Pioneer, Go Home!

by Richard Powell

  "You start by putting your arms around my waist."

  "I couldn't hardly do that on account of I am holding this cane pole and skittering for snook, and the fastest way to lose a snook is not to hang onto your pole."

  "Well, then, you could hold the pole in one hand and put just one arm around my waist."

  "All right," I said, and done it, and it was kind of a new feeling to have an arm around Holly's waist. "You are certainly real small through the middle," I said, "and a person would hardly think you are growed at all. Well, we got this far, didn't we? What comes next?"

  "Now you draw me up close against you."

  I give her a little tug and she come in easy and fitted up against me. Then she put her arms around my neck and all hell busted loose. It warn't exactly what Holly thought, though, because what happened was I must have give that cane pole just the right jiggle and a big old snook whomped that plug and the pole near about jumped out of my hand. When a girl is hanging onto you on one side and a snook is hanging onto you on the other, you have your hands full and are going to lose one or the other of them, even though the girl might not be trying to get away but the snook is. So it was a real job getting loose of Holly but I done it finally and went to work on that snook. A cane pole don't have no reel with line on it, so you can't let that fish run. What you have to do is keep his head out of water and let him thrash himself out. So I done that, and in a couple minutes I yanked a nice eight-pound snook up on the bridge.

  "Well, Holly," I said, "you brung some luck."

  "I think I would have made out better," she said, "if I had brought a club."

  "Oh, I don't need a club but will just whap him on the bridge."

  I got him off the gang hooks, making sure I didn't tangle with them sharp gill rakers of Iris, and lifted him by the tail and banged him on the bridge to quiet him down. I had a bucket out there like I always do so I can keep the bridge clean, and I lowered the bucket on a rope and brung it up full and washed off the bridge and cleaned my hands.

  Holly said, "It's very thoughtful of you to wash your hands, Toby."

  "Well," I said, "a man is not going to catch many snook if his hands are messy from fish and slip on the cane pole." I flipped the plug out and began skittering it.

  "But Toby, now that you've caught a fish, can't you take time out for our lesson?"

  "Them snook might be ready to start hitting good."

  "At least you could spare me one arm, the way you did before."

  "Maybe you're right," I said, "because maybe that is what brung me luck before."

  I put my arm around her waist again and hauled her in close, and dog me if that warn't right about it bringing me luck. I had a real good strike that bent the pole way down, but Holly got kind of tangled in the pole and the fish shook himself off. So I tried again with Holly and with the snook. I got Holly in close and nothing was happening with the snook and Holly reminded me about kissing her. Her face was real close and her hps was parted a little and when you come to study on it they looked sanitary after all so I begun kissing her. Ten or fifteen seconds went by, and I could see how a feller could get to like this if he practiced on it. It is funny how different a girl feels when she is hauled up against you than when she is just standing around, because I would have said Holly was just a half-growed kid and not much more than skin and bone, but if I hadn't knowed it was just Holly I would have said she was a girl who had growed up real good and in the right places.

  The only trouble about kissing a girl is it shows you up if you are not in good training. You might have thought there was a big barrel falling downstairs in my chest, and I couldn't have run no more short on breath if I had been swimming under water two-three minutes. So when some big old snook hit the plug I warn't in no shape to take him on too. I didn't know why no big old snook wanted to come butting in right then, and I tried to shake him loose.

  Holly put her hands against my chest and pushed herself back from me and said, "You're catching another one of those damn snook."

  "No," I said, "I am trying to get rid of this one."

  "I don't believe it," she said, busting loose from me and backing away. "Good night, Toby. Have fun with your fish."

  "But Holly, what about that lesson you started to give me?"

  "I decided you're not in as much danger from girls as I thought. At least, not if there are any fish around, too."

  She walked off, and I stood there a moment watching her and suddenly recollected that big old snook. I gave the pole a yank, but of course by then the snook had found something better to do than chew on my gang hooks. He would have gone fifteen pounds easy, and I wish he had picked a time when I was more interested in him.

