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Show i?AW.EeiWS F.I jf-JP i WOLFPEN f?l Jl Harlem Hatcher, ' " 1 CHAPTER XII Continued 15 "I'.ut to shoot a canVlnal It's sio-ful, sio-ful, Doug." "Not when tliey riddle my seeds." ': "Hut, Doug! You don't kill car- j dinals Just because . . ." She looked i at him. Words were useless unless i their meanings were already sensed i before they were spoken, and here they were not and could never be. "Do you want to let them eat -p my seeds I want tor next year?" he exclaimed. She turned the mare slowly bac'i Into the way she had come, moving down the hollow again toward the road. Doug followed along close behind her, confused and perplexed. ! 'I guess you'll be going away right ' soon now," he said at last. i "Yes. On Monday. Daddy Is rid- j Ing over with me." i "What's the use of your going off over there, Cynthia? You don't have j no need for that kind of book learn ing." j "Rut I do, too." "You're just going over there be- i cause of that surveyor, and you ! know It." "Why, I'm not, either; I've been I counting on going there all year and a right smart before any of those men came to the creek." "I saw you looking at him." "That doesn't make any difference differ-ence in It." "You swear M?" "I told you once when you were up to our bouse." "You swear It then?" "I don't feel any call to give account ac-count to you, Doug." It was sharper then he bad ever heard her speak. Instead of advancing his rising temper, tem-per, It halted It. "I calculate I ought to get about a thousand dollars for my 'seng. I'm going to dig It soon now." "That'll be nice and I'm right glad," she said. "I have to go back now. I just stopped to say good-by." "Cynthia. Don't go off over there. Let's . . . why can't we . . . let's us marry." Cynthia scringed, seeing birds tumbling through the still air Into death. "I'm getting things In good shape now and I been thinking about you while I was doing It. Will you?" "It's not time for me to think about that, Doug." "When you get bark, then?" "We can see about It then. It's Just not time yet and I hadn't thought to marry." "You won't feel too stuck up after aft-er you've been over there?" "Doug Mason, sometimes I get so mad at you I could die. You know better than that." "It's just that . . . you know . . . sometimes It's right lonesome and I get to thinking about you going off to people not just like us, and . . . Yon won't change your mind about going?" "Why, no, Doug. I've been planning plan-ning on this all year." She got easily Into the saddle. "Good-by, Doug." "Good-by, Cynthia." Cynthia booted the mare with her lieel and hurried from Snrah and Doug, the birds and the fallen trees, back to Wolfpen through the ruins of the visit she had planned. The final days were busy ones for Cynthia, but without visible evidence evi-dence of her Inward excitement at the thought of being away from home. Julia was always near her with kind words nnd suggestions j for the packing. Then three days before the time I for Cynthia to leave, Abral came tionie early from the camp looking pale and weak, but declaring he was all right. He ate little for supper, leaving the table before the others to lie In the cool on the porch. Sparrel went out to him. "What's the trouble with you, son?" "I guess I just got my stoninch riled a little at the camp. " "When did It begin to hurt?" '"It's felt funny for a day or so." Sparrel gave him some of his remedies rem-edies and after a while Abral went to bed. He lay there for two days very sick and refusing food. Then Julia, who had looked tired I for many weeks and had been up I Rnd down for two nights with Abral, fell sick In the third night and had to lie In her bed very pale and without with-out strength. On Monday at the hour set for half a year for Cynthia to ride away from Wolfpen. she sat by Julia and was startled to see how large her eyes wore under the pale skin of her forehead and how weak she had grown from her sickness. "You must go. dear, as we - planned. I'll be all right now," she paid In a low voice. "I've never ooen sick to amount to anything." But Cynthia sat by her bed, saying, say-ing, ''Abral's some better. I wouldn't go off today and you sick. A lew days won't make a sight of difference." differ-ence." Thinking: "I wonder how sick she is and why It came on so sudden right now. It must be the spread over the place of the sickness sick-ness In the trees or it wouldn't begin be-gin down there In Dry Creek and fasten on Abral and come on up here." She