by James Still
Mother had set the funeralizing for the last Sunday in September. Father came on the Wednesday before, bringing a headstone he had cut out of Brack Hogan’s quarry, chipped from solid limerock. The baby’s name was carved on one side with a chisel. We took it up on the Point, standing it at the head of the mound. Father built an arbor there out of split poplar logs. We thatched the roof with branches of linn.
“It’s big enough for Preacher Sim to swing his arms in without hittin’ anybody,” Father said.
Mother came up the hill to see it. “I wisht to God I’d had a picture tuk o’ the baby so it could be sot in the arbor durin’ the meetin’. I wisht to God I’d had it tuk.”
Father cut down some locusts, laying the trunks in front of the arbor for seats, and Mother took a pair of mule shears, cutting the weeds and grass evenly.
Grandma and Uncle Jolly came Thursday morning, Grandma riding sidesaddle on a horse-mule, and Uncle Jolly astraddle a pony not more than a dozen hands high. His feet nearly dragged dirt. He came singing at the top of his voice:
Polish my boots
And set ’em on the bench,
Goin’ down to Jellico
To see Jim Shanks.
Holler-ding, baby, holler-ding.
Ole gray goose went to the river.
If’n I’d been a gander
I’d went thar with ’er.
Holler-ding, baby, holler-ding.
When they turned out of the Little Angus sandbar, Uncle Jolly crossed his legs in the saddle, and came riding up the yard path, right onto the porch, and would have gone pony and all into the house if Mother hadn’t been standing in the door. Father laughed, saying, “Jolly allus was a damned fool,” and Uncle Jolly got so tickled he reeled on the porch, holding his stomach, and he fell off into the pretty-by-night bed.
Grandma hitched the horse-mule at the fence, looking at the egg tree as she crossed the yard. “Hit’s a sight,” she said, pulling off her bonnet. “I hain’t seen one in twenty year.”
Aunt Rilla came in time for dinner, walking up from the creek-bed road with Lala, Crilla, Lue, and Foan strung out behind. Uncle Luce and Toll came in the night. Aunt Shridy was there by daylight next morning, and we all set to work getting ready for Sunday. The floors were scrubbed twice over with a shuck mop, and the smoky walls washed down. Jimson weeds were cut out of the backyard, and the woodpile straightened. Mother cut the heads off of fifteen dommers. The stove stayed hot all day Friday, baking and frying. Cushaw pies covered the kitchen table.
“I reckon we got enough shucky beans biled to feed creation,” Grandma said. “Lonie, you hain’t never been in such a good fix since you tuk a man. You’d be puore foolish movin’ to Blackjack agin.”
“Since I married I’ve been driv’ from one coal mine to another,” Mother said, taking her hands out of bread dough. “And I’ve lived hard as nails. I’ve lived at Blue Diamond. I’ve lived at Chavies, Elkhorn, and Lacky. We moved up to Hardburley twicet, and to Blackjack beyond countin’. I reckon I’ve lived everwhere on God’s green earth. Now I want to set me down and rest. The baby is buried here, and I reckon I’ve got a breathin’ spell comin’. We done right well this crap. We got plenty.”
Grandma kept us children shooed out of the kitchen. We hung around Uncle Jolly until he put a lizard up Fletch’s britches leg, and threw a bucket of water on the rest of us. “Sometimes I fair think Jolly is a witty,” Aunt Rilla said.
Father met Preacher Sim Manley at the mouth of Flaxpatch Saturday morning, taking Uncle Jolly’s nag for him to ride on up the creek. But they both came back walking, being ashamed to ride the sorry mount. Father said he didn’t know the pony had a saddle boil until he had started with her.
Preacher Sim slept on the feather bed that night. Father took the men out to the barn to sleep on the hay. Grandma and Aunt Lemma took Mother’s bed, the rest of us stretching out on pallets spread on the floor.
The moon was full, and big and shiny as a brass pot. It was day-white outside. I couldn’t sleep, feeling the strangeness of so many people in the house, and the unfamiliar breathing. Before day I went out to the corncrib and got a nap until the rooster crowed, not minding the mice rustling the shucks in the feed basket.
Mother climbed up to the Point before breakfast to spread a white sheet over the baby’s grave. When she came down the Adamses were there, Quin looking pale with his first shave of the fall, and Mrs. Adams flushed and hot, not wanting to sit down and wrinkle her starched dress. Cleve Horn and his family were not far behind.
