The Yearling Read online

  “Give in, Buck,” he said, “give in.”

  Buck wiped his beard.

  “All right,” he said, “I’ll take it for funnin’. But don’t look to Lem to take it for ary thing but a cold-out insult.”

  Penny said, “No hard feelin’s. I got none, and I hope you-all’ll hold none, Lem nor nobody.”

  “Lem’s different. He takes things personal.”

  “That grieves me. I pitched into the fight betwixt him and Oliver because they was too many of you on one side.”

  Buck said, “Well, blood’s thicker’n water. We fight amongst ourselves now and agin, but when it’s us and t’other feller, we allus fight on the same side o’ the creek. But me and you has got no call to fall out.”

  Words began fights and words ended them.

  Jody asked, “If fellers didn’t say quarrelin’ things, would they put in to fight?”

  Penny said, “I’m feered so. I oncet seed a pair o’ deef dummies havin’ it. But they do say they got a sign language, and likely one passed the insult in a sign.”

  Buck said, “Hit’s male nature, boy. Wait ’til you git to courtin’ and you’ll git your breeches dusted many a time.”

  “But nobody but Lem and Oliver was courtin’, and here all us Baxters and all you Forresters was in to it.”

  Penny said, “They’s no end to what a man’ll fight for. I even knowed a preacher takened off his coat and fit ary man wouldn’t agree to infant damnation. All a feller kin do, is fight for what he figgers is right, and the devil take the hindmost.”

  Buck said, “Listen. I think I heered a fox bark then in the hammock.”

  At first the night seemed silent. Then sounds drifted like clouds into their hearing. An owl hooted. A tree-frog scraped his fiddle and predicted rain.

  Buck said, “There he be.”

  A thin bark sounded in the distance, shrill and mournful.

  Buck said, “Now wouldn’t that be music to my pore dogs? Wouldn’t they sing to that sopranner?”

  Penny said, “If you and Jody don’t clean out the litter tonight, bring your dogs on the next moon and we’ll have us a chase.”

  Buck said, “Let’s us git goin’, Jody. That yipper’ll about make the cornfield time we do.” He picked up Penny’s shotgun from the corner. “I’ll borry this tonight. Seems to me I’ve seed it before.”

  “Jest don’t bury it beside the dog,” Penny said. “Hit’s ralely a good gun.”

  Jody packed his muzzle-loader over his shoulder. He went out with Buck. The fawn heard him and bleated from the shed. They walked under the mulberries and crossed the split-rail fence into the cornfield. Buck walked north down the first row. At the far end of the field he began walking across the ends of the rows. He stopped at each row and focussed the light from the fire-pan down the length of the field. Mid-way he stopped. He turned and nudged Jody. Where the light came to rest, two fiery green agates caught the light.

  He murmured, “Slip half-way up the row. I’ll keep the light on him. Don’t git in the path o’ the light. When his eyes looks as big as a shillin’, give it to him, right between ’em.”

  Jody crept forward, hugging the corn at his left. The green lights were extinguished a moment, then stared again. He lifted his gun and allowed the light from the blazing splinters in the fire-pan to slip down the barrel. He pulled the trigger. The gun, as always, knocked him off balance. He started to run forward to ascertain his hit, but Buck hissed at him.

  “Psst. You got him. Leave him lay. Come back.”

  He crept along the row. Buck handed him the shotgun.

  “They’s likely another here clost.”

  They crept from row to row. This time he saw the glowing eyes before Buck saw them. He advanced down the row as before. The shotgun was a delight to handle. It was lighter than the old muzzle-loader, not so long, and easier to sight. He shot with a feeling of confidence. Again Buck called him back and he retreated. But though they combed the rows carefully, and worked around the west end of the field and flashed the light down the corn rows from the south, there were no more bright green eyes.

  Buck said aloud, “That’s the crop for tonight. Let’s see what we got.”

  Both shots had killed. One was a dog-fox and one a vixen, fat with Baxter corn.

  Buck said, “Now they got a litter off in a den some’eres, but they’ll be part-growed and kin make out by theirselves. Come fall, we’ll have us a fox-chase.”

  The foxes were gray and in good condition, with full brushes. Jody carried them in complacently.

  Approaching the cabin, they heard a commotion. Ma Baxter shrieked.

