chapter 9
One winter afternoon during his third year with Gram and Gramps, Bud waswaiting in the study hall for Mr. Demarest, who taught agriculture atthe Haleyville High School. Bud glanced at the clock on the wall. Whatseemed an hour ago it had been five minutes past four. Now it was onlysix minutes after. He sighed and stared out at the snow that wastrampled in the yards and left in dirty piles in the street.
Winter always seemed a barren, meaningless season in Haleyville. AtBennett's Farm, however, where the snow covered the fields with aninviting blanket and transformed the woods into another world, winterwas a natural and fitting part of things. There the seasons were fullyseen and felt, not mere dates on a calendar as they were in town. Springwas the time for new life to be born, summer for spring-born life toattain maturity, autumn for the harvest to be gathered and winter forthe land to rest and recuperate for spring.
As he stared out the study-hall window, Bud thought of Bennett's Woods,where Old Yellowfoot still bore his proud rack of antlers as he skulkedthrough the thickets and tested the wind for signs of an enemy. He hadbeen unmolested for the past two seasons, for Gramps had not been wellenough to hunt deer and nobody else had a chance of hunting himsuccessfully.
In Bennett's Woods, too, the black buck, now a king in his own right,snorted his challenge from the ridges and put to flight lesser bucksthat sought the favor of the does he coveted. Three years had not dimmedBud's memory of his first meeting with the tiny black fawn or lessenedhis feeling of bondship with him. Whenever Bud was troubled or facedwith problems for which there seemed to be no solution, he still wentinto Bennett's Woods to seek out the black buck. And always he foundthere the answer he needed, for seeing the black buck achieve hisdestiny gave Bud the confidence he needed to work out his own life.
Some of the things that had happened before he came to Bennett's Farmnow seemed as remote as if they had taken place during some other life.Bud could hardly believe that he had been the frightened, defianttwelve-year-old boy who had trudged up the Bennetts' driveway threeyears ago expecting nothing and having received everything. It seemedincredible that three years had elapsed since then and that he had goneon from grammar school into high school. And although his marks were notthe highest in his class, they were still a source of pride to Gram andGramps.
Some of the things that had seemed horribly unreal, Bud now saw in theirtrue perspective. He remembered vividly his first Christmas at the farm,but now he knew and liked the Bennetts' children and grandchildren. Andnow he appreciated the true measure of his own love for Gram and Gramps.He had been a starved waif, and they had fed his soul as well as hisbody. More than ever he wanted to be with them always, to live as theyhad lived and to shape his life by the ideals to which they had clung.But to be as good a farmer as Gramps had been, Bud needed technicalknowledge. That was why he was waiting for Mr. Demarest.
Bud thought wistfully of Gramps, who for the past two seasons had beenforced to confine his outdoor activities to a little fishing and grousehunting. But now he was fit again, and when the deer season openedtomorrow, he and Bud would be on the trail of Old Yellowfoot once more.This time they were certain to bag him; Gramps felt it in his bones.
Then the door opened and Mr. Demarest came in. He was a small man, butquick and wiry. He was in his late thirties, but the ordeals of apoverty-stricken boyhood and youth had made him look ten years olderthan he was. His black hair had gray streaks and he could never managemore than a fleeting smile. The son of a ne'er-do-well tenant farmer,Mr. Demarest had had no formal schooling until he was fifteen. But thenhe had set doggedly out to educate himself. Once he had done so, he haddedicated himself to teaching future farmers how to succeed, for hecould not forget his father's many failures.
"I'm sorry to be late, Allan," he said pleasantly as he came through thestudy-hall door. "What's on your mind, son?"
"Mr. Demarest," Bud stammered, "I want to be a farmer."
"Is something stopping you?" Mr. Demarest's eyes twinkled.
"No," Bud said. "I'm certain I can throw in with Gramps Bennett and takeover from him. I can buy out Gram and Gramps' children. They aren'tinterested in farming."
