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The Which Way Tree

Page 2

by Elizabeth Crook


  I’d be spooked if he was not dead, sir. It would be unnatural.

  This is certainly news. We may finish with Mr. Hanlin sooner than I thought. You are certain it was he?

  None other but him, sir.

  I see. Well. This only increases the importance of your job. Evidence is our bulwark against chaos. If Clarence Hanlin is guilty and living, he has to be found and convicted. If he’s deceased, he has to be proved so. He can’t simply be presumed so and allowed to go free when eight men traveling to Mexico were captured, robbed, and hanged. I want you to write the account I asked for and deliver it to Comfort as I said. I want all the details on record.

  Sir? I have no pens and papers.

  Izac, can you spare Benjamin quill and paper and a pot of ink?

  Yes, Your Honor. I can.

  Benjamin, I assume you’re heading home on horseback?

  Yes sir.

  You’re aware the Comanches have been raiding over in Blanco County?

  Yes sir, I’m much aware of it. And Mr. Berry Buckalew killed on the Seco. My father and me once cut shingles with him. And Mr. Hines, that lived at the Mormon camp, done for at Tarpley’s Crossing. I know of it all. The troubles with Kickapoos, too. I’m well aware, sir.

  Is your sister alone at your home?

  Yes sir.

  Take care on the road, will you?

  Thank you. I always do, sir.

  Chapter 2

  Dear Judge,

  Here is my statements to what you asked. However, it is not all of them as there is more. I will send more later.

  Yours kindly,

  Benjamin Shreve

  MY TESTAMENT

  WHO I AM

  I am Benjamin Shreve.

  WHO MY PARENTS WAS

  My father was Alton Shreve. My mother was Millie. I guess her name was Millie Shreve after she married my father. I don’t know what it was before that. My father always just called her your mother. I did not know her personally as she died shortly after my birth, which event took place in the winter of 1849. I have been told by others she was a good woman and pretty to look at if a tad bit flat in the face. Before I was born, she and my father come here from Duck Hill Mississippi and my father built a house and was making acceptable money in shingles which at that time was starting to be a good living in these parts, if hard work. When I was born and my mother passed, my father had a impossible time taking care of me and cutting shingles and making hauls to market. I was left to squall much of the time, what choice did he have in the matter. I suppose there was nights he wished the Comanches would hear and come take me.

  WHO MY SISTER IS

  My sister is Samantha Shreve. You asked me to be frank so I will tell you she is my half sister, as her mother was a Negro and mine was white. On occasion I call her Sam, which I think she prefers though I have no reason to know so, as she has never said so. She is fifteen years old, scarred in the face by a panther that killed her mother when she was six. She is scrawny and nothing to look at.

  Her mother was named Juda. The way my father met Juda was on the road to San Antonio. I was one year old at that time, lashed to the wagon seat so I would not tumble off. The wagon had a issue at Slide Off Pass with the wheel coming loose and the logs on the top sliding off the back like they are wont to do on that extreme incline. My father had to take me down and strap me to a tree so I would not toddle off. He was retrieving the spilled logs, and had about had all the good times he could stand, when along come a wagon driven by a man with a poorly looking woman beside him and a sturdy Negro woman in the back.

  The man called out, Do you need some help with them logs.

  My father, not being a man of much pride, I guess, said, I need some help with my whole life. And with that he commenced to weep like a baby—so he told me on the occasion that he recounted the story. He was not a delicate man nor a pessimist but he broke down and let her rip. I have not ever thought less of him for that particular moment. He had got hisself a sorry life, a bunch of logs going their own way, a broken down wagon, a hogback horse that given up, a chance of Indians coming along, and a terrible little baby boy strapped to a tree and making a racket.

  The man in the wagon climbed down and helped him out. In the course of this, in some way a deal was struck that the man could take possession of the logs, which he was in need of as he was new to the place and expecting to build, and in exchange the Negro woman Juda would be borrowed to my father for a month to clean up his house, wash his laundry, and otherwise do the work of a wife minus the conjugal—there was to be none of that.

