M.C. Higgins, the Great

by Virginia Hamilton

  “Up there,” she said.

  He nodded.

  “Are you scared?” she asked.

  “No,” M.C. said.

  “Then prove it.” Very carefully, she walked along the bridge to the post where Ben had been.

  “Come on back!” M.C. called softly. But she wouldn’t. He laid the rabbit out on the bridge. Ben came up the ravine.

  “It’s all clean,” Ben told Lurhetta, handing the knife to her.

  “Thanks,” she said, putting the knife through the loops on her belt. “You’re Ben. I’m Lurhetta. We never even said hello back there.”

  “Hi,” Ben said shyly, looking from her to M.C., who was coming on reluctantly.

  “Please to meet you, Ben,” she said, smiling at him. Ben broke into a grin, clearly pleased to be there with her and M.C. Happily, he looked from one to the other—if M.C. wanted the girl with them, it was fine with him.

  “Hot,” she said. “I sure am thirsty.” Glancing up toward the Mound. They watched her as she wiped her palm over her face. “You think I could have some water?” she said to Ben.

  A caution of silence in which the three of them seemed frozen separately. M.C. examined the fingers of one hand, pulling the knuckles and cracking them. Anxiously, Ben watched M.C.

  “Drink from the stream,” M.C. said finally. “It’s fresh and cold as anything.”

  “No sir,” she said, “I’m not going down there in all that quicksand.”

  “There’s no quicksand down there,” M.C. said. “Just some wet and some fog.”

  “You never know,” she said lightly. “I might go down there and be lost forever.” She winked at Ben. But so used to taking his cue from M.C, he didn’t know what to do.

  “Can I please get a drink?” she asked. Ben’s pale face turned red. Hopelessly trapped, he could do nothing more than hang his head and wait for M.C.

  M.C. sighed. What could you do with a girl like her, who didn’t know enough to even be afraid?

  At last he said, “Let her have the water. But bring her right back—is your father at home?”

  “He’s at home,” Ben said, “working in the fields.”

  Oh, man. “Well, you all come right back, you hear?” M.C. told them.

  “Aren’t you coming, too?” Lurhetta said. She smirked at him. He knew the look.

  Prove it.

  “M.C, the Great,” she said.

  Swaying back and forth, holding on to the side of the bridge. A pretty thing. Just as slim.

  “Come on, M.C. I’ve been to your house. Now I want to go over to your friend’s house.”

  A threat. A forcing. M.C. understood the kind of nerve she had. And without another word, he began walking up toward the Mound.

  Little Ben seemed to be everywhere at once. All around them. “You really coming over, M.C.?”

  “Act like I never want to come over,” M.C. murmured. “Mostly, I don’t have a minute to spare. But today I’ve got the time.” Not allowing himself to think or to fear, he almost believed what he was saying.

  Ben led the way, with Lurhetta behind him and in front of M.C. They were at the foot of the Mound on a stepped path cut out of rock. The strata of rock were worn smooth from years of barefoot climbing and descending, of running children, of sitting and playing. Wind and rain, sun, had given the path a patina neither man-hewn nor natural. Shiny smooth, it existed in neither the past or the present. So that walking on it now, they were neither here nor there, but perhaps heading toward some unknown future.

  Something about tall white pine trees forming an entrance grove, a semicircle of evergreens on each side of the path. Entering the Mound, the three of them became aware of their place in the mood around them. They were made less self-conscious among trees whose height alone caused them to reach out and upward, away from themselves. It didn’t seem odd that Ben reached out to pat a pale pine trunk, sliding his six fingers along its rough bark. Lurhetta patted the tree, not to imitate Ben, but because it seemed natural to do so. Without hesitation, M.C. did the same and with the same result. He felt he’d introduced himself to a being he hadn’t the sense to greet before.

