Year of the Big Thaw Read online

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  _In this warm and fanciful story of a Connecticut farmer, Marion Zimmer Bradley has caught some of the glory that is man's love for man--no matter who he is nor whence he's from. By heck, you'll like little Matt._

  year of the big thaw

  _by ... Marion Zimmer Bradley_

  Mr. Emmett did his duty by the visitor from another world--never doubting the right of it.

  _You say that Matthew is your own son, Mr. Emmett?_

  Yes, Rev'rend Doane, and a better boy never stepped, if I do say it asshouldn't. I've trusted him to drive team for me since he was eleven,and you can't say more than that for a farm boy. Way back when he was alittle shaver so high, when the war came on, he was bounden he was goingto sail with this Admiral Farragut. You know boys that age--like runawaycolts. I couldn't see no good in his being cabin boy on some tarnationNavy ship and I told him so. If he'd wanted to sail out on a whalingship, I 'low I'd have let him go. But Marthy--that's the boy's Ma--tookon so that Matt stayed home. Yes, he's a good boy and a good son.

  We'll miss him a powerful lot if he gets this scholarship thing. But I'low it'll be good for the boy to get some learnin' besides what he getsin the school here. It's right kind of you, Rev'rend, to look over thisapplication thing for me.

  _Well, if he is your own son, Mr. Emmett, why did you write 'birthplaceunknown' on the line here?_

  Rev'rend Doane, I'm glad you asked me that question. I've been turnin'it over in my mind and I've jest about come to the conclusion itwouldn't be nohow fair to hold it back. I didn't lie when I said Mattwas my son, because he's been a good son to me and Marthy. But I'm nothis Pa and Marthy ain't his Ma, so could be I stretched the truth jest amite. Rev'rend Doane, it's a tarnal funny yarn but I'll walk into themeetin' house and swear to it on a stack o'Bibles as thick as a cord ofwood.

  You know I've been farming the old Corning place these past seven year?It's good flat Connecticut bottom-land, but it isn't like our land up inHampshire where I was born and raised. My Pa called it the HampshireGrants and all that was King's land when _his_ Pa came in there andstarted farming at the foot of Scuttock Mountain. That's Injun forfires, folks say, because the Injuns used to build fires up there in thespring for some of their heathen doodads. Anyhow, up there in themountains we see a tarnal power of quare things.

  You call to mind the year we had the big thaw, about twelve years beforethe war? You mind the blizzard that year? I heard tell it spread downmost to York. And at Fort Orange, the place they call Albany now, theHudson froze right over, so they say. But those York folks do a sight ofexaggerating, I'm told.

  Anyhow, when the ice went out there was an almighty good thaw all over,and when the snow run off Scuttock mountain there was a good-sized hunkof farmland in our valley went under water. The crick on my farm flowedover the bank and there was a foot of water in the cowshed, and down inthe swimmin' hole in the back pasture wasn't nothing but a big gullyfifty foot and more across, rushing through the pasture, deep as a lakeand brown as the old cow. You know freshet-floods? Full up with sticksand stones and old dead trees and somebody's old shed floatin' down themiddle. And I swear to goodness, Parson, that stream was running alongso fast I saw four-inch cobblestones floating and bumping along.

  I tied the cow and the calf and Kate--she was our white mare; you mindshe went lame last year and I had to shoot her, but she was just a youngmare then and skittish as all get-out--but she was a good little mare.

  Anyhow, I tied the whole kit and caboodle of them in the woodshed upbehind the house, where they'd be dry, then I started to get themilkpail. Right then I heard the gosh-awfullest screech I ever heard inmy life. Sounded like thunder and a freshet and a forest-fire all atonce. I dropped the milkpail as I heard Marthy scream inside the house,and I run outside. Marthy was already there in the yard and she pointsup in the sky and yelled, "Look up yander!"

