Burning Ground

by D. A. Galloway

  Owning a car meant he was not limited to jobs previously accessible only by riding his trusty Schwinn Fleet bicycle. It opened the door for seasonal and summer jobs as a stock boy, a mechanic’s assistant, and a warehouse worker. While these jobs enabled Graham to earn more money, most of his working time was spent inside (a grocery, a garage, or a factory). And he longed to be outdoors whenever possible.

  He would be a junior at Penn State this fall, and he had chosen forestry as his major. His high school guidance counselor had provided particularly good advice on potential careers based on two factors. First was his love of the outdoors. This made outdoor professions such as forestry or park management obvious choices.

  There was also a second consideration related to his physical condition. Graham was afflicted with the mumps virus when he was six years old. In addition to being achy and tired, his jaw had become swollen and tender, and his cheeks puffed out so much he looked like a chipmunk chewing acorns. After the symptoms of the virus dissipated, Graham’s parents had indications something wasn’t quite right with the young boy. The Davidson family doctor ordered an audiology exam, which confirmed the physician’s preliminary diagnosis. In his early years, Graham had endured measles and rubella with no lingering side effects. But the mumps virus destroyed half his hearing. He had become profoundly deaf in his left ear.

  The guidance counselor strongly advised the tall teenager to avoid any profession in which he might be exposed for extended periods of time to loud noise for fear of losing hearing in his “normal” ear. Forestry was an obvious and serendipitous field of study.

  Graham considered his hearing loss a private matter. Outside his family, very few people knew about his handicap, and he wanted it to remain that way. Graham did not want to be treated differently. He went to great lengths to obscure his hearing disability by carefully positioning himself in social settings, so his “good ear” was directed toward conversations and any exposure to his “deaf ear” was limited. He taught himself lip-reading, which he would often use to fill in spoken words he could not understand.

  There were awkward occasions when he would not hear someone who approached him on his left. But he brushed these situations off and made self-effacing comments about being distracted any time he was unresponsive to someone who addressed him. Graham was determined not to use this minor handicap as a limitation on his activities. Ironically, like many twenty-year-old young men, he had no idea where he was headed. For someone who took pride in his ability to read a compass with great precision, this former Boy Scout had no direction.

  “I’ve gotta go check on the other crews,” Floyd said, as he leaned the wooden pole against the outside of a tree and took a handkerchief from his back pocket to wipe his brow. “You fellas keep workin’ on these two rows. I’ll be back around noon with the truck to take you back to the barn.”

  Graham watched as the farm manager hobbled up the hill toward the tractor, tilting side to side as he walked to compensate for one leg’s being shorter. Floyd unhooked the wagon, and smoke bellowed from the tractor’s vertical exhaust as it came to life. The tractor disappeared over the crest of the hill.

  Redfield and Miguel maintained their methodical thinning rhythm using the poles, and Graham tried to keep pace. After a while, Miguel started singing while he moved around the trees, whacking his wooden pole against the tree branches in what Graham thought was the same beat of the song that poured from his throat:

  De colores, de colores se visten los campos en la primavera

  De colores, de colores son los pajarillos que vienen de afuera

  De colores, de colores es el arco iris que vemos lucir

  Y por eso los grandes amores de muchos colores me gustan a mi

  Y por eso los grandes amores de muchos colores me gustan a mi

  “That’s beautiful,” Graham commented to Redfield, after listening to Miguel for about ten minutes. “I don’t know much Spanish. Do you know what the song is about?”

  “He’s singing an old Mexican folk song,” Redfield replied. “It’s about springtime and how wonderful it is to see all the beautiful colors during that season.”

  “You know Spanish?” Graham asked.

  “Mostly. I learned it by living and working with these people.”

  Graham wondered whom Redfield was referring to as “these people,” but he didn’t ask. He listened to Miguel’s repetitive rendition of the folk song as the three men worked their way gradually up the hill. Miguel eventually switched to different songs, and although Graham did not understand the words, he appreciated the tunes coming from his coworker’s lips. The songs that swirled among the peach trees in the warm breeze seemed to lighten their work. It made time pass more quickly.