  10

  ALL during July we seen a lot of Miss Claypoole. She come out two- three times a week to talk to Pop or me, and she must have filled up a couple of notebooks with things about us Kwimpers. Now and then she tried to get something out of the twins, but I don't think she done very good. If you don't know how to handle them little imps they will work all kinds of tricks on you.

  Like one day she brung out a box of candy and wanted to find out what one of the twins had dreamed about the night before. She coaxed one of them to set down with her on the porch and gave him a piece of the candy and said, "You're Eddy, aren't you? Now Eddy, one way we can learn what really goes on inside a person is by studying his dreams. Did you have a dream last night?"

  "I don't know," Eddy said. "I was asleep."

  "That's too bad," Miss Claypoole said. "Because there's some more candy here for a little boy who had dreams last night, and it looks as if I can't find one, doesn't it?"

  "I remember now," Eddy said. "I had a great big dream."

  I was on the porch listening and seen Eddy sneak a look at me, and I knowed that little imp was fibbing so

  he could get some more candy. I didn't want to put him to shame in front of Miss Claypoole by lighting into him about fibbing, but I was sure going to take it up with him after she left.

  "Isn't that nice?" Miss Claypoole said. "Here's a piece of candy. What was this dream about, Eddy?"

  "I forget."

  "It's often hard to remember dreams, Eddy. But think a moment, and see if you can get started on it."

  Well, that little imp looked all around, and anybody but Miss Claypoole would have knowed he was looking for something he could have a dream about quick. There was a fishing rod standing in one corner of the porch, and Eddy studied on it and his eyes lit up. "It was a dream where I was out fishing on the bridge," he said. "I was fishing and this great big thing grabbed my bait and I yanked up on the rod and this great big thing come right up in the air and . . . and . . ."

  Miss Claypoole made some notes. "Yes, Eddy. Go on."

  Eddy went into one of them squirming giggles that kids get into, when they are excited and having a high old time. I knowed he wanted to bust out laughing but was afraid he wouldn't get no more candy if he did, so in a moment he jumped up and run off the porch and around the shack to let off steam.

  Pretty soon he come racing back in and shouted, "It was a tiger and it come at me with big yellow eyes and I took out my sword and—"

  "Where did the tiger come from, Eddy?" Miss Claypoole asked. "Was that the great big thing you caught fishing?"

  "Can I have some candy?" he said.

  "Yes, Eddy. Here's a piece."

  "It wasn't fishing at all but hunting out in the Glades," Eddy said. He stuffed the candy in his mouth and run out again. He come back around the other side of the shack and yanked open the porch door and yelled, "When I got it up on the bridge it was the biggest old snook anybody ever caught."

  "But the tiger, Eddy?"

  He reached out and grabbed a piece of candy and took off again.

  Miss Claypoole said to me, "I'll just have to let him do this in his own way. But this is a very interesting dream, Toby. The child has an almost perfect split personality. He's living two different lives inside his mind."


  I thought a few moments, and watched that imp come racing in and tell her some more about the tiger, and then I went outside and eased around the shack. It was just like I thought. Both them little imps was in on it. One of them would race in and tell her what he had just made up about his dream, and grab a piece of candy and run around behind the shack and have a fit of the giggles, and the other one would take off to tell about the dream he just made up and to get his candy. And like the fishing rod on the porch had set one of them off about fishing, the one behind the shack had been going through a picture book Holly had brung him, and there was a picture of a tiger on the cover. So it warn't really a split personality like Miss Claypoole had said but only a split box of candy.

  Miss Claypoole done better with Pop, because he wouldn't lie for fun but only if he had to, and when it come to some of her questions he didn't lie but just didn't give her no answer. She was always asking who married who among the Kwimpers and how they got along and did they swap wives, but Pop wouldn't gossip about such things even when Miss Claypoole said she warn't interested for herself but just for science. Pop told her a lot of other things, though, and some was right interesting.

