“Well, I’ll go cut ’em, Mistuh Gid,” he said. “I sho enjoyed de elecshun day, Miss Molly. I hope we have anothuh one soon as we can.”
Molly kinda laughed. “We will,” she said. “We’ll have one in November. You be careful, Ikey. Don’t chop off your foot, and don’t get on no snakes.”
Ikey got on his mule and went off. Johnny just grinned and winked at Molly. It was hard to get his goat.
“I wish I was well off enough to hire my dirty work done,” he said. “But I ain’t that lucky. I always have to do my own.”
“I never noticed you doing much,” I said. “Besides, I felt sorry for Ikey. I’d like to see him get himself a better mule.”
“If that ain’t a lie I never heard one,” he said. “Ikey’s gonna spend that money on whiskey, and you knew it before you gave it to him. And you’ll probably talk him out of three-quarters of that. You can’t fool me.”
“Why, Gid, I heard you quit drinking,” Molly said. “I didn’t know you started agin.”
“I haven’t,” I said. “Johnny’s just spoofing you.”
“Well, I got to be going,” Johnny said. He’d done all the damage he dared do. “Don’t you’all take no bribes under five dollars.”
That made Molly mad, so he was smart to leave. She was kinda patriotic, and never liked to hear people hint about crooked government. It was because her old man was so crooked himself.
Anyway, Johnny got on his horse and loped off, and there we were. It was about ten o’clock, and I didn’t figure we much needed to worry about anybody coming to vote before dinnertime. Voting is the kind of thing most people like to put off as long as they can.
I looked at Molly, and she was looking at me and grinning. I guess she knew good and well what I was up to, rushing Ikey off.
“Well, Mr. Fry,” she said. “You sure was in a big hurry to chase everybody off. That wasn’t very sociable.”
“I ain’t very sociable with crowds,” I said. “Specially not crowds with Johnny in them.” I kinda reached for her hand, but I missed. She laughed and stepped out the schoolhouse door. The wind begin whipping her hair up around her face.
“You’re grabby,” she said. “Grabby Mr. Fry.”
“Don’t call me that,” I said. “And don’t put on thataway. Let’s go around to the cistern.”
“Okay,” she said, “let’s do. Only you’re so unsociable. I might just better go home.”
I got her hand after all and squeezed it and she squeezed back.
“I’m a lot more sociable where you’re concerned,” I said.
I got my big slicker off my saddle and spread it out by the cistern so we could sit down without the grass and the chiggers eating us up. We got on the shady side and leaned up against the rocks and just set there. It was right on the hill, high enough that we could see anybody coming a long time before they would notice us. Molly let me put my arm around her, and she kind of slumped against me, and talked about this and that. I mostly listened. After a while my arm went to sleep, but I didn’t dare move. Her hair was in my face. She must have washed it that morning, because it was real clean and I could still barely smell the vinegar she rinsed it in.
“It’s a nice day for election,” she said. “Look at the way the grass waves. I bet we can see nearly all over the county from here.”
I kept wishing she’d turn her face around, but she wouldn’t do it.
“Gid-ing-ton,” she said, “what are you doing back there where I can’t see you?” She called me that sometimes; she thought Gid was too short a name. I was agreeable.
“Don’t you wish I’d turn my face around, so you could kiss me?” she said. “Now don’t you?”
“I could stand it,” I said. “You won’t, though.”
“You think I should let a boy kiss me on election day?” she said, and then she turned around anyway, and let me. Some of her hair was between me and her mouth; I didn’t care. Only after a while she began to giggle and squirm.
“Let me fix it,” she said. “Who wants to kiss hair?” She sat up and turned her back, and all I could see was black hair and her polka dot dress. Then she rolled over on the slicker and propped up on her elbows.
“Let’s quit,” she said. “Let’s just talk. What if Johnny was to come back?”
“What if? It ain’t none of his business what we do.”
“He thinks it is, though.” I made her let me kiss her again, but she kept giggling and wouldn’t get serious about it. “Johnny thinks it’s all his business,” she said. “He keeps asking me all about us.”