"Think it over carefully," Mr. Demarest said seriously. "There arebetter farms you might have."
"I don't want any other farm," Bud said firmly. "I want that one."
"It's sort of special, eh?"
"It's very special."
"Then what is your problem?"
"I don't know enough," Bud said. "Three years ago, for Christmas, I wasgiven a pen of White Wyandottes. They're the Eichorn strain, about asgood as you can get. I built from them and I was able to show Grampsthat my purebreds were more profitable than his mongrel flock. Wereplaced his flock with Eichorn Wyandottes, too, and we're doing allright with them. But I can see where I made a lot of mistakes thatneedn't have been made if I had known how to avoid them. I want to goto college and study agriculture."
"Do you have any money?"
"No," Bud said. "I'm going to need most of what I have saved for berryplants next spring."
"But why, if you've built up a flock of Eichorn Wyandottes from onesingle pen, do you have only enough money to buy some berry plants?"
"The chickens have earned money, but I have needed it for day-to-dayliving," Bud said.
"Can Mr. and Mrs. Bennett help you at all?"
"They have a little more than four thousand dollars in the bank here atHaleyville, but that's all they have. They'll need it if anything goeswrong with either of them and I wondered if I could work my way throughagriculture college?"
"You could, but I wouldn't consider earning all your expenses. At least,not at the beginning. Haven't you been able to sell any breeding stockfrom your Wyandottes?"
"No," Bud said. "That's one reason I want to go to college."
"What's your scholastic average?"
"B plus."
"Good, but not good enough for a scholarship even if there were enoughof them for all able youngsters and if Haleyville Consolidated Schoolreceived its just share. Allan, I don't want to be a killjoy, but youasked for my advice. Don't even think of college until you're able tofinance at least your first semester. Then, if you show enough promise,the college will help you find ways to continue."
"How much will I need?" Bud asked.
"If you're careful, you should be able to get by with about sevenhundred dollars. Perhaps even less."
"Seven hundred dollars!" Bud gasped.
"It isn't a million."
"It might as well be!"
"You can earn that much on summer jobs."
"Gramps has been sick. He can't spare me in summer."
"What will he do when you go to college?"
"It looks as though I'll be spared that worry," Bud said miserably. "IfI need seven hundred dollars, I'm not going."
"You asked for my advice and I gave it, Allan, and I'd have rendered youno service if I hadn't been realistic," Mr. Demarest said gently. "If Ihad a magic wand to wave you into college with, believe me, I'd wave it.But I have no such thing. All you can do is to keep trying and neverabandon hope."
Bud could say nothing, and finally Mr. Demarest said, "The bus has left.How will you get home?"
"I'll walk."
"I'll take you," Mr. Demarest said.
Bud rode in heartbroken silence up the snow-bordered highway. Mr.Demarest, who knew so much about so many things that Bud had almostbelieved he knew all about everything, hadn't been able to tell him howto get a college education. And so it was hopeless. Mr. Demarest drew upat the foot of the Bennetts' drive and put out his hand.
Mr. Demarest drove off and Bud tried to put a spring in his step and atilt to his chin as he walked up the drive. The whole world, after all,had not fallen apart--just half of it. And Gramps was not only betterbut excited as a six-year-old over the prospect of hunting OldYellowfoot tomorrow. Bud took off his overshoes, patted Shep and wentinto the kitchen.
Gram had just taken a tray of ginger cookie
s from the oven and put themon the table. Their odor permeated the whole kitchen. Gramps sat againstthe far wall happily oiling his rifle. Since Dr. Beardsley had givenGramps permission to go deer hunting this season, Gramps had beeninspecting his rifle ten times a day. By now he had sighted it in sofinely that he could almost drive nails with it at a hundred yards.
"Tomorrow's the day," Gramps said as Bud came in, "and I'm betting OldYellowfoot will be hanging out in Dockerty's Swamp. You'd best get yourown rifle in working order."
