Part 7

“No, but I was aggervatin’ him. I hated Lizzie Bowles an’ her silk dresses, an’ when he swore an’ told me to go back, I picked up a rock an’ if he hadn’t jumped I’d a broke his head with it. I was ashamed to tell you then. I was wild mad, an’ he _ought_ to ’a’ throwed me inter the briars. I wasn’t any he’p to him in the field, an’ when I got sick I wasn’t any he’p in the house, like his mother said. I didn’t do my part at all.”

“You did all you could, Evvie,” I said, with no effect on the tide pouring from her heart.

“An’ way back, when we’s livin’ with mommie, I was aggervatin’. At first when he’d pout an’ wouldn’t come to the table, I’d slip out with something fer him to eat, an’ beg till he’d take it, but once when we had company an’ he’d made me ashamed ’cause he went to the barn an’ wouldn’t come to breakfast, I got me a bundle o’ blade-fodder an’ took it to him. I told him if he wanted to live with the steers he could eat with ’em too. I was shore mean. An’, Mis’ Dolly, I want you to go to Carson jail an’ see Judd, an’ tell him when he comes back from the Pen I’ll be ready an’ we’ll begin all over. He’ll know I’ll keep my word.”

It was useless to remind her of pain that she could not recall; but I spoke of her father and mother. Would she break their hearts again?

“But look at Bennie!” she cried. “He’s gettin’ more like his father ever’ day. If I’m hard on Judd now, how can I look at my baby? Ever’body’s against him. You’re hard as the others. Won’t you go, Mis’ Dolly?”

“No, I won’t. You don’t know what you are doing.”

“Then I’ll have to git somebody else to go.”

Her message went to Judd by some busybody, and I wired to Asheville for Cleve. When he arrived on the next train I was at the station. “The thing to do, Cleve,” I said, “is to bail him out and let him come home.”

Cleve, knowing so well the Evvie that eluded him, saw the point at once. He also saw that neither he nor I should figure as bondsman.

“It’ll be hard work,” he said, “but I’ll find somebody.”

And over the country he went, picking out men whom he knew to be secret abetters of Judd, and working on their fear of his turning informer. The amount of bail was made up, and Judd was free. Evvie thought that he would come directly to her, but first he went to Mossy Creek to see “the boys.” They got up a dance, and it would have seemed ungrateful of Judd not to remain for it. When he reached Evvie his face was still slightly swollen from drink and revelry, but his spirits were riding high. Friends had gathered at the Kanes’ for the evening, and Judd began to recount his triumphs in jail.

“They made me president o’ their club soon’s I got there, an’ kicked the other feller out. We had some reg’lations, you bet! Ever’ feller that come into jail had to pay fifty cents fer terbacker; if he didn’t we flogged him. They wouldn’t let us have whiskey, an’ that was tough, you bet! We’d have court, an’ try the fellers, an’ it was a purty good life if we’d had more to eat. They’s all sorry to see me go, an’ I promised to smuggle in some hot stuff to ’em if there was any way. Mebbe I can work it with a mulatter girl ’at cooks fer ’em--right purty--color of a hick’ry leaf ’fore frost--she’ll he’p me, you bet! I’ll try it to-morr’ when me an’ Evvie go to Carson to hitch up. Some quare, ain’t it, marryin’ yer own wife? An’ what about yer kid goin’ on two at yer weddin’?”

Choking and helpless, I slipped away from the sound of his voice. Sam, walking home by my road, began to talk.

“Reckon you noticed Evvie in that corner while Judd was talkin’. Ef you’d a cut off her head at the neck it wouldn’t ’a’ bled a drap.”

I could not answer, and hurried on, finding Cleve on my doorstep. I took him into the house, my tears of rage and failure dropping; but when the full light of the lamp fell upon his face I thought no more of my own misery.

“There’s twelve hours yet, Cleve,” I said. “Evvie is not an utter fool.”

But he wouldn’t speak. For over an hour he sat by my fire, a humped reproach. I exhausted every consolation, even to telling him that she wasn’t worth it. Then he lifted his eyes, full of such mourning scorn that I became as silent as himself. There was a tap at the door, slight enough to be Evvie’s. I asked Cleve to go up-stairs, saying that I would call him if he was wanted. When he was gone I opened the door and heard Evvie’s voice.

“They’s so many at our house to-night. Ever’ bed’s full. I thought I’d come here to sleep. You don’t keer, do you?”

“I’m glad to see you, Evvie. Come, warm a little, and jump into bed. You’ve been running.”