left Julia In a weak sleep, the long fingers of one hand lying delicately along the sheet. She found Jesse by the drying kiln spreading apples in the sun. "How is she?" Jesse asked, whispering whis-pering it. "Asleep now." "She didn't sleep any last night." "No. She looks pretty sick, Jesse." "Yes, she's kind of worn out. I reckon you're not going this morning." morn-ing." "I reckon not" "Sorry?" "Some, maybe, and because Mother Moth-er is sick." When do you aim to go-?" "In about two weeks now. I calculate cal-culate to get my share of the stuff in." She felt suddenly unhappy inside and depression squeezed at her spirit. spir-it. There were so many things she had wanted to talk about so she could carry them Into the day bright with the sunshine and Jesse's understanding. un-derstanding. And there was Reuben far away in some distant county, and the uncertainty un-certainty of Julia's sudden Illness, and confusion everywhere to be attacked, at-tacked, ordered and subdued. But she could not get it out between them at the kiln. "I'm sorry you can't go today, Cynthia. May be It won't be long. Don't you get sick." It was unexpected and clothed In a depth of genuine feeling which warmed the coldness she had felt creeping over her. She might even yet say the things In her heart. But he was going on now. She watched him away and then went back Into the yard. "There's a sight of things to do without thinking about yourself, your-self, Cynthia Pattern, and making out to yourself that you're wanting somebody to sympathize with you." It was in the second week of September that Julia Pattern died. She lay In the room which Sparrel had built for her when he brought her as a bride to Wolfpen. She lay on the sheets which she had made with her own hands by the fireplace as the children grew through the winters, on the bed where three generations" of Pattern women had lain before her. Sparrel was broken. He sat by Julia's side on the chair he had made for her when they were young. He spoke no word and no tear fell. The boys in stunned and complete silence wandered out between the house and the barn. Cynthia was deathstruck. For the first time she was seeing death invade in-vade her own family. She had never thought of her mother as a part of the mutabilities. She was as permanent per-manent and timeless as Wolfpen. There could be no Wolfpen, no Pattern Pat-tern household without Julia's gentle gen-tle words and silent competence In all things. Desolate, feeling so little and Impotent Im-potent before the assertion of such Invisible strength, she turned from the bed to the window and looked up to the Pinnacle gleaming golden In the sun. She was surprised that the world continued as though nothing noth-ing had happened, that the Pinnacle could take the sun and look over a bright land when her own heart was dark with grief and her world black with desolutlon. It was painful pain-ful to hear the chickens clucking In the yard, to observe the common activities of life, seething about the house quite uninterrupted by the heaviness of death In Its midst. There was Julia's garden, not to be thought of without Julia. The hollyhocks holly-hocks had had their proud days of color and now they were dry and brown: but they were bursting with seed. The larkspur had faded, the cosmos were falling to seed because there was no one to pinch them hack. The tomato vines were turning turn-ing brown and sprawling on the ground unable to bear the heavy red load. The beans were growing yellow and dry, the cabbage was bursting. It seemed to Cynthia, looking Into the familiar plot through eyes heavy with grief, that the garden and the still rooms of the house knew that Julia was dead. The news went np to the hollows, hol-lows, over the hills and down the creeks with mysterious speed. The P"ople came to Wolfpen; the old families on Gannon, the folk from the Big Sandy, The C.istle boys made and polished a casket for her at Sparrel's shop, using the knotted boards Sparrel had sawed l'ruiu a fragrant cedar. Amos Barnes came to conduct the funeral. There were so many people that the service was held under and around the tan-bark shed where there was room for every one. She looked very beautiful in the brown cloth dress she had woven with her own hands. They carried her slowly through the yard and up th- path to the Cranesnest Shelf, the people following. They laid her beside Grandmother Adah. Tivis's wife, just as the great shadow of the Pinnacle reached the stone by Saul's grave. They left her