THE HOMEPLACE

by Gilbert, Morris

  Lanie was fascinated. She had never seen Miss Pruitt disturbed, and something about the big man did bother her. “I think you embarrassed her, Sheriff,” she whispered.

  “Embarrassed her! Why in the blue-eyed world would she be embarrassed?”

  “You know. You asking for a romance book. I don’t think she has any romance much in her.”

  “Well, she ort to. I pure hate to see a fine-lookin’ woman wasted.”

  He grinned and winked and looked more like Clark Gable than ever.

  “I’m gonna ask her to a dance.”

  Lanie stared at him. “She never goes to dances.”

  “About time she started then.” Pardue Jessup stood a bit straighter as Cassandra walked back and laid the book down on the counter.

  “You might like this one. It’s romantic, so I hear,” she said.

  It took Lanie ten minutes to find the books she wanted. When she came out of the stacks, Pardue Jessup was still leaning there against the counter and talking softly, his hands moving expressively. Cassandra Pruitt was listening, fascinated. She was startled when Lanie put the books down.

  “Oh! Those are the ones you want!” She stamped the books with the date due and pushed them over toward Lanie, but her eyes were on the sheriff.

  “I’m not givin’ up on that dance. I’ll tell you what. A man gets lonesome around here. Needs company. If I’m gonna start readin’ books and be a literary fellow, I’m gonna need some help. How about it, Miss Librarian, would you give a fellow a hand?” He stuck out his big hand, and before Cassandra Pruitt knew what she was doing, she had taken it. Pardue’s big hand closed on her hand. He grinned. “You think about it. I’ll come by every day to be sure it’s on your mind.” He looked at Lanie. “You ready to go, sweetie?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  The two walked out of the library, and as they got into the Bearcat, Lanie said, “You can’t treat Miss Pruitt like you do other women.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because she’s a college graduate.”

  “Don’t they have feelings like other people?”

  “Well, I suppose—”

  “Shore they do, sweetie.”

  “But it doesn’t make any sense.”

  “Romance never does make sense. You just don’t see enough movies, Lanie.”

  “I don’t get my ideas from the movies.”

  “That’s a good idea.” Pardue reached over and squeezed her earlobe and winked at her when she turned around. “Come on. I’ll take you and that carburetor home. Maybe I’ll even help your pa put it in.”

  There was never any question about whether the Freemans would go to church. That issue had been settled before Lanie was born. They went to church every Sunday morning and Sunday night and Wednesday night, and every night during revival meetings, even if they lasted for six weeks.

  Ordinarily, Davis rather enjoyed church. He had a fine Sunday school teacher. Matthew Sixkiller was the town veterinarian and a full-blooded Cherokee Indian. He had played semi-pro baseball and was the best hunter and fisherman in the entire state as far as anyone could tell. He was also the best Sunday school teacher Davis ever had, for he could make the Bible come alive. On this particular morning, Davis wished Mr. Sixkiller wasn’t quite so good at it.

  “The lesson this morning is taken from the book of Joshua. You remember last Sunday we studied how Joshua defeated the men of Jericho. How many of you remember how he won that battle?”

  “By tootin’ horns,” Cody said eagerly. “They walked around the city and tooted on their trumpets until the walls fell down.”

  A smile creased the face of Mr. Sixkiller, and he nodded. “That’s right. Well, this morning I’m going to read to you from the seventh chapter of the book of Joshua. Get your Bibles out.”

  Davis’s Bible had been a gift from his mother and was signed by her on the front page. He followed along as Mr. Sixkiller read the story, and then he heard a serious note in the teacher’s voice.

  “You fellows see what happened?”

  “They got whupped!” Cody piped up.

  “That’s right. After defeating a big city and a powerful army within walls, the Israelites took a pounding. Do any of you know why?” He waited and looked around and then said, “It’s in the first verse. ‘But the children of Israel committed a trespass in the accursed thing: for Achan, the son of Carmi, the son of Zabdi, the son of Zerah, of the tribe of Judah, took of the accursed thing: and the anger of the LORD was kindled against the children of Israel.’”

