by Bette Greene
I tried changing the subject. “Know what today is?” She didn’t answer, only stared at me through shaded eyes. “Today is relay race day,” I said. “The Sunday of the Old Rugged Cross Church picnic! And if we all ain’t out on that highway by eight o‘clock, that bus going to go tooting on off without us.”
“You and the rest of the family go on ahead,” she said, falling back against her pillow. “Don’t reckon I feel like no picnic today.”
“You didn’t have no bad dream,” I admitted, bringing forth the flashlight. “This was the sun,” I said, clicking on the flashlight, “that you couldn’t get away from.”
“You!” she said, looking first at me and then at the light beam.
“Well, you sure wasn’t waking by yourself! The bus ain’t a-gonna wait. And if I had given you just one hit across your bottom, then you’d of been so mad that you wouldn’t have let me borrow your huaraches.”
After moments of squinting at me in anger, she reached under her bed, pulled out her made-in-Mexico sandals, and dropped them at my feet, saying, “Don’t you ever do that again! Heah?”
I gave little bobs of my head while examining the floor-boards. Anne must have understood that my nods were really an apology because she picked up her towel and went off to wash without another word.
At exactly thirty minutes before the hour of eight, her most royal and fancy highness, Miss Anne Lambert, took a long look into the mirror before announcing, “I’m ready to go a-picnicking.” Mama picked up the blanket which a little later on was going to be ate off of, rested on, and probably even snoozed upon. Pa carried a shopping bag full of fried turkey and egg-salad (but not chicken egg) sandwiches, cornbread, popcorn, and oranges.
Luther, wearing his battered blue baseball cap and his catcher’s mitt, was the first of the Lambert six out the door, followed by Ma, Pa, and Anne beneath a flowery bonnet. While I proudly wore my new bought-at-Logan’s and just-embroidered Pretty Penny T-shirt and carried Baby Benjamin, who wasn’t wearing nothing more (or less) than a pair of diapers.
The walk down the dusty road to the highway is, according to my pa’s calculations, a five-minute walk in January and a fifteen-minute walk in August. Well, this August morning we must have made the walk in January time, ‘cause nobody was taking any chances on missing that bus.
Already waiting at the gravelly highway’s edge was enough people for a small picnic. First of all there was Philip Hall and his folks, Mr. and Mrs. Moses Hall, and his big brothers, Jeb, Leon, and Eugene, with their wives and chilluns.
Just as soon as I asked Philip if the Tiger Hunters were ready for racing, Baby Benjamin burped up some sour-smelling milk against the shoulder of my Pretty Penny T-shirt.
“When you going to be old enough to stop that?” I asked, while applying my hand and some fresh spit to the shoulder smell. He’s almost six months old now and outside of eating and being carried around by me, there ain’t nothing he seems to enjoy so much as a good burp.
I looked down the road to see the lipstick-red bus which belonged to the Old Rugged Cross Church coming down the road as though it had to make time. Even before the old thing came to a complete stop, every window had a head, or sometimes two, popping out and calling “Howdy!” As soon as the door opened, the Reverend Ross jumped off to welcome everybody on board. Wearing a short-sleeve sport shirt with printed-on palm trees, instead of his usual preacher’s collar, made him look for all the world like an ordinary man. He shook hands with everybody who boarded, saying, “Climb on board, Brother. Climb on board, Sister, and climb on board, little children.”
The Pretty Pennies, who were all wearing brand-new and just-embroidered T-shirts, whistled and waved me to the-back, the very back, where they had “captured” the only seat that ran the width of the bus.
Two rows in front of us Philip slid into a seat saved for him by the Tiger Hunters. Gordon poked Philip with his elbow and said, “Tell those Not-so-Pretty Pennies how we’re going to beat them in the relay races. Beat them to Kingdom Come!”
At that, Bonnie Blake gave me a poke to my ribs, saying, “And you tell them Kitty Catchers that they couldn’t beat an egg, not even iffen their breakfast depended upon it.”
“Oh, yeah?” said Gordon.
“Oh, yeah!” answered Bonnie.