“Well, he can just cut it out,” I said. “I’m not going to put up with much more of him. You’re my girl now, ain’t you?”
“Am I?” she said, looking up at me through her hair, half-grinning and half-serious. “I think I’m too silly for you.”
“No you ain’t. Why, I’m worse that way than you are.”
“No you ain’t,” she said, and she wasn’t kidding. “You’re not even as silly as Johnny, and he’s not as silly as me. Eddie’s the only one who is.”
“If you mean he’s the only one who’s dumb, you’re right,” I said. I hated that sorry Eddie. “At least I’m a little smart. I’m smart enough to know you’re the prettiest girl there is.”
I made her let me kiss her agin, and finally it shut her up and she got real quiet and sweet. Once you get Molly quiet she’s the warmest, sweetest girl in the world.
“I still think you’re my girl,” I said.
“Maybe I am,” she said. “Lay down here and hush.”
She hugged me real tight, and just about that time we heard Ikey’s mule. I could tell that mule a quarter of a mile away.
“Damn it all,” I said. “Ikey’s coming back. I’d like to wring Johnny’s neck. I know damn good and well he put him up to it.”
“Let’s just lay here,” she said. “Let’s don’t get up. Maybe if Ikey sees us he’ll go on away. Or we could run hide.”
“No,” I said. “Damn Johnny anyway. I’ll get even with him. I don’t want Ikey to see us, and it’s silly to hide. I ain’t gonna do that.”
She got up and I folded the slicker.
“Brush the grass off my dress,” she said. “I got off the slicker.”
She turned her back and I brushed her off. She didn’t really look mad, and she put her arm around me and let me hold her hand even while Ikey was coming up. But she kept looking off across the pasture, off down Idiot Ridge.
“Where did you get that dress?” I said. “It’s awful pretty, Molly.”
“I made it. Thank you.” She looked up then and seen I had grass on my cheek, and she brushed it off with her hand. “You just ain’t very silly, are you?” she said.
two
Johnny never would admit he sent Ikey back; he was too stubborn. But I knew he was the one responsible. I finally got Ikey sent off agin, but it was too late. Ikey wasn’t hardly out of sight the second time before Dad come, of all people.
Dad made out like he come to vote, but he never: he just come to see what I was doing. He knew I was there with Molly, and he just thought he’d come and spy a little. I hated it like poison when he did something like that. Molly, she never minded. She always took up for Dad, and I guess he liked her for it; he always treated her like she was the prize of the world. Except when I got to talking about marrying her—then he got mad.
“Don’t be a damn fool and marry young,” he said. “Specially not to no poor woman. Work about thirty more years and make you lots of money. Then go off somewhere and marry a rich widow. Don’t never marry somebody who’s as broke and ignorant as you are; marry somebody who knows a little about it. Then you might have a chance to enjoy yourself a little.”
That was Dad for you. I didn’t pay him much mind. He never could understand that he wasn’t me.
What I knew was that Johnny McCloud had two things coming: one was a good saddle, and the other was a good whipping. I guess he thought I had a whipping coming too, because
he started it all.
About a week after election day, Old Man Ashtoe, the feller Johnny was cowboying for, sent him up to Henrietta with a little bunch of cattle he wanted delivered. Johnny delivered the cattle, all right, but then he bought some whiskey from somebody and got drunk and insulted a deputy sheriff or two and got put in jail. Soon as he got home Old Man Ashtoe fired him, and Johnny was so broke he had to take a job with a harvesting crew. The first day he worked with them was the day they were finishing up harvesting our oats. Dad had me out helping them, of course.
“Ain’t this hell?” Johnny said, when we were going out that afternoon for another big load of shocks. “A cowboy oughtn’t to do work like this. This here’s clodhopper work. It’s a kind of disgrace, ain’t it to you?”
“Not to me,” I said. “I don’t have no choice about it. It’s a real disgrace where you’re concerned, though. If you’d have behaved right, you could be horseback right now.”
