“Yes, sir. I got three.” He watched as Mr. Ben made three careful cuts around the muskrat’s tail and working from them turned the animal’s skin inside out over its head without cutting again except for the legs. “Gosh,” he said. “Isn’t that something? Mr. Ben, how did Charley know I’d quit? I was up there calling him and he just came home.”
Mr. Ben got up and went and picked up a flat board, about as thick as a shingle and narrowed toward one end. He put the skin over this so that it was stretched a little, and hung the board up in the screened part of the porch for the skin to dry. “I don’t know how he figures it out,” he said, coming back and starting on another muskrat. He threw the skinned one to Charley. “Some people eat muskrats,” he went on, “but I’m not hungry enough yet. Maybe we’d better ask Sharbee how he knows. Charley I mean. I have to go see him pretty soon, and you can go along and ask him.”
“Who is Sharbee, Mr. Ben?”
“His name’s not really Sharbee. It’s Shaw B. Atkinson, but everybody calls him Sharbee. He’s an old black man who lives back in the woods, up the road a way. If anybody knows how an animal knows anything, Sharbee’s the one. You just wait and see.”
“Yes, sir. You reckon I have time to skin my squirrels before I go out on the Pond?”
“I think so.”
Joey took the squirrels out of his game pocket, picked one out, laid it on the porch, and took out his new belt knife. So far, so good; but he didn’t know what to do next. He turned the squirrel over and over, and finally, seeming to recall that one started to skin animals (with the exception of muskrats) by cutting a slit along the belly, made a tentative slice at it. The skin was tough and had apparently been put on the beast with glue; he hacked and sawed and made a mess of it. Finally, covered with blood, hair, and confusion, he looked up and found Mr. Ben quietly laughing at him.
“I’m not very good,” he said.
“Give me one of the others,” Mr. Ben said, “and watch.”
Mr. Ben took the squirrel and made a slit on each side of the tail and cut through the tailbone. Then he stood on the tail, and taking the squirrel by its hind legs gave a steady pull. The squirrel peeled out of its skin like a man peels out of a sweater, leaving only a little skin over the shoulder, head, and chest which Mr. Ben peeled off over its head. Then he gutted it. “A nice young one,” he said. “We can eat it for breakfast. Give me the other one and I’ll skin that. You better go fishing.”
“Yes, sir,” Joey said, and handed over the other squirrel. He had watched Mr. Ben’s expert performance with great interest and wanted to try it himself, but the sun was pretty well down. He went into the house, put his gun in the corner of the living room, and went into the bedroom and put his casting rod together and tied the frog to the end of the line. Suddenly, as soon as he had finished all this, he began to tremble. He was at last about to try the fish; everything was ready; now that the long-awaited moment had come he had an attack of buck fever. He was deathly afraid that he would do something wrong and ruin his chances to catch the bass for all time to come, and he wished that Bud was with him for support. When he realized he was wishing this he stopped trembling, and suddenly was ashamed of himself for his scheming and the way he had treated Bud.
These various emotions, coming all together, confused him; he laid the rod down on the bed and his face grew hot. For a moment he stood there indecisively, almost making up his mind not to go. He felt mean and sneaky and cheap, wanting to catch the fish and not to catch it. Tears came to his eyes and he rubbed them away angrily and said, “Gosh hang it!” Then he picked up the rod and ran out of the house, past Mr. Ben busy at his skinning, and down the path to the wharf.
He got into the bateau and cast loose and paddled across the Pond. The western shore on his right, one of the short sides, was deeply shadowed now by the hill behind it. The breeze had dropped with the sun, and the long length of the Pond, stretching away on his left, was still, without a ripple. He stopped paddling and cast the frog, jerking the rod tip a little to see if it would kick. It kicked perfectly, and he wound it in and put the rod back on the bottom of the bateau. He began paddling again; he felt that everything was right, but got no satisfaction from the feeling. It was not as he had anticipated it, at all.