  Buck said, “Your Ma wouldn’t romp on your Pa while he was ailin’, would she?”

  “She don’t never romp on him with nothin’ but talkin’.”

  “I’d a heap ruther a woman tore me down with a light-er’d knot, than speakin’ sharp.”

  Close to the cabin, they heard Penny shout.

  Buck said, “Why, boy, the woman’s killin’ him.”

  Jody said, “Somethin’s after the fawn!”

  The yard itself was not often disturbed by anything more dangerous than the small varmints. Buck hurdled the fence and Jody vaulted it after him. A light shone from the doorway. Penny stood there dressed only in his breeches. Ma Baxter was beside him, flapping her apron. Jody thought he saw a dark form move off into the night, toward the grape arbor, followed by the dogs, baying.

  Penny called, “Hit’s a bear! Git him! Git him ’fore he makes the fence!”

  Sparks showered from the fire-pan as Buck ran. The light reached out to a lumbering body galloping to the east under the peach trees.

  Jody shouted, “Give me the fire-pan, Buck, and you do the shootin’.”

  He felt frightened and incompetent. They exchanged on the run. At the fence the bear turned at bay. He slashed at the dogs. His eyes and teeth shone in the spasmodic light. Then he turned to clamber over the fence. Buck shot. The bear tumbled. The dogs broke into a tumult. Penny came running. The light showed a kill. The dogs made a pretense of having done the job, and bayed and attacked proudly. Buck was smug.

  He said, “This feller’d not of come around if he’d knowed they was a Forrester on the place.”

  Penny said, “He smelt things set him so wild, he’d not of noticed the hull tribe of you.”

  “What was that?”

  “Jody’s fawn and the new honey.”

  “Did he git to the fawn, Pa? Oh Pa, the fawn ain’t hurt?”

  “He never got to him. The door by luck was closed. Then he must of winded the honey and come traipsin’ around by the stoop. I figgered it was you-all comin’ back and I didn’t pay no mind until he knocked the cover offen the honey. I could of shot him down right at the door, but here I was and no gun. All me and Ory could do was holler, but I reckon it was the fiercest hollerin’ he’d ever run into, and he lit out.”

  Jody was weak at thought of what might have happened to the fawn. He ran to the shed to comfort it, and found it drowsy and unconcerned. He stroked it gratefully, then returned to the men and the bear. It was a two-year-old male, in good condition. Penny insisted on helping with the dressing. They dragged the carcass to the back yard and skinned it out by the light of the fire-pan; quartered it and hung the meat in the smoke-house.

  Buck said, “Now I will beg a pail o’ the fat for Ma, to make her some bear grease and cracklin’s. There’s things she jest won’t fry without bear grease, and the old soul says bear cracklin’s and sweet pertaters rests so easy on her gums. Why, them four teeth o’ hers could chomp on ’em all day.”

  Ma Baxter developed generosity with the plenitude.

  She said, “And a big piece o’ the liver goes to pore leetle Fodder-wing. Hit’ll give him strength.”

  Penny said, “I’m only sad this ain’t old Slewfoot. My, wouldn’t I love to draw the knife down his thievin’ backbone.”

  The foxes could wait to be skinned until morning, for the meat would be used only to
cook for the chickens, with pepper, for a tonic.

  Buck said, “Did old man Easy Ozell ever ask you to come eat one o’ his fox pilaus?”

  Penny said, “He done so. And I said, ’No, thank you, Easy, I’ll jest wait until you cook one o’ your dogs.’”

  Penny was thriving on the excitement. He sat on his heels beside Buck and exchanged tales of foxes and of dogs, of strange foods and the stranger people who ate them. The yarns for once failed to hold Jody’s interest. He was anxious for every one to go to bed. At last Penny’s new-found energy failed him, and he washed his hands and cleaned his skinning knife and joined his wife in the bed. Buck was wound up to talk half the night. Jody knew the signs and pretended to go to sleep on his pallet on the floor of his small room. Buck had been occupying his bed, his long hairy legs hanging unsupported a quarter of its length. Buck sat on the edge of the bed and talked until the lack of audience discouraged him. Jody heard him yawn and pull off his trousers and lie down on the corn shucks mattress on the creaking slats.