Bud said, "I already have."
Gram was more observant. "You're late, Allan," she said.
"I stayed to talk with Mr. Demarest," Bud said, in what he hoped was acasual tone. "He brought me home."
"What's the trouble?" she said, and Gramps looked up sharply.
"There's no trouble," Bud said.
"You can tell me, Allan. We're here to help you."
"If you're in a jam, Bud, we're on your side," Gramps said. "What'd youdo? Sock the principal?"
"Honestly there's no trouble," Bud said. "Mr. Demarest and I talkedabout agriculture college."
"How nice," Gram said. "Every one of our boys and girls has gone tocollege. Now the twelfth will go, too."
"No he won't," Bud said. "Mr. Demarest said I hardly need a degree inagriculture if I'm going to stay here and take over Bennett's Farm. Hesaid I can learn what I must know about poultry husbandry and berryculture as I go along."
"You're a right handy young feller at a lot of things," Gramps said."But you're 'bout the poorest liar I ever laid eyes on. Joe Demarestnever told you that."
"Well," Bud stammered, "not exactly. We had quite a talk."
"About what?"
"College."
"You make nine times as many circles as Old Yellowfoot with fifteenhunters hot on his tail," Gramps said. "He told you to go to college,didn't he?"
"Yes," Bud admitted. "But I'm not going."
"Why not?"
"I don't want to waste that much time. I can pick up what I must know asI go along."
"That is about the foolishest notion I ever heard," Gramps declared. "Inmy time I've met lots of men who didn't know enough, but offhand I can'tremember any who knew too much. Sure you're going. May be you can't livelike a millionaire's son on what we got in the bank, but you can getthrough."
"I can't take your money!" Bud blurted.
"Pooh," Gram sniffed. "What's money for? Of course you'll take it andwe'll be mighty proud to have a college graduate running Bennett's Farm.Won't we, Delbert?"
"Yeah," said Gramps who had begun to oil his rifle again. "Now you'dbest get out of your school duds. I fed and bedded your hifalutin'chickens though I'm sort of uneasy around that one high-steppin'rooster. He's got so much blue blood that most any time at all I expecthim to whip out one of those fancy glasses on sticks. That rooster sureought to have one. He figures I'm not fit to be in the same chickenhouse with him. You beat it along now, Bud. I didn't milk the cows."
"Take a couple of cookies with you," Gram said.
Bud grabbed a handful of cookies and went up to his room. As he wentabout changing into work clothes, Bud kept his jaws clamped tightly.Gram and Gramps were wonderful, but they were so hopelessly out of touchwith the world that they understood neither the value of money nor whyBud couldn't take the savings they had accumulated almost penny by pennyover nearly half a century. They still added to it, but still almostpenny by penny, and there was not even a possibility of sudden wealth.Anyway, Bud said to himself, he had another year of high school beforehe could even hope to enter college. Perhaps something would turn upbefore then. But in his heart he knew nothing would and he decided tosay no more about college. There was no point in arguing with Gram andGramps.
As Bud milked the cows, took care of the stock and ate the evening mealwith Gram and Gramps, he all but forgot his lost hope for a collegeeducation. Tomorrow's hunt for Old Yellowfoot was too exciting for himto brood over what could not be helped.
The tinny clatter of his alarm clock jarred him out of deep sleep thenext morning well before the usual time. Bud shut the alarm off, leapedto the floor, and padded across it to revel for a moment in the frigidblast that blew in his open window. With snow on the ground and weathercold enough to keep it from melting without being too cold for comfort,it was a perfect day for hunting deer.
When he returned to the kitchen after doing the morning chores, Gram wasmaking pancakes and cooking sausage and Gramps was sitting in a chair."Why didn't you call me?" he growled. "We'd have been in the woodssooner if I'd helped with the chores."
"Now don't be grouchy," Gram said. "Old Yellowfoot's been roaming aboutBennett's Woods for a good many years. I think he'll last anotherfifteen minutes."