When he got to the right distance from the cypresses he carefully swung the bateau, put the paddle down silently, stood up, and made his cast. It was perfect. He began to reel in, jerking the rod tip just enough. The frog had moved only six feet before there was an eruption of water so loud and spectacular in the silence that he jumped and almost lost his footing; he jerked the tip up and was fast to the bass.
A swift, wild thrill of triumph scorched through him, so intense that he forgot everything else, and then he was too busy to think for a while. The bass was crafty and full of power; it made one long blind rush, burst out of the water, shook its head savagely, and went to the bottom. Joey couldn’t move it; he was terrified that it had tangled him around a sunken tree. He had read somewhere that when a fish did that, the way to stir it up was to keep a tight line and tap smartly on the rod, so now he drew his belt knife and rapped on the rod repeatedly, and the shocks traveling down the line got the fish into motion again. It ran toward him and, having got some slack, surfaced and threw its head about to shake out the hook. Joey frantically wound in line, almost weeping with anxiety, until he got rid of the slack, and then played the fish until it was exhausted and came in belly side up beside the bateau.
It was a very large bass, and must have weighed between twelve and thirteen pounds. Joey had to lay down his rod and use both hands on the landing net; the bass filled the live box, and after he had got the hook out of its jaw he sat down and stared at it. He was shaking from the excitement and the fear of losing it that had been in him, and now that he had it safely in the box he felt deflated and empty; the emotions that had confused him in the bedroom descended upon him again. He thought of Bud and his own maneuverings, the page torn out of the catalogue, and his face grew hot with shame. He got up stiffly, like a boy retreating from a fight, measured the length and depth of the fish with the paddle and cut notches on the paddle handle with his belt knife; then he scooped up the fish in the net and dumped it over the side. He didn’t even watch it lie for a moment in the water and then swim wearily away. He sat down and dropped his head into his hands and drummed his feet on the bottom of the bateau and wept.
They had squirrels for dinner; they were young, tender, and sweet, and Mr. Ben showed Joey how to make lyonnaise potatoes. Joey was quiet and subdued, for the affair of the bass had worn him out. When he had returned from the Pond Mr. Ben had taken one look at him and asked no questions, and Joey hadn’t volunteered any information. He was grateful to Mr. Ben for not talking about it.
They picked the small squirrel bones and took care of the dishes in companionable silence and went back into the living room and sat down by the stove. Mr. Ben filled his pipe and lit it, got out a pad, an old pen, and a bottle of ink, and wrote Joey’s mother a letter in a fine copperplate hand. When he had sealed the letter he looked at Joey and saw him nodding in his chair. “Maybe you’d better go to bed,” he said. “You’re tired.”
Joey’s head came up. “It’ll be cold in there.”
“We’ll get you a brick,” Mr. Ben said. “I meant to get one for myself.” He went out and returned with two bricks, which he placed on the flat top of the stove. “Soon as they get hot enough we can turn in.”
“Yes, sir,” Joey said, and sat looking sleepily at the two bricks on the top of the stove. “You ever killed a turkey, Mr. Ben?”
“Why, I’ve killed a couple. But that Hosiah Burt, that your father bought the place from … gentlemen, sir, he used to slay ’em. He’d find out where they were using, and he’d go there and just stand still for hours if he had to and wait for them to come to where he was. He’d get up against a tree and never move his feet or much of anything else. He’d stand there and move his head slow, looking this way and
that, and if they didn’t come his way that day, they’d do it the next or the day after that, or sooner or later. He practically turned into a tree, and that’s what it takes. A turkey’s got the sharpest eyes of anything; one little movement and they’re gone.”
“Yes, sir,” Joey said dutifully. Warm and half asleep, his drowsy mind pictured Hosiah Burt, who Mr. Ben had once said was a tall man with a beard, immobile as a statue flattened against an oak or a beech while a flock of turkeys fed through the woods toward him. Somehow Hosiah faded and Joey took his place; the beautiful birds, slim, wild, dark, gleaming with a shifting iridescence, came toward him scratching and pecking in the fallen leaves. One little movement, Joey knew, and they’d be gone, and he was still as a stone. They came closer, and then they were within range. An old gobbler, a great heavy bird with a long beard hanging from his chest, suddenly threw up his head suspiciously and Joey exploded into action. “Bang!” he shouted.