  Benny Oz, the son of Harry Oz, who owned the hardware store, said, “What’s the accursed thing, Mr. Sixkiller?”

  “God had told them not to take anything from Jericho, which He destroyed utterly, but this man Achan disobeyed God, and you heard the story. He hid it in his tent, buried it I suppose. And you know, boys, Achan probably thought, ‘Well, it’s gonna be all right. Nobody knows about it. I’m gonna make it fine.’ But as we’ve heard, he didn’t.

  I heard a preacher once preach on this in a sermon called ‘The Curse of Hidden Sins.’ It scared me half to death.”

  “What sin did you have hidden?” Cody asked.

  Mr. Sixkiller grinned. “That’s my business and God’s, but it really doesn’t matter. The fact is you can hide your sins from your daddy or your mama. You can hide ’em from the sheriff, maybe, but you can’t hide ’em from God.”

  The lesson continued until finally Achan and his sons and his daughters were taken, and Mr. Sixkiller read how the people stoned him and then buried him with stones, along with all of his sons and daughters and everything he had.

  “That’s a pretty rough deal,” Buddy Stockwell said. “To kill ’em just for takin’ somethin’.”

  “It’s not about how big a thing you take, Buddy,” Mr. Sixkiller said quietly. “It’s about disobeying God. When you steal a dollar, you’re in the same class as Al Capone, who steals millions of dollars. I want you boys to listen to this. If you’ve got a sin hidden in your life, sooner or later it’s gonna hurt you. You know what a time bomb is?”

  “Sure, I seen one in the movies. It’s got a clock attached. You set it and when it reaches whatever time you set, it goes off,” Cody said.

  “That’s right. If you’ve got a hidden sin, something that you know is wrong before God, your clock is ticking. And one of these days it’ll blow up.”

  Buddy said, “What do you do about it?”

  “Get it out of your life. If you harm somebody, confess it to ’em. Ask for their forgiveness. Don’t do it anymore. That’s what’s called repentance, and that’s what I’d like for you boys to get out of this lesson.”

  The bell rang soon after, and Davis left with the others to sit with his family in the sanctuary. During the song service, Davis sang mechanically. His mind wasn’t on it. Nor did he hear a word of the sermon. All he could think of was that time bomb inside of him, about to blow him up.

  Lanie stared at Davis. He had told her to meet him behind the barn. She had never seen him so troubled. His lips trembled as he told her about stealing the fruit and hitting Butcher Knife Annie with a pear, and she suddenly had an insight.

  “You didn’t go alone, did you, Davis?”

  Davis looked down at the ground and refused to answer.

  “Maeva and Cody were with you, weren’t they?”

  “They didn’t force me to go. But I feel terrible. Mr. Sixkiller talked about what happens when you do wrong things and try to cover ’em up.” Davis looked up, and Lanie saw the pain in his eyes. “I can’t stand it, Lanie,” he whispered. “I just can’t stand it!”

  “Well, you don’t have to,” Lanie said.

  “But what can I do?”

  “I’ll tell you what we can do,” Lanie said. “I baked a chocolate cake for supper tonight, but we’re not eating that cake. You and me and Maeva and Cody are going over, and we’re going to give it to Annie.”

  Davis stared at her for a long time and then nodded. “That’s what we’ll
do, Lanie, and I’ll tell her how sorry I am. Cody and Maeva maybe won’t want to go.”

  “That’s up to them,” Lanie said firmly. “You and I’ll go, and they can come if they want to.”

  As the four Freeman youngsters approached Annie’s house, Maeva grunted, “I don’t know why we’re having to do this.”

  “Because what we done was a rotten thing to do!” Davis snapped.

  “Now hush up or leave!”

  Cody had not said a word since agreeing to come. He looked nervously at Lanie, who was carrying the cake draped with a thin towel.

  “I don’t wanna do this, Lanie.”

  “Then leave,” Lanie said.

  Cody looked at Maeva, who sniffed at him. “Go on if you’re scared!