“I never asked for no sermons,” he said, grinning at me. “You’ve got just as much oatseed in your hair as I have. Where you want to work, on the wagon or on the ground?”
“On the wagon,” I said. “You’re such a good hand with a pitchfork, I don’t want you to get out of practice.”
We worked for about an hour, I guess. He threw the shocks up to me with his fork, and I stacked them on the wagon. The wagon was stacked up pretty high.
“I just need eight or ten more,” I said. “Let’s hurry, then we can take a rest.”
He stuck his fork in a big shock, and I noticed him stop to look at it pretty close. I figured there was a rattlesnake under it; we had killed five or six that day. Oatshocks were a great place for rattlesnakes, because so many rats lived under them.
It was awful hot, and I started to take my gloves off to wipe my face. Then Johnny picked up the shock and got ready to heave. I seen it coming and reached out to catch it, but just before I got my hands on it this big snake head came right up between my hands and hissed in my face. It scared the piss out of me and I went to running backward for all I was worth, but the shock kept right on coming till it looked like the snake was going to fall right on my face. I kicked like hell and went off the wagon backward, fighting with my hands to keep the snake out of my lap. I never seen where it went, because I hit the ground like I had fallen off a cloud. I never rolled an inch. In a little while I heard a lot of people laughing and one of them was Johnny. I looked around and Johnny and three or four of the harvesters were about to bust their guts laughing. Then I seen the snake sliding off the wagon wheel: it was an old brown bullsnake was all. It was mad, too, but not no madder than I was. I had to lay back down; I was seeing spots before my eyes.
“We better help him up,” one of them said. “He might have busted something.”
“Hell no, he’ll be up in a minute,” Johnny said. “You better get back to work or you’ll be the one with something busted.”
I propped up on my elbows and looked at him. “You’re a damn bastard,” I said. “What if that had been a rattlesnake?”
“It couldn’t have scared you any worse,” he said. “Besides, I seen what it was.”
“Well, you better take a good look at the world,” I said, getting up on my hands and knees. “You won’t be able to see much when I get through with you.”
“Goodness me,” he said. “Maybe that’ll teach you not to fiddle with my girl.”
I was beginning to feel the blood coming back from wherever it went to when I seen that snake. Johnny was standing about ten feet away, leaning against the wagon wheel and grinning.
“She’s no such a thing your girl,” I said.
Then I went for him, and we had it out right there. I nearly got the best of him right off, but then I got to missing ever time I swung at him. I guess the fall had thrown off my aim. Pretty soon I got tired and he did too, but we just kept standing there, pounding the piss out of one another. Finally we both stopped for a minute.
“When you’ve had enough, say calf rope,” I said. “I don’t want to put you in no hospital.”
“Calf rope, your ass,” he said. “You’re going to bleed to death if we don’t quit.”
“Hell,” I said. “My nose always bleeds in the summertime.”
“Let’s quit anyway,” he said. “Get a drink of water. You quit first.”
“Nope.”
“Then we’ll just have to stand here till you drop,” he said. “I never seen such a stubborn bastard.”
We might have stood there till dark, I don’t know. Finally the boss harvester noticed us and came over.
“Damn boys,” he said, “why don’t you fight with the pitchforks next time? There won’t be so much blood that way.”
“He started it,” I said.
“Load the wagon,” he said. “You can fight some more tonight if you want to.”
So I wiped off a little blood and Johnny got his pitchfork, and we finished making up the load. He never threw up no more snakes, either. Finally we got all the oats we could haul and went to the barn. Johnny rode on the seat with me.
“Shit-fire,” he said. “I’m quitting this job. I ain’t no damn clodhopper, and I ain’t gonna let no fat-ass like that give me orders.”
“What are you gonna do for money when you quit?” I asked.
