“They make big money,” Gertie said, stopping in the doorway. She hesitated, then turned into the storeroom, looking about her. She nodded with satisfaction when she saw a crate-like box, less flimsy than those used for the shipping of oranges, but made of some soft cheap wood unfit now for much of anything but kindling. She turned to Clovis, who had stuck his head around the door, curious as to what she was doing. “Do you recken th doctor would mind me taken a board er two frum this? A little whittlen foolishness ud make th time pass.”
Clovis bent on her the same look he gave to the truck motor when it made one of its forever different sounds that usually betokened nothing more than old age and hard usage, but always a mystery until he had solved it. “Nobody ud want that,” he said. “But if’n you must waste elbow grease on whittlen, couldn’t you make a ax handle er somethen somebody could use?”
“I ain’t got no wood by me fitten fer handles,” she answered, pulling a board from the box. “But any kind a whittlen foolishness is better than nothen. I’ll make Cassie a real jumpen-jack doll—I been aimen to fer a long time.”
“Th way she’s acten up, she needs a switch stid uv a doll. Went off to th woods right atter you left an didn’t git in till jist fore I got there—had Mom all worried—then come in frum getheren eggs an fell flat on th floor; never looked where she was goen an broke two and gommed up th floor. Clytie was a wanten me to spank her.”
“An eggs mighty nigh two fer a nickel at Samuel’s,” Gertie said, then added quickly, worriedly, “But you didn’t switch her—did ye, Clovis?”
“Now, Gert, you know I didn’t. Mom wouldn’t let me no how—but that youngen is a aggravaten little thing.”
Gertie said nothing, and Clovis began wondering on what he should tell her mother to keep her quiet so she wouldn’t go into her fainting spells again; and after listening with many headshakes to Gertie’s advice to tell her all about Amos, the hole in his neck, the needle in his arm, the tent, and everything, so as to take her mind off Henley, he went away.
She stood near the door, listening until the sound of the truck was gone, she then closed the door gently, looked for a lock or thumb latch and, when she found none, she stood a moment, considering. Then in the same carefully noiseless way, she took the chair, tipped it, and wedged the back under the handle of the doorknob. She looked at the child, still sleeping his drugged, unnatural sleep, listened a moment to his breathing, then called softly, “Amos?” She called again, and when he did not answer she took off her coat, sat flat on the floor, her legs outspread, her back against the uptipped chair, the coat across her lap. She put her hand down through the torn pocket, and slowly, carefully twisting her hand as if the hole in her pocket were almost the exact size of her hand, she began to bring out worn and grimy bills. Some were folded alone into tiny squares, others were folded two and three together, and many, like the four new bills, were crumpled hastily into tiny balls. Each she unfolded and smoothed flat on the floor with the palm of her hand, looking at it an instant with first a searching, then a remembering glance. Sometimes after a moment of puzzlement she whispered, “That was eggs at Samuel’s two years ago last July,” and to a five, “That was th walnut-kernel money winter before last,” and to another one, “That was th big dominecker that wouldn’t lay atall; she’d bring close to two dollars now.” Of one so old and thin it seemed ready to fall apart at the creases, she was doubtful, and she held it to the light until she saw the pinhole through Lincoln’s eye. “Molasses money.” She was hurrying now, eager to have it all in a pile, counting, pretending she was uncertain how much there would be.
“Three hundred ten,” she whispered at last, leaning back, looking at it, “Fifteen year, mighty nigh—an we’ve got more’n half enough to pay fer th Tipton Place.” Her words had been loud. She sprang up and looked down at the child; the waxy ear lobes were beginning to show a faint trace of pink.
“Oh, honey,” she whispered, “no worken away an given half to th other man fer you like’s been fer Reuben. Soon as your poor daddy gits in th army, we’ll git us a place a our own.”
THREE
GERTIE HELD THE BIBLE open at Ecclesiastes. She stood with her back to the open front door, and faced the five children. Amos, still a shade pale and thin from his sickness of three weeks back, sat on a sheepskin rug near the heating stove. The four older ones, neat and quiet in their Sunday clothes, sat in a row between the two beds that stood, one in each back corner of the big low-ceilinged, small-windowed room. Her reading seemed a talking, for she looked more often at the children than at the Bible page, saying the words sometimes when her eyes went past the children to the rows of October-colored hills that lay behind the back window.
