by Alden Nowlan
“Some things ain’t never gonna change, son. Yer poor — allus was an’ allus will be. There ain’t nothin’s gonna change that. The Good Lord meant it tuh be. The Good Lord meant fer folks like us tuh take what’s handed out tuh us an’ be grateful fer it.”
“This ain’t got nothin’ tuh do with what yer talkin’ about, Ma. I’m jist gettin’ rid of an old no-good cow. I been thinkin’ a tradin’ her off fer a long time now.”
“There ain’t no use in a-talkin’ tuh yuh when yuh got yer mind set on a thing, son! I might jist as well save my breath tuh cool my porridge. Answer not a fool accordin’ tuh his folly, the Good Book says. There ain’t no earthly use in a-talkin’ tuh yuh a-tall.”
“Yuh wanta come with me, Kev?”
Kevin stared at his father in amazement. Normally, Judd would never have dreamed of issuing such an invitation.
“Huh? Gosh. Yes, I guess so. Sure,” he stammered.
“Git on yer duds then, me laddie. Me and you is goin’ cow tradin’.”
Making a halter from a piece of clothes line, Judd led the red cow out of the barn and onto the road. There were only two colours in the world: the grey of the sky and the white of the snow.
“Break off a lilac switch, Kev, and switch her backside ever’ time she gits balky.”
Fetching a switch from the hedge, Kevin grinned; Judd slapped the cow’s dropping ears lightly, almost affectionately. It was incredible that this same man had once seized a pitchfork and —
“Geddap up there, yuh old red fool!” Judd bellowed.
Judd leading the cow and Kevin trotting behind her with the switch, they went down the dry, white canal that was the road . . .
Biff Mason wore red garters on his sleeves and a pencil stub behind his ear. His lips were flaccid, perpetually moist, and his voice was a lugubrious singsong punctuated by whinnying laughter. Once, in the previous summer, Biff had caught Kevin pilfering peppermints and since then he had said often, in Kevin’s hearing, that all of the mill hands’ children were unblushing little thieves.
But, today, Biff ignored Kevin. While the men dickered in the yard, prodding and poking the cow, making her open her mouth and lift her feet so that they might examine her teeth and hooves, Kevin stood inside, imbibing the atmosphere of the store. The building was scarcely larger than the O’Briens’ woodshed and, like the woodshed, it was built of unbarked slabs and raw, unpainted boards. But the smells, sights, and textures were inexhaustibly intoxicating. Crates, cartons, and barrels stood on top of one another in grotesque, teetering towers. The smell was a compound of a thousand aromas, sweet and salty, vapid and pungent. There were the scents of kerosene, vinegar, molasses, ham, bologna, cheddar cheese, butter, clean new denim, tinfoil, chewing tobacco, and waxed wrapping paper. At this season, crates and shelves overflowed with oranges, grapes, nuts, and a dozen kinds of multi-coloured, fruit-scented candies. And, as always, there were big boxes full of gum rubbers, jeans, and black-and-red checked lumber jackets, and little boxes containing mechanical pencils, hairpins, playing cards, and pocket watches.
After thirty minutes of talk and gesturing, the men led the cow away, and Kevin, watching through a little clear space made by his breath in the opaque frost on the window, knew that the sale had been made.
A further ten minutes passed. Then Biff and Judd came back from the barn and entered the store. Kevin knew from the reek of his father’s breath that he had drunk of the vanilla flavouring extract which Biff sold to the men as though it were liquor.
“This here young feller a yers is sproutin’ up jist like a bad weed, ain’t he, Juddie?” Biff whinnied.
“Yeah, I guess mebbe yer right, Biff,” Judd said shortly, dismissing the subject. There were occasions, such as today, when Judd tried to be friendly with Kevin while the two of them were at home or alone together. But it was his unshakable conviction that small boys should be barred from the company of men. When they could not be excluded, Judd’s etiquette demanded that they be ignored. Kevin had long ago been taught that the quickest and surest way to earn a strapping was to impinge on the conversations of men.
He sat on an orange crate, his mittened hands in his lap, as Judd and Biff transacted their business.
First, there was the question of a payment on the bill. Judd called credit buying “dealing on tick.” Having been jobless for two months, he now owed Biff Mason $200 “on tick.” A substantial part of the price of the cow was to be applied against this account.
