‘Wearin’ white hats?’ Uncle Sagamore asked.
‘Yeah,’ Pop says. ‘And one of ’em had a gold tooth. Looked like fellers that was real pleased with theirselves.’
Uncle Sagamore nodded, sort of solemn. ‘That was some of the shurf’s men. Real hard-workin’ fellers, always frettin’ about forest fars. They spend a lot of time up there watching for smoke.’
‘They ever find any?’ Pop asked.
‘Well, sometimes,’ Uncle Sagamore says. ‘Once in a while an old stump will catch afar from lightnin’ or something down there in my bottom timber. By God, they never miss her, neither. They come oozin’ out of the bushes from every direction like young’uns to a fish fry.’
He took another drink out of the jar, and kind of chuckled. ‘Other day there was an old rotten log a-burnin’ down there, and you know some careless idiot must of left twenty, thirty sticks of dynamite lyin’ around pretty close to it. Probably been shootin’ stumps, or something. Anyway, just about the time all these courthouse far-eaters come a-chargin’ in through the bushes she started lettin’ go. Damned if them fellers didn’t just about clear off a whole acre of new ground for me, gettin’ out of there. Never seen men could tear down so much brush tryin’ to get their feet headed in the same direction.’
Pop took another drink out of the jar. ‘Sure gives a man a comfortable feeling,’ he says, ‘to know his law officers is on the job like that, looking after things.’
‘That’s right,’ Uncle Sagamore says. ‘Matter of fact, they’ll be down here any minute now.’
Just then there was a loud racket up the hill where the wire gate was. It sounded like a car had run through the gate without bothering to open it first. Then we saw the car. It was plunging and bouncing down the hill like Nashua running over cheap horses in the stretch. There was a big cloud of dust boiling up behind it, and every once in a while it would hit a bump and go three feet in the air. They sure was in a hurry.
‘Been meanin’ to take a fresno and smooth that road down a mite for them boys,’ Uncle Sagamore says, watching them buck down the hill. ‘Sure is hell on us taxpayers, the way they tear up County cars gettin’ in and out of here.’ He stopped and shook his head. ‘Just never seem to get around to it, though, with all there is to do.’
While he was talking he reached the jar back in through the door and traded it for the one that was inside. ‘Guess the boys might want a little dram with us,’ he says. He handed the new jar to Pop, just like he had the other one.
‘I’d be careful about lettin’ any of her go down,’ he says. ‘She might have a little croton oil in her.’
‘Oh,’ Pop says. He tilted his head back and took a swig, but he didn’t seem to swallow. I asked them what croton oil was, but when they didn’t say anything I remembered Uncle Sagamore didn’t like to answer questions.
Just then the car put on its brakes and the tyres screamed. It slid about thirty feet and come to a stop under the tree. Uncle Sagamore looked up like he’d just now noticed it for the first time, took the jar away from Pop, and put it down on the floor to one side of him where it was out of sight from in front. The two men that had been looking for aeroplanes got out and started towards us. The smell hit ’em, and they started to sputter and choke and wave the air with their hats, but they kept coming, kind of grinning at each other.
Uncle Sagamore reached out a hand and moved the shotgun a little, like he didn’t think it had been standing just right before. ‘Come on up and set, boys,’ he says.
They come on up the steps. The gold-tooth one was tall and skinny and had a nose nearly as big as Uncle Sagamore’s, and a long jaw, like a horse. His hair was kind of a buttery colour, clipped off close along the sides of his head and real long on top and slicked down with hair oil. The other one was skinny too, but he wasn’t as tall. He had dark wavy hair and one of them fancy moustaches that look like they’d been painted on your upper lip with a fountain pen. His sideburns come way down on his jaw.
They both had wise grins on their faces.
They fanned the air with their hats, and the gold-tooth one says, ‘Sorry we broke down your gate, but we was in a hurry to get here before you could drink any more of that well water. Wanted to warn you there’s been a lot of typhoid going around.’
‘Well sir, is that a fact?’ Uncle Sagamore says.
They looked at each other again like they was going to bust out laughing, in spite of the awful smell. ‘Sure is,’ the moustache one says. ‘And you know, the shurf told us just this morning, he says you boys be sure to bring in a sample of water from Sagamore Noonan’s well so we can have it analyzed. Sure as hell wouldn’t want Sagamore to come down with that typhoid.’
