With

by Donald Harington

  She had only been able to look at him with wonder, trying to understand just what an in-habit was.

  Yowrfrowr had gone on grinning. Now if you’ll hold still, he had said, my in-habit would like to climb up on the back of your in-habit.

  You’re as silly as you look, she’d said, and had run away from him.

  Now she perceived that the man had gone, perhaps back to the truck for another piece of furniture, and she came out of hiding. Her hunger pangs were getting the better of her, and she was nearly tempted to turn one of those chickens into a ghost. But she knew all the chickens personally, although they had never exchanged names or made any attempt to communicate beyond Hreapha occasionally beseeching them to stop defecating all over her favorite lying-places.

  She went up to the house and discovered to her delight that he had left out a bowl of her favorite kind of commercial chow on the porch. So he knew she was there! He was going to feed her! This would be ideal, to share the premises with him without any servitude to him, or any ill-treatment from him, and yet retain the right to be regularly provided for. She decided that when he came back again she would say “Hreapha!” at least once, just in gratitude. She licked the bowl clean.

  But he did not come back. She waited a long time and then took a hike the harsh mile down the mountain to the place where he customarily left his pickup, but it was not there. She supposed he had gone back to Stay More for yet another load. Returning up the mountain trail, stepping gingerly along the ledge where not even goats could step and telling herself not to look down, she couldn’t help looking down at the sound of some familiar cackling, and she noticed, far down below, a whole flock of her feathered friends from the old place. Looking closer, she saw the smashed crate that had been their container in the treetop. Brainy as she was, it didn’t take her long to surmise that he must have accidentally dropped a crate of the chickens while negotiating the treacherous trail.

  It took her a while, more than a while, to find a way to get down there. But she did, and announced to the chickens that she intended to shepherd them to their new home. Of course they couldn’t understand her language, but she went on communicating, reassuringly, telling them that her great-grandfather on her mother’s side, whose name was Yiprarrk, had been a sheep dog, and knew how to herd the animals and get them to move in the desired direction. She thus had inherited at least a semblance of the ability to herd creatures. She went up behind a big fat hen and snapped “Hreapha!” and sure enough the hen moved in the desired direction, although casting Hreapha a malevolent and supercilious look. There was a rooster who responded to Hreapha’s commands by attempting to rise up and stab her with his spurs, screaming all the while in a way that damaged her ears, and she practically had to get into a cockfight in order to convince him to accompany his harem.

  It was slow work. All the rest of the afternoon was consumed in trying to get the birds moving in the same direction, up through the dark woods to the place where the remains of the trail could be picked up and they could march more smoothly toward their new home. A few stubborn hens ran the wrong way and she had to chase them down and pretend to bite them in order to get them turned around. She had shouted “Hreapha!” so many times that she was perishing of thirst. Surely Grandpa Yiprarrk had not had to work so very hard.

  But she was permitted the elation of job satisfaction when finally, as evening came on, she managed to get all fifteen of the hens (and even that rooster) to the yard of the henhouse, where the sight of their former companions cheered them up so much they would have apologized to Hreapha if they could have. Although the henhouse looked as if a strong wind might blow it down, it was still usable, and inside it the former owner had attached wicker baskets lined with straw to the walls, which served as nests for the laying hens. Hreapha could see into one of the lower ones and was pleased to notice that it already contained an egg, which, after all, was what hens were supposed to do.

  Hreapha did not understand any of the varied clucks, chirps, squawks, cackles, chuckles or chirrs with which the chickens communicated, but she managed to deduce that the newly arrived hens were inquiring of the already-settled hens about the possibility of drinking-water, a possibility that Hreapha herself needed to settle at once. One of the established hens peeped or piped an answer, and led her sisters a short distance up the hillside to a tiny building, just a shed of two sloping roofs and nothing else, which covered a spring emerging from the earth. The overflow of the spring collected in a small pool large enough for Hreapha and the chickens to jointly slake their thirst.

