“JEST NOBODY”
AFTER the midday meal, while walking about the place, Mr. Howitt found a well worn path; it led him to the group of pines not far from the house, where five rough head stones marked the five mounds placed side by side. A little apart from these was another mound, alone.
Beneath the pines the needles made a carpet, firm and smooth, figured by the wild woodbine that clambered over the graves; moss had gathered on the head stones, and the wind, in the dark branches above, moaned ceaselessly. About the little plot of ground a rustic fence of poles was built, and the path led to a stile by which one might enter the enclosure.
The stranger seated himself upon the rude steps. Below and far away he saw the low hills, rolling ridge on ridge like the waves of a great sea, until in the blue distance they were so lost in the sky that he could not say which was mountain and which was cloud. His poet heart was stirred at sight of the vast reaches of the forest all shifting light and shadows; the cool depths of the near-by woods with the sunlight filtering through the leafy arches in streaks and patches of gold on green; and the wide, wide sky with fleets of cloud ships sailing to unseen ports below the hills.
The man sat very still, and as he looked the worn face changed; once, as if at some pleasing memory, he smiled. A gray squirrel with bright eyes full of curious regard peeped over the limb of an oak; a red bird hopping from bush to bush whistled to his mate; and a bob-white’s quick call came from a nearby thicket.
The dreamer was aroused at last by the musical tinkle of a bell. He turned his face toward the sound, but could see nothing. The bell was coming nearer; it came nearer still. Then he saw here and there through the trees small, moving patches of white; an old ewe followed by two lambs came from behind a clump of bushes, and the moving patches of white shaped themselves into other sheep feeding in the timber.
Mr. Howitt sat quite still, and, while the old ewe paused to look at him, the lambs took advantage of the opportunity, until their mother was satisfied with her inspection, and by moving on, upset them. Soon the whole flock surrounded him, and, after the first lingering look of inquiry, paid no heed to his presence.
Then from somewhere among the trees came the quick, low bark of a dog. The man looked carefully in every direction; he could see nothing but the sheep, yet he felt himself observed. Again came the short bark; and this time a voice—a girl’s voice, Mr. Howitt thought—said, “It’s alright, Brave; go on, brother.” And from behind a big rock not far away a shepherd dog appeared, followed by a youth of some fifteen years.
He was a lightly built boy; a bit tall for his age, perhaps, but perfectly erect; and his every movement was one of indescribable grace, while he managed, somehow, to wear his rough backwoods garments with an air of distinction as remarkable as it was charming. The face was finely molded, almost girlish, with the large gray eyes, and its frame of yellow, golden hair. It was a sad face when in repose, yet wonderfully responsive to every passing thought and mood. But the eyes, with their strange expression, and shifting light, proclaimed the lad’s mental condition.
As the boy came forward in a shy, hesitating way, an expression of amazement and wonder crept into the stranger’s face; he left his seat and started forward. “Howard,” he said; “Howard.”
“That ain’t his name, Mister; his name’s Pete,” returned the youth, in low, soft tones.
In the voice and manner of the lad, no less than in his face and eyes, Mr. Howitt read his story. Unconsciously he echoed the words of Mr. Matthews, “Poor Pete.”
The dog lifted his head and looked into the man’s face, while his tail wagged a joyful greeting, and, as the man stooped to pat the animal and speak a few kind words, a beautiful smile broke over the delicate features of the youth. Throwing himself upon the ground, he cried, “Come here, Brave”; and taking the dog’s face between his hands, said in confidential tones, ignoring Mr. Howitt’s presence, “He’s a good man, ain’t he, brother?” The dog answered with wagging tail. “We sure like him, don’t we?” The dog gave a low bark. “Listen, Brave, listen.” He lifted his face to the tree tops, then turned his ear to the ground, while the dog, too, seemed to hearken. Again that strange smile illuminated his face; “Yes, yes, Brave, we sure like him. And the tree things like him, too, brother; and the flowers, the little flower things that know everything; they’re all a singin’ to Pete ‘cause he’s come. Did you see the flower things in his eyes, and hear the tree things a talkin’ in his voice, Brave? And see, brother, the sheep like him too!” Pointing toward the stranger, he laughed aloud. The old ewe had come quite close to the man, and one of the lambs was nibbling at his trousers’ leg.