  He waited until a deep rumbling snore sounded. Then he slipped from the house and groped his way to the shed. The fawn stood up at the sound. He felt his way to it and threw his arms around its neck. It nuzzled his cheek. He picked it up and carried it to the door. It had grown so fast in the brief time he had had it, that it was all he could do to carry it. He tiptoed into the yard with it and set it down. It followed him willingly. He crept into the house, keeping one hand on its smooth hard head to guide it. Its sharp heels clicked on the wooden floor. He lifted it again and stepped cautiously past his mother’s bedroom and into his own.

  He lay down on his pallet and drew the fawn down beside him. He often lay so with it in the shed, or under the live oaks in the heat of the day. He lay with his head against its side. Its ribs lifted and fell with its breathing. It rested its chin on his hand. It had a few short hairs there that prickled him. He had been cudgeling his wits for an excuse to bring the fawn inside at night to sleep with him, and now he had one that could not be disputed. He would smuggle it in and out as long as possible, in the name of peace. On the inevitable day when he should be discovered, what better reason was there than the menace—the constant danger, he would point out—of bears?

  Chapter XVII

  THERE was not a field of sweet potatoes, but an endless sea. Jody looked behind him at the rows he had finished hoeing. They were beginning to make a respectable showing, but the rows unfinished seemed to stretch to the horizon. The July heat simmered on the earth. The sand was scalding to his bare feet. The leaves of the sweet potato vines curled upward, as though the dry soil, and not the sun, were burning them. He pushed back his palmetto hat and wiped his face with his sleeve. By the sun, it must be nearly ten o’clock. His father had said that if the sweet potatoes were hoed by noon, he might go in the afternoon to see Fodder-wing, and get a name for the fawn.

  The fawn lay in the hedge-row in the shade of an elderberry bush. It had been almost a nuisance when he began his work. It had galloped up and down the sweet potato beds, trampling the vines, and knocking down the edges of the beds. It had come and stood in front of him in the direct path of his hoeing, refusing to move, to force him to play with it. The wide-eyed, wondering expression of its first weeks with him had given way to an alert awareness. It had as wise a look as old Julia. Jody had almost decided that he would have to lead it back and shut it up in the shed, when of its own accord it sought the shade and lay down.

  It lay watching him from the corner of one big eye, its head in its favorite position, twisted back against its own shoulder. Its small white tail flicked now and then and its spotted hide rippled, shaking off flies. If it would stay quiet, he could make better time at the hoeing. He liked to work with it near. It gave him a comfortable feeling that he had never had before in the company of a hoe. He attacked the weeds again lustily, and was pleased with himself to see his own progress. The rows fell away behind him. He whistled tunelessly.

  He had thought of many names for the fawn, had called it by each in turn, but not one pleased him. All the names by which the dogs of his acquaintance had been called, Joe and Grab, Rover and Rob, on down the line, all were inadequate. It had such a light way of walking, “tippy-toed” as Penny put it, that he would have named it Twinkle-toes and called it “Twink” for short, but that reminded him of Twink Weatherby and spoiled the name. “Tip” itself would not do, because Penny had once had an ugly and vicious bull-dog by the name. Fodder-wing would not fail him. He had a great gift for naming his own pets. He had Racket the raccoon, Push the ’possum, Squeak the squirrel, and Preacher, the lame red-bird, who sang from his perch, “Preacher, preacher, preacher!” Fodder-wing said the other red-birds came to him from the forest to be married, but Jody had heard other red-birds sing the same words. At any rate, it was a good name.

  He had done a great deal of work in the two weeks since Buck had gone home. Penny’s strength was returning, but every now and then he became faint and dizzy and his heart pounded. Penny was sure it was the lingering effect of the rattlesnake venom, but Ma Baxter believed it was the fever, and dosed him with lemon-leaf tea. It was good to have him up and about again, with the cold fear gone. Jody tried to remember to spare him. It was so good to have the fawn, to be relieved of the dull lonely ache that had overtaken him so often, that he was filled with gratitude for his mother’s tolerance of its presence. There was no question but that it did require a great deal of milk. It undoubtedly got in her way. It came into the house one day and discovered a pan of cornbread stirred up, ready for baking. It had cleaned the pan. Since then it had eaten—green leaves, cornmeal mixed with water, bits of biscuit, almost anything. It had to be shut in the shed when the Baxters ate. It butted and bleated and knocked dishes out of their hands. When Jody and Penny laughed at it, it tossed its head knowingly. The dogs at first had baited it, but they were now tolerant. Ma Baxter was tolerant, but she was never amused. Jody pointed out its charms.