“Yes, I was afraid--but--I had to come.”

Her little body was quivering. I sat her down, but did not dare to give a sign of sympathy that might plunge her into hysteria. I took up a book and sat reading until she became very still. We were in the kitchen, which was large and possessed a big, ugly fireplace. At the right of the fireplace, in the corner, ran a short flight of stairs, and under the stairs was a closet with an opening for a half-door. This opening was simply curtained.

I had held my book for ten minutes or more, when we heard sounds of talk and laughter from the road. I recognized Judd’s voice, and a loud knock followed. Instantly Evvie rose, stooped, and, darting like a bee, vanished behind the little curtain of the closet. There was hardly room for her among the pans and old ovens, but she scuttled her way, and there was silence. Then I opened the outer door and saw Judd with several companions.

“Me an’ the boys are lookin’ fer Evvie. We started to have a reel at bedtime an’ found she’d gone. I ’lowed right away she’d skipped over here, bein’ she’s crazy ’bout you. Reckon I skeered her a little talkin’ so much ’bout them jail fellers; but I’ll make it all right. I’m goin’ to be square with Evvie this time.”

He began to peek around me.

“Why--ain’t she here? She gone to bed?”

“No, Judd. Did you stop at Len’s?”

“We hollered, an’ she wasn’t there.”

“You’d better go on to Sam’s then,” I urged, following, or rather leading him away. “Take the short trail by the hemlocks.”

When they were certainly gone I went in. Cleve and Evvie were sitting by the fire. Her arms were around his neck and she was crying steadily. Cleve’s arms were determinedly in the right place. The next day they took the early train for Carson, and by noon were safely married.

Yesterday Evvie’s mother said to me: “You ought to go over to Asheville, Mis’ Dolly, jest to see how Evvie keeps that little house primped up. They’s water in it, hot an’ cold, an’ ever’thing, like I always wanted her to have. I reckon she’s ’bout fergot that shack in the holler.”

I tell myself that it is as well with Evvie as life permits it to be with the most of us; but she is now only eighteen, chiselled in beauty and colored with youth; and I try not to wonder what would happen if she should ever fall in love.

VI

MY WILD-HOG CLAIM: A DUBIOUS ASSET

I

It was mostly during my first two years on the farm that things happened. Unfamiliarity sharpened events into adventure. Later the unusual gradually flattened into matter of course. For this reason I am glad that I looked over my wild-hog claim during the first year of possession, a time when I fed on explorer’s elixir, and knew not plain bread and meat.

I can still see Sam, a clear-cut figure, swinging from an overhead bough which he had grasped just in time to save himself from the plunging, foam-scattering boar that in another second would have had his life. But the beginning of the day was calm enough. For some time I had heard talk of my claim as a fund-producing property which, if looked after as it should be, would enable me to buy out the County Bank as soon as I chose. My predecessor had imported a few Berkshires and Poland Chinas to mix with the wild breed, and the result, Len assured me, was “the best mixtry in the mountains.” Quality had been improved without unfitting the hogs for hardy life on the ridges. Acorns were abundant; sprouting chestnuts could be uprooted until late in the spring. By taking the hogs in midwinter, before the mast began to grow scant, one could find them fairly fat, and two or three weeks in the pen, with plenty of corn to crunch, would make the meat sweet and marketable. Whenever things looked expensively blue on the farm there was always some one to remind me cheerfully of my wild hogs that could be “fotched in an’ cashed quick as nothin’.”

We were having some bright, windless days in January, and Len said to me wistfully: “Ain’t this the hog-huntin’ time, though?”

I was getting close to the wall as to ways and means, so I answered: “Very well, Len. Tell Sam about it and get ready for a round-up to-morrow.”

He was delighted. “I jest been achin’ to git into the woods,” he said. “There’ll be a lot o’ young-uns to mark. ’Course you know what yer mark is, Mis’ Dolly?” I didn’t, and he apologized for my ignorance in a matter so vital. “A woman kain’t be expected to know ever’thing ’bout the hog business. Yer mark is an undercrap in the right year an’ two main smart slits in the top o’ the left. Ag Snead’s got a mark nearly like yorn, only they’s a slit in the right an’ a crap too. It’s a top slit, an’ ever’ hog that’s got the top o’ his year torn off ol’ Ag drives in fer his’n. An’ they’s mainly yorn, Mis’ Dolly.”

“But how do they get their ears torn off?”