Before nine o’clock the yard and porch were crowded. Neighbors came up quietly, greeting Mother, and the women held handkerchiefs in their hands, crying a little. Then we knew again that there had been death in our house. All who went inside spoke in whispers, their voices having more words than sound. The clock was stopped, its hands pointing to the hour and minute the baby died; and those who passed through the rooms knew the bed, for it was spread with a white counterpane and a bundle of fall roses rested upon it.
At ten o’clock Brother Sim opened his Bible in the arbor on the Point. “Oh my good brethren,” he said. “We was borned in sin, and saved by grace.” He spat upon the ground, and lifted his hands towards the withered linn thatching. “We have come together to ask the blessed Saviour one thing pint-blank. Can a leetle child enter the Kingdom of Heaven?”
The leaves came down. October’s frost stiffened the brittle grass, and spider-webs were threads of ice in the morning sun. We gathered our corn during the cool days, sledding it down the snaky trail from field to barn. The pigs came down out of the hills from their mast hunting, and rooted up the bare potatoes with damp snouts. Father went over to Blackjack and stayed a week. When he returned there was coal dust ground into the flesh of his hands. He had worked four days in the mines, and now there was a company house waiting for us.
“I promised to git moved over in three days,” Father said. “We got a sealed house with two windows in ever’ room waitin’ for us.”
“I’m a-longin’ to stay on here,” Mother said. Her voice was small and hoping. “I’ll be stayin’ here with the children, and you can go along till spring. Movin’ hain’t nothin’ but leavin’ things behind.”
Father cracked his shoes together in anger. “That’s clear foolishness you’re sayin’,” he said, reddening. “I ain’t aimin’ to be a widow-man this year.”
“I’m sot agin’ movin’,” Mother said, “but I reckon I’m bound to go where you go.”
“We ought to be movin’ afore Thursday,” Father said.
“Nigh we git our roots planted, we keep pullin’ ’em up and plantin’ ’em in furrin ground,” Mother complained. “Movin’ is an abomination. Thar’s a sight o’ things I hate to leave here. I hate to leave my egg tree I sot so much time and patience on. Reckon it’s my egg tree holdin’ me.”
“I never heered tell of such foolishness,” Father said. “Pity thar hain’t a seed so hit can be planted agin.”
Cold rains came over the Angus hills, softening the roads and deepening the wheel tracks. There could be no moving for a spell, though Father was anxious to be loading the wagon. Mother sat before the fire, making no effort to pack, while the rains fell through the long, slow days.
“Rain hain’t never lost a day for a miner,” Father said, walking the floor restlessly.
“You ought to be nailin’ up a little grave-house for the baby then,” Mother said. Father fetched some walnut planks down from the loft and built the grave-house under the barn shed. It was five feet square with a chestnut shingle roof. During the first lull in the weather, we took it up to the Point.
When the rain stopped, fog hung in the coves, and the hills were dark and weather-gray. Cornstalks stood awkwardly unbalanced in the fields. The trees looked sodden and dead, and taller than when in leaf. Father took our stove down one night. The next morning our mare was hitched to the wagon, and the hind gate let down before the back door. Mother gave us a cold baked potato for breakfast, then b
egan to pack the dishes. We were on the road up Flax-patch by eight o’clock, Mother sitting on the seat beside Father, and looking back towards the Point, where the grave-house stood among the bare locusts.
We reached Blackjack in middle afternoon. The slag pile towering over the camp burned with an acre of oily flames, and a sooty mist hung along the creek bottom. Our house sat close against a bare hill. It was cold and gloomy, smelling sourly of paint, but there were glass windows, and Euly, Fletch, and I ran into every room to look out. Old neighbors came in to shake our hands, but there was no warmth in their words or fingers.
Father started back after the last load as soon as the wagon bed was empty, leaving us to set the beds up. He came back in the night, none of us hearing him drive in the gate.
At daybreak we were up, feeling the nakedness of living in a house with many windows. We went out on the porch and looked up the rutted street. Men went by through the mud with carbide lamps burning on their caps. Mother came out presently into the yard. There was the egg tree. Its roots were buried shallowly in damp earth near the fence corner. Some of the shells were cracked, and others had fallen off, exposing the brown willow branches. Mother turned and went back into the house. “It takes a man-person to be a puore fool,” she said.
Lost Brother
I’ve seen men die.