  My father, being a man of his word, did not come near Juda during that time I don’t think. However, love was in the air, from his part, as I understand. I am not too sure what Juda thought of him. She must of liked him well enough, for when the time was up she did not return to them that owned her, and more deals was struck and finally after a while she and my father was together for good. You want me to be frank. I do not know of any wedding. I do not suppose there could of been one. But Samantha come along.

  The only problem was, Juda was mean. She used to about do me in. I believe she might of hated me, but I am not sure. She was a hard worker, and determined, and kept the house in good order, but she could whip the daylight out of a bad little boy. Being as I was the only one of those around, I got more than my share of that.

  I was a mere two years old at the time Samantha was born, but when I got my footing in life, and learned to say my piece and have a sense of what was going on about me, I recall taking my fists to Juda when she talked rough to the baby. We surely had our fights, and I would do nothing she said.

  One particular time I recall, if not perfectly, it was a hot day and she kept me in the house, sweltering, and made me tend the cookfire, which I felt was women’s work, whilst I preferred to go out and help my father. I was about five years old and big enough to help him some.

  Stir the pot, she told me.

  She was hanging nappies at the hearth, and the whole place smelled bad, of nappies and sweat, and blazing hot, and I said, No, I ain’t going to stir it, I am going outside.

  Stir it, said she.

  I said, I won’t. You ain’t my boss. My daddy is my boss and you ain’t.

  She boiled up with fierce anger in her head and her face. She was a sturdy woman. She had a fierce jaw, and skin that was pale for a Negro, and hair cut short to her scalp. She continued to tell me to stir the pot, and I continued to not do so, and the argument got loud, and I thought to make a break for the door, but she got me by the hair and dragged me back and said, I’ll snatch you bald.

  Her hold on me, as I recall, hurt me quite a bit. She did not let go. I screeched like a caught varmint, and Samantha caterwauled in her crib, creating a further ruckus. When finally I broke loose of Juda I was fed up. I took up the poker out of the fire and thrashed it about and proclaimed in a pitch wail, I will leave my mark on you, I will! I do not like you, and I will leave my mark!

  She ceased her hollering, ceased moving altogether, and the look in her eyes become murderous, and she said, in a slow voice, like she was talking to a slow witted person, You think I ain’t never faced down a hot poker before.

  Then she undone her buttons and dropped her dress to the ground, and stood before me without a stitch on, and I seen a bunch of stripes on her body, darker than her skin.

  Agape, I stood. God all mighty, Juda, who done that to you, I asked her.

  His name ain’t important, said she. But I will tell you one thing. A poker ain’t going to get you your way. You stir the pot, you hear me.

  I was inclined to stir it then, but my eyes was stuck on her, and my father come in and seen her stark naked, and he looked dismayed at the fearful sight, and rather doleful, and said, Juda, he don’t need to see that.

  And she said, Yes, by God, he do.

  After that, she put her clothes on, and I stirred the pot.

  That was the most I ever seen of Juda, other than her meanness.

&nb
sp; The fact that she was so hard on me and on Samantha makes it all the more curious the way she laid her life down, in such a bloody fashion, in defense of Samantha, the day a panther come calling.

  Chapter 3

  Dear Judge,

  To explain about Clarence Hanlin I have to explain about the panther. Those are of a piece. So this further report I am about to send to you is direct to the point although you might not know it. I have yet to get to what I have to say about Clarence Hanlin but I will make another report after this one. They take time for me to write, as I work at the shingle camp down from here when it’s not pouring rain. I have to write these reports mostly at night or early. Also I make furniture in what time I have.

  Also the quill is hard to manage.

  Here is the facts of what the panther done to Juda on a cold blue morning before the sun come up.

  Yours kindly,

  Benjamin Shreve

  MY TESTAMENT

  I was eight years old at the time it happened. On the night previous my father brought home with him a man he met in the shingle camp downriver. The man was to stay the night with us, as he did not yet have him a home of his own and it was exceeding cold out. His name was Luke. He had with him a buffalo skin to sleep on. Juda did not like the dirty condition that it was in. She liked things tidy and clean to a fault—you could not track even a piece of grass into the house without having to hear about it from her. She was not quite right in the head about that.

