by James Still
I wiped the green skims off my face. I saw old Gid walk up to Rant Branders, saying, “Hit’s time we’re acquainted,” and stuck out his arm. They clapped hands. Gid’s jaws clenched as he gripped, his neck corded. Yet Rant didn’t give down, didn’t bat an eye or bend a knee. He stood prime up to Old Gid and wouldn’t be conquered.
Old Gid dropped his hand. He cut a glance about, chuckling. “Roust the square if they’s to be a wedding,” he said. “Night’s a-burning.”
Jimp and I hid behind the cane pile, being too hang-headed and shy to watch a marrying. Under the gilly trees Jimp said, “Me and you hain’t never fit. Fighting makes good buddies.” He clenched his fists.
I knew Peep Eye spied upon us. “You hit first,” I said, acting cagey, taking my part.
“Say a thing to rile me.”
I said, “Yore pappy’s a bully-man, and I’m glad Rant Branders locked his horns.”
We fought. We fought with bare fists, and it was tuggety-pull, and neither of us could out-do. And of a sudden Peep Eye stood between us. Her cheek bore a soot mole, and she was fairer than any finch of a bird, fairer even than Plumey. She raised a hand, striking me across the mouth, and ran. Jimp said, “Jist a love lick.” The blow hurt, but I was proud. And then we heard Old Gid’s voice ring like a bell and saw him waving his arms by the forgotten molasses kettle. “Land o’ Gravy!” he shouted. “We’ve made seventeen gallons o’ candy jacks.”
Locust Summer
I recollect the June the medicine drummer and his woman came down Shoal Creek and camped three days in our mill. That was the summer of Mother’s long puny spell after the girl-baby was born; it was the time seventeen-year locusts cried “Pharaoh” upon the hills, and branches of oak and hickory perished where their waxy pins of eggs were laid. Wild fruit dried to seeds, and scarcely would birds peck them, so full their crops were with nymphs. Mulberries in the tree behind our house ripened untouched. Lark and I dared not taste, fearing to swallow a grub. Fern vowed not to eat, though I remember her tongue stayed purple till dog days.
“A rattlesnake’s less pizenous than berries in a locust season,” Mother kept warning. She knew our hunger; she knew how sorry Father’s cooking was. “A body darst eat off o’ vine or tree.”
“A reg’lar varmint and critter year,” Father told Mother. “Aye gonnies, if they hain’t nigh as many polecats in the barn as they’s locust amongst trees. Yet nothing runs as wild as these chaps. Clothes a puore tear-patch, hands rusty as hinges. Hit’ll be a satisfaction when you’re able to take them back under your thumb. I’d a’ soon tend a nest o’ foxes.”
“I figure to strengthen when the locusts hush,” Mother said. “A few more days o’ roaring and they’ll be gone.” And she glanced at Fern, being most worried about her. “Still, I can’t make a child take pride if they’re not born with it. Fern’s hair is matty as a brush heap. It’s eating her eyes out.”
“Humph,” Fern said. She didn’t care a mite.
Lark and I would look scornfully at the baby nestled in the crook of Mother’s arm. We’d poke our lips, blaming it for our having to eat Father’s victuals. Oft Zard would crawl under the bed to sniffle, and Mother had to coax him out with morsels from her plate. He was two years old, and jealous of the baby. Fern never complained. She fetched milk and crusts to her hidden playhouse, eating little at the table. So it was Lark and I who stubbed at meals. A pone Father baked was a jander of soda. Vegetables were underdone or burnt. We would quarrel, saying spiteful things of the baby, though above our voices rose the screams of the locusts, “Phar-rrr-a-oh! Pha-rrr-a-oh!” The air was sick with their crying.
Father would blink at Mother. He’d hold his jaws, trying to keep a straight face. “No sense raising a baby nobody wants,” he’d speak. “Wish I could swap her to a new set o’ varmint traps. Or could I find a gypsy, I’d plumb give her away.”
“I’d ruther to have a colt than a basketful o’ baby chaps,” I’d say. “I allus did want me one.” I would think of our mare, and the promise Father once made. Long past he’d made it, longer than hope could live. He’d said, “Some fine pretty day thar might be a foal. Hit’s on the books.” But never would he say just when, never say it was a sure fact.
I recollect that on the morning the medicine drummer and his woman came down Shoal Creek I had gone into the bottom to hunt Fern’s playhouse. She had bragged of it, nettling me with her talk. “A witch couldn’t unkiver my den,” she’d said. “I got something there that’d skin yore eyes.”