“Dogs. We have to ketch ’em with a dog, an’ he gits ’em by the year. Sometimes a blame hog’ll leave part of his year with the dog an’ go on. I’ve hearn ol’ Ag’ll sic his dogs onto yore mark, hopin’ to tear a year off an’ claim the hog, an’ I wouldn’t put it past him.”

“That’s rascality, Len, and Mr. Snead is a deacon.”

“Law, when a man goes hog-huntin’ he puts his ’ligion in the cupboard, so it won’t git hurt while he’s out.”

“Those hogs are mine. I’m going to have a talk with neighbor Snead.”

Len was startled. “Lord-a-mercy! This here’s a country where you kain’t call a man a hog-thief an’ git home by sundown.”

“I won’t call him a thief.”

“No, I reckon you’ll jest inquire ef he’s got any o’ yore hogs in his pen.”

Noting that I duly crumpled, he became protective as usual.

“You see, Mis’ Dolly, they ain’t any way to ’proach a man on sech a subject, less’n yer carryin’ a good gun.”

“We’ll meet at Sam’s,” he told me, “round about ’fore good daylight. There’ll be pap an’ my Ben, an’ we’ll take Burl ’cause he’s got a big dog.”

Burl was a cousin of Coretta’s, staying at Sam’s and trying, with fluctuating success, to court Len’s oldest girl. “A good hog-hunt,” said Len, “will show ef he’s any account, him an’ that dog o’ hisn.”

I managed to reach Sam’s the next morning while the smoky lamp was still burning on the kitchen table. As I approached I heard voices, zestful and happy, but when I appeared in the door there was surprise, then a troubled silence.

“You needn’t been afeard I wouldn’t git ’em off early,” said Coretta. “I been up sence three o’clock, an’ Len an’ Ben come at four. We’d done breakfast, an’ was jest chowin’ till light broke.”

“I’m not hurrying you. I was only afraid that I wouldn’t be in time myself.”

“You’re not going?” all questioned at once, and plunged into talk of the cliffs that I would tumble over, the thickets I couldn’t crawl through, and the “straight-ups” I couldn’t climb. I did not doubt their concern for me, but felt that more was behind their opposition than desire for my safety. In some subterranean way they knew that crafty hints had reached me of their having now and then spirited hogs to neighborly markets, forgetting to share the proceeds with the owner; they knew too, by the same invisible channels, that the tainting insinuations had been indignantly discouraged; yet they suspected me of wanting to keep on their track. After getting up at an heroic hour to prove my full comradeship, it was depressing to run against suspicion, as cold in my confident face as the frosty air of the dawn. But I innocently urged that I was bound for the hunt, that our lives were of equal value, and I would share all risks. After some minutes of talk--genuine even as it veiled the core of discussion--the springs of good humor began to flow, doubt was put to cover, and we were on the road.

Serena was with us. She had come with Len to the meet, and I had heard him insisting on her accompanying me. “You won’t have to go fur,” he said. “She’ll turn back ’fore we git to Broke Yoke Gap.”

Granpap also was of the party. “He kain’t run,” said Len, “but he’ll he’p us more’n you’d think. He caught a big feller last year all by hisse’f, ’cept what little ol’ Bub could do.”

“All right, granpap,” I said, feeling gay and generous as the sun began to warm our mountain, “you can have all you catch to-day. I won’t take any toll from you.”

There was no answer--no thanks. Everybody looked straight into the woods, ostensibly concerned with nothing but sighting a hog; and I knew thereby that my words had been taken seriously.

II

“We ought to git Red Granny to-day,” said Sam, examining the ground where the smoking leaves had been stirred. “Here’s her consarned ol’ broke-toed track. An’ here’s a lot o’ littler tracks. She’s been in an’ tolled out some more o’ our shotes. I bet if we hurried up we’d come right on her.”

“Let’s hurry then,” I urged; for I knew about the old sow called Red Granny, that for three years had proved uncapturable. She kept her inaccessible house on the side of a rough mountain, making her way to it through a great pile of rock by a passage yet undiscovered. Though a good breeder, filling the woods with sandy-haired pigs, she also seemed able to teach them the secret of escape. Bub, who was an old dog, could hardly be made to run a red pig unless it was on his own side of the mountain.

“’Tain’t no use to trail Red Granny,” said Len. “Ol’ Bub leads the dogs, an’ he won’t run thataway. I put him on her trail onct an’ he was out all night. When he come in next day he was too ’shamed to look at me.”