  She was glad to know of the existence of that tiny springhouse. Going inside, she discovered how cool it was in there. The low temperature helped to freshen her body after its exertions, and she was so comfortable she lay down beside the spring and went to sleep. Not one of the chickens had made any attempt to thank her for helping them find their way home, but she would discover, in the days and months ahead, that they were all extremely polite and friendly to her, and they made an effort to refrain from defecating on her favorite napping spots.

  In fact, the very next day, when the man had still not returned, and Hreapha could not devise a method for breaking into the house to get at the bags of commercial dog chow (there was a missing window-pane but it was too high for her to leap through), a chicken appeared at the patch of grass where Hreapha was lying, sat down, stared Hreapha in the eye, clucked, and then stood up and walked away, leaving an egg behind. Hreapha studied the egg. She was almost certain that the hen intended it as a gift. She was touched. Hreapha had never eaten an egg. Yowrfrowr had once explained to her the meaning of “egg-sucking dog,” which was often considered an insult, he said, but it was quite possible, he assured her, to puncture an egg with your teeth and then suck the contents out of it. He himself had not tried it, but he knew from other dogs that it was delicious, although a dog who developed a taste for eggs was considered worthless at guarding the henhouse and therefore was customarily shot. Yowrfrowr had said, Still, I would much rather be an egg-sucking dog than a shit-eating dog. And he had also told her about coprophagy, which was commonplace among certain malnourished dogs and probably, she realized, accounted for their bad breath.

  “Hreapha!” she called after the generous hen in a way meant to express her thanks, and then she punctured and sucked the egg, which constituted her only victuals for the day, since she could not bring herself, as the chickens did, to scavenge for worms and bugs and, Hreapha noticed, the early lettuce that was beginning to appear in the soil of the vegetable garden the man was attempting to start.

  Night came again, and still the man had not returned. To amuse herself, for she had absolutely nothing else to do, she tried to imagine what was keeping him. She even imagined the worst: his truck had fallen off the mountain. Such things happened. Maybe, she conjectured, he had consumed too much of the beverage that made him stagger and had actually flown over the moon, or even suffered an early demise. Yowrfrowr had told her that just a few years previously men had actually landed on the moon, but not because they had been loaded up on spirituous beverages. You can’t do it, he assured her. But you can certainly drink enough to bring about your death. She imagined what life would be like for her here if he was truly dead and she was alone but for the chickens. Possibly, given time, she would find a way to get inside the house and into those bags of commercial chow. Or possibly she would just have to become a wild dog, a feral dog, howling at the moon. It was not a happy thought but it was not outside the realm of possibility. But no, she could not imagine life without human company, and she knew she’d probably have to go back to Stay More and hope to find somebody who needed her. The trouble was, there were so very few people still living in Stay More.

  Thus, despite whatever revulsion and bitterness she had sometimes felt for him, her heart leapt up and her tail began oscillating crazily when she detected, shortly after dawn of the following day, his imminent arrival. Despite her resolve to keep herself hidden from him, she could not h
elp shouting “Hreapha! Hreapha!” joyfully, and dancing in circles.

  He was coming up the trail with yet another piece of furniture on his back. What was it? No, it was not furniture. And it was not exactly on his back, but draped over his shoulder. As he came nearer, and she continued calling her name in exuberant greeting, she perceived that the furniture was a person, a small person with long light hair, a little female person.

  At the moment of this perception, he took the person down off his shoulder and stood her on her feet and said to her, “Look, here comes our doggie!”

  And she ran to join them.

  She danced around them, jumping up and down continually, her tail going a mile a minute, her voice announcing her name over and over. But almost at once she saw that the little female person, the charming girlchild, was extremely unhappy. Hreapha could smell the girl’s unhappiness, and her fear and her panic.

  “Down, Bitch,” he said, and she stopped dancing. Then he addressed the child, “She shore aint much to look at, is she? But she’s the smartest dog ever there was. Now I aim to let ye walk on the rest o’ the way to our house yonder. I don’t reckon you’ll try to run away, now will ye? Just wait till ye see what-all I’ve got for you.”