“I been thinking about that,” he said. “You know what, Gid, I think I’ll go to the Panhandle. This here country ain’t no place for a cowboy. It’s all right if you got your own ranch, like you have, but if you ain’t, it’s no good. I’d like to go up on the plains, where them big ranches are, and do some real cowboying. I’m tired of sitting around here listening to my old man bitch at me. I think I’ll just strike out.”
“I wouldn’t mind going with you,” I said. “Hell, working for Dad’s worse than being a hired hand. He thinks he has to tell me ever move to make.”
“Then let’s go,” he said. He was excited about it. But I knew I never would be able to get away from Dad. There was too much that needed doing around the place that he couldn’t do. Besides, we had done been gone two months, to that hospital. I pulled the wagon over in the shade of the barn, and we got down.
“Let’s go over to the horse trough,” I said. “Wash this blood off.” I figured if he was going off to punch cattle, I had better give him his saddle. Even if I was still mad at him.
“Well, you coming with me?” he said. Then he bent over and ducked his head plumb under the water and came up shaking it like a wet dog.
“I don’t reckon so,” I said. “I guess I got too much to do here.”
“Too much cowboying or too much courting, which one?”
“You better watch out,” I said. “I ain’t going to take no more off you today.”
He slapped his hat back on without even drying his hair. “Hell, I ain’t eager to go off and leave Molly, either,” he said. “But a man’s got to get out and see a little of the world in his life. I guess they’ll be some pretty sweet girls up there.”
“Not that sweet,” I said. “Let’s unload the hay.”
“I may not go after all,” he said.
But stacking those damn itchy oats in the hot oatbin almost got us down. I guess we was both weak from the fight.
“Oh hell,” he said, when we finished. “Piss on this. This here’ll kill a good cowboy in a week. It takes weak-minded bastards to stand this kind of work. I’m quitting.”
“I don’t blame you,” I said, and I didn’t. It would be the real life, up on the plains, with all those big ranches and cow outfits. I just couldn’t manage it, though.
“Come around here,” I said. “I got something for you.”
We went around in the hallway of the barn, and I drug out the saddle. He never knew what to make of it.
“That’s a beauty,” he said. “Whose is it?”
“Yours,” I said. “I thought you ought to have it for going up to the hospital with me and taking care of me all that time. If you’re going off to cowboy, you’ll
get some use out of this.”
“Why, my god,” he said. “You don’t mean it! Why, ain’t it a beauty. That’s as nice a saddle as I ever seen.”
“Yeah, it ought to last you a long time.”
“Well damn, sure much obliged, Gid,” he said, feeling of the leather. “This here’s something to be proud of. I never had nothing this well made in my life.”
“Let’s try it out,” I said. “It’s too late to haul oats today.”
We caught a couple of horses and went for a ride. I never saw Johnny so tickled over anything, or so excited. He rode it awhile and then I rode it awhile, and it rode like a rocking chair. It was a little creaky and new, but he would ride that out of it in a hurry.
We got back to the barn just in time to start the evening chores. Dad was out fiddling around in the lots, watching the milkpen calves.
“Well, this settles it,” Johnny said. “I ain’t wasting a saddle like this on this part of the country. I think I’ll leave in a day or two. Sure wish you’d go with me.”
“Can’t make it,” I said. “You better wait till them eyes get better. Ain’t nobody going to hire a blind man.”
“Blind, my ass,” he said. “What about your nose?”
“It ain’t very bad squashed. It’ll straighten out.”
Dad finally come poddling over and looked at the saddle some.
“Well, I see you boys been beating on one another,” he said. “Too bad neither one of you had any sense to beat into the other one.”
“Oh, we wasn’t out for blood,” Johnny said. Dad got a big laugh when he told him about me reaching out for the snake. Johnny could tell things so they sounded a whole lot funnier than they were.
“What do you think about my new saddle, Mr. Fry?” Johnny asked.
Dad just grunted. “I think it’s a better one than I ever had,” he said. “And I’m four times your age and several times your smart.” He walked off toward the house. Johnny winked at me and I grinned. Dad never got Johnny’s goat quite, and it tickled me.