The Hills Remember

by James Still

  Godey and Mal sniggered. Godey said, “Did they know it, it’s us they’d better watch.”

  “What I say,” agreed Mal.

  “I’m after my honest due,” Riar said. “I don’t intend to cheat or be cheated.” And a thought seized him. Glancing swiftly at the boys he said, “You can count to two hundred, I hope to my soul.”

  “I can count my finger,” jested Godey.

  “How much schooling have you had?”

  “Aye,” said Godey, “I learned who killed Cock Robin.”

  Mal said, “Godey Spurlock coming up short hain’t been heard of.”

  Beyond Landrum a packing house appeared, the metal roof glaring sunlight. Riar drove past, and Godey clamored, “Hain’t you going to stop?”

  “They’re a contract outfit,” Riar said. “They wax and shine their fruits like a pair of Sunday shoes, and some retail at ten cents apiece. They don’t deal with the little feller.”

  “They’d allow us to peep around, I reckon.”

  To humor them, Riar drew in at the next shed. “Another large operator,” he explained, “and we won’t buy here either. Just stretch our legs and cool.”

  A line of ten-wheel trucks was parked at the loading platfom, and Godey breathed, “Gee-o! Look at the big jobs.” He teased Riar. “Hain’t you ashamed to take your old plug out where people can see it?”

  “Not in the least,” said Riar.

  From the platform Godey and Mal gazed under the shed. They saw the roll conveyors tumbling fruit forward, the workers busy at the picking belts. Hail-pecked and wormy fruits were being shunted aside. The peaches flowed on through sizers and brushes of the defuzzer to the packers, and there seemed no end to them.

  Godey’s eye lit on a huge peach in a basket, and he snatched it up. A voice behind him spoke, “You’re welcome, young fellow, stuff till you bust.” Without deigning to turn, Godey held out the great peach and sneered “Pea-jibbit!” and let it fall and stepped on it. But he peeled and ate six others.

  When Riar got up with the boys twenty minutes later there was nothing they had not looked at. As they drove away Godey said, “The first ever I knowed peaches have hairs like cats.”

  “Get them brushings on you,” said Riar, “and they’ll eat you alive.”

  “What they told me,” said Godey. “Claimed it takes a spell to dig in, but after it does bull nettles hain’t a patching to it.”

  Said Mal, “We’d got some, did we have a poke to put ’em in.”

  “Of what use is it? I ask you.”

  Said Godey, “For Doss and Wint Colley a beating is too fine. I want to see them dance.”

  “Now, yes,” said Mal. “They’d throw an ague fit.”

  Riar frowned. “Hitting back at folks is all you think of.”

  Two miles beyond Landrum, Riar turned onto a dirt road and the wheels set the dust boiling. The boys’ faces were streaked where they wiped the sweat. Riar stopped at a number of small-growers’ sheds, buying at none, saying, “They sell high as Haman,” or “Their fruit is too green for my business,” or “Most of my customers want Elbertas.”

  Godey said, “Always I’ve heard a fruit bought off of you had better be stomached quick, it’s so rotty-ripe.”

  “The mellower the cheaper,” said Riar.

  Mal said, “You’ll travel farther for a dollar than anybody on creation.”

  “Was I you,” said Godey, “I’d take any peaches handy and call ’em Elbertas, and nobody’d know the difference.

  Riar shook his head. “When I say a thing is such and such, you can count on it.”

  “Oh yes?” scoffed Godey. “You point me to a plumb honest feller, and I’ll show you a patch of hair growing in the palm of his hand.”

  “My opinion,” gibed Mal, “he’s hunting a place where they give away.”

  “About the size of it,” said Godey.

  “Even if I had my fruit on order I’d wait until the shade comes over,” said Riar. “I don’t cook my peaches by hauling in the sun.”

  The shed where Riar bought was a barn with the sides gone. A single processing unit was operated by the owner’s family, and the picking belt was lined with children. Elbertas and Georgia Belles and J. H. Hales lay across the floor in drifts.

  With Godey and Mal at his heels Riar inspected the heaps. Encountering a boy, Godey opened his knife and greeted, “Hello, coot, what’ll you give to boot?” He lifted a Georgia Belle on the awl, peeled it with the butcher blade, used the shoe hook to pluck the seed. A second youngster hastened to watch, and Godey readied another, bringing the scalper and corkscrew into play.