there In the silence and the peace. The people went away. The dark came again, the autumn dew dripped like rain in the orchard leaves, the fog settled in and shifted shift-ed eerily about erasing the stars. Cynthia, in collapse, on her bed : "I ought to feel. But I can't any more. I am not me. The weight pushes me down. I don't know how to think about it, and it hurts to feel." CHAPTER XIII IN THE weeks that followed, the spiritual disruption in this house seemed complete. No one spoke of Julia in words; each one suffered in private his own particular degree and quality of grief. They fell to the accumulated work, easing their sorrow in excess of toil. The plans Cynthia and Julia had made for the Institute now seemed as remote as though they belonged with other people. This was her place, where Julia had always been, directing the house for Sparrel. Gradually the deadness grew cus tomary as the days lengthened into a new routine. The work of the full harvest filled up and spilled over the days into both ends of the night. Cynthia did all the woman's wom-an's part with some aid from the boys. She and Jesse gathered the late beans from the garden. She pickled them in the brown earthen jars in the cellar, giving painstaking painstak-ing care to preserve the flavor which Julia developed in them. The sweet potatoes were carefully dug, put into open slatted crates and stacked In the cellar where they gave off a good earthen smell. The Irish potatoes were buried in the hole by the smoke-house. Sparrel and the boys made the sorghum thick and brown and full flavored. The stone jars were filled with apple ap-ple and pumpkin butter and tomato preserves, the great goose-necked and green-striped squash and burnished bur-nished copper-colored pumpkins were buried In the haymow. Jesse brought In the dark honey from the hives and filled the jars on the fruit shelf. Cynthia tried to cook meals like her mother for her. menfolk, and to order all things with as little change as possible. She looked after Shellenberger and spread his two sheets as a matter of course and custom. She even had a better liking lik-ing for him because of the way he spoke and left unspoken his shock and his sorrow at the death of Julia. "She was a Cine woman. I am very sorry." And so September gave way to October, and the poignant grief was, by repetition, a little older. There was even a melancholy beauty beau-ty In the days. The hills turned riotously from the long summer green into all the flamboyance of autumn, arranging In exotic pattern pat-tern around the hillsides the flame-and-golden-hued maple leaves, the soft yellow of the poplars, the dull rich scarlet of the white oaks, the deep brown of the black oaks, with a few vivid gum trees screaming among the dark green pines. Nothing Noth-ing was left untouched. Cynthia found herself in moments of complete abandon to the display around her, her heart gone out of her Into the prodigal splashing of color. Then she would have that sudden vague awareness of tears In the heart from which she had escaped es-caped for an Instant and to which she must return. They came with the first sight of the dark clouds gathering over the Pinnacle, presaging pre-saging the coming of the cold rains and the violation nnd the annihilation annihila-tion of all the glowing beauty which supported the hours. When the first sprinkles shattered the flaming maple near the smokehouse, smoke-house, she cried, "Oh, rain, leave the leaves alone! Give them one more day." But the rain did not hear the cry of one lonely girl deep In the Big Sandy hills. All night long she could hear the battering attack of each heavy bullet of rain tearing through the magic world of yesterday, and she knew that on the morrow the sun would disclose their wet and melancholy nakedness. naked-ness. The summer was gone. The death of Julia and the press of work had kept Jesse on at Wolfpen. Wolf-pen. Cynthia was not sorry. But the work was nearly done now, and she knew that he was restless to go, and was waiting only for the drovers to come. The news that they were riding up the creek was less exciting than formerly. In past years the drovers, with their talk of politics and the growth of Mount Sterling and Maysvllle, had been an Important link with the outside world. But this year Gannon Creek bad already seen a steam-engine, a sawmill, and a lumbering enterprise ; and Reuben Warren and Shellenberger Shellen-berger had been there. The drovers came up the creek from house to house performing the ceremony