  They was talking one time about how the Kwimpers come to Cranberry County in the Year One, and stuck by themselves so much that they come to have a funny way of talking that was different from other folks.

  "You couldn't hardly understand my Grandpop and Grandmom when they talked," Pop said. "That is, not unless you had growed right up beside them. Like if you dropped in to see Grandpop he might say, 'Wouldst care to sup with us' instead of saying right out plain to set down and have a bite."

  "How fascinating!" Miss Claypoole said. "Pure Elizabethan! How would your grandfather have asked your grandmother to marry him?"

  "Well," Pop said, thinking back on the way they talked, "he would maybe have said, 'Wilt thou marry me?' And I reckon Grandmom must have said, 'Ay, that I will right well.'"

  Miss Claypoole wrote that down in her book, and said, "If you were visiting them and they wanted to send you home, how would they have said it?"

  "Let's see, now," Pop said. "They might have said, 'Prithee, lad, stay not.'"

  I hung around taking it all in, on account of I hadn't knowed about any of this before. Because of course none of us Kwimpers talk funny like that now, and since the public schools come to our part of Jersey we talk as good as anybody.

  Mostly, though, Miss Claypoole spent her time asking me questions and giving me tests, and I couldn't help feeling proud and happy that science wanted to know everything I thought and said and done. I always knowed I thought things out pretty good but until Miss Claypoole come along I hadn't knowed everything I done was scientific. The only trouble with talking to Miss Claypoole was things kept happening to bust up our talks. One time it would be the fresh water barrel leaking so it had to be filled again. Or one of our rowboats would start drifting off, or all of a sudden we would run out of bait, or Holly would lose track of the twins and ask me to see where they was, or Holly wouldn't be able to get Pop's car started, or something she was cooking would blaze up and I would have to put it out. You might almost have thought Miss Claypoole brung bad luck but anybody with brains knows things like that is just the result of chance.

  This one afternoon Miss Claypoole brung out a real important test that she didn't want anything to bust in on, and said how about if we drove to a quiet place in her car. I said fine, and clumb in her car. I did think I heard a shriek from Holly down by the dock as we was leaving, and a sound like something had exploded, but Miss Claypoole said it warn't nothing and kept on driving. I found out later I was right and Miss Claypoole was right, too. Holly had been starting an outboard motor in a barrel of fresh water to wash salt out of the lines, and it backfired and begun smoking and Holly yelled for me. But when I warn't around, Holly dunked the motor in the barrel and cooled it off, and it proves what folks can do for themselves if they have to, so Miss Claypoole was right that it warn't nothing.

  We drove partway to Gulf City and Miss Claypoole turned off on a side road and finally we come to a little beach with nobody around to bust up our talk. She brung out a blanket from the car and some pillows and fixed a place to set down, and she had one of them little pocket radios to pick up music, and it was a warm afternoon and right nice setting there on the beach.

  She got out a notebook and pencil, and said, "I have some sandwiches and milk and things, in case we stay a while and get hungry, but let's get the work out of the way first, shall we?"

  "Well," I said, "it is not really work for me but fun, because it is not a matter of me working hard to study

  science but more of taking it easy while science studies me.

  "Oh, I enjoy this too, Toby," she said. "It's just that some things can be more fun than others, and I don't want to use up all this lovely day just talking. Now let me tell you about the test."

  "I hope this is not one of them ink blot tests where

  I am supposed to see all kinds of things in ink blots but don't see nothing but ink blots."

  "Yes, the Rorschach tests were disappointing. But this is different. It's a word-association test. I'll say a word, and you must immediately say the first word that pops into your head."

  "It don't sound very scientific. I would ruther give it some thought before coming out with my word."