  The man had a odd way of twitching his head and had scurf in his hair. Juda had words to say to my father about bringing him home, as she did not want him around. However, she did finally allow him to come in with his buffalo skin, to eat corn bread, and to sleep on the floor. She would not give him any meat.

  He did not kill it nor skin it, she said, and he ain’t going to eat it.

  I will give him a portion of mine, my father said.

  But Juda said, No, he can’t have any.

  She did not turn her back whilst we ate. She kept her eye on my father to see he did not give up any meat. This was unfriendly, as there was no shortage then.

  Me and Samantha slept in the same bed at that time, whilst Juda and my father slept in the other. The man spread his skin before the fire and commenced to snore. I had trouble getting to sleep, as I could feel how mad Juda was to have the man there, and how sorry my father felt, and how little caring the stranger had about any of it at all—I do not think he cared about meat, he only wanted the warmth of the fire, and there was plenty of that.

  Some time before the sun come up I seen Juda get out of the bed. She wore her dress, other than her gown, on account of the stranger was in the house. She stirred up the coals and nursed up a flame. Then she knelt by the side of the man and set to searching his head. She did not touch it, but only got very close. I knew what she was up to. She had a aversion to lice and was forever at the ready for them. The man’s hair smelled bad and I suppose she was suspicious of it.

  In a short time she stood up and give him a kick in the side. Get out, she told him. Get going.

  He roused with a start, and let out a yell.

  My father awoke to the noise. The man looked to him, as I guess he could not believe my father would let a Negro act like that.

  What have you done, my father asked Juda.

  I want him gone, she said. I want him gone now.

  As if that might of escaped my father’s notice.

  You get him out, she said. She said the twitch he had got was not natural but on account of the itch.

  My father tried to get her to put a sock in it but she would not.

  The man said, I ain’t going. I don’t know the way to the road.

  It’s yonder, she told him. You can find it. Only a fool can’t find a road.

  My father said, He is not a fool. It’s dark out.

  They had words about it.

  After some time of this, my father raised his voice and said, Goddamn, I’m going with him. Daylight or not, it’s time to go. Hell or high water, it’s time to go.

  He did not often curse in such a manner.

  He and the stranger went to the shed and saddled their horses and left.

  That did not satisfy Juda well enough. She had it in her mind that we had all got lice in our hair on account of the man having been in our midst and because they can sneak. This was a terrible thought for her to suffer, as she hated the creatures, and all creatures that was not under her say-so. In a angry manner she swept the floor and got out her ridding comb and dumped kerosene into a bowl and combed it into her hair.

  She told me to take off my shirt and to sit at the table. I knew how this would go, as we had done it before. I did not see any use to put up a fight. I would of preferred to ride off with my father and the stranger, but unlike them I did not have a horse. She slathered the kerosene onto my hair and combed in a vigorous manner. I figured I’d have to go out and dunk my head in the creek, and this was a unwelcome thought on account of how cold it was out. I did state once, I have got no bugs. She continued to scrape my head and splash the kerosene over my hair. It burned a great deal on my scalp.

  I seen Samantha was awake now and alert to us from the bed. So as to pretend she did not see us, she did not sit up nor fully open her eyes. I knew there would be some difficulty with her. She had a hatred to having a comb in her hair, which was trouble to manage, as it was Negro hair and she had a good bit of it.

  Without giving us warning, she bolted out of the bed and run out into the dark. One minute she was in the bed and the next she was out the door and left it open. The night was cold and the sky black with a partial scoop of the moon to see by. Through the door I seen her light out for the creek. I do not know where she thought she would get to, but I had a idea about that. A huge old sow roamed with the notch-eared hogs down in the creek bottom, and Samantha was fond of that sow. It had taken a hatred to Juda, who had beat it out of the house on occasions it dared to wander in, but Samantha had always treated it right and there was affection between them. It might be she was heading down to the creek to hide out with the fat sow. I have never seen fit to ask her if this was the case, as I think the question would trouble her, given what happened on account of her taking off in the manner she did.