  And then, with him leading the way and the girl following slowly behind, her back bent and her head down, and Hreapha trotting last, they made their way up to the house.

  “Why, lookee here,” he said, “I do believe all our chickens has done come home to roost. We’ll shore have all the eggs we can eat and plenty of fried chicken besides. And that rooster will get us out of bed in the morning.” He opened the door, and they all went inside the house. Hreapha could see the opened bag of commercial chow through the door to another room, and she couldn’t wait for him to dole her out some of it. “Now you jist sit here on the davenport and get comfy,” he said to the girl, “and I’ll make a little fire in the stove to keep ye warm. Are you chilly? And then I’ll scare us up some breakfast. How bout some pancakes and syrup?”

  The girl did not answer.

  “Jam or jelly or molasses instead of syrup?” he wanted to know. But she would not answer. “I reckon I could run out and see if our hens has laid any eggs yet, and fry you up a bunch of eggs, if you’d druther have ’em.” The girl made no response. “Listen, sugar, you got to eat you some breakfast and keep up your strength,” he said. “I’m starving myself.”

  The girl did not answer, so he disappeared into the kitchen and Hreapha listened to him banging around some pots and pans in there. Hreapha studied the girl, who looked as if she wanted to jump up and run out the door. Hreapha tried to understand who she was and what she was doing here. Could she possibly be his daughter perhaps, long lost and now home? Granddaughter, even? Was she conceivably a stray he had found somewhere, or who had followed him home? Part of Hreapha felt a certain jealousy, if not resentment. She knew she was going to have to share the place with this girl. But part of her felt a powerful sense of attraction and protection. The child was lovely, and innocent and uncorrupt, and potentially loads of fun. Hreapha wagged her tail and moved closer to the girl and nuzzled her ankle.

  The girl spoke her first words. “Get away from me!” And she kicked Hreapha, who whimpered and backed off.

  Chapter ten

  And he wapped a wag awound her eyes so she could not see. And he knotted it too tight. And the twuck started up and she could not tell where they were going. And she could not bweathe. And then he. And the twuck went on and on. O why is this happening why why why? And then he finally started to talk. “I don’t aim to hurt ye,” he said. And he said. He said. She could not see him in the dark. And she knew it was him. It was him who. But why? The twuck went on and on. Bouncy bouncing bouncy. And she tried to cwy but could not. Why not? She wanted to cwy but the gag in her mouth kept her from cwying, yeah, she would cwy except for the gag. But she could not cwy with her eyes either. And why? And she was just too scared to cwy. And no, and no, she had not cwied since she was three years old. A long time ago. Why? And she heard him talk again. “Are you cold?” And she would not nod or shake her head. She had stopped sweating. All that skating had made her sweat, was why she’d skated out onto the balcony to catch the breeze. And she heard him talk again. “Here, let me put this blanket on ye.” And she felt the blanket on her, which she did not need because she was still all wet with sweat and the twuck’s heater was running and it was hot. And she was too scared to cry. And in the dark she reached with her hand to feel for where the door was, and she reached for the door handle. And she heard him talk again, heard him yell, “Hey now! Don’t do that! Take your hand off there!” And felt him reach across and grab her hand. “You don’t want to be trying to open the door, honey. If you was to open the door and you was to try to jump out, it would kill you!”