I was searching the berry thicket when a dingle-dangle sounded afar. A spring wagon rattled the stony creek bed, pulled by a nag so small I could hardly believe it, and a man and woman rode the jolt seat. It passed the mill, climbing the steep road to our house. I watched it go, and hurried after; I ran, hoping it came unbeknownst to Fern.
But Fern was there before me, staring. Mother came onto the porch, taking her first steps in weeks. She held the baby, squinting in the light, her face pale as candlewax. Zard peeped around her skirts.
The drummer jumped to the ground, his hat crimped in a hand. He was oldy, and round-jawed as a cushaw is round, and not a hair grew on the pan of his head; he was old and his woman seemed young enough to be a daughter. He bowed to Mother, brushing his hat against the dirt. He spoke above the thresh of locusts, eyeing as if taking a size and measure. “Lady,” he said, “could we bide a couple o’ nights in your millhouse, we’d be grateful. My pony needs rest.” The woman gazed. Her hair hung in plaits. She watched the baby in its bundle of clothes.
Mother sat down on the water bench. She couldn’t stay afoot longer. “You’re welcome to use,” she replied. “A pity hit’s full o’ webs and meal dust. My man’s off plowing, else he’d clean the brash out.”
I couldn’t hold my eyes off the nag, off the tossy mane that was curried and combed. She looked almost as pretty as a colt.
Fern edged nearer, anxious. “Lizards in that mill have got razor throats. You’re liable to get cut at.”
“We can pay,” the drummer said to Mother.
“Not a pency-piece we’d take,” Mother assured.
Fern became angry, and I marveled at her. She doubled fists behind her back. “Spiders beyond count in the mill. Spiders a-carrying nit bags and stingers.”
“Lady,” the drummer said, speaking to Mother and paying Fern no attention, “I’ve traveled a far piece in my life.” He stacked his hands cakewise. “A host of sicknesses I’ve seen. Now, when a body needs a tonic, when their nerves stretch, I can tell on sight. I’ve seen women’s flesh fall away like a snow melt. I’ve seen—”
“Doc Trawler!”
The woman had called from the wagon, calling a bit shrill and quick, tossing her plaits uneasily. She had seen Mother’s face grow whiter than puccoon blossoms.
“Ask about the berries.”
“Ah, yes,” the drummer said irritably, dropping his hands. “My wife’s a fool for berry cobbler. She’s bound to eat though one seed can cause side-complaint. My special purge has saved her being stricken long ago.”
“Ask may we pick berries in the bottom!” The woman’s words cracked like broken sticks.
The drummer waited.
Mother stirred uncertainly. “Wild fruit’s pizen as strickynine when locusts swarm,” she cautioned. “Allus I’ve heard that.”
The drummer’s face lit, grinning. He swept his hat onto his head and climbed on the wagon. The woman smiled too, but it was the baby she smiled at.
“That mill’s a puore varmint den,” Fern spoke hatefully.
The pony wheeled, and they set off for the mill. The drummer’s woman looked back, her eyes hard upon the baby.
That night we children sat at the table with empty plates. Grease frizzled the dove Father was cooking for Mother. “They hain’t a finickier set o’ chaps in Kentucky,” Father groaned. “I bile stuff by the pot, I bake and I fry, still these young ’uns will hardly eat a mouthful. By jukes, if I don’t believe they could live on blue air.
”
I wrinkled my nose. A musky smell came from somewhere. I spied at the bowl of potatoes, at the bud eyes staring. “I hain’t hungry,” I said, but I was. Hunger stalked inside of me.
The musk grew. Lark and Zard pinched their noses and grunted. Yet Fern didn’t seem to mind. She spread her hands flat upon her plate, and they were pieded with candle-drip warts.
I grew envious of the warts. I bragged, “I’ve got a spool will blow soap bubbles the size o’ yore head.”
“Baby’s got the world beat for bubbles,” Father said. “Blows ’em with her mouth.”
“A varmint’s nigh,” Mother said, covering the baby’s face. She rocked her chair by the stove to fan the smell. “Traps ought to be set under the house.”
Father poked a fork into the dove. “I met a skunk in the barn loft,” he chuckled. “Stirred the shucks and out she come, tail high. I reckon it’s my pea jacket by the door riching the wind.”
“Polecats have got the prettiest tails of any critter,” Fern defended. “Hain’t allus a-miaowing like nannies.”
“Their tails are not bonny as the drummer-pony’s mane,” I said.