  We stood looking up at the sky over Shattuck mountain where there was agreat big--shoot now, I d'no as I can call its name but it was like atrail of fire in the sky, and it was makin' the dangdest racket you everheard, Rev'rend. Looked kind of like one of them Fourth-of-Julyskyrockets, but it was big as a house. Marthy was screaming and shegrabbed me and hollered, "Hez! Hez, what in tunket is it?" And whenMarthy cusses like that, Rev'rend, she don't know what she's saying,she's so scared.

  I was plumb scared myself. I heard Liza--that's our young-un, LizaGrace, that got married to the Taylor boy. I heard her crying on thestoop, and she came flying out with her pinny all black and hollered toMarthy that the pea soup was burning. Marthy let out another screech andran for the house. That's a woman for you. So I quietened Liza down someand I went in and told Marthy it weren't no more than one of themshooting stars. Then I went and did the milking.

  But you know, while we were sitting down to supper there came the mostawful grinding, screeching, pounding crash I ever heard. Sounded if itwere in the back pasture but the house shook as if somethin' had hit it.

  Marthy jumped a mile and I never saw such a look on her face.

  "Hez, what was that?" she asked.

  "Shoot, now, nothing but the freshet," I told her.

  But she kept on about it. "You reckon that shooting star fell in ourback pasture, Hez?"

  "Well, now, I don't 'low it did nothing like that," I told her. But shewas jittery as an old hen and it weren't like her nohow. She said itsounded like trouble and I finally quietened her down by saying I'dsaddle Kate up and go have a look. I kind of thought, though I didn'ttell Marthy, that somebody's house had floated away in the freshet andrun aground in our back pasture.

  So I saddled up Kate and told Marthy to get some hot rum ready in casethere was some poor soul run aground back there. And I rode Kate back tothe back pasture.

  It was mostly uphill because the top of the pasture is on high ground,and it sloped down to the crick on the other side of the rise.

  Well, I reached the top of the hill and looked down. The crick were aregular river now, rushing along like Niagary. On the other side of itwas a stand of timber, then the slope of Shattuck mountain. And I sawright away the long streak where all the timber had been cut out in abig scoop with roots standing up in the air and a big slide of rocksdown to the water.

  It was still raining a mite and the ground was sloshy and squanchyunder foot. Kate scrunched her hooves and got real balky, not likin' ita bit. When we got to the top of the pasture she started to whine andwhicker and stamp, and no matter how loud I whoa-ed she kept ona-stamping and I was plumb scared she'd pitch me off in the mud. Then Istarted to smell a funny smell, like somethin' burning. Now, don't askme how anything could burn in all that water, because I don't know.

  When we came up on the rise I saw the contraption.

  Rev'rend, it was the most tarnal crazy contraption I ever saw in mylife. It was bigger nor my cowshed and it was long and thin and as shinyas Marthy's old pewter pitcher her Ma brought from England. It had apair of red rods sticking out behind and a crazy globe fitted up wherethe top ought to be. It was stuck in the mud, turned halfway over on thelittle slide of roots and rocks, and I could see what had happened, allright.

  The thing must have been--now, Rev'rend, you can say what you like butthat thing must have _flew_ across Shattuck and landed on the slope inthe trees, then turned over and slid down the hill. That must have beenthe crash we heard. The rods weren't just red, they were _red-hot_. Icould hear them sizzle as the rain hit 'em.

  In the middle of the infernal contraption there was a door, and it hungall to-other as if every hinge on it had been wrenched halfway off. As Ipushed old Kate alongside it I heared somebody hollering alongside t
hecontraption. I didn't nohow get the words but it must have been forhelp, because I looked down and there was a man a-flopping along in thewater.

  He was a big fellow and he wasn't swimming, just thrashin' andhollering. So I pulled off my coat and boots and hove in after him. Thestream was running fast but he was near the edge and I managed to catchon to an old tree-root and hang on, keeping his head out of the watertill I got my feet aground. Then I hauled him onto the bank. Up above meKate was still whinnying and raising Ned and I shouted at her as I bentover the man.

  Wal, Rev'rend, he sure did give me a surprise--weren't no proper man I'dever seed before. He was wearing some kind of red clothes, real