  And the twuck went on and on. The woad was wough, the wough woad went up and down, the woad started to climb, and it climbed and climbed and she wondered if maybe they were on their way to Heaven, and maybe she had already died and he was some kind of angel who was taking her to Heaven, and there really was a God and God lived at the end of this climbing woad. Yes. But then she thought no, no, he was not an angel but the Devil and he was not taking her to Heaven but to Hell because she had committed the terrible sin of vanity, too gosh proud of herself because her skating made all the other girls look like clumsy yo-yos, which they were. None of them could skate backward as she could, no. Nor do heel-to-heel spins. She put them all to utter shame and now she was paying the price for her dazzle. That was why. And the twuck stopped. And she heard him talk again. “Now, sugar, I’m a-taking off the gag, though I cain’t take off the blindfold just yet.” And he took the gag out of her mouth. “You can scream if you take a notion, but won’t nobody hear ye. We’re way off away from everybody.” And she did not scream. She could not cry and she could not scream. And the twuck started to move again and it climbed and climbed and bounced and bounced and she could not imagine that there was a woad anywhere in the world that climbed and turned and twisted and bounced like this woad. And she heard him speak again, talking very loud over the sounds the twuck was making. “You can talk now, sweetheart. You can tell me your name.” And she could not talk. No talk. She would not talk. “My name’s Sugrue Alan. You can call me Sugrue. Can you say ‘Sugrue’?” And she would not say anything. “I reckon I’ve gave ye a bad fright, but there aint nothing you need to fear from me. Like I told ye the other day, me and you are fated to spend the rest of our lifes together, and I mean to love ye more’n you’ve ever been loved. So I sure do hope that you can get over your scare and learn to be mine and—” His voice was lost behind a horrible sound, a scraping grinding wrenching banging. She jumped. “Well, there went the goldarn muffler!” he said, and drove on, the twuck motor so noisy that surely God could hear it if He was anywhere, but He was not.

  And the woad went up and up and up and then the twuck stopped, the noisy motor went off, and then she heard him speak again. “This here’s as far as the trail can reach. Good thing too on account of they’s just a drop or two of gas left. I reckon I’ll just take off your blindfold now, but you won’t be able to see nothing, out there in the dark. We’re nearly home but there’s still the worst mile to go and we caint do it in the dark, so we might as well just get cozy here in the truck and wait until daylight, when we can see to find our way along the rest of the trail. I promise ye you’ll be tickled to pieces with your new home as soon as you can lay eyes on it, come dayspring.” And she would not speak, nor move, nor see, nor feel, nor be. “You might as well go to sleep, honey,” he said to her. “You could stretch out here on the seat, or even put your head in my lap or whatever you want to do to get comfy.” And it was late at night, and then it was later at night, and she was very sleepy, very sleepy, but she could not sleep without Paddington. She really really needed to sleep but she could not sleep without Paddington. Of course she wanted her mommy but she wanted her bear even more. She could sleep without her momm
y but she could not sleep without her bear. And she began to think that she might never see him again.

  “Here, no wonder you caint sleep with them there skates still on your feet. Let’s take ’em off.” And he got out of the truck and came around to her side and opened the door and lifted her feet and untied the skates and removed them and tossed them into the back of the truck. “Don’t reckon you’d ever have no use for ’em no more, which is a shame, the way you was flying around that roller rink looked like you’d been born on skates.”

  So then yes maybe he was the Devil punishing her for her vanity at the skating rink. “I’m sorry,” she whispered.

  “What’s that?” he said. “You said something, didn’t ye? I was afraid you’d turned deaf and dumb on me. Did you say your name is Sarah?”

  But she could not say anything else. He got back into his seat and talked a while more and told her she had better try to sleep and he said sleep so many times that the sound of the word put him to sleep. He even snored. She waited a while and then she gently opened her door and got out. Behind the twuck must have been the woad they had come up on. If she could follow that woad and get down there before he woke up, she would be free. But it was so dark, and nothing scared her more than the dark did, and the gravel hurt her feet in her sockies and worst of all she hated the woods. She walked just a few steps beyond the truck before she realized she was already lost, and there were monsters out there in the woods waiting for her who were much worse monsters than he was.

  She returned to the truck, glad to be back, but could not sleep. It was very cold now. She wrapped the blanket tightly around herself. She imagined her mother somewhere crying. She imagined Kelly and Rebecca and Gretchen and Beverly still wide awake at the slumber party, maybe crying too, and Kelly’s party was ruined and maybe the parents came and got the other girls and took them home. And Grandma and Grandpa were at Mommy’s house with the lights on and staying up all night waiting for her to come home. And if all those people could be staying awake there was no reason for her to sleep.