He and Mr. Ben both jumped in their chairs; both of them almost upset.
“Great day, boy,” Mr. Ben said, when they had righted themselves, “you took five years off my life.” He began to laugh. “I was talking about turkeys, and then …”
“I shot a big gobbler,” Joey said, shamefaced. “I reckon I was dreaming, Mr. Ben. I’m sorry I scared you.”
“I don’t mind being shot if you got him. There’s no eating like a turkey, and I haven’t had one for a long time.” He got up and went upstairs, and when he returned he had a little thin-sided box with him. He sat down and scraped the chalked lid of the box across the top of one of the sides. A series of short, clear, yelping sounds filled the room, and Joey’s hair stirred on his neck. He had heard domesticated turkeys make the same sounds, but this was wilder and more plaintive; it was a wild turkey itself. He stared at the box in fascination, and Mr. Ben said, “If you ever break up a bunch of turkeys, don’t run around and shoot just to be shooting. Don’t shoot unless you get one in range. If you don’t, keep quiet and come right back here and get me. When a bunch gets broken up they want to get together again, and they stand around and call. You get me, and we’ll go and see if we can call one up.”
“Yes, sir,” Joey said. “I sure will. Could I see the call, Mr. Ben?”
Mr. Bend handed it over. Joey was all thumbs with it, and couldn’t get a sound that had any resemblance to a turkey. Mr. Ben grinned at him. “Takes practice,” he said. “You can work on it now and then.” He took the box back and put it on the mantel behind the stove. “You’re too tired to be any good at it now.” He leaned over and spat on one of the bricks. It sizzled, and he nodded his head and got up and found an old newspaper in the kitchen cabinet and brought it back into the living room. He reached behind the stove and brought out a wooden instrument that looked like a big pair of pliers, picked up a brick with it, and, laying half the newspaper on the floor, put the brick on it and wrapped it up. “There, now,” he said. “Go and put that in your bed and jump in after it.”
Joey remembered the sizzle. “Won’t the paper burn?” he asked. “It’s awful hot.”
“It probably will be scorched brown by morning, but it won’t burn. I’ve been doing it for years.”
Joey picked up the brick. It was so hot that he had to run into the bedroom with it. He put it into the bed, came back, and undressed and put his flannel pajamas on. “Good night, Mr. Ben,” he said.
“Pleasant dreams. Oh, I almost forgot. Odie and Claude want you to go coon hunting tomorrow night. Want to go?”
“Yes, sir,” Joey said, and went back to the bedroom again and crawled into bed. The brick was wonderfully comforting; he pushed it around with his feet until all the cold, dank places were warm, and then brought it back to within a few inches of his stomach. It was like a little stove, and as drowsiness overtook him he thought of the turkeys again and then the bass; but this time it was something that had happened long ago, and somehow the meanness had been cleansed.
CHAPTER SIX
The day dawned clear and a little warmer, and there was a boisterous northwest wind; it was roaring in the walnut trees when Joey went out on the back porch to brush his teeth and wash his face with cold water in the enamel basin. Because he hadn’t washed his face since he’d left home, he went all out and used a little soap; he felt phenomenally clean and glowing when he came back in again. Mr. Ben was busily scrambling eggs on the stove and had already cooked the bacon. He pointed to the loaf of bread on the table, and Joey cut a few slices and toasted them one at a time on a long fork over the rear eye of the stove from which Mr. Ben removed the lid.
“It’s not a very good day for squirrels,” Mr. Ben said, as they finished eating. “The wind’s making so much noise in the woods I doubt if Charley could hear them very far. He hasn’t showed up, anyhow. Maybe Sam took him off somewhere himself.”
“Yes, sir,” Joey said. Since he’d got up he’d been thinking about the head of the Pond again, and now he had a good reason to go there; he could take his gun along and still-hunt if he felt like it. He decided to go. “I reckon I’ll go up toward the head of the Pond in the bateau.”