  When the sun approached its apex in a few hours, the men spotted Floyd, who had parked the pickup truck at the end of the row under a stand of black locust trees. He waved his arm out the window and motioned for them to climb into the bed of the truck. Soon they were back at the main barn for their lunch break.

  Small work crews and laborers began showing up at the central gathering place. Graham recognized Leonard, a tall, lanky, Black man with a goatee, driving a one-ton commercial truck up to the barn. Leonard was Floyd’s second-in-command on the farm and one of the few men who worked throughout the year at Big Hill, unlike the others working today, who were hired only for seasonal work. Wooden sideboards mounted on both sides of the truck bed creaked and strained as a half-dozen men held onto the slats while the dusty vehicle came to a halt in the gravel parking area. The men chattered in Spanish as they filed to the tailgate, jumped down in rapid succession, and headed toward the barn.

  Several tractors with mower decks attached to their power takeoff units rumbled up to the long, white shed adjacent to the barn, kicking up dust as they rolled to a stop. Marcus and Curly stepped down from their mower rigs and walked up the small rise toward the barn. Graham noted the three Black men who were year-round workers (Leonard, Marcus, and Curly) were the only ones he observed who drove a vehicle. Redfield was a full-time employee of Big Hill Farm, but for some reason he had not been entrusted with operating a truck or tractor on the road - he would drive these vehicles only in the orchard rows or hay fields.

  Graham followed the others into the massive barn, where numerous picnic tables with attached seating were arranged in two groups in the center of the wooden floor. Miguel had joined the Spanish-speaking group at three tables placed end to end. Leonard, Marcus, and Curly sat down at the other set of tables, where five other Black men were eating sandwiches.

  Redfield looked at Graham and nodded toward an empty cable spool toward the back of the barn. Someone had repurposed the massive spool by turning the heavy wooden object on its side to make a small, round table. Two folding metal chairs were sitting around the perimeter. After retrieving their lunches and two Coca-Colas from the old Frigidaire by the main work bench, Graham and Redfield sat down at the spool table.

  Graham had witnessed this lunchtime routine every day. It seemed as if the sequence had been choreographed. Everyone had assigned seats, and he knew the unspoken rules - or quickly learned them. Graham recalled how he sat at one of the picnic tables with Miguel on his first day at Big Hill. The table group that had been animated and talkative suddenly became silent. Redfield had rescued Graham by walking over, gently placing a hand on the young man’s shoulder, and asking quietly, “Why don’t you come join me over here?” Graham quickly got the message and joined his new friend at the wooden spool table. This was his assigned seat.

  Redfield didn’t talk much. He was soft spoken with a deep voice that was authoritative yet reassuring. Graham wanted to know more about this solitary man who had features distinctive to many Native Americans. As Redfield took a bite of his sandwich, Graham tried to initiate a conversation by asking a question that had been bothering him for several weeks.

  “Why am I not allowed to sit with the Mexicans at lunch?” Graham blurted out, not really knowing the best wa
y to ask the question. “Sometimes we work together in the orchard.”

  Redfield took a swallow of Coke. “You mean Hispanics,” he said, correcting Graham.

  “They’re not Mexicans?”

  “Most are from Mexico. A few are Puerto Rican. One guy is from Cuba.”

  “Oh,” Graham said, a bit embarrassed. He paused before asking, “Is there any reason I can’t sit with Leonard?”

  “You can sit wherever you like,” Redfield said, shrugging his shoulders. “Just realize the other guys are not comfortable with you at their table. This is their free time. They have thirty minutes for lunch. Let them talk with people they know.”

  Graham thought about this for a minute. Redfield’s message was clear. We should let each person associate with people who were most like them. By choice, Chicanos and Hispanics were segregated from Blacks. The groups seemed to tolerate each other; however, their only connection was farm work. Since Redfield appeared to have an Indian heritage, he would not be welcomed by either group.