  The owner cast an appraising look at Riar. Noting his eye on a section of Elbertas three days harvested he said, “There’s your bargain. A dollar and a quarter a bushel.” To explain their being on hand he added, “The whole crop is trying to shape up the same minute.”

  Riar broke several in half. The flesh was grainy and yellow. He tasted, and they had the sugar. Though much softer than he usually handled, he judged most could bear the trip. They would last the night and the cool of the morning. If he bought them reasonably and peddled them at two fifty, he could clear his debts and have money left. What matter the loss of the bottom layers. He said, “I’ll pay seventy cents.”

  The owner had hardly expected to get rid of the aging fruit. Still he said, “I can’t accept less than a dollar.”

  “Seventy cents,” repeated Riar.

  “Yesterday they were a dollar fifty.”

  “Day after tomorrow,” parried Riar, “you’ll have to scrape them up.”

  Godey butted in. “People don’t call him Tightwad just to beat their gums.”

  Riar’s neck reddened, but he held himself.

  Trying to make a stand, the owner said, “I’ll drop to eighty, but they’ll rot on the floor before I’ll accept less.”

  “Well, then,” said Riar, “we can’t do business, for I won’t pay above seventy for dead-ripe peaches.” Shuffling to go he asked, “How far to the next shed?”

  The owner changed his tune. He said, “Couldn’t we split the difference and meet in the middle?”

  Riar gazed at the Elbertas. Only hovering gnats bespoke their advanced maturity. “I’ll tell you what I will do,” he proposed, “and we can both keep our word. I’ll pay eighty for a hundred and seventy-five bushels if you’ll throw in the twenty-five that are bound to mash.”

  “Riar to a whisker,” said Godey.

  After figuring a moment, the owner grumbled, “But you’d still be getting them at seventy cents.”

  “What I know,” admitted Riar.

  Throwing up his arms, the owner groaned, “Take ’em, take ’em.”

  The sun was still high. Leaving Godey and Mal on their own, Riar rested in the truck, but it was too sultry to sleep. And at sunset he called them with, “My peaches will never be any greener.” Godey carried a paper poke, the neck of which was tied with string, and Riar said, “If that’s something you’ve picked up, leave it lay.”

  “Where I go this poke goes,” said Godey.

  Guessing the contents, Riar said, “The stuff will not ride in the cab with me.” Yet thinking to forbear until he had his peaches aboard, he added, “If you’re so set on it, put the poke in the toolbox.” He figured to lose it later.

  The children loaded the truck, the smaller filling baskets and sending by conveyor to the platform, the larger hoisting them over the rack and emptying. The work quickened upon the arrival of a contract van. Riar counted at the tail gate, and Godey and Mal clung to the slats and sang out the number, and though three measures were often dumped at a time, Riar got his two hundred without a doubt.

  The servicing of the van started immediately. And the moment Riar and the owner disappeared into the crib office to settle up, Godey traded his knife to the boys. Five bushels of Georgia Belles headed for the van were switched onto Riar’s truck.

  At leaving, Riar handed Mal two dollars and advised, “Keep them in your pocket, they w
on’t spoil,” and he chided Godey, “You could of had the same if you hadn’t got ahead of yourself.”

  Godey smiled slyly. “I hain’t so bad off,” he said.

  Night caught them on Saluda Mountain in North Carolina. Pockets of fog appeared, and sometimes Riar had to drive with his head through the door. As they crept upward, vehicles passed them, and Godey taunted, “I want to know is this the fastest you can travel?”

  “She’d show life,” said Mal, “was she fed the gas.”

  Riar grunted. He was getting used to their gibes.

  “Did I have Riar’s money,” Godey said, “I’d buy me a ten-wheeler. I’d haul a barrel to his peck, put him out of the running.”

  “They’d no moss grow on the tires either,” said Mal.

  Riar said, “I’ll have to see a profit this trip or I’m already finished. Folks won’t have it, but I’m poor as a whippoorwill. I started with nothing, and I’m still in the same fix. You’ve no reckoning how much a family can run through.”

  “If I owned a truck,” Godey mused, “I’d put in a scat gear, and I’d get gone. I’d whip around curves like a caterpillar. And when I stopped smelling fresh paint I’d trade in on another ’un.”