Mr. Howitt seated himself on the stile again, and the dog, released by the youth, came to lie down at his feet; while the boy seemed to forget his companions, and appeared to be listening to voices unheard by them, now and then nodding his head and moving his lips in answer.
The old man looked long and thoughtfully at the youth, his own face revealing a troubled mind. This then was Pete, Poor Pete. “Howard,” whispered the man; “the perfect image;” then again he said, half aloud, “Howard.”
The boy turned his face and smiled; “That ain’t his name, Mister; his name’s Pete. Pete seen you yesterday over on Dewey, and Pete he heard the big hills and the woods a singin’ when you talked. But Jed he didn’t hear. Jed he don’t hear nothin’ but himself; he can’t. But Pete he heard and all Pete’s people, too. And the gray mist things come out and danced along the mountain, ‘cause they was so glad you come. And Pete went with you along the Old Trail. Course, though, you didn’t know. Do you like Pete’s people, Mister?” He waved his hands to include the forest, the mountains and the sky; and there was a note of anxiety in the sweet voice as he asked again: “Do you like Pete’s friends?”
“Yes, indeed, I like your friends,” replied Mr. Howitt, heartily; “and I would like to be your friend too, if you will let me. What is your other name?”
The boy shook his head; “Not me; not me;” he said; “do you like Pete?”
The man was puzzled. “Are you not Pete?” he asked.
The delicate face grew sad: “No, no, no,” he said in a low moaning tone; “I’m not Pete; Pete, he lives in here;” he touched himself on the breast. “I am—I am—” A look of hopeless bewilderment crept into his eyes; “I don’t know who I am; I’m jest nobody. Nobody can’t have no name, can he?” He stood with downcast head; then suddenly he raised his face and the shadows lifted, as he said, “But Pete he knows, Mister, ask Pete.”
A sudden thought came to Mr. Howitt. “Who is your father, my boy?”
Instantly the brightness vanished; again the words were a puzzled moan; “I ain’t got no father, Mister; I ain’t me; nobody can’t have no father, can he?”
The other spoke quickly; “But Pete had a father; who was Pete’s father?” Instantly the gloom was gone and the face was bright again. “Sure, Mister, Pete’s got a father; don’t you know? Everybody knows that. Look!” He pointed upward to a break in the trees, to a large cumulus cloud that had assumed a fantastic shape. “He lives in them white hills, up there. See him, Mister? Sometimes he takes Pete with him up through the sky, and course I go along. We sail, and sail, and sail, with the big bird things up there, while the sky things sing; and sometimes we play with the cloud things, all day in them white hills. Pete says he’ll take me away up there where the star things live, some day, and we won’t never come back again; and I won’t be nobody no more; and Aunt Mollie says she reckons Pete knows. ‘Course, I’d hate mighty much to go away from Uncle Matt and Aunt Mollie and Matt and Sammy, ‘cause they’re mighty good to me; but I jest got to go where Pete goes, you see, ‘cause I ain’t nobody, and nobody can’t be nothin’, can he?”
The stranger was fascinated by the wonderful charm of the boy’s manner and words. As the lad’s sensitive face glowed or was clouded by each wayward thought, and the music of his sweet voice rose and fell, Mr. Howitt told himself that one might easily fanc
y the child some wandering spirit of the woods and hills. Aloud, he asked, “Has Pete a mother, too?”
The youth nodded toward the big pine that grew to one side of the group, and, lowering his voice, replied, “That’s Pete’s mother.”
Mr. Howitt pointed to the grave; “You mean she sleeps there?”
“No, no, not there; there!” He pointed up to the big tree, itself. “She never sleeps; don’t you hear her?” He paused. The wind moaned through the branches of the pine. Drawing closer to the stranger’s side, the boy whispered, “She always talks that a way; always, and it makes Pete feel bad. She wants somebody. Hear her callin’, callin’, callin’? He’ll sure come some day, Mister; he sure will. Say, do you know where he is?”
The stranger, startled, drew back; “No, no, my boy, certainly not; what do you mean; who are you?”
