“He’s just a child, Mr. Hooper. I’m sure you know enough to teach him what he needs to start out with.” She smiled reassuringly. “You plan on having him go to school, don’t you?”
“’Course.”
“Start him with the letters, and then teach him the sounds. And soon enough he’ll be off to school where they’ll be equipped to teach him more,” she said.
“Hope he goes further with it than I done.”
“If you let him know how important it is to you, he’ll do just fine.”
“I aim to raise him up good. I sure do.”
“Well, you’re doing a fine job of it, Mr. Hooper. He’s healthy and happy, and he has all that he needs,” Gilda reassured him.
“I ain’t gonna let him make the same mistakes I done made. I’ll see to that,” he said fervently. “I’ll teach him right, I will.”
“I don’t doubt it,” she replied.
Jim cranked the Model T to life before Gilda climbed in to leave. He and Ellis waved goodbye from the porch as she gunned the automobile, leaving a cloud of dust in her wake. She headed down the drive, quickly becoming a small speck on the horizon, before disappearing completely.
Things changed when Ellis was old enough to begin school. Jim had not had the foresight to think much on how that would alter their lives. Up to then, they had lived in relative peace and comfort, isolated from the world around them on their own piece of mountain. Now he had to watch the boy go off alone each day to the schoolhouse. It nearly broke his heart to see him trudge away—a solitary figure against the morning sky—and know that his days of protecting the boy were over. Ellis would have to fend for himself from here on out. He would have to meet the cruel world alone during the hours he was away.
Jim was faced, for the first time, with what people were saying about him and his little son. No one dared say anything outright to Jim’s or Ellis’s faces, but the scandal plagued them still. Jim did his best to shield Ellis from all of it, which was a much easier task when he was just a little boy. Ellis appeared oblivious to it all, up to the point when he started his schooling. And perhaps the other children didn’t know exactly what made him different either, only that their parents eluded to him being a misfit, or a no-good, or said things that only touched upon the not-so-long-ago scandal. He knew that children had a strange way of picking up on the pecking order without really having to be told about it. So the older generation would not forget, and the younger generation followed in the elder’s footsteps, as tradition dictated.
Once, when Jim was laboring over a skillet of scrambled eggs for dinner, Ellis asked him, “Why don’t I got a mama like all them other boys and girls?”
Jim paused, thoughtful. How was he supposed to answer a question like that so a six-year-old would understand? “Well, Ellis, it’s ’cause Mama is with the good Lord in heaven. She done went on to live with them angels and such.” He brought the skillet over to the table and shoveled the eggs on the two plates that had been set out for them.
“Didn’t she love me?”
“Yeah, she loved you very much.” Jim sat down at the table with Ellis, suddenly downhearted.
“Why’d she go and leave me, then?”
“Don’t s’pose she woulda if she had a choice, Ellis. It’s the good Lord that says what there is to say on it. And he done took her ’cause he needed her there.”
“Didn’t the good Lord think we needed her too?”
“Well, now, it ain’t for us to know all there is to know. The good Lord, he knows it all, and someday we gonna understand why it gots to be this a-way. But your mama, she looks down on you, and she’s a-watchin’ over you, Ellis.”
“What was she like, Daddy?”
“She was the purtiest girl I ever laid eyes on. Had brown hair, and she was a tiny woman. Just come up to my chest, just so.” He held his hand up just below his breast to show Ellis how tall she had been. “And she was soft, and her voice was like buttermilk. She was always kind to everybody, even them that didn’t deserve it. And she liked the color red. And, aw, I loved her so.”
“Was she glad she’s gonna have me?”
“Never was happier. If you was to be a girl, she’d a-called you Ruby after your grandmother. ’Course you was named for my daddy when you was a boy.” He smiled to himself as a memory popped into his mind. “Why, she’d get to sewin’ and makin’ all them purty little things for you—a quilt and some dresses and such. One right after the other. And she woulda been a real good mama to you. She’d a rocked you and nussed you.”
“Did she see me at all? Afore she died, I mean?”