  "But answering quickly is the whole point of the test, Toby. This is a test to probe your motivations. Everybody has three levels of motivations. One is what we call the Conscious-Outer Level. We all know our motivations on this level, and we don't mind telling other people about them."

  I hauled one of the pillows over so I could lean on it, and said, "I am following you pretty good so far. It is like me asking why you brung this pillow and you telling me you brung it so we could have a comfortable thing to lean on."

  She give me a funny little smile and said, "That's right, Toby. Now, the second level of motivations is the Conscious-Inner Level. We all know our motivations on this level, but for one reason or another we won't tell people about them."

  "That would be like you brung this pillow for some other reason than to lean on."

  Miss Claypoole got took with a little coughing fit, and it reddened her face up some. "I don't know what you're talking about," she said, when she got her breath again.

  "Well," I said, "you might be feeling lazy and not really like doing no work, and had in the back of your mind a notion that a pillow would be handy if you wanted to take a nap. But you wouldn't want to let on you felt lazy, so you wouldn't tell nobody why you really brung the pillow."

  She laughed and said, "Oh, Toby, you're so refreshing. Let me tell you about the third level of motivations. We call it the Unconscious-Unrecognized Level. It makes us do things, but we don't know that it's making us do things."

  "A person like that don't know his own mind. There is never a time I don't know my own mind."

  "I wonder," she said in a soft voice. "I wonder. Well, anyway, the word-association test makes people reveal unverbalized attitudes that are on the second and third levels of motivation, and that they wouldn't or couldn't tell you about. So now remember, when I give you a word, you must say at once the first word that pops into your mind. For example, if I said the word eat, what would you say?"

  "I reckon I would say food. But it don't sound like that would give you much of anything."

  "Maybe not. But suppose I said eat and you said love. Of course I wouldn't try to draw conclusions from just one pairing of words. But if other pairings confirmed it, I might decide that the pairing of eat and love indicated that you had very strong sex repressions, and that eating was your way of sublimating your sex urges."

  "I am not following you too good on that, so if you say eat I will just say food."

  "Only if it's the first thing that comes into your head, though. Now, are you ready?"

  "Yes ma'am," I said. "Go ahead and say eat and I will say food."

  "No, no, no. We fi
nished with eat."

  "Well, I'm sorry about that, because I had it practiced good."

  "Here's your first word, Toby. Hurt."

  "Ow," I said.

  "I'm not sure we can count that as a word, but it will have to do. Yes, as a matter of fact, it indicates a simple, uncomplicated reaction. So that's all right. The next word is king."

  Naturally I thought right off of Mr. King, so I said, "Mister."

  "What an odd combination! King and mister. Perhaps when your ancestors left England originally, they disliked royalty and felt they were as good as anybody. So they would equate a king with a mister. That would come down to you as a family tradition. The next word is school."

  "Football."

  "Another nice simple reaction. The next word is friend."

  "Can't."

  "Did you say can't, Toby?"

  "Yes ma'am. The reason I said it was—"

  "Oh no, Toby, you mustn't tell me. You would only give me your Conscious-Outer Level reason for saying can't. It's up to me to figure out the Conscious-Inner

  Level, or the Unconscious-Unrecognized Level motivation. So don't try to explain anything, please."

  "Yes ma'am," I said, but I warn't sure she could figure out I said can't on account of I always liked that song Can't We Be Friends.

  She said, "The next word is government."

  "Pop."

  "Oh yes, of course. You look on government as the provider, the head of the family, the father or 'Pop.'"

  "Well," I said, wanting to tell her I was thinking of my Pop, "what I had in mind was—"

  "Toby!"

  "Yes ma'am. I'm sorry. I won't do it no more."

  "The next word is life."

  Her little radio had a feller on it saying to drive careful on account of the life you save may be your own, so when Miss Claypoole said life I come right back with, "Death."

  She studied on me for a moment and then said right quick, like she wanted to catch me off balance, "What do you think of first when I say death?"