"A body would figure I'm a crippled old woman," Gramps said. "Maybe youshould ought to wrap me up in cotton and put me to bed so I won't getscratched or something. Pah! I never did see the beat of such abusiness!"
"If you're feeling as mad as all that," Gram said sharply, "you won'thave to shoot Old Yellowfoot. Just bite him and he'll die fromhydrophobia."
Bud giggled and Gramps couldn't help chuckling.
"Of all the dang fools in the world, people are the dangdest," he said."I put myself in mind of Charley Holan, who said he'd be the happiestman in Dishnoe County if he just had a good brood sow. He got the sowand then he needed a place to keep it. So he said he'd be the happiestman ever if he had a place to keep it. He got one and found he needed aboar. Charley got the boar and first thing you know he was overrun withpigs. They did poorly that year, it didn't even pay to haul 'em tomarket. So Charley says he'd be the happiest man in Dishnoe County ifhe'd never even seen a pig. And this is the first season in the pastthree I've ever been able to hunt Old Yellowfoot. We'll tag him 'forethe season ends, Bud."
"I hope so, Gramps," Bud said.
"Dig in. It takes a pile of Mother's pancakes and a heap of sausage tosee a man through a day in the deer woods."
After breakfast they stepped into the cold predawn blackness. Shep,tied as usual while deer season was in swing, came to the end of hisrope, whined, pressed his nose against their hands and pleaded as usualto be taken along.
Gramps stopped just inside Bennett's Woods, almost in sight of the barn.It was still too dark to shoot, but they often saw deer from the barnand they could expect to see deer from now on. It was true that OldYellowfoot had never been seen so near the farm but that was no sign henever would be.
They went on as soon as they were able to sight clearly on a target ahundred yards away. Their jackets were tightly buttoned and theirearmuffs pulled down against the frosty air. A doe faded across thetrail like a gray ghost, leaving sharply imprinted tracks in the snow. Alittle farther on they saw a small buck. Then a doe and fawn ran wildlythrough the woods, and Gramps halted in his tracks.
Bud stared. Since he had come to Bennett's Farm he had seen many deer,and many of them had been running. But he had never seen any of them runlike this.
"That pair's scared," Gramps said. "In all my born days I haven't seenten deer run that fast, and the last one had wolves on its trail."
"Could wolves be chasing these?" Bud asked.
Gramps shook his head. "As far as I know, there hasn't been a wolf inBennett's Woods for twenty-six years. Me and Eli Dockstader got the lastone, and there's nothing else I can recall offhand that could start acouple of deer running that way and keep 'em running. Still, it has tobe something."
Off in the distance, rifles began to crack as hunters started sightingand shooting at deer. Gramps and Bud paid no attention, for if otherhunters could see them, they must be ordinary deer.
When they reached Dockerty's Swamp, where Gramps thought they might findOld Yellowfoot, Bud said, "Let me go down and track him through, Gramps,and you take it easy."
"Poof!" the old man said. "If Old Yellowfoot's in there, there's justone man got a chance of putting him out and that's me. Doc Beardsleysaid I could come deer hunting, didn't he? 'Sides, did you ever know adeer hu
nter--I'm talking of deer hunters and not deer chasers--who tookit anything 'cept easy? The slower you go, the more deer you see."
"That's so," Bud admitted.
"Kite round and get on your stand," Gramps ordered. "I'll be through byand by."
He disappeared and Bud circled the swamp to the brush-grown knoll thatdeer chose as an escape route when they were driven out of Dockety'sSwamp. Rifles, some of them close and some distant, cracked at sporadicintervals as other hunters continued to find and shoot at deer. Budwaited quietly, with a couple of chickadees that were sitting nearby ona sprig of rhododendron for company.
Before long he saw something move down the slope. Bud stiffened, readyto shoot. It could only be a deer. But at the moment it was too far awayand too well hidden by brush for him to tell what kind of a deer. Thenit came on up the slope and Bud saw that it was a very good ten-pointbuck, but he refrained from shooting. The ten point was a nice trophybut he was not Old Yellowfoot.