“‘One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh: but the earth abideth for ever. … All the rivers run into the sea; yet the sea is not full; unto the place from whence the rivers come, thither they return again. … The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done; and there is no new thing under the sun.’”
She stopped, her finger under a word, cleared her throat, and looked at the children. “What th old preacher—recollect he was a smart man—th son uv David, means, I allus thought, is to tell us that whatever kind a luck comes, good er bad, it has already come to somebody afore us. Right now they’s trouble over all th world, an trouble right in our settlement—but it won’t be ferever. It’ll—” Twelve-year-old Reuben, her oldest boy, alone was listening. He searched her face, frowning, with one hand absent-mindedly pulling against the blanket roll of the old wild cherry bed. He had her eyes and bigness of bone and cast of face—a straight mouth, and still gray eyes, solemn, that to a stranger might seem sullen.
“But th trouble cain’t go away,” he said. “Uncle Henley cain’t come back.”
Clytie, the biggest girl, and two years older than Reuben, looked up from staring at a little silver guitar strung on a silver chain around her wrist, a gift of her Uncle Henley, and put on now for Sunday. Henley had sent her the bracelet when he wrote his last letter from a place in Texas. He had sent more things to her than to the others for she had been his favorite, though in looks she was not akin to him at all. Thin-boned and pretty, Clytie was, with her father’s large shiny brown eyes and chestnut-colored hair, worn always in two thick braids, each formed of three smaller ones, so that now as she sat with bowed head, weeping, the braids coming away from the middle seemed like folded satiny wings upon her head; and her face, unlike Reuben’s, was not ugly in sorrow, held no anger, no questions that would never be answered because there were no answers. She turned now to Reuben with a sisterly rebuke, “It was God’s will.”
“That they took Henley off an killed him. If he’d ha been a bigger, richer farmer—”
“Hush,” Gertie said. “It’s been happenen to men since th beginnen. Listen to old Ecclesiastes: ‘I returned, and saw under the sun, that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, neither yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to men of understanding, nor yet favour to men of skill; but time and chance happeneth to them all.’ Allus you’ve got to recollect, youngens, that a sober hard-worken man could go hungry an a good man go to jail, but—”
The children were not listening: Clytie sniffled above the silver guitar; Reuben thought of Henley; the others were most too little. Enoch, the nine-year-old, sat stiff and straight on a chair like a boy having his picture taken, his new overalls neatly creased from Clytie’s iron as he had directed, his hair parted, his eyes on his mother, but with a critical, almost an accusing, glance. Amos, the baby one, and not yet four, studied two hickory nuts between his outspread legs.
Cassie sat on the block of wild cherry wood, as quietly as she was ever able to sit, wiggling, giggling, whispering. Gertie looked at her sternly until she sat consciously still, her thin legs, that looked even thinner above Enoch’s last spring’s shoes, held carefully straight and still by the block of wood, her arms folded over her stomac
h, her hair, the color of corn silk, escaped from its braids and fallen across her bright dark eyes, laughing now in spite of the prim straightness of her mouth.
Gertie went on at last, but only Cassie’s eyes were upon her as she read: “‘For man also knoweth not his time: as the fishes that are taken in an evil net, and as the birds that are caught in the snare; so are the sons of men—’”
Cassie with a low laugh had slid from the block of wood, her bottom striking hard against the floor. She turned and hit the block of wood, crying in her laughter-bubbling voice, “You mean youngen, quit a pushen me.”
Gertie folded her lips together, looked hard at Cassie. “What am I a doen, Cassie Marie?”
Cassie flipped hair out of her eyes, the backward motion flinging her head against the block of wood; and leaning so with her head against the wood, she considered her mother’s question. “Why, I recken you’re a tryen to preach at us like Samuel.”
Clytie cried, “Make her behave, Mom, acten like a heathern,” and Enoch corrected:
“Mom cain’t preach; she’s not so much as a church member, crazy.”