  Riar said, “The most I can see you possessing is a bigger foot to step on the gas. Your life long you’ll be as penniless as you are now.”

  Nudging Mal, Godey told Riar, “I won’t be broke after you and me do a little trafficking.”

  “You haven’t a thing coming from me,” said Riar.

  “You’ll learn different in a minute,” said Godey, “for I aim to buy a stack of hamburgers a span high at the next eating place.”

  “Can’t I beat into you we’re carrying food?”

  Godey said, “I’ve missed many a bucket of slop, not being a hog.” Then he announced, “I’m about to offer you a chance too good to refuse.”

  “What are you hatching?” asked Riar.

  “I’m telling you five bushels of my own peaches are riding in a corner of the rack. They make yours look like drops.”

  Riar straightened, suddenly vigilant.

  Said Mal, “They’re Georgia Belles, the ten-cent apiece kind, size of yore fist.”

  “They sell two dollars a bushel at the shed,” boasted Godey, “and they’ll peddle for three. I’ll let you have the whole caboodle for five bucks.”

  “Awfulest bargain ever was,” said Mal.

  “A pure giveaway,” said Godey.

  Riar’s shoe jiggled on the accelerator, the engine coughed. He blurted, “You’ve got me hauling stolen goods, aye?”

  “Dadburn,” Godey swore, “I swapped my knife for them and they’re mine.”

  “You didn’t trade with the owner,” accused Riar. “I’ll not reward chicanery.”

  Godey’s lips curled, but he spoke levelly. “I’m a plain talker, and I’m telling you to your teeth I’ll not be slicked out of them.”

  Mal cautioned Riar, “Was I you, I wouldn’t cross Godey Spurlock.”

  “The truth won’t hold still,” said Riar.

  “By jacks,” snarled Godey, “you don’t know when you’re well off.”

  “Now, no,” said Mal.

  “I have my principles,” said Riar. “What I get for the Belles I’ll return to the owner next season.”

  Godey said, “Anybody with one eye and half sense would understand they couldn’t gyp me and prosper.”

  “You heard me,” said Riar.

  “You hain’t deef,” replied Godey.

  They hushed. Nothing was said until the lights of Flat Rock appeared. Mal broke the silence, declaring, “I can smell hamburgers clear to here.”

  Godey mumbled, “I’m so starved I’m growing together.”

  “Reach back and get some fruit,” Riar said irritably. “All you want.”

  “Juice is oozing out of my ears already,” spurned Godey. And he said, “Big bud, I’m about to make you a final offer. Let me drive to the Tennessee line and you can have my peaches. I’d ruther drive than eat.”

  “You’re not talking to me,” said Riar. “I’ve had a sample of you at the wheel.”

  “I’ll stay on my side of the road, act to suit you.”

  “Everything has a stopping point,” said Riar. “I’ll not court a wreck.”

  “My opinion,” said Godey, “when affairs get tough enough you’ll break over.”

  Godey and Mal ate in a café while Riar munched cold bread outside. Before setting off again, Godey held a match to the gasoline meter and said, “You’d better take on a gill. She’s sort of low.”

  “She can read empty,” said Riar, “and still be carrying a gallon.” Godey would bear watching.

  “See do the tires need wind.”

  “They’re standing up,” said Riar, pressing the starter.

  Riar didn’t pause until he reached Fletcher. He had the tank brimmed, for businesses open after midnight were scarce. And he tightened the cap himself. He climbed the rack, the while cocking an eye at Godey. Riar watched Godey so closely Mal had to do the mischief. Mal caught a chance and scooped up a fistful of dirt, crammed it into the tank, and stuck the cap back on.

  They passed through Arden and Skyland and Asheville. And nothing happened. The truck ran smoothly. At Weaverville, Riar halted at a closed station to replenish the radiator. A bulb inside threw a faint light. He left the engine idling, but as he poured in water it quit, and feeling for the key a moment later, he found it missing. He spoke sharply: “All right, you boys, hand over.”

  “Hand what over?” Godey made strange.

  “The key. You don’t have to ask.”

  “Why hallo to us. We haven’t got it.”

  Riar struck a match and searched the cab. He blustered, “I don’t want to start war with you fellers.”

  Stretching, Godey inquired, “Are you of a notion we stole the key? You can frisk us.” They stepped out and shucked their pockets.

  Mal said, “I never tipped it.”