“Well, let’s get somewhere,” I said, feeling the cold in spite of the sun. Then I found I had made a mistake. The first part of hog-hunting is deliberation. There was a long discussion as to the most fruitful direction.

Finally little Ross, who had followed Serena, said, “Let’s go to the sow’s oak,” and to my amazement everybody agreed. “I bet that spotted sow is there with some little pigs, an’ poppie promised me one,” said Ross.

The sow’s oak was a giant tree with a large hollow at the butt, big enough to furnish good shelter for a litter. For years it had been a favorite bedding-place. To find it we had to descend into a cove where there was a clear spring. All stopped for water, though everybody had taken a drink just before leaving Sam’s. The Highlander can go without a meal or two with no inconvenience, but he drinks water in season and out of season. After leaving the spring we passed around the curving side of a hill and came in sight of the tree.

“Sst!” said Sam. “I see her. She’s in there, an’ she’s got pigs. Don’t crowd her now. Keep the dogs back. We don’t want her to git tore, an’ her a-sucklin’ pigs. Y’all stand out here in a circle like, so she kain’t git through if she runs, and I’ll ease up behind the tree. When ye see me bounce ’round to the front to grab her leg, ever’body an’ the dogs bear right in.”

He made a wide circuit and came up behind the tree, but before he reached it Burl’s dog, Bugle, who was new at the game, gave a yelp and the sow sprang out. About a dozen tiny pigs, black-spotted and with delicate pink noses, followed her. All three of the dogs rushed forward and yapped in her face. She bristled to fight, then turned and dashed in the opposite direction, flashing by Sam and leaving him to look foolish, with a knotted rope in his hands. The dogs flew after the sow and the men followed the dogs. Little Ross began to scramble after the terrified, squealing pigs.

“Go after the one with the black spot on its year,” said Serena. “It’s the purtiest.” Ross tumbled after the one she pointed out and secured it. Serena took it into her apron. By that time not a pig was to be seen or heard. They were all under the leaves, behind logs, anywhere they could secrete their quivering bodies. In the distance we could hear the cry of the dogs and shouts of the men. Then the yelping ceased, and we heard the wild squeals of the captive. When we reached the spot the men were looking down on the struggling sow. She was tied by one hind leg, and the other end of the rope was made fast to a young tree.

“She’ll keep all right,” said granpap, examining the knots critically. “Reckon anybody’ll find her here ’fore we git back? The woods air full o’ hunters.”

“Hunters and stealers,” said Len indignantly. “But we kain’t he’p it. We got to go on.”

“She’ll drive in easy,” said Serena. “It’s that sow you brought in last year, an’ I gentled her with slop fer a month.” She put the little pig down by his mother, who became very still as he lifted a nudging nose to her. I wanted to return and find the other pigs, but was swiftly talked down.

“They’ll find the sow ef she’ll squeal loud enough,” said Sam. “They won’t run fur anyhow, an’ we’ll look ’em out as we go home.”

The men had discovered some signs which they were sure would lead to a fine bunch of shotes. “An’ shotes pay,” they said. “Anybody’ll buy a shote.”

The “signs” took us by a very rough way through a damp hollow. Serena declared it was so “blustery” she couldn’t stand it, and persuaded me to turn up the slope and walk along the ridge, leaving the men to push their way below. “They always scour that holler,” she said, “but they’ve never brought a pig out of it.” In half an hour the men came up defeated. Some pigs had been found, but they proved to be in Ag Snead’s mark.

“I’ll tell ye what let’s do,” said Len. “We’ll go to Raven Den side to find that big b’ar hog that’s tuskin’ our gentles ever’ time they go to the woods.”

“B’ar hog” was euphemistic usage, in my presence, for boar. It was humorously incorrect, being similar in sound to the abbreviation for barrow.

“I’m afraid o’ that feller,” said young Ben. “I seen him onct. He suits me where he is.”

“Let’s go fer him,” said Burl. “That sounds like a hunt.”

“I’m ready,” said Sam. “That feller’s too mean to let live. I’ve had to sew up two shotes this week that come in all cut up.”

We were moving slowly along the ridge, and little Ross, who had been running ahead, came flying back to say that he had found a hog sound asleep. We rushed forward and came upon a fine sow lying dead. Len pointed to a bullet-hole in her forehead.

“Is it ours?” I asked, for my mind was set on revenue and this was a dismal beginning. So far we had to our credit only a half-tame sow that would probably have come in of her own accord when food grew scarce--and this. Len flicked the exposed ear of the sow. “You see the undercrap,” he said. Then he pulled the other ear from under her head. “An’ there’s the two slits. It’s a ten-dollar bill you got layin’ there.”