  There was an uneasy relationship between Whites and Blacks, especially after the seminal events surrounding the civil rights movement of the sixties. He witnessed this latent racial bias first-hand when the manager of a small local grocery where he worked several summers ago told him, “If anyone suspicious looking comes in, I need you to keep an eye on them as they walk through each aisle and make sure they’re not stuffing things in their pockets.” When Graham asked for help in identifying who might be considered a suspicious patron, the manager looked at him incredulously and said, “You know. Any Spics or Niggers.”

  Graham decided to turn the focus of their conversation toward learning more about the background of the middle-aged man sharing the round table with him. “Did you grow up around here?” he asked, hoping to get Redfield to say more than a sentence or two.

  “Nope. I was born in Montana. Somehow my path led me east. Been here with Mr. Floyd almost fifteen years now.”

  “Montana?” asked Graham. “Any place I’ve heard about?”

  “Not likely. I was born on the Crow Reservation. It’s about an hour from Billings.” Redfield reached into a paper bag, pulled out an apple, and walked over to the small sink near the Frigidaire to wash it.

  Graham took a few more bites from his ham-and-cheese sandwich while studying Redfield’s features. He had high cheekbones and brown, almond-shaped eyes. His straight black hair was shoulder length and gathered into two braids. Graham noted Redfield had a few stray facial hairs on his unshaven chin. He was six feet tall with a slim athletic build, although he had a small round belly that pushed against a tight-fitting Western-style shirt. Perhaps the most surprising physical attribute was Redfield’s feet. Judging from the well-worn boots that emerged from the legs of his blue jeans, Graham thought they were at least size twelve. Graham knew what big feet looked like. He wore size fourteen.

  He was pleased Redfield confided in him about his Crow heritage. At the same time, he felt unsure about what to say next. He knew absolutely nothing about the Crow people. The same thing could be said about his knowledge of almost all Native American tribes. He realized his understanding of native people could be summarized in a few pages of his American history book. The textbook portrayed Plains Indians as savage enemies who were defeated by the US Army so European immigrants could settle the American West.

  When Redfield returned to the spool table with his apple already half-eaten, Graham continued their conversation. “I’d really like to learn more about the Crow people,” he said earnestly.

  When Redfield didn’t answer immediately, Graham was concerned he may have crossed a line with this statement—although he could not imagine why Redfield would have been offended.

  After finishing his apple, Redfield pulled a small, empty mint tin from his front shirt pocket and carefully removed a thin square of paper. A tobacco pouch appeared from his other shirt pocket. He pulled out a pinch of loose tobacco, placed it in a folded paper crease, and deftly rolled the paper into a small tight tube. As Graham watched this miniature tobacco art form being shaped, he noticed the end of Redfield’s middle finger of his left hand had been amputated.

  Then he did something that astounded Graham. It happened so quickly Graham thought his eyes may have deceived him. Redfield folded his tongue into multiple bends before licking the edge of the rolling paper to seal it.

  Graham gasped. “What did you do with your tongue?”

  “What do you mean?” Redfield asked, as he finished making the cigarette by twisting both ends.

  “Did you create a cloverleaf with your tongue?”

  “You mean this?” Redfield opened his mouth and recreated the distinctive shape of a clover.

  Excitedly, Graham opened his mouth and duplicated the tongue-folding feat, making his own series of four bends to form a cloverleaf.

  Redfield slowly leaned back in his chair and pulled a matchbook out of his jeans pocket. He lit the rolled cigarette and brought it to his lips and inhaled, drawing the nicotine into his lungs. Thick, white smoke rushed from his mouth as he said, “Well, how about that? I’ve never met anyone else who could fold their tongue that way.”

  “Me, neither!” Graham said so loudly the table of Spanish speakers stopped their conversation and looked over his way. Graham lowered his voice when he realized he had drawn the attention of the others in the barn. He waited until the others resumed their conversations to speak again, this time in a lower voice.

  “I just can’t believe this. What a coincidence!”