I reckon I’ve seen a half-a-dozen drap in their tracks without loosenin’ their brogans. I seen Ruf Craig swallow a bullet square in his mouth and go down with his teeth clenched, his lips drawed, and nary a speck o’ blood droolin’ out.
I seen Brag Thomas soak up a plug o’ lead in his heart last gingerbread election. He never batted an eye. Jist sort of sunk down in the mud, his eyes standin’ pine-blank open. When they laid him out it tuk five nickels to hold his lids down.
Oh I’ve seen men head toward eternal torment without a flinch. But men are powerful braggers. They would do this, and they would do that. When it comes to stretchin’ out final for the grave-box, no man can say what he’ll do.
Death kin come sudden. Here on Squabble Creek it comes that way more’n a leetle. Hit don’t tickle-toe up and tell you to lay down and pull the sheet up. And to call yore woman and yore pap and all yore young ’uns.
Hit’s like lightnin’ strikin’ a yaller poplar and skinnin’ her all the way down. Hit’s like yore heart turnin’ square over and givin’ you a minute to do all the rest o’ yore life’s thankin’ in. This ole breath kin be mighty puore and sweet when it comes to loosin’ it.
I’ve seen men die. But nary a one that tuk it like a lost brother come home.
Oh nary a one ’cept Ambrose Middleton, who never dodged a chunk o’ lead all his days. And never moved a frog-hair to stop the last one. Ole Fiddlin’ Ambrose, who never harmed a critter in his life, who made ole Bollen County the best sheriff they ever knowed, and who could fiddle like all git-out.
His fiddle was the sassiest in the hills. He made it hisself out o’ best grained cherry. And he drawed and waxed his own catgut. Thar was fourteen rattlesnake rattlers makin’ it sound like the one I heered ole Bull had. I heered tell he was the fiddlin’est fool ever lived. I reckon he was favorin’ Ambrose. Ruther play than to eat groundhog gravy.
And when ole Fiddlin’ Ambrose come to die, I reckon he was tickled and never begrudged a wink o’ light that went out o’ his eyeballs.
Oh he never put store in livin’ like you and me. He wasn’t stingy with the calendar. Not since he killt his blood-son Parly nigh goin’ on twenty years ago.
He never aimed to do it. Hit was puore accidental, and it was with a shotgun he was unloadin’ after he’d come in from a fox hunt. And his belly had been washin’ likker for a week afore. He never tetched a drap after that. Not in these twenty years.
Hit’s a lot o’ tales they tell on ole Ambrose. About him scratchin’ up the grave-box with his fingernails the night after the buryin’. About him makin’ his bed in the graveyard for three months. I never put a grain o’ faith in them tales.
Parly was buried on the ivy p’int yonside the doublins. Never the time did I see Ambrose on that p’int, never the night or day in all my life. Once I seen him standin’ in a patch o’ moonlight lookin’ up thar. I reckon he was lookin’ square through that hill at the stars. He stood thar a long time, never movin’ or retchin’ his eyes down. I streaked off through the thicket and he never knowed I seen him.
I never seen nothin’ quare about Ambrose.
There was nothin’ quare about him ’less it was the way he sawed the fiddle. He could make yore feet go to beatin’ time spite o’ wish and damnation.
There was nothin’ quare ’less it was the way he stood up to the shootin’ and scrappin’ when he was the Law. Oh he’d spit death in the face many the time. He never cared after Parly went. With him it was jist hell or no.
After Parly went he was in a puore bad fix. I reckon he jist run for sheriff to give him somethin’ to thank about. Well, hit wasn’t much runnin’ he done. He jist stuck his name on the ticket and said no more about it. Ambrose Middleton ain’t asked a livin’ soul to vote for him till yet.
Oh he put the cat on the fellows runnin’ agin’ him. I figger folks voted for Ambrose ’cause he didn’t ask ’em to. I figger they voted for him out o’ puore respect.
You wouldn’t a-knowed Squabble Creek when Ambrose was sheriff. It got to where a fellow could go to a bean strangin’ or a log-rollin’ without gittin’ his skull cracked with a gun-barrel. Or his nose or his ears bit nigh off.
When ole Ambrose was around you’d better keep yore Barlow knife retched out o’ sight. Many the time he stepped squar’ in where the bullets was a-spewin’. He never got a scratch till his time come at Wage Thompson’s squar’ dance.
