The Road From Gap Creek: A Novel Hardcover

by Robert Morgan

  I think Troy discovered his talent for art from drawing that dog. He’d made pictures before, in school and in Sunday school. He could draw birds and color them with crayons. He made pretty cardinals and blue jays. He made a picture of Old Nell the horse and a rainbow trout he caught in the Lemmon’s Hole on the river. One time he borrowed Papa’s carpenter’s pencil, the big flat kind, out of the toolbox, and Papa was so mad he smacked his butt. He drawed clouds and an airplane that he’d seen fly over.

  But there was something different about the pictures of Old Pat Troy made. You could say it was the love he felt for the dog that made him draw better. Or you could say it was the practice day after day, in picture after picture, that made him better. Or you could say that as he got older he learned more about art. But in the pictures of Old Pat you could see a real likeness, a living likeness, especially after he started coloring the pictures with crayon, with the gray in just the right places and the black and brown blending into tan just the way a German shepherd’s coat does.

  But the likeness was more than the color. It was in the way he drawed the eyes so you could see the round shape between the lids and the black spot in the middle with light reflected off it. And the lips. Troy studied the dog’s lip and drawed it so you could see just where it drooped and where it held firm. He drawed the shine on the nose and the curve of the nostrils. You wouldn’t think a boy of twelve or thirteen could do that. And he got the slope of the shoulder just right so you could feel the bones and muscles under the fur when you looked at the drawing.

  As Old Pat got bigger we found she had one bad habit. She got excited if she heard a car or truck coming on the road. She didn’t pay much attention to a horse or a mule passing. But the rat-tat-tat of a car or the groaning of a truck woke her up if she was sound asleep, and she’d run out to the road and leap at the vehicle and run alongside the tires.

  “That dog is going to kill herself one day,” Papa said.

  “No she ain’t,” Troy said.

  “She’ll run under a wheel and be crushed.”

  German police dogs don’t bark much, and she never did. But even if she was in the orchard or in the pasture, sure as she heard a car coming, she run and yelped and jumped at the tires. There was something about the sound of a motor that made her act crazy.

  “If you don’t break her of that, she’ll be killed,” Velmer said.

  When Old Pat run after a car Troy called to her. We all called to her, but it didn’t do no good. Luckily there wasn’t many cars on the road then. One time I come around the corner of the house by the cherry tree. Troy was setting on the edge of the porch holding Old Pat in his lap and he was talking to her. “What if you was to run after a car and be crushed?” he said. “What if you was to die and I had to dig a hole and bury you?” He didn’t know anybody was listening. “Think how I’d feel if you was in heaven and I was still here,” he said. He went on talking like that and I backed away and went around by the hemlocks cause I didn’t want to embarrass him. I reckon he talked to that dog all the time just like she was another person.

  IT WAS FUN watching Old Pat grow up day by day and week by week, almost like watching a baby grow, except a dog grows faster, seven times faster they say. And she drunk milk from the saucer like a cat does and eat table scraps and bread soaked in bacon grease. Her legs stretched out and her feet got big and clumsy. “You can tell she’ll be a big dog by the size of her feet,” Papa said.

  Picking up that dog and holding her in your lap and looking into her eyes, you could think she was almost human, except for her willingness to always be happy, to run wherever you went, to come when you called her. She was a smart dog and learned her name and knowed all of us in the family. But it was Troy she liked best. Wherever he went, whether it was down by the branch to check his rabbit gums or in the orchard or up on the mountain to hunt with his .22 rifle, she followed him.

  I don’t reckon a police dog has a nose like a hound dog. She wasn’t that kind of hunting dog. But she could run after mice or rabbits in the field, jumping above the weeds to see them, following them by sight. She could see and hear things better than any dog I ever seen. Along in October after Troy got her, it come a warm spell, unusual for the time of year. Leaves was already turning, and goldenrod was blooming along the road and edges of the fields. But every day it seemed to get warmer.