  They were on the Mound. It was a place unexpected and out of tune with the hills. Lower than the plateau but higher than the ravine, it was a valley reach of land unmarred by a single curve, jagged boulder or coal seam. It was a fifteen-acre Midwestern plain perhaps transported by Killburn magic to the top of the Mound. An unbeatable square saved from being a burning, dull landscape by the straight thread of a wide stream that dissected it, fed it from underground springs and in the past had made its soil rich and black. To come upon such flatland without a single tree on it in the midst of the hills was a surprise in itself. But ahead of them was the weirdest sight. M.C. had seen it a few times in his life, he couldn’t recall where or when. But it was familiar. He turned to Ben. Ben raised his hand, those witchy fingers, motioning M.C. to stay still. Lurhetta was completely absorbed. M.C. knew she’d never seen anything like it before.

  A snake rolling away from them down a runner bean row. They must have scared it coming off the path. It had taken its tail in its mouth and run off like a hoop. Grinning, Ben sidled up to it, careful not to step on any runners. He stuck his arm through the circle the snake made and lifted it, a dark wheel, still turning. He held the hoop up for them to see. Then he swirled it around and around his wrist. He let it fly; in midair, it snapped open and straightened like a stick.

  Was it a stick by magic?

  Falling, hitting the ground, it hooped again and rolled and rolled until it felt safe and hid.

  “What in the world—!” Lurhetta said.

  “Just a hoop snake,” Ben said, coming back to where they stood. “We have hoop snakes and milk snakes, garter snakes, green-grass snakes and some copperheads. Only the copperheads will kill you. Daddy don’t mind the copperheads but he’s been hating the green-grass snakes for longer than a month. The milk snake will steal the cow’s milk, but we don’t have a cow.”

  “You mean your father likes them?” Lurhetta said.

  “He feeds them,” Ben said. “He sets out milk for the milk snakes just to see them slither. He lets the garters sun and have their babies on the cement of the icehouse step and feed off the gardens. He don’t mind any kind of snake, can handle them like they were puppies. Copperheads, he talks to and if they don’t listen right, he grinds their heads into the ground.”

  Uneasily, M.C. laughed. “How come he fell out with the green-grass snakes?” he asked.

  “They did something wrong, most likely,” Ben said. “Probably made up with them now, though.”

  “Whew!” M.C. said.

  “Anyhow, from here,” Ben said, “we have to climb up and over. Nobody’s supposed to walk in the gardens unless they mean to work or to go inside.”

  The houses of the Mound were grouped together to one side, a short distance away. Surrounded by outbuildings, every inch of space between the buildings was planted with crops. No yards, no dried, caked earth swept clean as were the yards of many hill houses. Up to the porches and foundations of piled stones, every foot of ground was taken up by tomatoes or potatoes. Runner beans, beets, lettuce and peas. Even in the hot darkness under the houses grew ghostly spreads of mushrooms. The trouble was, none of the vegetables looked healthy. Some had a blight of rust eating at the leaves. And others were being attacked by a black and white mold similar to mildew.

  “Follow close,” Ben told Lurhetta. “Keep careful lookout for creatures if you not used to slithery things.”

  At the thought of snakes, Lurhetta nearly walked on his heels.

  “If I see one, I’m going to crush it,” she said.

  “Better not,” M.C. told her. “Might be one of Mr. Killburn’s friends.”

  They skirted the fields to a point very near the banks of the stream. Here there was an implanted space along the bank where they could walk inland toward the houses. They went slowly. Ben had cut his pace as if knowing Lurhetta and M.C., a
lso, would need time to take in the view.

  For the Killburn houses, sheds and barns were grouped to form an enclosure. This compound was in no way extraordinary to look at, at first sight. The sheds and barns were weathered silver, sagging and almost shapeless. The houses were not the unpainted crate construction of most hill houses, but on the order of rambling, frame farmhouses. They had been added onto at the rear each time a child was born; and they had been painted once, all the same color. A dark, deep brown trimmed in blue. There was still a thin covering of paint on the houses, although they hadn’t been retouched in years.

  So that what happened right before M.C.’s eyes was that the enclosure of chocolate and silver sheds and barns took on the appearance of a fairyland. Carved out of dark soil and bold, blue sky, it looked unearthly all of a sudden, and slightly sinister.