Like the moaning of the pines came the reply, “Nothin’, Mister, nobody can’t mean nothin’, can they? I’m jest nobody. But Pete lives in here; ask Pete.”
“Is Pete watching the sheep?” asked Mr. Howitt, anxious to divert the boy’s mind to other channels.
“Yes, we’re a tendin’ ‘em now; but they can’t trust us, you know; when they call Pete, he just goes, and course I’ve got to go ‘long.”
“Who is it calls Pete?”
“Why, they, don’t you know? I ‘lowed you knowed about things. They called Pete last night. The moonlight things was out, and all the shadow things; didn’t you see them, Mister? The moonlight things, the wind, the stars, the shadow things, and all the rest played with Pete in the shiny mists, and, course, I was along. Didn’t you hear singin’? Pete he always sings that a way, when the moonlight things is out. Seems like he just can’t help it.”
“But what becomes of the sheep when Pete goes away?”
The boy shook his head sadly; “Sometimes they get so lost that Young Matt can’t never find ‘em; sometimes wolves get ‘em; it’s too bad, Mister, it sure is.” Then laughing aloud, he clapped his hands; “There was a feller at the ranch to keep ‘em, but he didn’t stay; Ho! Ho! he didn’t stay, you bet he didn’t. Pete didn’t like him, Brave didn’t like him, nothing didn’t like him, the trees wouldn’t talk when he was around, the flowers died when he looked at ‘em, and the birds all stopped singin’ and went away over the mountains. He didn’t stay, though.” Again he laughed. “You bet he didn’t stay! Pete knows.”
“Why did the man go?” asked Mr. Howitt, thinking to solve a part of the mystery, at least. But the only answer he could draw from the boy was, “Pete knows; Pete knows.”
Later when the stranger returned to the house, Pete went with him; at the big gate they met Mr. Matthews, returning unsuccessful from his trip.
“Hello, boy!” said the big man; “How’s Pete to-day?”
The lad went with glad face to the giant mountaineer. It was clear that the two were the warmest friends. “Pete’s mighty glad to-day, ‘cause he’s come.” He pointed to Mr. Howitt. “Does Pete like him?”
The boy nodded. “All Pete’s people like him. Ask him to keep the sheep, Uncle Matt. He won’t be scared at the shadow things in the night.”
Mr. Matthews smiled, as he turned to his guest. “Pete never makes a mistake in his judgment of men, Mr. Howitt. He’s different from us ordinary folks, as you can see; but in some things he knows a heap more. I’m mighty glad he’s took up with you, sir. All day I’ve been thinking I’d tell you about some things I don’t like to talk about; I feel after last night like you’d understand, maybe, and might help me, you having education. But still I’ve been a little afraid, us being such strangers. I know I’m right now, ‘cause Pete says so. If you weren’t the kind of a man I think you are, he’d never took to you like he has.”
That night the mountaineer told the stranger from the city the story that I have put down in the next chapter.
THE STORY
SLOWLY the big mountaineer filled his cob pipe with strong, home grown tobacco, watching his guest keenly the while, from under heavy brows. Behind the dark pines the sky was blood red, and below, Mutton Hollow was fast being lost in the gathering gloom.
When his pipe was lighted, Old Matt said, “Well, sir, I reckon you think some things you seen and heard since you come last night are mighty queer. I ain’t sayin’, neither, but what you got reasons for thinkin’ so.”
Mr. Howitt made no reply. And, after puffing a few moments in silence, the other continued, “If it weren’t for what you said last night makin’ me feel like I wanted to talk to you, and Pete a takin’ up with you the way he has, I wouldn’t be a tellin’ you what I am goin’ to now. There’s some trails, Mr. Howitt, that ain’t pleasant to go back over. I didn’t ‘low to ever go over this one again. Did you and Pete talk much this afternoon?”
In a few words Mr. Howitt told of his meeting with the strange boy, and their conversation. When he had finished, the big man smoked in silence. It was as if he found it hard to begin. From a tree on the mountain side below, a screech owl sent up his long, quavering call; a bat darted past in the dusk; and away over on Compton Ridge a hound bayed. The mountaineer spoke; “That’s Sam Wilson’s dog, Ranger; must a’ started a fox.” The sound died away in the distance. Old Matt began his story.