Then nine does came by in no hurry, but without lingering as they walkedthrough the sheltering brush into the forest beyond. They were followedby two smaller bucks, and then by another doe. Two and a half hoursafter Bud had taken up his stand, Gramps reappeared. Bud saw with reliefthat the old man did not look tired or even winded. Doc Beardsley hadknown what he was talking about when he had said Gramps was able to huntdeer this season.
"There were plenty of deer in the swamp, but Old Yellowfoot wasn'tamong 'em," Gramps said. "We'll try Dozey Thicket."
But Old Yellowfoot was not in Dozey Thicket or Hooper Valley or Cutter'sSlashing or Wakefoot Hollow. Nor did they find Old Yellowfoot the nextday, although they saw at least three bucks with imposing racks ofantlers.
On Monday Bud had to return to school and Gramps hunted alone. All weeklong he had no success, but when Bud came home Friday, Gramps waswaiting for him in the kitchen. There was an air of triumph about himand a hunter's gleam in his eye.
"Found him, Bud," he said as soon as Bud came through the door.
"No!"
"Sure 'nough did! He's gone plumb out of Bennett's Woods into that footylittle thicket above Joe Crozier's place. I saw his track where he cameto the top of the hill and went back again, but I didn't hunt him 'causeI was afraid I might spook him. But two of us can get him right where heis."
Saturday morning, Bud and Gramps waited for dawn on the ridgeoverlooking Joe Crozier's thicket. When daylight came, they sightedtheir rifles on a rock about a hundred yards away, and for a momentneither spoke.
Crozier's thicket had at one time been a fine stand of hardwoods. JoeCrozier's father had cut the larger trees and buzzed them up forfirewood, and the thicket had grown back to spindly young saplings. Itwas just the place a wise buck like Old Yellowfoot would choose as arefuge during hunting season, for nobody would ever think of looking forhim there. But it was also a place where experienced hunters who didstumble onto his refuge would surely kill him.
"Let's go down," Gramps said softly.
Side by side they descended the hill, but when they were still fortyyards from Crozier's thicket, they stopped. There was a patch of darkgray there that might have been a protruding knob of a tree or aboulder, but it wasn't. Old Yellowfoot, who knew the odds but was notabout to give up, began to try to sneak away.
He was as huge as ever and he had lost none of his cunning. But his leftantler was now only a single straight spike and his right one a snarledwelter of many points.
Bud almost cried with disappointment, for he knew how Gramps had dreamedof the royal trophy Old Yellowfoot's antlers would make. And now he hadovertaken Old Yellowfoot only to find him in his decadence. Never againwould Old Yellowfoot be a worth-while trophy for anyone. He hadsuccumbed to age.
As Bud was about to speak to Gramps, the old man said serenely, "Naturegot to him before we could and I reckon that's as it should be. He wasjust a little too good to hang on anybody's wall. Let's go see Mother."
* * * * *
A week later, Bud and Gramps went into Bennett's Woods to bring out aload of firewood. Bud drove the team, Gramps sat on the bobsled seatbeside him and Shep tagged amiably behind. They were half a mile fromthe farmhouse when the horses stopped of their own accord and raisedtheir heads to stare. Looking in the same direction, Bud saw the blackbuck.
More darkly colored than any other deer Bud had ever seen, the buck wasstanding rigidly still in a little opening between two clusters ofstunted hemlocks. His antlers had become magnificent. The black buck'shead was high, and his eyes wary and his nostrils questing. A secondlater he glided out of sight into the nearest hemlocks.
For a moment Bud and Gramps sat enthralled, scarcely believing what theyhad seen. Then Gramps sighed and said, "Nothing's ever really lost, Bud.That's as good a head as Old Yellowfoot ever carried. Next year we'llhunt the black buck."