While he was talking he eased around a little so he could see the jar sitting at Uncle Sagamore’s side. He watched it like he was thinking of some big joke he wanted to remember.
‘Well sir, that’s real nice of the shurf,’ Uncle Sagamore says. He looked at Pop. ‘It’s just like I was telling you, Sam. You take a lot of them goddamn lard-gutted politicians settin’ around on their fat in the courthouse with both hands in the taxpayer’s pocket, they don’t do nothing to earn their money; but these shurf’s boys is different. Now you take them, they’re out protectin’ the pore taxpayer, the way they ort to be, lookin’ out for airplanes and forest fars and frettin’ about this here typhoid and watchin’ him through field glasses so he maybe don’t fall down and die of sunstroke while he’s out here workin’ from sunup to dark to pay his taxes and keep the trough full for ’em, Makes a man downright proud to know they’re on the job like that. So you boys just go on out there and draw up a bucket of that water and I’ll see if I can find an old fruit jar or something you can put her in.’
‘Oh, we wouldn’t want to put you out,’ the gold-tooth one says, and grins. ‘We’ll just take that jarful you got settin’ there by your hip. That’ll be plenty for the grand jury—I mean, the health department—to analyse.’
‘Oh, you mean this one?’ Uncle Sagamore says. He brought the jar out. ‘Why, boys, this ain’t well water.’
‘It’s not?’ The two sheriff’s men was so astonished they looked at each other again. ‘Imagine that! It’s not well water.’
‘Why, no,’ Uncle Sagamore says, ‘this here is a kind of a remedy I seen advertised in one of them magazines. “Do You Feel Old at Forty!” it says, and here was this picture of this purty girl without much on in the way of clothes, and it goes on to say how you can get yore pep back and start shinin’ up to the gals again if you been kind of losin’ out on it lately, so I figure I ort to try me a little of it.’
‘Well, what do you know?’ the gold-tooth one says. ‘And they sent it to you in a fruit jar, just like moon—I mean, well water?’
‘Uh—not exactly,’ Uncle Sagamore says. ‘You see, you kind of make her up yourself. They send you this powder, whatever it is, and you mix it right at home. There may be just a teensy smell of alcohol about it, but don’t let that fool you. It’s just because the only thing I had to dissolve it in was some old patent medicine of Bessie’s.’
‘Well, imagine that!’ the moustache one says. ‘A little smell of alcohol. Who would of suspected a thing like that?’
The gold-tooth one picked the jar up and held it under his nose. The other one looked at him.
‘Can’t smell nothing with that stink out there,’ he says. ‘But, hell, we know what it is.’
‘I tell you it’s just a remedy, boys,’ Uncle Sagamore says. ‘You wouldn’t want to take that in to the health department. They’d laugh at you.’
‘Who do you think you’re kiddin’?’ the gold-tooth one says. ‘But just to make sure it’s evidence—’ He tilted the jar up and took a swig out of it. He choked a little.
‘How about it?’ the other one asked.
The gold-tooth one looked kind of puzzled. ‘I don’t know. Strong enough to be moon, all right. But it’s got a little funny taste. Here, see what you think.’
The moustache one looked a little doubtful. Then he says, ‘Well, hell, he was drinkin’ it.’ So he tilted it up and swallowed.
He looked kind of puzzled too.
‘See,’ Uncle Sagamore says. ‘I told you. It’s just a remedy. But you boys is kind of young to be usin’ it. You don’t want to blame me if you start chasin’ the gals around like banty roosters after a pullet when you get back to town.’
The gold-tooth one still looked a little doubtful. ‘You can’t kid me,’ he says. ‘I know moon when I taste it.’ But he thought about it for a minute and then took another drink.
‘Well, I don’t know,’ he says. ‘It would be kind of silly if we took it in and it was medicine.’
‘You ought to know better than to believe anything Sagamore Noonan says,’ the moustache one told him. ‘Here. Let me have it again.’
He took another one too. But he couldn’t seem to make up his mind either.
‘Well, take her in if you just got to,’ Uncle Sagamore says. ‘But you might as well set and visit a spell. Ain’t no hurry.’
‘No, we’ll just run along,’ they says. ‘This was all we was after. Didn’t want you to catch that typhoid.’ They started to turn around.