  She run in her white gown with her arms flapping alongside. She was six years old at that time, and puny for that, racing as fast as she could to the trees and the creek. I might of laughed out loud at the sight if not for the fact that Juda would of let loose on me for doing that. You run, I thought to myself. Hide out where Juda can’t find you.

  And then I seen a creature low to the ground and moving so fast I could not make out what it was. It went directly at Samantha from off to the right where we kept eight goats in a pen. It come into my line of sight in a flash of yellow-brown color, with a long tail, crossing our bare patch of yard, just under the scoop of the moon. I had no time to think of what it might be before it was on Samantha. It was bigger than I can even say. It covered her fully up. One minute her shape was there in the dark, and the next it was not to be seen. All I made out was the long shape of the beast, as if it had swallowed her up. It did not make a sound, nor did Samantha. In the midst of the quiet it come to me what sort of beast this must be, although I was not thinking much about what to call it.

  I got to my feet in haste and was out the door. I do not recall what I thought I would do, but the question arose in me as I drew closer. I would like to tell you I leapt on the cat and forestalled it, and yet it was not me that done so, but Juda. She run faster and past me.

  What happened next was loud. Juda threw herself down on top of the cat like she was a rug laid over it. She was plenty big, but the cat was bigger. It yowled and roared. Juda latched herself on to it and swung at it with a hatchet she had got from by the door. It was not a big hatchet. It was a chicken chopper. She shrieked in a manner that I did not know she could, laying it on the panther. But the panther was hard to keep hold of. Juda got her arms around its
throat and tried to drag it off Samantha. I thought if she did not hack it to death then she was bound to strangle the creature. It made fierce noises, and the struggle was such a frenzy of twisting and turning I could not tell what was Juda and what was the cat. I was not sure Samantha was still a part of the picture as she was flat on the ground and could not be seen. After a time of terrible struggle Juda flipped the cat on its back and Samantha rose up and run for a tree close by.

  I have heard that when a cat has got its eyes on a prey it will settle for nothing else, it wants only to kill what it has set its heart on. In this case that was Samantha. Juda hung on to its neck and all but rode on its back, but it continued after Samantha. The tree Samantha climbed was a old pecan tree. The panther got halfway up after her whilst Juda hacked and pulled at its hind end and chopped at its paws. Juda’s screaming was a racket. I run to the house to get my father’s rifle. I can’t actually swear I had a intention of fetching the rifle, as it is likely I just wanted shed of the fright. But when I got to the house I did think of the rifle. It was a old caplock with a short stock and it took me a minute to load it and get back out the door.

  When I was out there I seen the panther had ceased going up the tree and was on the ground on top of Juda. She was on her back and the panther’s teeth was sunk in her throat. Its jaws was squeezing down hard. This was a terrible sight to behold, as you could see the death coming over her. She had nearly lost her hold on the hatchet but was trying to hit the panther with it. But a hatchet used to chop up chickens was not handy against a beast such as that which had got her pinned down.

  I fired, but did not hit the panther. It did not so much as look about for the sound. Juda made fearsome noises and then she moved no more. The panther got off her and sunk its claws in the trunk of the tree and headed for Samantha again. Samantha screeched at me, Shoot it, shoot it! But I had already spent the ball and could not do so. Therefore I advanced and took a whack at the cat with the butt of the rifle and hit it squarely on the back with a thud as it went up the tree. I jabbed at it with the barrel. It hissed and yowled and swiped at me but kept on going after Samantha. Its hair stood on end. I seen Juda there at my feet, her dress tore up, her skin ripped up, her throat a terrible mess, one of her eyes hanging out of the socket. I had to watch out for fear I would tread on her body. Juda had done a good bit of damage to the cat. Two toes of the hind right paw was chopped clean off and missing. I struck with the rifle, and Samantha jabbed with a stick until the panther backed down the tree, at which time I thought we might win the fight yet.

 

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