“Haste that garment to the woodpile,” Mother told me.
I snatched the jacket and went into the yard, leaving it on the chopblock. I looked about. The mulberry tree stood black-ripe with dark. Below, in the bottom, the mill cracks shone. I planned, “Come morning, I’ll get a close view o’ that nag. I’ll say to the drummer, ‘Was Poppy of a notion, would you swap to our mare?’ ” I spat, thinking of our beast.
Father was talking when I got back. “I’ve set traps the place o’er, but every day they’re sprung, bait gone, and nothing snared. I say hit’s a question. The only thing I’ve caught’s an old she in the millhouse, and I figure little ones were weaned.”
“Once I seed two varmints walking,” Lark said. “I run, I did.”
Fern stuck her chin out, vengeful and knowing. “I told them folks that mill was a puore den.”
Mother saddened. “I’ve never heard a child talk so brashy to olders. I was ashamed.”
Fern raised her hands, tick-tacking fingers. “Humph,” she said willfully.
The thought came into my head that Fern’s playhouse might be close to the mill. I stung to go and see.
“One thing’s gospel,” Father laughed, not wanting Mother to begin worrying. “Chaps nor varmints won’t tetch my bait. I load the traps and table, for nothing. They’re independent as hogs on ice.”
“These chaps are slipping out o’ hand,” Mother said, her lips trembling. “Fern, in partic’lar. Eleven years old and not a sign o’ womanly pride. I can’t recollect the last time she combed her hair.”
“Might’s well buy her breeches and call her a boy,” Father teased, “yet I’m a-mind she’ll break over. Girls allus get prissy by the time they’re twelve. Hit’s on the books.” He eyed Lark and me. “I know two titmice hain’t combed their topknots lately.”
“You ought to make Fern wear plaits,” I spoke. “The drummer’s woman wears ’em.”
“I hain’t going to weave myself to ropes,” Fern said. She walked fingers around her plate, skippety-hop. “Hair tails hanging. Humph! Ruther to be baldy.”
“Ah, ho,” Father laughed. “I come by the mill before dark and talked to Doc Trawler. I saw him with his hat off. Now, his woman don’t need a looking-glass. She kin just say, ‘Drap yore head down, old man. I aim to comb my lockets.’ ”
“Once I seed a horse go by with a wove tail,” Lark said.
The dove browned, and was lifted to a plate. Father handed it to Mother. The bird was small, hard-fried, and briny it was bound to taste. Father always seasoned with a heavy hand. I thought, “It would take a covey o’ doves to satisfy me.” I felt that empty. I thought of berries wasting in the bottom; I thought of the mulberry tree. I spooned a half-cooked potato from the bowl, speaking under my breath, “That baby’s to blame. She hain’t nothing but a locust-bug.”
Mother fiddled with the bird. Zard slid off the bench to get a morsel. Presently Mother gave it all to him, saying, “I can’t stir an appetite. I can’t force it down.”
Father groaned. “Be-dabs, if the whole gin-works hain’t got the punies. Even the mare tuk a spell today. She wouldn’t eat corn nor shuck.”
“What ails the mare?” Mother asked quietly. The baby had whimpered in her nap.
I didn’t pity the beast, being contemptuous of her. I scoffed, “Bet they’s folks would say hit’s writ in a book. Now, they’s no book got everything printed already.”
Father answered neither Mother nor me, but his eyes were sharp and bright. He said, “I forgot the drummer sent a bottle o’ tonic. Swore it’d red the blood and quick the appetite. Hit’s yonder in my pea jacket. One o’ you fellers fotch it.”
“I be to go,” Lark said. He brought in a tall bottle of yellow medicine.
Father held the bottle aloft, jesting, “If this would arouse hunger, I’d dose chaps, traps, and the mare. Allus been said, when the sick take to eating, they’re nigh well. A shore promise.” He set the bottle on a high shelf and chuckled. “I wonder from what creek Doc Trawler dipped that yaller water.”
“Is that mare’s sickness natural?” Mother insisted.
“I heard a gander honk last fall,” Father said, “but hit’s no sign we’ve got a goose nest.”
Lark said. “I bet she up and et berries.”
“Old plug mare,” I mumbled. I spoke aloud, “That drummer’s got a healthy nag. Hain’t much bigger’n a colt. Was she mine, I’d not swap for gold.”
“I glimpsed that play-pretty of a nag,” Father said. “She’s old as Methuselum’s grandpappy’s uncle. Teeth wore to the gum. Thar she was eating out o’ a plate, like two-legged folks. If a woman hain’t got chaps to spile, she’ll pamper a critter to death. The way with women.”