Uncle Sagamore lifted the shotgun down kind of absent-minded and set it across his knees. He broke it, lifted the shells out and looked at them like he wanted to be sure they was really in it, and then slid ’em back in and closed the gun again. He was sliding the safety catch back and forth, just to be doing something, the way a man scribbles with a pencil while he’s talking on the telephone. They watched him. The moustache one licked his lips.
‘Sure you boys can’t set a spell?’ Uncle Sagamore asked. ‘No use you rushin’ off in the heat of the day.’
They stopped. The gold-tooth one says, ‘Uh—well—’
‘That’s the trouble nowadays,’ Uncle Sagamore went on. ‘People just don’t take the time to be neighbourly. Come a-chargin’ in here like a highlifed shoat to save a man from comin’ down with that typhoid, and then before he can hardly thank ’em for what they done they get another burr under their crupper and go tearin’ off to hell an’ gone to save some other pore taxpayer from something. Man was to just set once in a while he’d live longer.’
The two sheriff’s men looked at each other again and then out at the car like it had suddenly got a long way off and they wasn’t sure they could make it that far in the hot sun. They kind of oozed down on the steps, still watching Uncle Sagamore and looking into the end of the shotgun. ‘Well, I reckon there ain’t no great hurry, come to think of it,’ the gold-tooth one says.
‘Now you’re talkin’,’ Uncle Sagamore says. He took the old plug of tobacco out of his pocket, rubbed it on his overall leg to get off some of the lint and dirt and the roofing tack that was sticking to it, and bit off a big chew.
‘Want to make you acquainted with my kinfolks,’ he went on. ‘This is my brother Sam and his boy. Sam’s in the investment business in New York. Sam, say howdy to the shurf’s boys. The high-pockets one with the chicken fat in his hair is Booger Ledbetter, and the other one, with that kiss-me-quick moustache, is Otis Sears.’
‘Howdy,’ Pop says.
‘Howdy,’ Booger says.
‘Howdy,’ Otis says.
Nobody said anything else for a minute or two. We all just sat there hunkered down looking at each other. I was on one side of Uncle Sagamore and Pop was on the other, and the two sheriff’s men was on the top step, in front of us. I could hear that bug going buz-z-z-z out in the trees again. Then a little breeze come along and the smell got awful. The sheriff’s men fanned harder with their hats.
‘You boys warm?’ Uncle Sagamore asked.
‘Well, not exactly,’ Booger says. ‘It’s just that smell. Get’s sort of rank at times.’
‘Smell?’ Uncle Sagamore asked. He looked at them kind of puzzled, and then at Pop. ‘You smell anything, Sam?’
Pop quit waving the air with his hat. ‘Why, no,’ he says, surprised like. ‘What kind of a smell?’
Uncle Sagamore looked back at Booger and Otis. ‘You sure you boys ain’t just imaginin’ it? Where does it seem to be coming from?’
‘Why, I thought from the tubs over there,’ Booger says.
‘You don’t mean my tannery, do you?’ Uncle Sagamore asked.
‘Well—uh,’ Booger says, looking at the end of the shotgun again. ‘I thought there was a sort of smell coming from over there, but maybe I was wrong.’
‘Sure is funny,’ Uncle Sagamore says. ‘I ain’t noticed a thing, myself. But I’m glad you boys mentioned it; reminds me it’s time for them two on the end to dreen a little. They been soakin’ for nine days now, and I better hang ’em up. I’ll be right back.’
He got up with the shotgun under his arm and walked over to the end of the porch. He stepped down and lifted the old cowhide out of the end tub with a stick and threw it over the clothes line, kind of spreading it out. Then he took the next one out and spread it on the line too. They begin to drip brownish water onto the ground.
They was bad enough before, but now when they was out in the air it was awful. They was only ten or twelve feet away, and with the air circulating around ’em and then blowing over us in the little breeze I could feel my eyes watering and my breath choking up in my throat.
Booger and Otis was looking a little sick. They would breathe real slow and easy, and fan with their hats, and then they’d look at Uncle Sagamore and quit fanning and just try not to breathe any more than they had to.
Uncle Sagamore come back and sat down with his back against the door jamb and the shotgun over his knees. He didn’t seem to notice the smell at all.