  I’m gonna face up to her. I ain’t afraid of her nor her butcher knife neither.”

  “She doesn’t have a butcher knife!” Lanie said. “That’s all gossip. Now come on!”

  They approached the house, but there was no sign of Annie.

  “Maybe she ain’t home,” Cody whispered. “We can come back later.”

  Ignoring him, Lanie knocked on the door. She heard someone moving inside, and then the door opened. Annie stood before them dressed in the same dress that it seemed she always wore. She didn’t say one word but stared at the four children.

  “Miss Annie,” Lanie said, “my brother Davis has something to say to you if you don’t mind.”

  “What is it?” The old woman’s voice seemed creaky like a hinge that needed oiling. She stared at Davis, and her face was set in a stern frown.

  “Miss Annie, I . . . I want to tell you,” Davis said, forcing the words out, “I’m right sorry for what I done. I’m sorry I stole your pears, and I’m sorry I hit you with one of them. If you want to hit me back, it’ll be all right with me. But I had to say I’m sorry.”

  The four Freeman youngsters scarcely breathed. Annie was glaring at them almost wildly. Maeva stepped forward and said, “I’m sorry too, Miss Annie. I shouldn’t have stole them pears. I’m sorry, and I’ll do anything you want to make it right.”

  “Me too,” Cody said quickly. “If you need some work done around here, you just tell us what it is, and we’ll do it.”

  “That’s right,” Lanie said. She held the cake out and smiled at the old woman. “I baked this cake, and all of us want you to have it. I’m not the best cook in the world, but I think it’s fairly good.”

  Annie stared at them and something changed in her expression. They saw her lips move slightly, and then she said, “What you doin’ this for?”

  It was Davis who answered. “Miss Annie, that was a rotten thing I did. I . . . I wish you’d hit me with a stick of stove wood! It’d make me feel better.”

  “Ain’t no need for that. What do you want?”

  Davis swallowed hard and looked down at his feet for a moment, then he looked up and said, “I guess, Miss Annie, I just want us to be friends.”

  Butcher Knife Annie stared at the four children, and for a moment Lanie thought she was going to scream and run them off. But she smiled. There was snuff in the corners of her mouth, and she was dirty and wearing clothes that should have been thrown away. Yet there was something strange and wonderful in the smile that came to her thin lips.

  “I reckon I’d like that cake. Maybe you young’uns can come in and help me eat it.”

  Davis took a deep breath and said with a shaky voice, “Be right proud to, Miss Annie, and after that we’ll figure out some way to work out what we done.”

  Lanie walked inside. There were cats everywhere. “You must love cats, Miss Annie.”

  “People dump ’em off here. I can’t let ’em starve.”

  “I’ve got a cat. His name’s Cap’n Brown.”

  “I got me eighteen of ’em now. I’ll have some more when that ’un there has kittens.”

  The smell of the place was terrible, but the four Freeman children ate the cake, which Annie cut with a butcher knife. As she was cutting it, she saw them watching her. “That’s right. This is the butcher knife I use. They call me Butcher Knife Annie, but I don’t mind. I been called worse.”

  Lanie saw Annie’s loneliness, and tears came to her eyes. She silently made a vow that the old woman would never be lonely again.

  Lanie put her pen down and reread the poem she had written. For several days she had thought of Butcher Knife Annie and finally decided to write a poem about what happened. Though she wasn’t there when Davis hit the old woman with the pear, Lanie had the gift of putting herself inside other people. Why, she’d even written a poem from the point of view of Cap’n Brown trying to catch a mouse!

  She’d seen the guilt in Davis’s eyes and tried to write a poem that expressed his feelings. Now she read it aloud, whispering the words softly so no one could hear.

  Butcher Knife Annie lived in a tar paper shack

  With cats inside and pear trees in the back.

  Every day she combed the alleys, filling

  A warped red wagon with empty bottles, spilling

  Juices on its wobbly track.