Jim was getting in deeper than he intended, and he paused for a moment before saying, “Just for a bit. She held you, and she cried. She was so happy to see you. And she tole me to take care with you, to raise you right.”
Ellis was a quiet child, but Jim knew that it was because his mind was always working. Jim could see it now, as the boy slowly ate his eggs with a puzzled expression.
He thought that perhaps he had addressed his son’s concerns sufficiently, until a few days later when Ellis came home early from school with a note pinned to his bibs.
Jim saw the dried blood under his nose and his dirty clothes and was alarmed. He rushed to him. “What happened to you, boy?” he asked, taking the note from him.
Ellis shrugged, looking down at the dirt beneath their feet.
“Says here you got in a fight,” Jim said.
Still, Ellis was silent.
“Well, what do you gotta say for yourself?”
“They was sayin’ I don’t got no mama,” Ellis mumbled.
Jim’s immediate reaction was outrage. He wanted to go thrash them himself. He knew that was not the answer, nor the fitting and proper thing to do. Instead, he took the opportunity to use it as a teaching moment. Instincts often led to trouble, and he wanted Ellis to be a master of himself, not a victim to others. He asked in a mildly disappointed tone, “So you beat on ’em?”
Again, the boy shrugged.
“You can’t go on beatin’ on somebody ’cause they say you ain’t got no mama, Ellis. That ain’t right.” He bent down and swept Ellis’s bruised hands into his. “These hands is for prayin’, and workin’, and playin’, and writin’, and…and doin’ arithmetic. They ain’t for hurtin’ others.”
“They work for defendin’ yourself, too, Daddy.”
“Defendin’ yourself from what, son?” Jim persisted. He was doing his best to understand Ellis.
“Them boys.”
“What’d them boys do to bring a beatin’ on ’em? ’Cause this here note says you was after them. Not the other way.”
“I tole ’em what you done said, Daddy, ’bout Mama and how she’s with them angels up in heaven and all. Why, they just laughed at me,” he said, his face burning with shame.
“Still ain’t no reason to beat on ’em,” Jim repeated.
“Well, now they circled me up, and they’d push a feller in to hit on me. And I’d beat on him back, and then they’d put another ’un in after me when I got that a-one. So I just kep on a-fightin’ ’em till the teacher come ’cause they wouldn’t let me be.”
“You tell it to the teacher?”
“Sure I did.”
“And what’d she tell you?”
“Teacher tole me I’s nothin’ but trouble since the day I’s born,” Ellis answered.
The direct way he said it seemed almost comical coming out of a child that was no taller than his thigh. Jim would have laughed if it hadn’t been for the nature of what he had said.
“Don’t matter what I’s to say, she wouldn’t believe me, Daddy. She says I’s a natural-born liar.”
“That ain’t so,” Jim said as he pursed his lips. “You ain’t never been a moment’s trouble, child. And you sure ain’t no liar. No, sir. Not my boy. You a Hooper, and Hoopers don’t tell no false tales.”
“Well, I ain’t a-goin’ back there. You can’t make me,” Ellis told his father as he gritt
ed his teeth with resolve.
Jim put his hands on Ellis’s shoulders. “Now, Ellis, what she done weren’t right. And I sure do wish you didn’t have to go on back there, but, son, you gotta get your learnin’.”
“But, Daddy…” Ellis began.
“Times like these, sometimes a man gotta swaller his pride and do what needs to be done, Ellis, even if it ain’t the easy thing to do. I’ll go on and have a talk with her, but no matter, you gotta go and get your learnin’. Understand?”
“Yes, Daddy,” he agreed with his head bowed.
His submission filled Jim with guilt. The last thing he wanted was for his child to have to go back and face those tormenters.
Jim squatted down so he could look Ellis in the eyes, so that he was at his level. “You’re a good boy, no matter what nobody says, Ellis. None of ’em knows you like I do. And someday with your learnin’, you gonna be a fine man. Just you wait.” He tried not to grow emotional as he told Ellis, “Just ’cause a body says somethin’ don’t make it so. You know who you are, and they can’t change that no matter what them cacklin’ hens is to say.” He tapped him on the chest. “What matters is what’s in here, son. Not a soul can take that away from you.”