“Ay,” said Sam, “she’s worth ten dollars more yisterday than to-day.”

“Yisterday!” said Len. “She’s shot early this mornin’. She ain’t froze yit, an’ last night would ’a’ froze fire. Whoever shot her is in the woods now, an’ he better not come shammuckin’ where I can see him. I’d have my say.”

“You ain’t goin’ to talk into a gun, Len,” said Serena. “Wha’d you promise me about this hog business?”

“Shucks, Reenie, I ain’t broke no promise yit.”

“Y’ain’t goin’ to nuther. Ol’ Ag’s got more bullets. Reckon I’m goin’ to chance comin’ on you layin’ in the woods like this here sow?”

“Why,” I asked, at last getting in my burning question, “did they shoot the poor thing and leave her here?”

“Oh, she looked slick an’ fine a hundred yards off, but when they shot her an’ come up close they seen she was goin’ to litter an’ wasn’t fit fer meat.”

“What about a stomach that can eat a hog right off the mast?” said Sam. “Ag Snead ain’t more’n ha’f human anyway.”

“’Twa’n’t Ag,” said granpap. “It ’ud take two men to git this hog in home, an’ ol’ Ag is secrety. He wouldn’t want a partner in this kind o’ work. It’s the Copp boys more’n likely.”

“There’s ol’ Aggervation now,” called Ben. We looked ahead and saw a man approaching. It was Agnashus Snead. A boy, big-limbed and nearly grown, walked beside him.

“That’s his nephew, Ted Shoals,” said Len. “’Course they done it! Now watch Ag, the ol’ devil! You’d think he was jest from prayer-meetin’.”

“Howdy, folks,” Snead called to us. He was about seventy, with cool, pink cheeks, and white hair that still kept a youthful ripple. His eyes were golden brown and young as a boy’s. I found myself introduced, and shook hands with him almost eagerly. Oh, no, he couldn’t have done it!

“Any luck?” he asked, and Len pointed to the dead hog. The old man was properly shocked. “They’s some rotten folks in this kentry,” he said, “ef a man knowed where to find ’em.”

“Right, there is,” said Len, “an’ I b’lieve I’d know ’em ef I seen ’em.” His black eyes looked kindlingly into the brown eyes of Snead. Serena pushed in. “_Your_ luck’s all right, Uncle Ag. The boys jest now found a bunch o’ yore shotes down in that holler.”

“Reckon they didn’t have no years tore off?” he asked, repaying Len’s thrust. But no fight was precipitated because he accompanied his question with the frankest of smiles. Serena had often told me that you could say anything in the mountains if you took care to say it laughing.

“No,” put in Sam, with a grin equally disarming, “but if I’s as mean as _some_ folks I’d whacked off their years ragged-like, an’ druv ’em in home.” The laugh went round. Both parties had spoken their minds. Old Ag bent over and touched the bullet-hole.

“Them Copp boys air in the woods to-day.”

We knew what he meant, but if the Copp boys should ever get him cornered not one of us could swear that he had accused them.

“Their gun makes the same kind of a hole yorn does, I reckon,” said Len, with a steady look at Snead’s rifle.

This was going too far. Snead rose up and looked about. He would be two against five, with maybe a woman to claw him from the back. A tolerant smile spread over his face. “It shore does,” he said. “I’ll tell you what, boys. I kain’t take my shotes in with jest Ted here to he’p me. S’pose I hunt with you to-day, an’ you he’p me to-morr’.”

Asking a favor was more disarming than laughter. This was a neighborly appeal, and Len was first, last, and always, a good neighbor. In two minutes we were all on our way to the haunt of the big b’ar hog, leaving the embryo feud, for a time at least, to smother under amenities.

III

Serena had slyly given me several opportunities to turn back with her. At last she openly rebelled. “Ef yer goin’ down in them rocks,” she said, “I’m goin’ to make a fire on the ridge an’ set here till ye git back, if ye ever do git back.”

“Stay if you want to,” Len told her, “an’ keep Ross to he’p ye pick up brush. Ef we roust that b’ar there’d best be nobody round that kain’t hop quick.”

The entire party gave me a look which was a plain request that I keep Serena company. I was half angered. “Come on,” I said, taking the lead along the ridge. “I hope you’ll enjoy yourself, Serena.”

They stood dubiously, then came on with a shout.