  “Couldn’t have disappeared of itself,” said Riar. “One of you is guilty, and I think I know which.”

  Godey chuckled sleepily. “Why, it might be square under your nose. Scratch around, keep a-looking.”

  Riar made a second search, and then he said, “Let me tell you boys something. A load of peaches generates enough heat a day to melt a thousand pounds of ice. They have to be kept moving or they’ll bake.”

  “That makes it mean,” said Godey.

  “Rough as a cob,” agreed Mal.

  Riar couldn’t budge them. He had no choice other than to wire-over the ignition. He got out pliers and a screwdriver, but it was pitch-black under the hood. Offering a penny matchbox to Mal, he said, “Strike them for me as they’re needed.”

  “Do that,” warned Godey, “and I’ll hang you to a bush.”

  Breathing deep to master his anger, Riar chuffed, “You jaspers don’t care whether my family starves.”

  “Not our lookout,” said Godey, yawning.

  Lighting match after match, Riar peered to the farthest the key could have been tossed. He felt along the cab floor again and on the ground beneath. When the matchbox was empty he groped with his fingers.

  Godey and Mal were soon asleep, but Riar didn’t leave off hunting the rest of the night.

  At daybreak Riar loosened the ignition wires and hooked them together. The boys stirred as the truck moved, but did not rouse. Beyond the town limits Riar smartened his speed to an unaccustomed forty-five miles an hour. Then, on the grade north of Faust, the engine started missing, and he had to pump the accelerator to coax it to the top.

  Halting in the gap, Riar decided gasoline was not getting through to the carburetor, and inspecting the sediment bulb, he found it choked. His breath caught as he reasoned he had been sold dirty gasoline. In a hurry he cleared the bulb and blew out the fuel pump. Already the truck bed seeped juice and the load was drawing hornets. The day had set in hot.

  He rolled downhill, and at the bottom it was the same t
hing over. The engine coughed and lost power. Again the bulb was plugged, the pump fouled. This time he checked the tank, and the deed was out. The cap barely hung on, and the pipe was rimed with grit. Riar gasped. His face reddened in sudden anger. He threw open the cranky door and glared at Godey and Mal. For a moment he had no voice to speak, but when he could he cried, “You boys think you’re pistol balls!”

  Godey and Mal cracked their eyelids. Godey asked, “What are you looking so dim about?”

  Riar sputtered, “You’re too sorry to stomp into the ground.”

  “Has she tuk the studs on you?”

  “Filled my tank with dirt. Intending to make me lose my peaches.”

  “Are you accusing us? Daggone! To hear you tell it, whatever happens to your old scrap heap we’re the cause.”

  “Don’t deny it. You’re the very scamp.”

  “If you mean me,” said Godey, “that’s where you’re wrong. Bring me a Scripture and I’ll swear by it.”

  The veins on Riar’s neck showed knots. His cheeks looked raw. “Then you put your partner up to it. Besides, you got my key last night.”

  Godey chirped, “Where’s your proof, tightwad?”

  “I have evidence a-plenty,” bumbled Riar.

  “I’d take oath,” vowed Mal, “I never tipped the key.”

  “When I get mad,” confided Godey, “I can see little devils hopping in front of my eyes. How does it serve you?”

  Riar was getting nowhere. Slamming the door, he went to work on the pump. He saw the cure was to purge the whole fuel system with fresh gasoline. But getting to a filling station was the question. He tried again and the engine struggled almost a mile before dying.

  Godey said, “Give me justice on my peaches and we’ll help.”

  “All you’re good for is to gum up,” blared Riar. “You’re as useless as tits on a boar.”

  Godey shrugged. He sang, “Suit yourself and sit on the shelf.”

  “Don’t contrary me,” Riar begged. “You make me speak things I don’t want to.”

  “Then hurry and fix the old plug, and let’s get to some breakfast.”

  The sun beat upon the peaches as Riar labored. He jockeyed the truck two miles after unclogging it, a half mile next, and each holdup used three quarters of an hour at least. Then several blowings gained less than five miles altogether, and mid-morning found them still in North Carolina and no station in sight. As the day advanced the load settled slowly, the seep of juice became a trickle. Hornets swarmed, and the fainting fruit seemed to beget gnats. Around eleven the truck made a spurt, crossing into Tennessee jerking and backfiring.