  There were men and women scattered over the land, working at hoeing and picking, and dropping vegetables into bushel baskets. At least four were bent to the task within the enclosure where row upon row of plants took the place of what would have been one large common yard. Every so often a figure would appear at the side of one of the houses, walk into the fields or disappear inside a house. M.C. found it hard to tell which figures were men and which were women, for all wore overalls of the bib kind with straps at the shoulders. But it wasn’t long before he discovered that those wearing bright blue overalls with dazzling white stitching were men. And that those wearing faded overalls were women, having obtained their outfits second-hand from the men. He had a vague memory that this arrangement was thought practical and had always been so. Many of the figures wore coverings on their heads against the fierce sun, but the men wore oddly shaped hats of a kind he’d not seen before.

  The three of them came up to the enclosure from the rear of a shed. They stepped around tomato plants that were too small and yellowish this late in the growing season. Ben led the way to a rope ladder hanging down from the top of the shed.

  “We climb from here,” he told them.

  Neither Lurhetta nor M.C. said a word, such was the strange feeling they had so near Killburn life.

  “You climb like this,” Ben said to Lurhetta. He climbed easily as the ladder changed shape, sagging under his weight.

  “I don’t know. . . ._Where does it lead to?” Lurhetta said.

  “Just up and over,” Ben told her. “Now just do the way I do. We take it a step at a time. Try just to look up as far as my heels. Because at the top, we have to turn the corner—you can’t see where, but it’s just one step and around.”

  “What is? I don’t know,” Lurhetta said, “can’t we just walk it?” But at Ben’s gentle urging, she followed him up the ladder. All of her natural grace came into play, helping her manage the awkward climb.

  Wish we hadn’t come, M.C. thought. Wish she’d just learn the hills with me.

  He waited, peering around the side of the shed. Up ahead was the stream, which moved sluggishly and was a sickly shade of yellow. Behind it was the first house of the compound. A woman standing still on the small front porch. She faced the common yard of vegetables and just her head was turned toward the shed and M.C. Apparently, she had witnessed their coming and she stood poised, waiting. She was the only one of the women M.C. had seen who wore anything resembling a dress. It was more in the shape of a tent. Homemade, belted, with just a neck hole and armholes, of a faded, neat flower pattern. A tiny child stood holding on to her at the knee. No other children could be seen from below. They were all up above, M.C. guessed, remembering. But he kept his eye on the woman who was watching him. And slowly he sifted her features out from the general look all of the Killburns had. He recognized her as she seemed to recognize him. Ben’s mother, Viola Killburn. A big woman, not fat, but strong and lanky, with gentle movements and an easy smile. She was smiling at M.C. right now. Smiling and nodding.

  He felt glad, a relief at seeing her after so long a time. How long had it been? He couldn’t remember when he’d seen Mrs. Killburn. But he felt good about finding her again. Leaning there at the side of the shed, he would have liked to skip over the rows of vegetables to sit at her side.

  Sit on one side, his memory told him, with Ben on her other side.

  The both of them leaning against her, without either one of them saying a word. Never a war between her and them and whatever they wanted given. If she had ever wanted anything, they would have given it. But she never wanted.

  “Come on, M.C.” Ben and Lurhetta at the top of the shed, peering around the corner. Lurhetta looked down at M.C, her face full of surprise.

  “You can see everything!” she called down. “There’s lots of kids!”

  At these words, M.C. noticed the chatter from above. All around from above. He must have been hearing it all the while. But he had been remembering things. Feeling regretful, sad, talking to himself in his head. The girl, Lurhetta, all mixed up with past and future, with vegetables and witchy folks. So that the chatter had been like an internal clock ticking off loneliness of his dreaming, or the staccato of a time bomb set to go off.

  The sound of chatter spilled over him and through him. And he remembered with sadness, with regret, that the Mound had been the happiest place he’d ever known.

  No mountain to worry. No past. No ghosts.

  “M.C., come on.”

  He could just stay here forever.

  “I’m coming,” he said, and started his climb.

  12

  IT’S THE BIGGEST COBWEB I ever saw in my life,” Lurhetta said. “See? That’s just what it looks like.”