A man of his word, Jim went with him to school. “You wait out here, Ellis. I’ll only be but a minute.” He left the boy sitting on the bottom step with his chin between his fists then he let himself into the schoolroom and approached Miss Frank with his hat in his hands. He was decent about it when he quietly suggested to Miss Frank that she was not exempt from having a past. He gently reminded her that he knew for a fact that she had been caught in a compromising situation with Merle Carter’s son only a few years previously in an elopement gone awry. He reminded her that not many people knew about the minor scandal, and it really would be too bad if it ever got out, her being the teacher and all. He left the school feeling as though he might be struck dead on the spot for extortion, but then, if saving Ellis meant he had to go to hell, it was a sacrifice he was willing to make.
Just to be sure that all was well, Jim stood outside of the schoolhouse at a distance, waiting and watching. He sat there within the recess of the woods, torturously idle, going over all of the work that was waiting for him back home. Finally, he saw the children file out and watched them take up playing. He spotted Ellis, so small and vulnerable, hanging back with his hands in his pockets, squinting his eyes against the sun. He stood apart from all of the other children, who were laughing and running and busy at amusing themselves. Occasionally the ball would roll over Ellis’s way, and he would kick it back out to the crowd that was playing with it.
Once, a few of the boys who were several years older than Ellis approached him. He kept his head down and did not respond to them. Miss Frank was sitting on the steps at the front door. She saw them begin to surround Ellis and sat there observing at first. Her casual manner made Jim angry as he watched.
He wasn’t sure that she would do anything, and he was determined that Ellis would not suffer through another bullying session. It had been his intent to stay out of it, but he could not tolerate watching while his poor child took another beating. He came out from behind the trees and drew close to the edge of the woods, prepared to intervene.
His mounting anger set his blood pressure pounding in his temples. “Try and lay a hand to him,” he muttered beneath his breath.
Just as he was ready to step out into the sun, Miss Frank slowly got up, taking her time. She walked over to the group of boys and spoke softly to them. Whatever she said was effective. The boys surrounding Ellis broke up and moved away. Miss Frank went back and sat down on her perch, and Ellis remained alone, standing by himself as he had been before. Jim relaxed a bit and stepped back into the trees. Maybe his threat had paid off after all.
When the school day was over, he came out to collect Ellis and walk him home. Ellis put his little hand into Jim’s big one, and they started off down the road toward home.
When they had gotten out of sight of the schoolhouse, Ellis looked up at Jim with a puzzled expression and asked, “Why you walking me home, Daddy? You never done it before.”
“Figured you might could use some company is all,” Jim answered.
He looked as if he were thinking this over. “And what was you doin’ out by the woods today?”
Jim stopped short, his eyebrows drawn together and a look of surprise on his face. “What do you mean?”
“You was a-standin’ over yonder in them trees over by the school,” Ellis said.
Jim thought for a moment and then replied, “You saw that, huh? Had some business in town and was just happenin’ by is all.”
“Oh,” Ellis said, taking Jim’s hand again and continuing to walk in rhythm with him. “I thought you was there lookin’ after me.”
Jim looked down at Ellis’s wide and innocent eyes and burst out laughing.
The boy looked utterly confused. “What got you so tickled, Daddy?”
“Don’t let nobody never tell you you ain’t got a brain in that there head of yours.”
“I won’t never, Daddy,” Ellis replied, the true meaning of Jim’s words lost to his youth.
Chapter 6
JIM HUNG HIS LONG UNDERWEAR up with clothespins on the line that was spread between two pine trees. He had a difficult time keeping up with the farm and the woman’s work too. He often put the laundering off for too long, but something had to give, he reasoned.
Ellis came tearing around the corner of the house with Lobo, his pup, right at his heels. He held his hands up before him, holding something up for Jim to see. “Daddy!” he cried. “Daddy!”