  “This must be Indian summer,” Velmer said.

  “Indian summer is later,” Mama said.

  “It’s Indian summer when the leaves are red and yellow,” I said.

  “That’s not what Indian summer means,” Papa said. “In the old days Indians attacked the settlements before bad weather set in. That’s why it’s called Indian summer.”

  Every day it seemed to get hotter and one Saturday it was hot as July. Because of the warm weather the garden had kept bearing. The late tomato vines was still loaded. Mama said it was a good day to pick them and put them on the porch to ripen so she could can them next week.

  As soon as I went out into the garden to gather tomatoes with Troy I was already broke out in sweat. Because it was late summer there was bull nettles and saw briers along the rows, and you had to watch out and not prick your fingers as you picked. Old Pat followed us and run around chasing grasshoppers and then a butterfly. “Here, Pat,” Troy said, and the dog come over and watched us pick. For a while.

  Velmer come out to help us, but instead of picking ripe tomatoes he picked little green ones and throwed them at me. Velmer always did have a mean streak in his teasing. Them green tomatoes was hard and stung when they hit.

  “You quit that,” I said.

  “Ain’t doing nothing,” Velmer said.

  He was too big to be teasing me like that. He’d already dropped out of school and was helping Papa build houses around the lake. But that didn’t stop him from teasing me. “I’m helping you pick maders,” he said.

  He hit me on the butt and he hit me on the legs and on the back of my neck. When Velmer got started teasing you it was hard to stop him. I looked around for something to throw back at him. I didn’t want to waste a good ripe tomato.

  The next row over from the row of tomatoes was the old summer squash vines. Some of the squash had not been picked and growed warts and necks long and curved as yellow geese. I looked for a squash to pick up and throw at Velmer and seen one that was so rotten you could almost see through it, like it had turned to jelly. I picked it up and throwed it at Velmer. I meant to hit him on the chest or shoulder. But I must have throwed higher than I aimed for that rancid squash hit him in the face and busted into a thousand pieces. Rotten squash sprayed all over the place and seeds and pieces stuck to his cheeks and nose like it had been a cream pie. Velmer was so took aback he stumbled and then spit seeds out of his mouth and wiped his cheeks. “Damn you,” he said, and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.

  “You cussed,” I said, and laughed fit to die, and Troy laughed too. Seeing Velmer with rotten squash stuck all over his face made you have to laugh. Velmer was so mad he stomped off brushing squash from his hair and ears. Old Pat danced alongside him, excited because we was laughing so.

  That morning we picked only half the tomatoes in the terrible heat. We was going to pick the rest after dinner, and Mama was going to help us. But it must have been two o’clock by the time we washed the dinner dishes and went back out to the garden with our baskets. It was so hot you shivered. A dark cloud had rose from the south over Cicero Mountain. Mama pointed to the yellow light around the edges of the cloud and said that meant it was going to hail. I’d heard her say that all my life. A yellow light around a storm cloud meant hail.

  We started picking, hoping to get as much done as we could before the storm hit. But the cloud moved higher and we could hear rain on the mountain across the river. The edge of the cloud straight above us was blinding white. Lightning licked out and clawed the side of the Cicero Mountain and thunder split the air. Rain advanced like an army across the river and through the fields
and then into the pasture. Old Pat yelped and whimpered and run around us. Thunder always scares a dog.

  “Here, Pat,” Troy said, and tried to calm her.

  “Let’s pick all we can,” Mama said.

  I tore tomatoes off the vines. Didn’t matter if I broke stems and branches since it was the end of the season anyway. The first drops hit my face cold as nickels and quarters. The drops was so heavy they stung my skin.

  “Let’s carry the baskets to the porch,” Mama said as thunder crashed down right on top of us. I picked up a basket and started toward the house. But we’d waited until it was too late. The cold drops hit my face and shoulders like they was shot from a gun, and then I felt something tap the back of my head. White pellets fell all around me, hitting the tomato vines, first the size of aspirin tablets and then big as marbles and mothballs. Old Pat run around yelping and growling, as white hailstones hit her on the nose and back and bounced on the ground.

