisonous, festering abscess that plagued him day and night. Lately, he’d been powerfully drawn to the Moses place, and he had taken to driving past there at odd times, just to see what was going on.