proscribed by custom. They w-ere dressed In their tight trousers, tall boots, broad hats, and with fed handkerchiefs around their necks. They went to the barnyard at each place and leaned over the rails, sizing up the cattle. Tliey walked in among them to slap the rumps of the steers and feel their hide. They told a story or two, sending their big laughs infectiously over ihe group of men gathered around, and giving a holiday spirit to the bargaining. Then they made their final offer, the sale was closed, and the drovers and the neighbor men moved on behind the growing herd to the next house. Where they were at meal-time, there they all ate, taking turns at the table under un-der the hospitable urgings of the womenfolk. And when evening came, the neighbors returned home and the drovers spent the ni.iht wherever they happened to be. At Wolfpen, where they always managed to stay the night, Sparrel gave them the use of a fenced meadow mea-dow for their cattle and stalls and feed for their saddle mules. But when they talked about buying his steers, Sparrel said: "I guess I won't be selling any this time." "Why not, Sparrel?" "I told Shellenberger I'd let him have all we could spare for his men this winter." Then Jesse said, "I want to sell mine to you fellers." Sparrel looked at his son In silent surprise, but offered no interference. interfer-ence. "We'll be glad to look at It, Jesse," they said. Cynthia watched them go to the barn-lot where Jesse had driven in his fat steer. She could see them out there looking and feeling and bargaining. Then, after a proper time, they drove it out of the pen and down to the meadow with their herd. Jesse came back to the house where Cynthia was. She knew from his look that he was content, and that it was the pleasure of a man in the quality of his product and in seeing others appreciate it, as well as satisfaction with the price it brought. "Did they like your steer?" "They seemed to. It was a good beef." "Did you get what you wanted for it?" "Yes. I got thirty-six dollars for it, and I bet that's more than Dad'lt get out of Shellenberger for his." "Why do you say that, Jesse?" "Well, he's been here all year nearly and nobody's seen any of his money yet for anything." Cynthia thought of the paper on which she had entered the record of his board. But she was more concerned over Jesse's leaving. "I reckon you'll be going soon now, Jesse?" "I aim to be there on Monday morning for the opening court." "That'll be might' nice. Have you told Daddy yet?" "No, not yet. I'll tell him tonight, to-night, maybe." "I don't think he'll mind, Jesse." She knew how It would proceed after supper. The menfolk sat by the fire while she cleared away the dishes. There was more silence than talk. Then Jasper spoke about the drovers and the cattle. Abral talked about the men at the camp and the plans for the spring rafts; he was going to float one. Sparrel said little, staring Into the fire and looking at his sons. And Jesse twisted his mouth, glanced at bis father, at the fire, at Cynthia, at Jasper, put his hands Into his pockets and took them out. "I guess the fall work's about done up now," Jesse said. "We've done right well with It," Sparrel said. "I reckon I'll go over to town now and read the law with Tandy Morgan." Mor-gan." It came with nothing but a higher pitch and a brittle utterance to betray the nervous constraint behind be-hind it. Sparrel said easily and very gently, gen-tly, "I allowed you had a mind to It. You'll need some money for that." He took from his pocket the long leather sack which he carried, car-ried, and held It out to Jesse. "If you're going to be a lawyer, be a good one, son. and be clean about it. The law can dirty a man." "It didn't dirty Blackstone or Lincoln Lin-coln any. I mean to be that kind. And I don't need the money," Jesse said, handing the purse back to Sparrel. "I got enough for the winter." win-ter." Cynthia knew the fervor of his voice and was moved. Sparrel had got up from his chair, and stood looking down at Jesse. With unaccustomed demonstration demon-stration he laid his hand on Jesse's shoulder and pushed away the leather leath-er sack. "Keep It, son. That's what I got It for. I'll Just ride over with you tomorrow and see you settled, by your leave." In the morning they rode down Wolfpen, Sparrel choosing the Flne-mare Flne-mare for the journey, and Jesse on his own mule with the small grip of clothes and the yellow Black-stone Black-stone firmly strapped to the saddle. (TO BE COXTIXUED) |