  Troy throwed down his basket of tomatoes and picked up the dog and started running. I followed, carrying my basket and his, but hail hit my back like a hundred whip lashes. “Lord a mercy,” Mama said.

  The ground was already white and it looked like a ton of mothballs and ice-coated grapes and plums was falling. Hailstones bounced and rolled and banged my head like rocks throwed from the top of a barn. When we got to the hemlock trees Mama said to leave the baskets there under the trees and make a run for the porch. I put my arm over my face as I run. Hail whizzed and whistled and I thought that might be the way a soldier felt with bullets flying all around. It felt like the sky and the whole world had collapsed and was falling on top of me.

  Hailstones piled on the steps made it hard to step on them. I slipped and hit my knee and had to hold on to the rail. Hail jumped and bounced on the porch and ricocheted off the wall. Troy held Old Pat and the dog yelped and squirmed, so scared she couldn’t be still.

  “We’ll have to go in,” Mama said. Mama didn’t say nothing when Troy brought Old Pat inside.

  In the house you could hear the hail banging on the tin roof and hitting the walls and windows. A blast of thunder shook the house and rattled the window frames. Old Pat kept on whimpering. That was the first time I seen what a sensitive dog she was. She was as high strung in her nerves as a cat.

  We set down and I seen hailstones on the hearth where they’d come down the chimney and was melting in the dark, making pools on the hearth. The whole mess would have to be cleaned up before we could start a fire. “Shhhh,” Troy said to Old Pat to get her to quit whimpering.

  Next thing I noticed was that the knock of hail on the roof and walls had slowed down and then stopped. I got up and looked out the window and seen it was lighter. It was still raining, but the storm was passing. Even while I was looking the rain stopped, just as fast as it had come.

  When we stepped out on the porch I seen that some of the tomatoes we’d laid there in the morning looked like they’d been pecked by chickens. The hail had made chips in their skin. Hail was melting on the porch and in the grass. It felt like the grass was full of marbles when you stepped on it.

  Old Pat was so excited she yelped as we walked toward the garden. The baskets of tomatoes under the hemlocks was OK, but Mama gasped when we got to the edge of the garden. The tomato vines was all knocked down and the tomatoes looked beat to pieces. The bean vines was just rags pushed down into the mud.

  “At least we got some tomatoes,” Mama said.

  I NEVER DID understand why men was attracted to me. For I was never much attracted to them. Or I guess I was and I wasn’t. It was a kind of surprise when I was about thirteen and just beginning to show breasts and to have hips you could notice that I seen men watching me. It was a little scary to catch men and big boys always looking at my legs. My legs was just beginning to get their shape then. I was a skinny little thing when I was a girl, and the dresses we wore in those days went down to your ankles almost. But I’d see men looking at my ankles and calves. Men always look at a woman’s legs first. I reckon they can’t help it.

  When you’re a little girl it don’t occur to you how fascinating a woman’s butt is to a man. And even if it did, you wouldn’t be able to talk about it. But it was shivery to find a man studying your behind, especially when you walked, like they couldn’t take their eyes off it. And if you caught them looking, most turned away, like they was ashamed of enjoying the sight of your rear end. But some didn’t care at all. They’d look you right in the eye and grin. The bold men was the scariest. They’d stare at you like they could see everything under your dress, like you didn’t have no clothes on at all.

  There is a way in which men just seem like animals, compared to women. Most of the time all men think about is their bellies. The saying is that the way to a man’s heart is through his belly, and I reckon that’s true, as far as it goes. Men will set down at the table and eat like hogs, they will. And when nobody ain’t looking they’ll go out in the garden and eat four ripe tomatoes or half a watermelon that has cooled overnight and still has dew on it.