  Jody Finds the Fawn (p. 157)

  “Ain’t his eyes purty, Ma?”

  “They see a pan o’ cornbread too fur.”

  “Well, ain’t he got a cute, foolish tail, Ma?”

  “All deer’s flags looks the same.”

  “But Ma, ain’t it cute and foolish?”

  “Hit’s foolish, a’right.”

  The sun crept toward its zenith. The fawn came into the sweet potatoes and nibbled a few tender vines, then returned to the hedge-row and found a new place of shade under a wild cherry tree. Jody checked his work. He had a row and a half yet undone. He would have liked to go to the house for a drink of water, but that would cut down his remaining time too sharply. Perhaps dinner would be late. He pulled the hoe as fast as he dared without cutting the vines. When the sun stood over-head, he had finished the half-row, and the full row stretched mockingly before him. In a moment now his mother would beat on the iron ring by the kitchen door and he would have to stop. Penny had made it plain that there would be no quarter as to time. If the hoeing was not finished by dinner time, there would be no visit to Fodder-wing. He heard steps on the other side of the fence. Penny was standing there, watching him.

  “A heap o’ ’taters, ain’t it, son?”

  “Hit’s a mort of ’em.”

  “Hard to think, this time next year, there’ll not be one left. That baby o’ yours there, under the cherry tree, he’ll be wantin’ his share of ’em. Remember the time we had, two year gone, keepin’ the deer out?”

  “Pa, I cain’t make it. I ain’t scarcely stopped all mornin’, and I’ve yet got a row.”

  “Well now, I tell you. I ain’t fixin’ to let you off, for I said I’d not. But I’ll strike a bargain. You go fetch fresh water for your Ma from the sink-hole, and I’ll finish the ’taters this evenin’. Climbin’ the walls o’ that sink-hole purely beats me. Now that’s a fair deal.”

  Jody dropped the hoe and started on a run for the house to get the water-buckets.

  Penny called after him, “
Don’t try to tote ’em plumb full. A yearling ain’t got a buck’s strength.”

  The buckets alone were heavy. They were of hand-hewn cypress, and the ox-yoke from which they hung was of white oak. Jody hung the yoke over his shoulders and trotted down the road. The fawn loped after him. The sink-hole was dark and still. There was more sunlight in the early morning and at evening, than at noon, for the thick leaves of the trees cut off the overhead sun. The birds were still. Around the sandy rim of the sink-hole they were nooning and dusting themselves. In late afternoon they would fly down for water. The doves would come, and the jorees, the red-birds and the beemartins, the mocking-birds and the quail. He could not be too hurried to run down the steep slope to the bottom of the great green bowl. The fawn followed and they splashed together across the pool. The fawn bent its head to drink. He had dreamed of this.

  He said to it, “Some day I’ll build me a house here. And I’ll git you a doe, and we’ll all live here by the pool.”

  A frog leaped and the fawn backed away. Jody laughed at it and ran up the slope to the drinking trough. He leaned over it to drink. The fawn, following, drank with him, sucking up the water and moving its mouth up and down the length of the trough. At one moment its head was against Jody’s cheek and he sucked in the water with the same sound as the fawn, for the sake of companionship. He lifted his head and shook it and wiped his mouth. The fawn lifted its head, too, and the water dropped from its muzzle.

  Jody filled the buckets with the gourd dipper that hung on the rim of the trough. Against his father’s warning, he filled them nearly full. He would like to walk into the yard with them. He crouched and bent his shoulders under the yoke. When he straightened, he could not rise against the weight. He dipped out part of the water and was able to stand and pull his way up the remainder of the slope. The wooden yoke cut into his thin shoulders. His back ached. Halfway home, he was obliged to stop and set down the buckets and pour out more of the water. The fawn dipped its nose inquisitively into one of the buckets. Fortunately, his mother need not know. She could not understand how clean the fawn was, and would not admit how sweet it smelled.