“It ain’t that I’m tryin’ tuh dun yuh or anythin’, Juddie — yuh know that, boy — but I gotta have cash tuh stay in business. Them there wholesalers wants their money ever’ thirty days. Why, Juddie, iffin it hadda been anybody but you that owed me that there two hundred bucks, I’da cracked down on ’em long ago. But yer a friend a mine, Juddie, and I trust yuh. I’d say that behind yer back jist like I’d say it tuh yer face. Juddie O’Brien allus pays his bills, yessiree, Juddie O’Brien allus pays his bills!” Biff rubbed his hands together and licked his wet, flabby lips. Kevin squirmed with contempt for the storekeeper’s slyness and greed. But Judd, warmed by the vanilla extract, seemed pleased.
“Yeah, Biff, I guess there ain’t nobody in Lockhartville can say that Judd O’Brien don’t allus pay his bills,” he boasted.
“That’s right, Juddie! That’s right!” Biff neighed like a stallion. “And I’m the man tuh say it! Ever’ man in Lockhartville will tell yuh that Biff Mason has allus said Juddie O’Brien is a man that pays his bills. I’ve allus said it, Juddie. Yessir. Yessir. Yessir . . .” Biff’s voice trailed away as if he had exhausted this subject and could not think of anything more to say.
“Yeah, I’ve paid ever’ cent I ever owed, Biff — ever’ damn cent. I’ve paid ever’ cent since I went tuh work — and that’s twenty-six years ago.”
“That’s what I allus say, Juddie. That’s what I allus say . . . Now, how much was yuh figgerin’ tuh pay on this little bitty bill here, Juddie, eh, hay?”
For a few minutes they haggled. Bored and rather scornful, Kevin arose and went to the little glassed-in showcase near the door.
“Kevin!” his father said sharply.
“Huh?”
“Sit down over there! Don’t yuh know no better’n tuh run all over the damn place when a man’s tryin’ tuh talk business?”
“Yessir.”
Flushing, Kevin returned to the orange crate. He hated the little dark flicker of amusement in Biff ’s eyes.
But now Judd began selecting delicacies: round, smooth-skinned oranges; grapes that might have been picked from the trees pictured in the Bible; cashews, peanuts, butternuts, Brazil nuts; chocolate, coconut, caramel, butterscotch, and peppermint candy. Kevin’s mouth watered as he watched Biff lay the little paper bags on the rough plank that served as a counter. And he noted that Judd prolonged the buying of these things, seemed to relish the privilege of smelling, touching, tasting, and ordering.
He bought a great red hunk of ham and a bag of sausages, and he bought pork and beefsteak. After hesitating for a long time, he bought canned clams and sour pickles and a bag of onions; these last items were the kind of food that Judd liked best: stout, vinegary, biting foods to be washed down with great draughts of black tea or buttermilk.
Then, stuttering and reddening like a young boy, he bought a frock for Mary. He did this hurriedly, staring around wildly as though afraid of being seen, barking a refusal when Biff invited him to feel the rich texture of the cloth. “It’s all right! Put the goddamn thing in a bag or somethin’!” And as Biff wrapped the frock, Judd stared at it dubiously, as though it were a silly and useless thing.
Then: “Kevin, come here!”
“Yessir.”
Judd pointed to a box. “Give him one a-them there goddamn watches,” he ordered gruffly.
“Ah, yer makin’ a good buy there, Juddie. Them there watches is worth three times what I’m askin’ fer ’em! Why —”
“Jist give him one a the goddamn things!”
Biff extended the watch on an upturned palm. Kevin lifted it by its chain and held it gingerly.
“Seven dollar and fifty cents, Juddie, and worth thirty bucks iffin it’s worth a cent,” Biff Mason neighed.
To Kevin, seven dollars and fifty cents was a fortune. He felt that this gift was a rich and splendid thing.
“Gee, thanks, Daddy,” he whispered.
“All right, put the goddamn thing in yer pocket and git over there outta the way and sit down!”
“Yessir,” said Kevin, retreating hastily.
Back on the orange crate, he held the watch in front of his face, letting it dangle from its chain. He was rapt with admiration for its shining, silvery case and red-green-and-black face —
“Put that there damn thing in yer pocket, Kevin. I told yuh once.”