“Keep your eyes open up there,” Mr. Ben said. “You might see some turkeys. If you want to go to Sharbee’s with me, you get back in the middle of the afternoon.”
“Yes, sir, I’d like to go.”
“Maybe you ought to take a couple of sandwiches, then you wouldn’t have to come back so soon.”
“Yes, sir,” Joey said, and set about making two sandwiches from canned corned beef. He put them into an old paper bag, got his gun and fishing gear together, and went down to the wharf. The water was rough in the wind, with a running glitter of sun on it, but Joey stayed under the lee of the northern shore and had no trouble. The trees were tossing about in the woods; it was a crisp, cool day of low humidity, with a high, clear sky, that brings a feeling of well-being with it, and Joey sang to himself as he paddled up the shore. He didn’t fish; there was enough wind under the lee of the shore to swing the bateau around if he left it to its own devices, and he saw nothing to shoot at. When he reached the head of the Pond he hugged the east shore and turned into the mouth of the stream. He was among the cypresses, and as the swamp was low and under the wind, the silence of the place settled around him.
He didn’t have to get very far in before the strange, brooding quality of his surroundings took hold of him; among the close-growing cypresses, gliding over the dark, still water was like being in another and different world. He paddled slowly and silently, listening, not wanting to break it; it seemed to him that he had left the Pond and its familiar, everyday creatures behind him, and that at any moment some unknown creature, unknown and unguessed at, would appear. He followed the winding water farther and farther into the swamp, hearing nothing but the drip from the paddle as he brought it forward and the whisper of blood in his ears.
There was more Spanish moss now, hanging gray and ghostlike from the trees and reflected on the water; no other plant in the world would have been so fitting for such a place. The feeling of almost penetrating the mystery, more intense here than in the sunny woods with Charley, had come upon him again, and at one point he wished that he could stay here forever. He had lost track of time but his subconscious was aware of the tyranny of it; finally he decided reluctantly that he would have to turn back.
He let the bateau lose its forward way and moved to the other end of it. Now that he faced in the opposite direction he realized at once that he didn’t know the way out; the waterway that had seemed so easy to follow in its winding course was now only one of several, and there was nothing to distinguish between them in all the water around him. At first he thought only that he would be late to go with Mr. Ben to see Sharbee, and then he knew he might be much later than that. The neighboring Dismal Swamp was well fixed in local legend, and now he remembered stories he had heard of men who had got lost in its gloomy recesses and never got out again, of torchlight hunts for them finally given up. He had forgotten to keep the bow of the
bateau steady, and now he realized, as he watched a cypress in front of him, that it was turning slowly; he didn’t even know any more in which general direction he should be heading. The surrounding swamp, so fascinating in its difference a few minutes ago, had become a prison that held him with a remote and inimical detachment.
The strange blind panic that takes hold of people lost in the woods and makes them run in circles took hold of him, but here, surrounded by dark water and cypresses, he couldn’t run; he couldn’t engage in the violent physical action that releases the tension of the nerves and leaves the lost one sweating and exhausted but calm enough to think a little. Any violent action here would have him ramming into the trees or capsizing the bateau.
He had a few bad minutes in which panic ruled him so completely that he didn’t think of anything, but he was not given to hysterics and presently the panic began to subside. He came out of it sweating and trembling but sensible again, and assayed the situation. At best he would have to stay here until he was missed, probably at the onset of darkness, and Mr. Ben came looking for him; then a few gunshots between them would give his location and the location of his rescuer; gunshots, or even shouts, carried well around the Pond where it was so quiet. It occurred to him then that this water was flowing into the Pond, just as it was flowing out over the spillway; there must be a current, a small current but a definite one. He was excited by this thought and rather proud of himself for having it, and suddenly very hungry. He got out the sandwiches, tore off a small piece of the bag and put it in the water, and began to eat. He watched the floating paper. It moved very slowly, but it moved; by the time he had finished the first sandwich he had some idea of the direction he should be going. If there had been any wind the paper wouldn’t have been much use to him, and he realized that.
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