“Our folks all live back in Illinois. And if I do say so, they are as good stock as you’ll find anywhere. But there was a lot of us, and I always had a notion to settle in a new country where there was more room like and land wasn’t so dear; so when wife and I was married we come out here. I recollect we camped at the spring below Jim Lane’s cabin on yon side of Old Dewey, there. That was before Jim was married, and a wild young buck he was too, as ever you see. The next day wife and I rode along the Old Trail ‘til we struck this gap, and here we’ve been ever since.
“We’ve had our ups and downs like most folks, sir, and sometimes it looked like they was mostly downs; but we got along, and last fall I bought in the ranch down there in the Hollow. The boy was just eighteen and we thought then that he’d be makin’ his home there some day. I don’t know how that’ll be now, but there was another reason too why we wanted the place, as you’ll see when I get to it.
“There was five other boys, as I told you last night. The oldest two would have been men now. The girl”—his voice broke—“the girl she come third; she was twenty when we buried her over there. That was fifteen year ago come the middle of next month.
“Everybody ‘lowed she was a mighty pretty baby, and, bein’ the only girl, I reckon we made more of her than we did of the boys. She growed up into a mighty fine young woman too; strong, and full of fire and go, like Sammy Lane. Seems to wife and me when Sammy’s ‘round that it’s our own girl come back and we’ve always hoped that she and Grant would take the ranch down yonder; but I reckon that’s all over, now that Ollie Stewart has come into such a fine thing in the city. Anyway, it ain’t got nothing to do with this that I’m a tellin’ you.
“She didn’t seem to care nothin’ at all for none of the neighbor boys like most girls do; she’d go with them and have a good time alright, but that was all. ‘Peared like she’d rather be with her brothers or her mother or me.
“Well, one day, when we was out on the range a ridin’ for stock—she’d often go with me that way—we met a stranger over there at the deer lick in the big low gap, coming along the Old Trail. He was as fine a lookin’ man as you ever see, sir; big and grand like, with lightish hair, kind, of wavy, and a big mustache like his hair, and fine white teeth showing when he smiled. He was sure good lookin’, damn him! and with his fine store clothes and a smooth easy way of talkin’ and actin’ he had, ‘tain’t no wonder she took up with him. We all did. I used to think God never made a finer body for a man. I know now that Hell don’t hold a meaner heart than the one in that same fine body. And that’s somethin’ that bothers me a heap, Mr. Howitt.
“As I say, our girl was built like Sammy Lane, and so far as looks go she was his dead match. I used to wonder when I’d look at them togeth
er if there ever was such another fine lookin’ pair. I ain’t a goin’ to tell you his name; there ain’t no call to, as I can see. There might be some decent man named the same. But he was one of these here artist fellows and had come into the hills to paint, he said.”
A smothered exclamation burst from the listener.
Mr. Matthews, not noticing, continued: “He sure did make a lot of pictures and they seemed mighty nice to us, ‘though of course we didn’t know nothin’ about such things. There was one big one he made of Maggie that was as natural as life. He was always drawin’ of her in one way or another, and had a lot of little pictures that didn’t amount to much, and that he didn’t never finish. But this big one he worked at off and on all summer. It was sure fine, with her a standin’ by the ranch spring, holdin’ out a cup of water, and smilin’ like she was offerin’ you a drink.”
It was well that the night had fallen. At Old Matt’s words the stranger shrank back in his chair, his hand raised as if to ward off a deadly blow. He made a sound in his throat as if he would cry out, but could not from horror or fear. But the darkness hid his face, and the mountaineer, with mind intent upon his story, did not heed.
“He took an old cabin at the foot of the hill near where the sheep corral is now, and fixed it up to work in. The shack had been built first by old man Dewey, him that the mountain’s named after. It was down there he painted the big picture of her a standin’ by the big spring. We never thought nothin’ about her bein’ with him so much. Country folks is that way, Mr. Howitt, ‘though we ought to knowed better; we sure ought to knowed better.” The old giant paused and for some time sat with his head bowed, his forgotten pipe on the floor.
The Shepard of the Hills Page 3