A Difficult Boy

by M. P. Barker

Ethan twirled on top of the haystack, arms spread wide as he surveyed his domain: the big white house, the flower garden and the kitchen garden, the cattle yard, the sheds, the smokehouse, the privy, and the corncrib; the barn and all the newly made haystacks hunched around it like old ladies huddled beneath mustard-colored cloaks.

  “King of what?” Daniel asked from below.

  Ethan gestured grandly around him. “King of everything!” He danced a little jig on his haystack. His feet slipped out from under him, and he slid down the haystack on his backside, landing in an unregal heap at Daniel’s feet.

  Daniel held up a wreath he’d woven from the hay. “If you’re a king, I s’pose you’ll be wanting a crown, then.” He dropped the circlet on Ethan’s head, where it settled over one eye.

  Ethan shoved the prickly crown back from his forehead and stuck out his tongue.

  “Lucky we got that lot of hay in today,” Daniel said. He stretched, no doubt aching from a week’s worth of mowing, raking, pitching, and stacking. “Them clouds’re piling on something fierce.”

  The sky had been a perfect silken blue when they’d begun bringing in the hay that morning. Now flat-bottomed clouds piled up and rolled over each other like tufts of wool falling from the shearer’s blades. Silas had been lucky to have most of the week fair and dry for his haying. The backbreaking work had seemed endless, but at last the hay was safely packed in the barn’s haymows and in the surrounding haystacks, carefully sloped to shed water and keep the center of each stack dry.

  Ethan scrambled to his feet, dusting off the seat of his trousers. “If it rains tomorrow, d’you s’pose Silas might give us a holiday?”

  Daniel squinted. “For me, maybe. After I’m done sharpening scythes and mending rakes and such. But s’posing themselves come home from their grand trip tomorrow? I wager Lyman’ll be wanting a turn at you in the store then.”

  Ethan’s lower lip drooped. “It’s not fair.” He hoped it would rain long and hard and bottle Mr. and Mrs. Lyman up in Springfield for another week. Having only Silas and Mr. Bingham to answer to for eight whole days had felt almost like freedom.

  “Well, I fancy he’d let you off if you explain to him about you being king and all.” With a sharp tug, Daniel yanked the hay crown down over Ethan’s face and leaped away.

  “You—you—” Ethan spluttered. Pulling the crown off, he lunged after Daniel, trying to swat him with the twisted hay.

  Daniel barked a laugh and dodged out of reach. He stretched one leg forward and bowed. “Careful, your dustiness, you’re spoiling your crown.”

  “You—” Ethan grinned as the word came to him. “Cráin!”

  “A sow, am I, now? Couldn’t you at least be making me a boar?”

  “Oh.” Ethan frowned as he searched his memory for the proper word.

  Daniel took advantage of Ethan’s distraction to swoop him up and hold him upside down. Whenever he saw an opening between Ethan’s flailing arms and legs, Daniel poked the ticklish spots along Ethan’s ribs and under his arms.

  “Put me down,” Ethan tried to shout, but it was difficult to get the words out between his giggles.

  “Not ’til you learn your words proper. Now, what am I again?”

  “Muc . . . No . . . Collach.” (“Pig . . . No . . . Boar.”)

  Daniel stopped tickling but kept a firm grasp on Ethan’s legs. “Is fearr sin é. Agus Nell?” (“That’s better. And Nell?”)

  “Bó.” (“Cow.”) Ethan’s voice jogged as Daniel bounced him. “Can I get down now?”

  “Cad é Ivy é?” (“What’s Ivy?”)

  “Capall.” (“Horse.”)

  “Agus cad atá tusa?” (“And what are you?”)

  “Rí!” Ethan crowed. (“King!”) He hung with his knees against Daniel’s shoulder, Daniel’s arms around his waist. He poked at Daniel’s knee, wondering if there was a ticklish spot at the back of it. “Is mise an rí!” Ethan said. (“I’m the king!”)

  “Ní tusa.” (“You are not.”) Daniel shook him. A handful of skipping stones fell out of Ethan’s pocket and bounced around Daniel’s feet. “Tá tusa bunoscionn.”

  “Cod ’ta mise?” (“I’m what?”) Ethan squirmed, trying to twist up to see Daniel’s face.

  “Upside down,” Daniel translated.

  Ethan couldn’t find Daniel’s ticklish spot, so he punched the back of Daniel’s knee instead. “Nil níos nío!” (“Not anymore!”) he said, as Daniel’s leg buckled and the boys tumbled down into a laughing heap.