  “I know,” M.C. said, “I remember now.” He eased himself up on the web next to her and Ben.

  The same idea as the swinging bridge, but an earlier version using rope as well as vine. It was like a half-forgotten dream awakened into life. M.C. must have been very little when he’d last seen it. And no wonder Ben’s father had made the swinging bridge so quickly after M.C. had told Ben the idea. Because Mr. Killburn had had the idea first here on the Mound. He had used it differently, maybe better. Unwittingly, M.C. had taken Mr. Killburn’s idea, changed it a little and given it back to him.

  What it was the three of them were looking at: Guidelines of thick rope and vine twisted so as to combine. These connected the houses in the area of the common ground. The lines were held to each house just under the roof edge with iron stakes, around which the rope and vine were knotted.

  The three of them sat near the top and in between two guidelines where began a loose weave of rope weathered to a softness not unlike old cornshucks. There were at least eight guidelines and in between each was that soft weave. Nearer the ground, the lines came closer together. Their weave grew tighter at dead center of the common, some five to six feet over the ground. Here began a hub connected to the weave. It was some twenty feet across and just as long, made of twisted vines and rope loosely tied into six-inch square shapes.

  The effect from guidelines to hub was one of an enormous web or net, or even a green and tan sunburst. In the hub were many children of various sizes and ages. Most had the light, sickly complexion of Killburn people. With a color range from orange to reddish-brown hair, they looked like a fresh bunch of bright flowers jumbled and tossed by breezes, their stems dangling through the square shapes of the hub.

  “How many kids?” Lurhetta asked, breathlessly.

  “Not too many,” Ben said. “Maybe seventeen up here. Twenty-three all together, if you count me.”

  “It looks like more,” M.C. thought to say and then fell silent, watching

  At any time, some of the older children would crawl out of the hub onto the weave. There they would flip over under the weave and swing hand over hand to the hub again. Grabbing the nearest stem, the closest leg of a brother or sister or cousin, they would hang on, clinging from leg to leg. Until they had made their way directly above a potato row or a cabbage row, where they would fall lightly down and commence to pull up weeds. At any moment, three or four Killburn children would be
hard at work, often filling bushel baskets to the brim with vegetables in seconds. Or they would dance through the rows over to Mrs. Killburn’s house. They always seemed to go to that house in particular, dancing on up the steps. A table on the porch held pitchers of lemonade and single-server clay dishes of custard. Women and young men and girls in overalls came out of the house with drinking glasses and returned with empty dishes or pitchers. All of it done in a pleasant, amiable fashion.

  The children chattered. The women and young men and girls continued their conversations with one another as they worked. Furthermore, they kept an eye on the babies who were too young for the hub and who spilled out of the door onto the porch like sweet cinnamon lumps.

  Lurhetta sighed in awe. M.C. watched her, feeling a growing jealousy, he didn’t know why.

  “Better be going back,” he said once. But she merely frowned an instant before her face cleared and she was delighted.

  Lurhetta gazed all around, at men and women far off in the fields and close by in the common. Her eyes roved over the children.

  “You must have enough food here to feed an army,” she said to Ben.

  “Looks like a lot,” he said, “but everybody eats only vegetables. Soups and things or just plain-cooked. Sometimes we get too much rain, too fast; or not enough and too late. That water of the stream is changing color. And so when a good year comes with the right kind of weather, we store a lot. Still the vegetables is smaller than they once was.

  “I see,” Lurhetta said. “And you buy—”

  “—we buy milk, coffee, flour, clothes and cloth, just a few things like that,” he said.

  “And you live—”

  “—we live okay. Now that daddy has the icehouse and a new generator, we live fine,” he said.

  “But you are all one family?”

  “We are all relatives,” Ben told her. “Just a few, maybe not so related. Sometimes a friend with nothing and no one.”

  “How long have you all been here?”

  “Been here?” Ben repeated. He gazed at the children down in the hub. Some were in groups, playing games. Others stared peacefully down through the squares to the plants below. A few were even sleeping serenely on their backs. “My grandmother is ninety-six.”