I didn’t take no special notice of Bonnie and Gordon’s argument until I heard Philip Hall say, “Don’t let that silly girl get your goat. Don’t you know there ain’t no girl alive can run as fast as no boy? And that’s the Lord’s truth!”
Suddenly I was out of my seat, pointing an angry finger at him. “You take that back!”
“Will not!”
“Last chance,” I warned.
His lower lip pushed forward. “Ain’t taking nothing you is offering,” said Philip Hall. “Not even your last chances.”
“Bet you our Pretty Penny shirts that we’ll win.”
“OK,” he said, smiling as though he was putting something over on us. “We’ll bet you your shirts.”
“But you can only get our shirts if the Tiger Hunters win,” I said. “But iffen the Pretty Pennies win then the Tiger Hunters will have to become our personal slaves for a whole week.”
“Deal!” cried Philip, putting his hand out in a war shake that would make our bet as real and as true as if it had been signed in blood in front of a hundred judges.
“Jesus is a-listening,” sang out the lone voice of the Reverend Ross before the passengers joined with him on the second line, “Don’t make a sound... Oh, Jesus is a-listening ... Don’t make a sound.”
And everybody was happy and singing away. The only exception (if I was of a mind to notice) was them Tiger Hunters, who were too busy messing around to do much singing. Philip was hanging onto an iron luggage rack high over the seat.
I warned him. “Better get down from there before somebody mistakes you for a chimpanzee and ships you off to the Little Rock Zoo.”
He let go of one hand to strike himself across the chest. “I’m the Great Phil, King of the Mountain.”
Past Imboden the land grew beautiful with watermelon-shaped lakes and popcorn clouds. The smell was of pine and mountain laurel and I couldn’t see no place that wouldn’t make a fine place for a picnic. At the sign, HARDY, ARK.—POP. 692, the bus slowed and some clapping broke out.
The picnic grounds at Hardy was a soft green valley between two mountains with a narrow but fast-moving river running through. The Tiger Hunters raced to the edge, pulling off shoes, throwing off shirts to touch the tippy- most points of their toes to the water with all the courage of a turkey in a thunderstorm.
“Careful,” I called to Philip, while walking right into the water. “You might get your little toesies wet.”
The look he threw me was anything but friendly. “I’m King Phil, King of that mountain,” he said, pointing to its peak. “And if I’ve a mind to, I’ll push you off.”
“You’re no more King of the Mountain than you are Man in the Moon.”
Then Philip reached to the bank to pick up one of my borrowed huaraches. “Whose pretty sandal is this?” he asked as though he didn’t want nothing more in this world but to find the owner so as to return it. Polite like.
“It is mine so would you kindly put it right back where you got it.”
He held out the shoe toward me as he stepped closer. “Oh,” he said sweetly, “I didn’t know it belonged to you, little Beth.”
“Well, it does,” I said, reaching out to take it.
Suddenly he whirled the tan shoe across the river, shouting, “Catch, Gordy. Catch!”
I cried out as Anne’s prize headed toward open water. My eyes closed; it was too painful to watch. But a moment later I opened them to a miracle. Gordon had actually saved Anne’s huarache from a drowning.
Gordon was smiling like he had found a really new game. “Here,” he said, holding out the shoe temptingly. “Take it if you want it.”
It didn’t take one bit of smartness to know what tha
t low-down polecat was up to. Only one step toward him and he’d have that shoe flying off toward Philip, Bobby, Jordan or Joshua.
I had to make him listen. “Gordon, don’t throw it! Please! That’s Anne’s shoe and water ain’t good for sandals that come all the way from Mexico.”
“Want this?” he asked, holding it almost within my reach. “Then come and get it.”
Thinks he can goad me into reaching for it so he could throw it Lord-knows-where. What if I made a really quick lunge? Reckon I could get ... No, reckon not! My only chance is in talking him out of the game. “If something happens to that huarache, my sister wouldn’t ever talk to me again. Please. Oh, please don’t throw it!”
Again Gordon smiled as though he was on speaking terms with the devil himself as he repeated, “You want this? Then come and—”
Suddenly the huarache was jerked out of his hand by Philip Hall. “That shoe oughtna get wet. Didn’t you hear Beth explain it to you?”