  Daniel shoved Ethan off him. “Tá tusa bunoscionn agus trom,” he said.

  “Say that again.” Ethan rolled onto his belly.

  “Trom. It means heavy. I taught you that one last week, didn’t I?”

  “No. The other one. The upside-down one. It’s a funny one.”

  “Bunoscionn,” Daniel repeated. He took a running start and launched himself at the haystack. “Now it’s me own turn to be king, eh, lad?” A shower of hay spilled down as Daniel scrambled for the top.

  Ethan recognized the word Daniel used when he reached the top. Daniel had always refused to translate it for him, so he knew it was a rude one.

  “What?” Ethan called.

  “Bloody hell, they’re coming back already. Putting Ivy into a lather, too, to beat the storm.” Daniel slid back to the ground. “Run and tell Lizzie they’re coming. And wash up proper, not like you been doing all week. And have an umbrella ready for ’em, too.”

  The Lymans’ carriage reached the house just as a streak of lightning brightened the yard. The ensuing thunder sounded ragged, like something tearing. Almost immediately, fat raindrops poured down, as if the sky were a great sack that had suddenly burst at the seams.

  “Not a second too soon,” Mr. Lyman said, tossing the reins to Daniel. Between the rapid pace Mr. Lyman had set and the storm, Ivy looked frazzled. She pawed and snorted anxiously, her eyes rolling until Daniel took her head and shushed her—in English, Ethan noticed.

  Ethan had expected Mr. Lyman to be upset by the weather, but both he and his wife were grinning together. He rubbed his hands and laughed. “Well, I haven’t raced like that in years. Quite the exciting ride, eh, Mercy?”

  Ethan wondered if somebody had replaced Mr. Lyman with a twin. He never called Mrs. Lyman by her first name. Daniel had once speculated that they called each other Mr. and Mrs. even in their bedchamber. He’d never seen either of them look so jolly before.

  “Ah, there’s a good boy.” Mr. Lyman smiled as Ethan held the umbrella over him. “Thinking ahead, that’s what I like to see, hmm?” He patted Ethan on the head as if he were a favorite dog. Putting his arms out, he helped his wife down and the two of them dashed into the house, hand in hand, Ethan trotting alongside with the umbrella.

  “A good trip, sir?” Silas asked, greeting them at the front door.

  “Excellent, excellent!” Mr. Lyman said. “Cheese and butter are up, cotton’s down, and that investment in—”

  “Papa! Mama! Did you bring us presents?” The three girls clamored around their parents.

  “For pity’s sake, let them in the house first,” Silas said, shooing the girls down the hallway.

  “Presents for everyone,” Mr. Lyman said, swooping Ruth into his arms and giving her a kiss.

  “Even Lizzie?” Ruth asked. “And Ethan and Paddy?”

  “Everyone. And more to come,” Mr. Lyman said. “Your mama’s new cookstove wouldn’t fit in the carriage, so I’m having it sent.”

  “A stove!” Lizzie exclaimed, her eyes wide.

  “A cookstove and a heating stove for the parlor,” Mr. Lyman said. “Silas, why don’t you and the boys bring in the packages from the carriage?”

  “What’s it mean?” Ethan asked Daniel as soon as he could slip away to join the Irish boy in the barn. Daniel had been walking Ivy up and down the barn’s central aisle to cool her off while Silas and Ethan had taken care of the boxes and carriage.

  “Good days for a bit,” Daniel said. The mare grumbled softly
as lightning blazed and thunder shook the barn. “Éist, a mhuirnín. Fil ach stoirm í,” Daniel said. (“Hush, sweetheart. It’s only a storm.”) Even though Ethan knew what some of Daniel’s words meant now, and could half say them himself, it didn’t take away the magic as Daniel soothed the mare and cooled her down. The magic wasn’t in the words after all, Ethan realized. Ethan could say them himself, and they’d have no power. But Daniel could say fence post or doornail or ladder instead of There, lass, it’s all right, and the mare’s nervous feet would grow still and her tail stop switching. “He could’a been easier on the lass, though,” Daniel said, rubbing a rag across her sweaty neck.

  “What’s he so happy for? I thought he’d be cross about the rain.”

  “Some fellas need drink to brighten their moods. For Lyman, it’s profits. He must’a sold high and bought low and made good on his speculations and such. That’s all you need to know. If it’d gone the other way, though, you’d not be able to keep shy of his temper even if you was to be as perfect as the entire Holy Family altogether.”