“Yessir.”
Judd blinked, straightened his cap and turned back to the corner. His voice had been harsh. But Kevin did not feel hurt.
He understood.
Twenty-Four
Before leaving the store, Judd bought more vanilla extract. Seeking to conceal the transaction from Kevin, he signalled Biff with winks and little furtive movements of hand and head. But he was too clumsy to be cunning. In the field of guile and subterfuge, Judd was like a collie masquerading as a kitten.
The bottles hidden in the pockets of the denim smock he wore over his windbreaker, Judd loaded his arms with groceries. Kevin gathered up the remaining parcels. Their gum rubbers crunching the snow crust, they started up the road toward home.
As they reached the cabin of Madge Harker, Judd slowed his steps. “Seems like I’m fergittin’ somethin’, Kev,” he drawled archly.
“Yeah?” Kevin’s voice was dubious.
Judd stopped. “Eh! I remember now. I owe Madge Harker a few dollars. I guess mebbe I oughta stop in while I got the money on me.” He glanced at Kevin as though appealing to his judgement in such matters. “It’ll only take me a second or two,” he added.
Kevin gazed at Madge’s cabin: a squat, soot-coloured shack, half-hidden among tamaracks and willows. Smoke rose bleakly from the tilting stack.
“Can’t I go with yuh? It’s cold standin’ out here.”
“Eh? Why don’t yuh walk on ahead? I’ll catch up with yuh.” Then Judd recalled his mood of friendliness and joviality. “Well, all right, then, come on!”
The path was so narrow that following it was like balancing on a fence rail. Twice, Kevin missed his footing and floundered in hip-deep snow. Laying his parcels aside, Judd lifted the leather latch: Lockhartville people did not knock on one another’s doors.
The heat that struck Kevin’s face smelled of coal oil, stale beer, and unwashed bedding. Madge Harker’s cheeks were lacquered-red, as though from the cold. Her corpulent body was wrapped in a stained and rumpled housecoat. Exchanging greetings with Judd, she motioned him and Kevin to seats. Laying his packages at his feet, Kevin slumped down on the woodbox, by the bedroom door. Judd and Madge began the inevitable, ritualistic dialogue. Kevin fidgeted, sweltering in his wool breeches and mackinaw. He wondered how long it would take his father to tell Madge what she already knew: that he had come to buy liquor.
The cabin was heated by an old-fashioned stove, the legs of which bent like the knees of step dancers. The stove stood on a low platform made of slabs and covered with a sheet of wrinkled tin. Behind the platform lay an overturned carton and a pile of empty beer bottles. The cabin had not been finished: its posts and rafters were naked grey like those in a barn. From a spike in a beam opposite him hung a green-and-red windbreaker which he recognized as belonging to Madge’s daughter, Nancy . . .
“Hello.”
The whisper startled him more than a shout would have done. He turned in the direction of the voice. Nancy Harker grinned at him, her body, except for her head and shoulders, hidden in the blanket that served as a bedroom door.
He blinked and gaped. “Hello,” he mumbled.
“Are you scared or somethin’?” she whispered.
He felt his ears reddening. “No, of course not. What is there tuh be scared of?”
“Nothin’. But you look scared. When I spoke to you, you turned as white as a sheet.”
He scowled. “You shouldn’t oughta sneak up on people that way.”
“I didn’t sneak up on you. I made myself invisible. I pressed a vein in my wrist and made myself invisible.”
“I bet.”
She laid her cheek against the blanket. “Why don’t you ever talk to me at school?”
“Huh?”
“Why don’t you ever talk to me at school?”
“I do talk tuh yuh. I’ve talked tuh yuh dozens a different times.”
“Yes, but you don’t say anythin’.” She wrinkled her nose. “Did you know that my father was a merchant seaman?”
“Huh?”
“Why do you say ‘huh’ all the time?”
“Huh?”
“See! You said it again!”
He glared at her, feeling very hot and foolish.
“Yes, my father is a merchant seaman and he’s sailed all over the world. He’s in Haiti now. Do you know where Haiti is?”
“Yeah, I guess so.”