Under a shade tree Mama had spread out the blanket and set the food on top. Every family had pretty much the same idea because the picnic area was abloom with colorful chenille bedspreads, white sheets, and patchwork quilts. After all the folks had about finished eating their home-brought food and drinking their soda water, the Reverend went around distributing ice-cream cups.
Bonnie and Gordon almost missed out on the ice cream because they were too much into their fussing over whether the Pretty Pennies or the Tiger Hunters were going to win the relay races. Too bad, because I for one had been hoping that everybody would forget all about that. If we just happened to lose and the Pennies had to give up their shirts—why, they’d never forgive me.
With a branch Gordon drew a line in the dirt. “We can start the race here and run it in five relays, down to the river and back.”
I always knew that Philip Hall was taller than all of us Pretty Pennies, but for the first time I noticed that Gordon was too. Taller with longer legs, and longer legs are faster. Always?
I told him, “You can’t go around making up racing rules. You ain’t the president of the Tiger Hunters, know that?”
Gordon must have believed in the wisdom of my words ‘cause he went off down toward the river to fetch Philip while I went to lie down on our blanket and think. I think too much as it is. If I ever get us Pennies out of this mess, I’m going to glue a stop light on the tip of my tongue. Least thataways I’ll have a red light telling me to stop my mouth before it goes roaring off into trouble.
I glanced around to see if anybody else felt miserable. But if they did they sure didn’t show it. My pa was reading Mr. Moses Hall the letter he received from Turkey World magazine.
Dear Mr. Lambert:
I apologize for taking all these months to respond to your letter, but I couldn’t decide from which species of animal came your turkey thief.
However, after much consideration and even further deliberation, I have now concluded that the thief could only come from the species Homo sapiens. Man!
Sincerely yours,
Thomas J. McCabe
(The Answer Man)
Gordon politely waited until Pa finished reading to complain to Mr. Hall how the Tiger Hunters can’t race without their president. “And he’s nowhere in sight.”
“You mean he ain’t with you either?” asked the dairy-man. “When he didn’t join up with the rest of us Halls for the eats, I just figgered he was munching on somebody else’s baloney.”
“No, sir,” answered Gordon. “I haven’t seen Phil since he was fooling around near the river.”
At that, Philip’s pa looked at my pa, and then they both jumped to their feet and took off toward the water. And so did I. Where was he? When I couldn’t find him there, I looked up to the sky. “Oh, please, God, let him be found safe and sound.” My eyes ran across the green pine mountains. “You can bring Philip back safe, God. You’re King of the Universe. King of the Mountains.” King of the Mountain? Where had I heard that before? From Philip Hall, that’s who!
With his clothes on, Mr. Hall was sloshing through the river calling forth his son’s name with every sloshy step. I called to him, “Mr. Hall! Hey, Mr. Hall!” For a moment he looked up at me, and the first thing that struck me was his forehead, which was as firmly wrinkled as a washboard. I told him about Philip’s talking about being the King of the Mountain, but Mr. Hall didn’t seem to pay any attention. I tried again, “We ought to be searching for Philip on that there mountain.”
Next I tried my own pa, who didn’t seem any more interested in what I was saying than Mr. Hall did. Now everybody was running down by the riverside frantically seeking somebody who wasn’t no more there than the Monster of the Mountain.
Luther was always one who listened to good common sense. I found him and Ginny trying to look deep down into the river’s bottom. When I told him how Philip had hung onto the bus’s luggage rack to proclaim himself King of the Mountain, Luther looked at me only long enough to look confused. He had already returned to his search when I called out, “I’m going up that mountain to bring Philip down.”
Past the picnic grounds there were acres of farmland that first had to be passed through. Over yonder a ways, a red tractor worked its way through the field. The base of the mountain didn’t look all that far away until I started walking toward it, and then, after I’d walked for quite a spell and then a good spell longer, I finally reached that point where the land begins its climb.