  “How long does it last?”

  Daniel shrugged. “No telling. Best enjoy it while you can, lad. If I was Silas, I’d ask for that new plow and the merino ram he’s been wanting, though. Maybe two rams and a cow, then he’ll be sure to at least get the plow and the ram.”

  “And what do we get?”

  “A pocket of sweets, maybe. Perhaps a bit of a holiday from being thrashed.”

  At dinner the next day, Mr. Lyman approved the plow and one ram without debate. On the second ram and the cow, however, Mr. Lyman said, “I don’t know. What would you say to a new horse?”

  Ethan held his breath. A new horse. A horse that he could mind just as Daniel minded Ivy. He could already feel the velvety nose exploring his palm, hear the throaty whicker meant just for him.

  “A new horse?” Silas repeated.

  “Maybe two. A fellow in West Springfield has a pair of geldings for sale: fine, high-stepping animals. Coal black, and so alike you’d think they were twins. They’d be quite a sight drawing a carriage. Maybe a barouche, eh? So my girls can ride in style.” Florella and Zeloda squealed with delight, and Mrs. Lyman beamed. “I’ve a mind to buy one of them, or maybe even the pair, if I can get his price down.”

  “And what about the mare?” Silas asked.

  Mr. Lyman brushed some crumbs from the tablecloth. “We’d have to sell her, of course. No sense keeping three horses. She’s fit enough to bring a good price, don’t you think?”

  Out of the corner of his eye, Ethan saw the tip of Daniel’s knife quiver.

  “If it’s profit you want, you could keep the mare for breeding and the geldings for driving,” Silas suggested.

  Mr. Lyman’s thumbnail rasped along his chin as he considered the proposition. His eyes flickered the way they did when he was summing up a customer’s bill.

  Daniel set his knife down next to his soup bowl, pressing the blade’s butter-smeared end into the tablecloth. His other hand picked his roll into fragments.

  Mr. Lyman finally shook his head. “No, no. I’m better off selling her. I’ll make some inquiries. It shouldn’t be hard to find someone who’ll want her.”

  “I’ll buy her,” said Daniel.

  Spoons crashed into bowls. Mrs. Lyman’s glass of raspberry shrub teetered and nearly spilled.

  “What did you say, boy?” Mr. Lyman’s voice froze the diners in their seats.

  “Sir,” Daniel added hastily. “I’ll buy her. Sir.” His face glowed nearly as red as Mrs. Lyman’s raspberry shrub.

  Mr. Lyman snorted a laugh. “And with what do you propose to buy her?”

  Daniel’s swallow was nearly audible. Ethan watched a damp trickle creep down Daniel’s temple, along his jaw, and under his collar. “When I leave,” Daniel said deliberately, as though trying out words for the first time. “I’m to have me wages when I leave. I’ll pay for her out of that. And if it ain’t—” He cleared his throat. “If it isn’t enough, I’ll work for you until it is. Sir.”

  Mr. Lyman stared down the length of the table with raised eyebrows and creased forehead.

  Daniel stared back, his neck and shoulders taut with his struggle not to duck his head and let the shaggy copper forelock shadow his expression. A muscle quivered under his eye.

  The storekeeper broke his stare first, turning toward Silas, then toward Mrs. Lyman. He tugged at his ear. One side of his face slanted suddenly upward, an eyebrow lifting even farther, a corner of his mouth tilting up and parting. His hand thumped the table, rattling silverware and crockery.

  Although Ethan had expected an explosion, the noise still surprised him. He hadn’t thought Mr. Lyman could laugh so hard. Mr. Pease’s braying laugh soon joined in, followed by Mr. Wheeler’s soft wheezing chuckle. Zeloda snickered. Even Mrs. Lyman contributed a dry breath of a laugh. Silas and Lizzie exchanged a blank stare.

  Finally, Mr. Lyman wiped his eyes with his napkin and spoke. “Now, boy, it’s not that I don’t credit your ambition and foresight, but your indenture runs another five years. It’s not just the cost of the mare, but five years of the mare’s board you’ll have to pay, never mind farriers’ bills and Lord knows what else. You’d be more prudent to wait and use your money to rent a place or buy a cow, or some sheep, or some tools. Something useful.”

  “I don’t want a cow. Sir.” Daniel’s words were soft, but clear.

  “Well, then, if you’re that set on having a horse when you leave, you’d do well to wait. Then you can have the full value of your wages without losing anything for that mare’s board. Get your horse then.”