  That was something I learned from Mama. When she had to ask Papa something or explain something that was awkward, she’d wait until he’d finished a good meal and was feeling warm and relaxed, and then she’d ask him. One time I wanted to go on this trip to Asheville to see the movie Ben-Hur. Lewis Shipman was taking his big old logging truck, and a bunch of younguns was riding in the back to Asheville to see the movie. There was no talking in movies then, but people still liked to see them.

  It costed a dime to go to the movie and I didn’t have no dime. I’d have to ask Papa for the dime and that was hard enough. But I had to beg him to let me go to Asheville with all the others and that was the hardest part. I was only thirteen and he wouldn’t let me go out with boys. He said a girl my age had no business messing around with boys. If he thought I was going on the trip to be with boys he wouldn’t let me go. But there wasn’t nothing to do but ask him. It was Friday, the day before Lewis Shipman was taking the kids to Asheville and I had to find out.

  Mama said I could go as far as she was concerned, but I had to ask Papa. He was working on a summer cabin down at the lake for cotton-mill folks from Spartanburg. It was the way he made money to pay for our place.

  “I can give you a dime, but you’ll have to ask him if you can go,” Mama said. Mama always had a little money from selling eggs and butter down at the store.

  “I’ll ask him as soon as he gets home,” I said. I was helping Mama shell peas for supper.

  “No.” Mama said. “Wait.”

  “I can’t wait; they’re going tomorrow.”

  “No. Wait until after supper,” Mama said. “When Hank comes home he’ll be tired and on edge after working all day and walking home from the lake. After he has eat a good supper he’ll feel better and might agree.”

  That was the first time I seen how smart Mama was at handling Papa. She was so calm and good natured you wouldn’t think she was that clever. But she’d lived with Papa a long time and knowed how to persuade him. It was a lesson to me about how to get along with a man. But even more, it was a lesson about women, about what a woman has to do to get along with a man.

  Since it was Friday and payday, Mama fixed a good supper of peas and corn bread, chicken and dumplings. She had a few dried apples from last fall and made a pie. And when Papa got home she made a pot of fresh coffee. Nothing makes a meal perfect as apple pie and good strong coffee at the end. When Papa had eat and went into the living room to read the paper I followed him and told him Lewis Shipman was taking his truck to Asheville to the movie.

  “Movies ain’t good for you,” Papa said.

  “This is a movie about Jesus,” I said. I told him about the novel Ben-Hur. Papa liked to read the Bible and the newspaper and religious tracts. But he never did read novels that I knowed of.

  “Who else is going?” Papa said.

  “Just a bunch of kids, Fay Powell, Lorrie Summey, and a few others.”

  Papa kept stu
dying his paper, but when he looked up I knowed I had won. When he give in he always acted like he hadn’t give in. He never did want nobody to think he was easy to persuade. He took a square of tobacco out of his pocket and cut off a corner. “You can’t go unless Troy goes,” he said.

  “It will cost a dime,” I said.

  Papa reached into his pocket and took out a shiny fifty-cent piece and put it in my hand. Then he went back to his newspaper. And I seen that because I’d waited till after supper I got to go to Asheville and Troy got to go too, and we had extra money for popcorn and a Co-Cola for each of us.

  Three

  I reckon a woman knows she’s in love when she keeps loving a man she don’t want to love. I had every reason not to love Muir Powell. He was a local boy that worked on the farm and done a little house painting and carpentry on the side, and a lot of hunting and trapping in the wintertime. He didn’t even have a car and he never did much want to go anywhere. His idea of a date was to walk home with me after prayer meeting on a moonlit night. We’d take the long way round, walking through the pasture by the spring or even down to the river. If it was a little chilly, he’d warm me by putting his coat around my shoulders.

  There is nothing like the world at night with the hunter’s moon or harvest moon over the mountains. The mountains rise up like big black shadows and the pastures and fields are blue. The river sparkles silver like a road that goes to the edge of forever.

  “I never did love anybody but you,” Muir said as we looked across the valley toward the Powell place. “All I want is to live here with you.”