Once I started up the tree-on-tree mountain, the day dropped into shadow and the now pine-scented air suddenly changed from pretty warm to pretty cool. And just as quickly my confidence got traded in for something else. Something less than confident. How was I going to find one medium-sized boy among a jillion acres and a trillion pines?
Remembering the movies and what the Indians do, I put my ear to the ground and listened. I heard the earth’s heartbeat—or was it merely my own? I heard water rushing downstream and a nightingale’s sad song, but I didn’t hear nothing of no Philip Hall.
My knees, even more than my feet, grew tired. Never mind that. Had to go on. With every step I began to wish for a speedy train that could zip me up the mountain. And I even made a wish that I had never in my life laid eyes upon huaraches. My right heel was forming a blister, sure enough. A large damp leaf between the heel and the strap, though, helped out.
The coolness became cooler while the shadows became more shadowy. I called out “Philip!” and the sound of my own voice scattering the quietness scared me.
I sat down on the pine-needled ground to listen, rest, and decide whether to turn back or keep going. It was a hard decision to make. But figgering out what I did wrong was easier. Baby Benjamin could figger that one out as good as me. Imagine somebody dumb enough to go rushing off alone on some mountain looking for some boy who might not be there. King of the Mountain, my foot! He may be way downriver right now trying to teach minnows to swim through the narrow mouth of a Nehi bottle. Or snoozing away high up on the bus’s luggage rack. And who would ever think to look for him there?
After a while the shady coolness gets to a person. Wish I had my sweater from home. Wish I was home. I tried rubbing away the turkey-pimples (Pa always says: Why give the glory to the goose?), but it began to feel as though the only thing that I was rubbing away was my own skin. Enough of that. And enough of this mountain! I’m going back down!
As I stood brushing the pine needles from my shorts, I heard a sound—it might have been a cry. I listened hard but I didn’t hear it anymore. Just imagining? No! There it is! And it’s coming from up the mountain. It was a Philip Hall moan! “Philip,” I hollered up the mountain. “Phil-ip Hall, is that you?”
I began running up the mountain. The pine needles were a little slippery under the soles of my huaraches. “PHILIP!” Why didn’t he answer me? This time I cupped my hands around my mouth just the way Luther does when he’s calling his precious pigs. “Phil-ip, oh, Phil-ip! Can you hear me a-calling?”
This time I was luc
ky. A tear-soaked voice called back, “Beth! That Beth?”
“Sure enough is!” I yelled back just before coming to a granite boulder so wall-like that only God himself could have ever moved it. As I went around the immovable wall, I got my directions just a bit off. Nothing serious. Which way did I come from? And which way was I going? Here the mountain rose so gently that I couldn’t be sure it was rising at all.
“Where are you, Philip?”
A whimper of a voice called back, “Here.”
The pine trees grew closer and the light was dimmer.
“Where here?”
“Here here.”
Philip sounded as though he were behind me. But how could that be if I’m facing up mountain? Well, what if I’m not? I’d have to listen carefully. In all four directions, I sang out. “Philip, keep talking.”
“What do you want me to talk about?” he asked.
“Count backward from a hundred.”
“One hundred... ninety-nine... ninety-eight ...”
By the time Philip had reached ninety, I had found his direction. I’d walk a few steps and then stop and listen. “Seventy-nine ... seventy-eight ...” Reckon I must be getting closer ‘cause his voice is getting louder. Trees, underbrush, and ever shadier shade, though, ain’t helping none. “Fifty-two ... fifty ... forty-nine.”
And there he was sitting up against a tree, big as life. When I spoke his name, he lit up happier than he’d ever lit up before. But that lasted only a moment. The next moment he was turning his eyes and finally his head from me.
“Ain’t you pleased that I came up here looking for you?” Philip didn’t answer, just kept his head turned away from me. I didn’t know what to think unless he’s thinking that I came up here to be King of his Mountain. Well, that’s plumb ridiculous and I was just about to tell him so when I noticed his foot.
Swollen like I don’t know what and shades darker than it had any right to be. “Oh, Philip, you hurt yourself.”
He turned to face me. Even in this soft light his eyes looked red. “A branch tripped me. I fell against a rock... and it hurts too.”