‘I was kinda wantin’ to show you boys my tannery,’ he says. ‘Bein’ in the gov’ment, so to speak, you’re probably interested in new industries and the like, and the different ways a man can scrabble around and break his back to make enough money to pay his taxes. What with them pussel-gutted politicians settin’ around in the court-house just waitin’ for him to scratch another nickel out of the ground so they can swoop down on it like sparrows after a oat-foundered horse, a man’s got to do something or he’d get desperate and start runnin’ for office hisself. So I figured I’d go in the leather business as kind of a sideline.’
‘Why, that sounds like a real good idea,’ Otis says, wiping the sweat off his face.
Uncle Sagamore nodded his head. ‘Sure. That way, I figure I might be able to eat something once in a while to stay alive so I can manage to get in town once a year to borrow enough money to make another crop, and kinda keep goin’, so none of them fat bastards would ever have to do anything real desperate, like goin’ to work. You couldn’t have nothing like that. If them Rooshians ever heard things was so tough over here that politicians was goin’ to work, they’d attack us in a minute.’
‘Yeah, I reckon that’s right,’ Otis said, like he didn’t really think so but figured he ought to say something just to be polite.
The conversation kind of died then and we all just sat there. You could see the heat waves dancing out along the hill, and once in a while there’d be some hammering from down where Uncle Finley was.
Pop nodded his head down that way, and asked Uncle Sagamore, ‘Don’t he ever knock off?’
Uncle Sagamore puckered up his lips and shot out a stream of tobacco juice. It sailed out flat and straight, right between Booger and Otis, and landed ka-splott in the yard.
‘No,’ he says. ‘Only when he runs out of boards. Things is kind of slow right now, since he used up the last privy, but he manages to keep busy with a little patchin’ here and there.’
We all looked at Uncle Finley.
‘Just what’s he building, anyway?’ Pop asked.
‘A boat,’ Uncle Sagamore says.
‘Boat?’
Uncle Sagamore nodded. ‘That’s right. The way Finley figures, it’s goin’ to start rainin’ like pourin’ water out of a boot any day now. And when the day comes he’s go
in’ to go sailin’ off like a bug on a whiteoak chip and the rest of us sinful bastards is going to drowned. He thought for a while of maybe takin’ Bessie along, being she’s his sister, but after she raised so much hell about the privies, he finally told her he’d takened it up with the Vision and the Vision says the hell with her, let her drowned like the rest of us.’
‘What kind of a vision is this?’ Pop asked.
I was sort of wishing he wouldn’t keep asking about it, so we could maybe get off the porch and away from that smell, but it seemed like he was anxious to hear about it now and Uncle Sagamore was real anxious for all of us to stay there so he’d have somebody to talk to. Anyway, that’s the way it looked, so I didn’t say anything about wanting to move. Sig Freed was the only one that was comfortable. He went way off up the hill and laid down under a bush.
Well, not the only one. Uncle Sagamore seemed to be comfortable enough too. He stretched a little and scratched one leg with the big toenail on his other foot, and moved his tobacco into the other cheek.
‘The Vision?’ he says. ‘Oh, Finley seen it one night about four years ago, as near as I can recollect. Me and Bessie was asleep in the front room when he come a-tearin’ through the house in his nightshirt like somebody’d jabbed him in the butt with a bull nettle and says as how this Vision had told him he’d better not lose no time because the end of the world was due any minute. So he runs out in the back yard with a pinch bar and starts tearin’ down the hen house to get boards to make this boat with. It was only about two o’clock in the morning, and there was a regular damn madhouse with all them chickens squawkin’ and tryin’ to figure out what’s goin’ on, and Bessie yellin’ at Finley to go on back to bed. I didn’t hardly get no rest at all.’
4
‘AND HE’S BEEN BUILDING HER ever since?’ Pop asked.
‘Off and on,’ Uncle Sagamore says. ‘Dependin’ on the supply of boards. After he used up the hen house and the shed I used to keep the truck in, he started to tear down the house, but we finally got him talked out of that. So then he starts driftin’ around to the neighbours, pickin’ up any boards that wasn’t nailed down too tight. He tore down Marvin Jimerson’s hawg pen so many times Marvin finally got a court order agin him and says if he has to chase them hawgs one more time he’s comin’ up here and shoot Finley right in the tail with a charge of rock salt, he don’t care if Finley did used to be a preacher and was the one that baptized Miz Jimerson. Says come to thing of it, she takened the pneumonia when he baptized her anyhow.’
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