The baby waked suddenly, crying. Father leaned over Mother’s shoulder. He clucked. “See her ope her eyes?”
I said, “Ruther to hear a bullfrog croaker.”
Lark scowled. “Wust I come on a little ’un nested in a stump, I’d run far and not go back.”
Fern twickled her warty fingers at me and Lark; she made a hop-frog of her hands. She knew how to rile us.
“Woe, woe,” Father moaned. “I reckon we might’s well give this child to the drummer-woman and be done. She’s got nothing to pet on but that nag and bald-head man.”
I looked squarely at Fern. “I’ve a fair notion where your playhouse is,” I said. “I’m going a-searching.”
“Humph,” Fern said, but she became uneasy. She rubbed her hands together, flaking the tallow warts. “Unkiver my play-nest and I’ll get level with you. I’ll pay back double.”
Mother sighed, “If a pot o’ soup could be made tomorrow, I believe I could eat. Soup with a light seasoning.” She rocked her chair impatiently as Fern and I kept quarreling. “I long to tame these chaps,” she said.
“You’d have to do what Old Daniel Tucker done in his song,” Father said. “Comb their heads with a wagon wheel.”
The mulberries were ripe. They hung like caterpillars, ready to fall at a touch. I sat high in the tree crotch among zizzing locusts, longing to taste the berries, and watching Fern. I saw Fern crawl under the house; I saw her skitter up the barn-loft ladder. She went here and yon, and was gone, and never could a body tell where.
I hurried toward the mill. The cow tunnels winding through high growth in the bottom were empty. I listened. A beetle-bug snapped and a bird made clinky sounds. I heard digging. A thing went rutch rutch in dirt. I tip-toed; I craned my neck. There amid tall briers the drummer knelt, digging herb roots. The pan of his head was glassy in the sun.
“Did some ’un go this way?” I asked.
The drummer rested. Sweat drops beaded his forehead. “While ago a skunk come in smelling distance. I had to stopple my nose.” He sorted the roots, pressing them between his thumbs until sap oozed; he frowned and the meat of his jaws tautened.
“It’s the contrary season to gather herbs, yit a kettle o’ tonic’s got to be brewed ere I set off tomorry.” He plucked a weed sprig from his grab pocket. “Only could I find more o’ this ratsbane.”
“I know where they’s a passel,” I said.
His face slackened. “Help me gather some and I’ll be obliged. I can pay.”
I cut my eyes about, ashamed to say the thing I’d planned. The words pricked my tongue. I took note that blackberries grew large as a toe in the bottom, and both hunger and the pony grew in my mind. “Would you be in a notion swapping your nag to our mare?” I ventured at last. “I allus did want me a little beast.”
“Fifteen years we’ve fed that pony,” the drummer said. He arose, stretching his legs. “She’s nigh a family member, and my wife thinks more o’ that nag than she does her victuals. She’d skulp me, was I to trade.”
How bitter I felt toward our mare. “Our critter’ll never have a colt like it was promised,” I grumbled.
The drummer stacked his hands. He looked wise as a county judge. “She needs a special medicine,” he advised. “I mix a tonic that cures any ill, fixes up and straightens out man or beast—the biggest medicine ever wrapped in glass.” He patty-caked his palms. “Now, there’s one trade I do fancy. Show me where the ratsbane grows and I’ll make you a present of a bottle. One’s all I’ve got left.”
I spoke, “Bet was a feller to eat wild fruit, a dram o’ that tonic would cuore the pizen. I bet.”
A woman’s voice called from the mill. “Doc Trawler! Oh Doc!”
The drummer started off. “You stay till I see what my wife’s after,” he said. I waited, and soon heard him returning, and the cow tunnels were filled with his laughter. He came back shaking with merriment. “That devil of a pony!” he said. “Oh hit’s a good thing we’re leaving tomorry.”
We went to grabble ratsbane and the drummer chuckled all day. He was a fool about that nag. We dug till my back sprung; we dug till the sun-ball stooped in the sky.
Late in the afternoon we stood by the mill with a poke crammed full of roots. I breathed in the smell of cooking victuals and fairly starved. The drummer slapped the poke; he treated it like a human being. “I’ll get your pay,” he said, and fetched a bottle out of the mill, a bottle no taller than my uncle- finger. “Hit’s strong as Samson,” he said. “And wait. My wife’s fixing something for your mother.”