“I ain’t preachen,” Gertie said, “but somebody’s got to teach you th Bible. Don’t you know, youngens,” she went on, “that a long, long time ago, away back afore ever old John Kendrick—you recollect his grave’s in our graveyard, an many’s th time you’ve heard your granpa tell on how he rid a mule into th battle a Brandywine, an how that mule outswum them horses—well, away a long time back afore he was born his people warn’t allowed to read their Bibles. In them days a Bible cost a heap a money an a body had to read em on th sly. But more than enything, them people—they was your people, recollect—wanted a place where they could read their Bibles when an how they pleased. An now jist because our preacher’s gone to Oak Ridge an they ain’t enough people left fer Sunday school, that’s no reason to do without th Bible. We need it worse right now in this evil-net time.” She looked at Reuben. “Can you say th commandments any better than last Sunday?”
The children grew ever more restless as slow-tongued Reuben struggled through the Ten Commandments, helped at times by impatient promptings from Clytie, who already knew the commandments, the blessings, and the Lord’s Prayer. Gertie looked once behind her through the open door and frowned a little on the shortening shadow of the house, but continued with the memory work. She listened while Enoch repeated the blessings, swiftly, tonelessly, going ever faster until when he reached, “Blessed are ye when men shall revile you and persecute you and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely for my sake,” his words were blurred as those of a too swiftly played phonograph.
Clytie, carefully, and with a clear pronunciation, different from her everyday speech, recited the psalm that Gertie had suggested she learn: “‘God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble; therefore will we not fear, though the earth be removed … ’”
Clytie finished, and together they recited the Lord’s Prayer. But before the prayer was finished, Clovis, long since through with his Sunday’s shaving in the kitchen, cleared his throat impatiently; and hardly was the “Amen” ended before the line of children broke apart, and Clovis reminded from the kitchen door:
“Gert, we’ve all got to be a goen. Yer mom’s already taken it hard cause you ain’t come sooner. An—well, you know—I’ve got to tell my folks goodbye.” He caught Enoch’s troubled glance. “Go visit with em, I mean. It ain’t like I was leaven next week fer good.”
“Yes,” Gertie said, but was still, looking through the window toward the hills. Clytie was crying again. The other children were too silent, and Clovis, when he did speak again, was choked and hoarse, “Aw, Clytie, honey, don’t start a carryen on so. Pshaw, it’ll mebbe all be over fore I go.”
Gertie drew a sharp quick breath, then turned to the children, “Your Granma Nevels wants you all to come, too, today, when your pop goes to—” She managed to smile. “Law, he’s just goen fer a visit. A body ud think from all this carryen on that Wednesday he was goen acrost th waters stid uv jist fer his examination. An I don’t want a one a you to be a snifflen an a carryen on about yer daddy goen off in front a yer Granma Nevels. Recollect he’s her boy, an she’s got three gone.” Her voice hoarsened. “I’ve got to go see my mother, yer Granma Kendrick. I ain’t been to see her an Pop since your Uncle Henley—”
She couldn’t go on; and anyway Enoch, looking ever more accusing, was saying: “You’re allus sayen that everything’s goen to be all right; an Uncle Henley he’s dead, an Uncle Jesse, he’s been missen so long he’s same as—”
“Alive,” Gertie said with loud conviction.
Clytie, recovered from her tears, looked accusingly at Cassie. “Mom, cain’t you take Cassie Marie with you? I jist cain’t make that youngen behave. T’other day when you was gone with Amos, she kept asken Granma Nevels when was Uncle Jesse comen home—like she didn’t know it was nigh six months ago that th missen-in-action telegram come, an that Uncle Jesse’s most likely—”
“Alive,” Gertie repeated. “Keep your Granma Nevels a thinken that. They wouldn’t git two frum sich a little place. We’d better git goen now. Cassie Marie, honey, I guess you had better go with me.” She saw the disappointment in the child’s face at losing the trip in the coal truck to see her favorite grandmother, and comforted, “We’ll have us a pretty walk through th woods.” Then to Enoch, pulling on his jacket as he ran to the coal truck. “Recollect, no snifflen now. Be good, an make Granma Nevels happy.”
Reuben lingered in the doorway, “Mom—cain’t I go hunten? I seed Granma and Granpa Nevels Friday when I hauled em up some wood. Couldn’t I go hunten an then hep Granpa Kendrick with his night work this evenen?” He looked hopefully, but doubtfully, at his mother, and then at Clovis, who was getting Amos into his coat.