  She swapped at Kroger’s for snuff and day-old bread,

  Stopped at Bell’s for a fifth of Dago Red,

  Then shuffled back to her cats and trees, weaving

  A bit from either wine or age, breathing

  Heavily, plodding toward her flimsy shed.

  One memory of Annie presses on me hard—

  That day one spring I broke into her yard

  And started eating stolen fruit, squeezing

  Juicy nectar from sweet pears—freezing

  When Annie came and caught me off my guard.

  Mindless with guilt and fear, I seized a pear,

  With all my might I heaved it hard and fair.

  It struck her mouth, she gave one cry—then stood

  Without a word, and so did I—like wood.

  The world was mute. Just she and I alone.

  In that wink of time, I saw her eyes

  And knew a loneliness without disguise

  Then for the first time in my life I wept

  For another than myself—then swept

  Away—but still in dreams I see old Annie’s eyes.

  Lanie stared at the poem, then whispered, “I can never show this to anyone. It would shame Davis.” She put it with the other poems she’d written about the people in her life, hid the notebook under her mattress, then got into bed and went to sleep.

  C H A P T E R 5

  Elizabeth moved clumsily across the room and felt a wave of discouragement. This pregnancy was different from her others. It seemed all four of her children had been born with great ease. Of course eleven years had passed since Cody’s arrival, and memories of the pain and discomfort of childbirth faded, as hard things sometimes do. Still, she could not remember having difficulties as she had now.

  She heard the sound of a vehicle approaching and, moving carefully, went over to the window. Her eyes widened with surprise when she saw Forrest drive up in the log truck. It was not loaded, and she wondered if something was wrong. He usually worked like a machine, not stopping until he delivered a certain number of logs to the mill. She watched as he leaped out of the door and ran for the house. He appeared excited but not disturbed.

  He’s like a little boy getting excited about things.

  She turned and heard him bound up the porch steps, open the screen door, and let it slam behind him, and then he appeared, his eyes bright and his ball cap pushed back on his head.

  “What is it, Forrest?”

  He walked over to her in long strides, smiling. He put his arms around her, handling her gently as if she were a precious treasure, and then kissed her. “I’ve got a surprise for you.”

  Whenever Forrest got excited, his eyes seemed to dance, and he could not keep still. His feet were twitching even now, and he patted her back as he held her. “Come on over here and sit down. What are you doing up anyway?”

  “I get tired of lying down and
sitting down.”

  Even so, she allowed him to walk her over to the couch and ease her down, and then he plopped himself down beside her. He leaned forward so he could look into her face and said, “I’ve been working on something. I didn’t want to tell you about it until it happened, but by golly it’s come true now!”

  “What’s come true?”

  “I’ve been thinkin’ for a long time, Elizabeth, about how we’re not gettin’ anywhere.”

  “We’re doing all right! We haven’t missed a meal yet.”

  “No, but we had to postpone one or two. The kids are growing up, and they’re going to be more expensive, so I’ve been thinkin’ of a way that we could better ourselves.”

  “What is it? You’re not thinking of getting out of the logging business, are you?”

  “No, I’m thinkin’ of getting into it bigger.”

  “Bigger? In what way?”

  “Well, I’ve been doing all right with the one truck, but it’s about had it, Elizabeth. You know I have to spend as much time working on it as I do using it. What I need is some new equipment. So I went in and talked to Mr. Langley about those big tracts of first-growth timber over by Elmore. He owns a lot of land over there, and I heard a rumor that he was gonna start logging it. Well, there’ll be a lot of fellas tryin’ to get that job, but I went to see him this morning. I walked right into his office and asked to see him.”

  Elizabeth saw that Forrest was proud of himself. She took his hand and held it. “What did he say? And what did you say? Now, don’t just tell me the headlines like men do. I want the fine print.”

  “Well, I’ll give you the headline first. I’ve got the job of cutting most of that timber, but it’s a big job, and I’m going to have to have at least two trucks and hire some extra men.”

  “But that will take a lot of money, won’t it, Forrest?”

  “Yep, it will. We’re gonna have to borrow. But it’s the chance of a lifetime!”