“I should make you tell me, to see if you really know. But I won’t. You see how nice I am? Did you know that in Haiti all the people are black and that they come out in the middle of the night and dance around fires and after a while the dead all get out of their graves and dance too. Did you know that?”
He decided that she was crazy. “No, I don’t believe anythin’ like that. It’s only a story,” he said, rather lamely.
“No. It’s the truth.” Again she laid her cheek against the blanket as though caressing it. “I’m a love-child, did you know that?”
“No. I didn’t know.”
He wondered who, or what, was a love-child. He supposed it must be a polite synonym for halfwit. Yet this Nancy Harker was reputed to be one of the smartest girls in school.
“Are you a love-child too? No, I guess you wouldn’t be. Madge says I’m very lucky to be a love-child. She says most children are made outta hate — but me, I was made outta loads and loads and loads of love!”
He rather resented her assumption that she was a love-child, whatever that might be, while he was not.
“I was born in Halifax.”
“Oh.”
To Kevin, this was as though she had been born in Antioch or Jericho. Like her, he was whispering. Judd and Madge, ignoring them, continued their conversation at the other end of the room.
“It’s a stupid place. I didn’t like it much. I wish I’d been born in Haiti.”
“I bet.”
“I like you. I like you a lot. Did you know that?”
“Gosh, yer crazy —”
“I think maybe I’ll fall in love with you. I’m thirteen. I guess that means I’m old enough to fall in love. Are you old enough to fall in love with me?”
His jaw dropped. His tongue writhed impotently in his mouth.
“Yes, I think I’ll fall in love with you. You have the most interestin’ eyes of any boy in Lockhartville. I bet you see all sorts of things. I bet you can see in the dark like a cat.” She grinned. “Did you ever see a vampire?”
He blanched as though she had discovered one of his shameful secrets. He thought of the dark fears that insinuated themselves into his mind on windy nights —
Her laugh was crystal. She bounced up and down, almost tearing the blanket from its rung. “Oh, yes! Yes! Yes! I should have fallen in love with you the minute I got in Lockhart-ville!”
“Yer crazy as a bed bug! Yer crazy as the birds! There ain’t no use a-talkin’ tuh nobody as crazy as you!”
She made a little pouting face. “Kevin!” Judd called sharply.
“Yessir?” He wanted to escape from Nancy Harker. No — he did not quite want to escape: he wanted to go off by himself and think.
Judd’s lips wer
e sly. “Why don’t yuh and Nancy carry them parcels up tuh the house, eh? Me and Madge has got a little business tuh talk over here.”
“I’n carry them. I don’t need no help.”
Madge chuckled and fingered her scarlet cheeks. “Well, then, you can just take Nancy along for company, Kevin.”
“I don’t need nobody tuh help me —”
“Hit the grit, young feller.”
“Yessir.”
He got to his feet, buttoned his mackinaw, picked up his groceries, and started for the door.
“Wait for me, Kevin! Wait till I get my coat.”
Her laughter ringing like a bell, her empty sleeves flailing as she wriggled into her coat, Nancy ran after him —
Down the narrow path between the snowdrifts and under the willows and tamaracks, they walked in silence. When they came to the road, Nancy hopped, skipped, walked backwards, and leapt into the air. “Be careful, you’ll spill alla that there stuff,” he growled, thinking her very babyish and giddy.
“Your father is goin’ to get drunk,” she said mildly.
“Who says so?”
“Oh, of course he is. He sent us away because he wanted to stay alone with Madge and get drunk. All the mill men get drunk. Madge says it’s the only time they’re ever really alive.”
“Humph!” He decided that he would not answer her again.
He would stride in cold, aloof silence until they reached his home.
“Have you ever been drunk, Kevin?”
He tightened his lips to a bloodless line.
For a few yards, she skipped, the groceries swaying precariously in her arms. “Madge says I wake up drunk every mornin’ a my life! She says that when you’re as young as I am you’re drunk all the time!”
They passed an open field: a sloping wasteland of snow. Sparrows flew up from almost beneath their feet. Their steps made the sound that horses made as they chomped their oats.
“What are you thinkin’ about, Kevin?”
“Huh?”
“Don’t keep sayin’ that! I asked you what you were thinkin’ about.”
“Oh, nothin’ I guess.” Too late, he remembered his resolution to rebuke her with stony silence.