Sensing his urgency, Jim dropped the clothespins into the basket and rushed to Ellis. Held carefully in the palm of his hand was a rabbit, a small rabbit, its fur as fine as the fluff of cotton. It was just big enough to fit within Ellis’s boy-sized hands.
“What is it?” Jim asked.
“Oh, Daddy, he’s a-tremblin’ so!” Ellis lamented. “I found him out yonder in them bushes. That ole cat was a-prowlin’ ’bout, and I could see he’s up to no good. So’s I come up on him and shooed him off, and I found this little feller hid up. He’s hurt bad, Daddy.”
Jim inspected the baby rabbit and found the work of the cat upon his body. The rabbit had no chance of surviving the attack. His front paw was torn up, and as Jim looked him over, he realized that the rabbit had probably been hurt at least a day or more. The maggots had already found him. Jim could see the white worms darting their heads out now and again as he examined the poor animal.
“Yeah, son. He’s hurt bad.”
“We gotta hep him, Daddy.”
Jim’s heart hurt. He looked upon Ellis, with his big eyes fervent and full of faith, and he didn’t want to crush the child’s tender feelings. He looked back to the rabbit, a swell of pity rising within his chest.
“Ellis,” he began. “There ain’t nothin’ can be done for him. He’s soon to meet the maker.”
The boy grew outraged and at the same time began to cry. “We gotta hep him, Daddy! There’s somethin’ we can do! There’s somethin’!” he insisted.
“Ellis, he’s hurt too bad.”
Ellis shook his head. “Feel him. He’s shakin’ so. He must be awful afeared. He can’t hep hisself. If we don’t heal him, he can’t do it hisself. There must be somethin’. Can’t we take him on up to the doctor? I bet you he could save him, Daddy.”
“Son, this rabbit is gonna die. Sometimes there’s no savin’. Sometimes there’s only lettin’ go. The kind thing to do for this here animal is the lettin’ go.”
As Jim spoke, Ellis shook his head violently and whispered, “No, Daddy! No! You gotta fix him!”
“Ellis, dyin’ is part of livin’. And it’s this rabbit’s time to die. It’d be nothin’ but cruel to draw out his sufferin’. Some things can’t be fixed.”
“Oh, no!” He wept bitterly. “He never done no harm to nobody. Why’d that cat go on and do him this a-way?”
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“That cat don’t know no better. That’s what a cat does. They chase after whatever will be chased. It’s born in ’em. It ain’t nobody’s fault. It’s just the way of it,” Jim consoled. “Now go on and put that rabbit down and leave it.”
Ellis pulled the rabbit up to his chest and held it close. “I can’t, Daddy.”
“He’s hurtin’, Ellis. Leave him be. Let him go on. Put him down; leave him in peace now.”
“I can’t leave him to die alone,” Ellis whimpered. “Not alone.” He trudged dejectedly over to the porch and sat upon the steps, holding the baby rabbit in his cupped hands, shedding tears.
Jim watched him for a while and then went and sat next to him. By and by, the rabbit died.
“He’s in a better place, son.”
He and Ellis took a shovel and dug a hole out by the barn and placed the little creature in it. They covered it with dirt and stood quietly side by side for a time.
The boy woke Jim up sometime in the wee morning hours. It was still dark out, and Jim did his best to fight the bleary disillusionment that confused his brain as he was pulled from a deep sleep. He rolled over and sat up on the edge of the bed, rubbing his face briskly. “What is it, son?”
Ellis leaned into Jim, pressing himself against his chest. “Daddy, I don’t feel so good,” he said, and then he promptly threw up down the front of Jim’s long underwear and the side of the bed.
Jim refrained from cursing, although that was his first inclination. He jumped up, trying to figure out what he should do. His reactions were delayed, and he couldn’t seem to formulate a plan of any kind. Finally, he took Ellis by the hand, led him into the main room, and sat him in the rocking chair. He stoked the fire and went about getting water in the basin so that he might wash Ellis’s face.
“Keep this here so’s if you get sick again,” he said, placing a bowl on Ellis’s lap. Then he went about cleaning himself up and proceeded to change the bedding in the bedroom.
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