  Graham rarely told anyone about his weird talent, if that’s what it’s called. Many people can curl their tongues into a single fold. But one day when Graham was a young boy, he was moving his tongue around while looking into a mirror when he realized he could curl his tongue with four folds. When he showed other kids the cool trick, they made fun of him. They considered him a bit of a freak. He was different already because he could hear from only one ear. The last thing he wanted was another physical anomaly that invited his classmates to invent cruel nicknames. He could still hear them taunting, “That’s the kid with good luck in his mouth and bad luck in his ear! The lucky deaf boy!”

  There was another minute of silence before Redfield responded. Graham was beginning to understand and appreciate Redfield’s communication style. He was clearly a man who pondered his words carefully before speaking.

  “Gra’am,” Redfield said softly, as he leaned across the table. “Let’s keep the tongue trick our little secret. Okay?”

  Graham was somewhat startled. Was Redfield also embarrassed by his tongue-rolling prowess? Nevertheless, the young man was thrilled with Redfield’s response. It was the first time Graham heard Redfield say aloud his first name, which he had pronounced with one syllable. Graham’s name had been abbreviated to Gra’am—the way madam is sometimes shortened to ma’am. He deciphered Redfield’s phonetics as a sign of friendship and respect.

  Graham was also pleased with Redfield’s suggestion to keep confidential their quirky physical trait. Graham thought about the irony. They had widely divergent backgrounds and incongruous native languages, yet they had a mutual ability to contort their tongues in a way very few people could. This shared competency, however trivial, created an initial bond between the introspective middle-aged Crow and the young Caucasian. Graham did not realize it at the time, but their nascent relationship would continue to strengthen and intensify during the next year.

  “Sure,” Graham agreed, as he returned Redfield’s gaze. “It’s our secret.”

  Chapter 3

  1965

  Everyone found his or her own way to deal with the tragic death of little Susan. Instead of supporting one another in this time of shared grief, each discovered their own unique coping mechanism.

  Helen redoubled her efforts to save the world by volunteering for charitable organizations with an emphasis on those who served underprivileged children. Ironically, she seemed to have less time for her family because she was spe
nding so much time in soup kitchens, clothing pantries, and a local orphanage. The Davidson boys and Leroy were left to make their own meals most weeknights. This didn’t seem to bother Leroy or Frank, as they preferred their mutually exclusive solitary activities. Dinner was just another occasion that required everyone to be somewhat sociable. And being sociable meant the potential for talking about personal matters both father and son deemed better left private.

  Frank spent most of his free time working on his car. When he wasn’t disappearing under the raised hood or chassis of the Fury, he would pack a peanut butter sandwich, fill a thermos with coffee, and leave early in the morning to go hunting. Another favorite pastime was target shooting. He would hike to the railroad tracks, set up targets, and fire live rounds into the hillside from his .30-06 Springfield bolt-action rifle from varying distances. People knew Frank was sighting in his rifle when they heard a series of loud reports from the weapon echoing in the hollow. Sometimes he would invite Graham to come along with him to shoot targets. He knew his younger brother needed to minimize exposure to loud sounds, so he would bring along some handloaded 135-grain cartridges, which were lighter than the standard factory ammunition. When fired, these bullets caused less recoil and resulted in less noise.

  Leroy replaced the Country Squire station wagon with a sedan, explaining to Helen he didn’t want to own any vehicle with a designed death trap like cargo-area seating. He poured himself into crafting furniture, with a specialty in making cane rocking chairs, and soon had a thriving side business that required him to spend many long evenings in the workshop to satisfy the backlog of orders. When he wasn’t operating the lathe and assembling rockers on weeknights, he was delivering the chairs to customers on weekends.

  Graham became depressed. For months he would lie awake at night going through the scenario of that fateful day in Lancaster County when Susan lost her life. He had a lot of “what if?” questions with no answers. What if he had let his younger sister sit in the back seat instead of negotiating for her to move to the jump seats? What if his father had purchased a car without this option? What if they had taken a different route? What if . . . ?