“Yer Granpa Kendrick ud be mighty glad to see you,” Clovis said, “but you know yer mom er me neither don’t hold by hunten an carousen around on Sunday, specially when Henley’s—when they’s so much trouble in th settlement.”
Gertie looked through the door, past the rented ridge field to the hills, warm-looking and soft and kind in the yellow autumn sun after the frosty night. “He’s worked hard all fall,” she said, “down at Mom’s an here, a saven that hog-messed-up corn in th rain.” She drew a shivering breath. “Henley would mebbe a gone hunten today.”
Clovis picked up Amos. “Well, whoever’s riden with me, come on,” he called, as he started for the truck.
Clovis was put out, Gertie realized, by her unreligious ways in letting Reuben hunt on Sunday. Still, she had no heart to forbid the boy to go. He had already gone for the little twenty-two that Henley had given him on his tenth birthday. Enoch ran to help Clovis with the business of filling the truck radiator, which he had drained the night before against the frosty cold, while Clytie got the many-layered jelly cake they had baked yesterday for Granma Nevels. Clovis poured a thin trickle of gas into the carburetor. In an instant, blue flame whooshed up. As always Cytie squealed, Gyp barked, the younger boys cried out in delight, and Clovis, his eyes beaming with gratification, exulted, “She’s started.”
Only Reuben, walking now through the last summer’s cornfield where the thin blade-stripped stalks rose no higher than his shoulders, did not glance at the truck. “Don’t be a shooten me and Cassie, now, son,” Gertie called above the sound of the motor. “Recollect, we’ll be comen down through th woods past th old Tipton Place.”
He had walked slowly on, giving little sign that he listened to her warning, but at the words Tipton Place he stopped short, then turned and looked at her. “That Tipton Place, it’s pretty, Mom,” he said. He seemed eager to say more, but after a cautious glance toward Clovis lifting Amos into the cab he only looked a moment at his mother, his eyes narrowed in thought. He turned swiftly about then, and strode across the field.
Gertie watched him and nodded with satisfaction over the way he carried his rifle. Clovis and the other children were calling and waving g
ood-bye. She stood a moment longer on the porch, and waved and watched the battered truck go lurching down the rutted lane.
A low laugh caused her to look behind her. She hurried back into the middle room, saying with more sorrow in her voice than chiding, “Cassie Marie, quit kicken that block a wood. You’ll be ruinen it.” She knelt and smoothed the wood with her apron, and examined it for scratches.
Cassie, who had been lying on the sheepskin, kicking the wood with her heels, was troubled, and patted the wood as she, kneeling now, leaned her cheek against it, whispering, “I didn’t mean tu hurt ye, honey, honest.” And to Gertie, with a contrite; hair-flipping headshake, “I fergot she could feel it, Mom.”
“Him,” Gertie said, rising, but still looking down onto the top of the great chunk that stood high as Cassie’s shoulders.
“Her,” Cassie said, her eyes gay again, teasing. She flung her arms about the wood, laughing, pushing hard to make her fingers touch on the other side. As usual they would not touch, and as always she cried, “You’re so fat—fat as Granma Kendrick’s feather beds, you ole fat thing you; an your hair not braided yit. It’ll git in yer eyes, Callie Lou, and you’ll be cross-eyed, Callie Lou.” Still hugging the wood, she tilted her head far backward, looked up at her mother, begging, “Part her hair an make braids, Mom.”
It was an old argument between them, the hair on the block of wood, for if one were close enough, looking down in good light, like now, when the early sunshine fell like a curtain by the southern windows, not falling through but making a brightness in the room, the shape of the top of a head with unparted hair swirling loosely away from the center showed clearly. The waving hair might have twisted into curls on its ends, but the curls, like the face, were buried in the wood. There was only the top of a head, tilted forward a little, bowed, or maybe only looking down, but plainly someone there, crouching, a secret being hidden in the wood, waiting to rise and shed the wood and be done with the hiding. Gertie bent, reaching for the sheepskin, and at once the top of the head with its wavy hair was lost below the protecting rim of the wood, and the bright dark block seemed cherry wood only. But Cassie continued to fondle it, begging: “Take her out, Mom. It’s Sunday—she wants out. She’s been a waiten there so long—so awful long, ever since I was little.”