When ole Fiddlin’ Ambrose was the Law he jist about opened the jail doors and told all the likker makers to git home. He told them to git to their home-seats and plant a patch o’ corn for their women and young ’uns.
But he done one thang he ought never done.
Thar was a boy in jail named Tobe Romer who had jist about growed up yonside the bars. I reckon he’d got more jailhouse victuals than any other kind. His mommy and poppy was dead and he jist run wild on the hills like a fox, a-stealin’ and a-preyin’.
Tobe was twenty-one on the record books, but he didn’t look more’n seventeen. And he was all the devils in torment rolled in one ball. Oh he’d steal the horns off a billy goat. You had to be good to Tobe Romer or he’d feed pizen to yore hound dogs. Or burn yore house down over yore head. He was a rascal if thar ever was one twixt earth and burnin’ hell.
The devil hisself must o’ put the idea in Ambrose’s head.
He tuk Tobe to his house and treated him like he was his own blood. He give him everythang. Hit was a sight the pettin’ Ambrose give that boy. But it didn’t make no difference to Tobe. I reckon it come too late.
Hit was like pettin’ a wild cat. He jist tuk all Ambrose would give him, then he’d raise more racket than ever. But Ambrose never give up. Tobe always had plenty o’ good victuals, and he tuk to more meanness ’cause Ambrose was the Law and he’d never be put in jail agin.
I reckon Ambrose done everythang he could. Everythang that talkin’ and beggin’ could do. You can’t make a saint out o’ the puore devil. Tobe jist done what he’d been doin’ straight on, and many the knife stayed sharp for his hide. I bet thar was bullets jist achin’ for his meat.
I was at Wage Thompson’s squar’ dance when Ambrose met the bullet that was molded for him the minute he was born. Oh that lead had been a-growin’ sixty-two years afore it had a chancet to do its work.
Thar was Ambrose settin’ on a splint-wood chair, fiddlin’ for puore glory. Oh he could make a fiddle talk sweet talk. He could make it whine like a baby when he had a mind to. He could make it yell and holler, and nigh walk out o’ his hands when he put hisself to it.
John Tolbert was callin’ the sets and we had danced three, gittin’ powerful warm and beginnin’ to sweat. He wa
s jist gittin’ limbered up good when Tobe come in. He was all lit and his chin was sort of hung over his collar. We looked at Ambrose settin’ thar in his chair with his fiddle in his lap. Ambrose jist set thar and never let on.
I went outside with a couple o’ fellows to take a drank, and when we come back I see somethin’ had happened. Tobe is settin’ by hisself in the corner and glarin’ at Ambrose pine-blank. Ambrose ain’t payin’ him no attention.
Somebody tells me Ambrose has told Tobe to leave and stay gone till he sobers up.
But Tobe ain’t made a move. And Ambrose ain’t sayin’ a word. He’s jist a-settin’ and a-restin’ for the next set.
Then, sudden-like, Ambrose gits up and walks over to Tobe. We stood thar froze and wonderin’. He never says nothin’, jist stands thar and looks at Tobe. Tobe gits to squirmin’. I reckon his seat was gittin’ too hot for him. He gits up and sidles out o’ the room.
John Tolbert jumps out in the middle o’ the floor and hollers right big, and Ambrose gits to pullin’ down hard on his bow agin. First thang we knowed we was shuffling the Squirrel Chase. And the fiddle was nigh talkin’.
Keep yore skillet good and greasy all the time, time, time.
Oh that was a sweet set we was a-dancin’. It must o’ been a heap o’ noise we was makin’ too, draggin’ and scrapin’ our feet, keepin’ time to that music. That music was like a dream you dreamt.
I was swingin’ Hebe Fuller’s daughter right nigh Ambrose when I heard somethin’ crack. You couldn’t have hardly heered it with all that noise and everybody laughin’ and payin’ no attention to nothin’ ’cept cuttin’ corners proper.
Hit was like somebody had broke a right dry stick in a brashpile. I looked at the window and didn’t see nothin’. Then I looked at Ambrose, and I saw the quarest look on his face. But he was still strikin’ that catgut with all his might.
Right off I knowed what had happened. I broke loose and started for the door, lookin’ back at Ambrose. He shuck his head and I knowed he didn’t want me to go out. I didn’t say nothin’ ’cause there wasn’t nothin’ to say. If I was actin’ quare nobody paid me any mind. I was drankin’ right peart.