  “I don’t want a horse. Sir.”

  Frowning, Mr. Lyman leaned forward. “Now, wait a minute, boy. Isn’t that what we’ve just been discussing?”

  “I don’t want a horse, sir,” Daniel repeated. “I want Ivy.”

  Ethan hovered in the empty barn, waiting for Daniel to emerge from the house. It seemed he’d been shut up with Mr. Lyman in the study for hours. Finally, Daniel came out. He pulled his cap low over his forehead, so Ethan could see only the grim line of his mouth.

  “What’d he say?” The question stuck in Ethan’s throat, but he had to ask it.

  Daniel padded through the barn. He stopped in front of Ivy’s stall, empty now that the mare was out to pasture with the cattle. He stood with his back to Ethan, his hands gripping the top edge of the waist-high partition. “Only that I’m a fool.”

  “But he’ll owe you the money when your time’s up. Why can’t he just give you Ivy instead?”

  Daniel’s knuckles whitened. “There’ll be no money for me, lad. He showed me the numbers in that black book of his—not that I could make any sense of ’em. He says I’ll be lucky if I’m not owing him when me time’s through.”

  “But how—?”

  “Breakage. Damages. Clothes and such.”

  “But he’s s’posed to give you clothes.”

  Daniel stretched his arms apart as far as he could. “Lad, ain’t you learned by now that ‘s’posed to’ don’t come that close to ‘is’ around here? He’s s’posed to give me one set’a clothes a year. What I get is . . .” He plucked at his ragged shirt and looked down at his broadfalls, whose cuffs stopped well above his ankles. “And if I’m not tending ’em proper, that’s me own loss, ain’t it, now? Though it’s the proper dandy I’d be if I had everything he’s got writ down in that book of his.”

  “What’re you going to do?”

  “Same’s always, I s’pose. Wait. Wait and see.”

  “Have you thought of what to do yet?” Ethan’s pitchfork quivered with its sopping load of manure. He heaved the burden to the top of the manure pile. A wave of heat rose from the exposed center of the pile and flapped at his face, matching the heat from the sun that scorched his neck and shoulders.

  “Maybe I would if you’d give me some peace to think, instead of asking me twenty times a day if I’ve thought of anything.” With a fierce grunt, Daniel plunged his own for
k into the pile as viciously as if he were stabbing a dragon to the heart.

  “You’re not thinking of stealing her, are you?”

  Daniel leaned wearily on his pitchfork. “I been thinking of naught else all week, lad. But then I think of getting caught, and I lose me nerve. It’d be safer if I hunt for her when I leave.”

  “But that’s not for five years!” The fork slipped in Ethan’s sweating hands, dumping its load onto Daniel’s toes.

  “What’s the point in me staying all of that now?” Daniel flapped his bare feet free of the dung. “No. I’ll go after her soon’s she’s sold.”

  “Won’t Mr. Lyman stop you? Your indenture—”

  “Maybe he’ll be glad to be rid of me. Maybe he’d not be thinking me worth the bother. Maybe it’d be different now.”

  “Different from what?”

  “From when I run away before.”

  “Oh.” Ethan stuck his fork into the pile and left it there. He rubbed his palms on the seat of his trousers. “What happened then?”

  “What do you think? He thrashed me and Silas half to death, he did.”

  “He beat Silas, too?” Ethan said, astounded.

  “Aye. It was two years or so after I come.” Daniel planted his fork in front of him and gathered his fists at the tip of the handle, where he propped his chin. “Silas lied, said he’d sent me on an errand. He thought maybe it’d give me time to get clear. But Lyman found me and dragged me back. After he’d done with me, it was Silas’s turn. His own son lying to him over a bit of Irish trash—that was too much for him, I fancy. Silas just took it without a word. And there was a bloody lot of it to take. He was so still afterward, I thought he was dead. Lyman did, too, I fancy. There was such a look on his face, I think he scared himself by what he done. He carried the lad inside and put him to bed. Silas couldn’t work for nigh on a week. His da never touched him after that, not that I saw, anyway. But Silas never gave him cause to, neither.”

  “But you and me, we’re just bound out. Silas is his son.”

  “I forgot. Your da don’t believe in thrashings, does he, now?” He lifted his cap and swiped his hair back. Sweat had turned his hair into rusty damp spikes that stuck to his forehead and temples. It stood up in greasy ridges before his cap flattened and hid it. “You never knew any lads that got thrashed by their own das?”