by Lois Lenski
“Why, them scrubby little ole woods cows don’t give enough milk to bother with milkin’ ’em,” laughed Mrs. Slater.
“Where we come from,” said Mrs. Boyer slowly, “we feed our cows.”
“Feed ’em!” Mrs. Slater laughed a shrill laugh. “With all the grass they is to eat? Where you folks come from anyway?”
“We come from Marion County last month,” said Mrs. Boyer. “We come there in a covered wagon from Caroliny ’bout ten year ago.”
Silence fell. Mrs. Slater’s girls stared, tongue-tied, at the new girl.
“What’s the matter with ’em, ma’am, they don’t talk?” Birdie asked their mother.
“Ain’t nothin’ the matter with ’em but meanness,” snapped Mrs. Slater.
Birdie took the little girls by the hand and led them out to the back porch. Here, her little brother, aged two, was playing in the water in the basin on the wash-shelf. A comb hung by a string from the porch post.
“What’s that?” asked Essie, pointing.
“What—this? Why, a comb!” exclaimed Birdie. “Lemme comb out your hair.”
“We ain’t got us a comb, but Ma uses a shucks brush sometimes,” said Zephy.
The two little girls sat down on the top step. Birdie began to comb out their short, straggly hair. Combed smooth, it looked soft and pretty, curling up at the ends. In the bright sunshine, it shone like warm, glistening silver. Birdie brought the washbasin and washed their thin, pale faces. Their features were fine, their eyes blue as cornflowers.
“What’s his name?” asked Essie, pointing to the little brother.
“Robert, but we call him Bunny,” said Birdie. “We all got us pet names. My big brother’s name’s Bihu, same as Pa, so we jest call him Buzz. My other brother’s Daniel Alexander or jest plain Dan. My big sister’s Dixie Lee Francine—we call her Dixie. My little sister’s Dovey Eudora—we call her Dovey or Dove—she’s asleep now. Me—I’m Berthenia Lou, but Pa calls me Birdie, ’cause he says I look like a little bird. Sometimes he calls me his little wren.”
The lanky boy had ventured round the house and now stood staring.
“What’s your name?” asked Birdie.
“Jefferson Davis Slater,” he said gruffly.
“Purty good name,” said Birdie.
“All but the Slater,” said the boy, biting his lips.
Was he ashamed of his family? Birdie wondered. “What they call you—Jeff?”
“Naw. Shoestring—’count of I’m so long and thin. Never couldn’t git no fat to my bones.”
“Shoestring!” laughed Birdie. “That shore is a funny name!”
“Shore is!” agreed the boy, smiling. “I answer to Jeff, too.”
Birdie took the mirror off the nail in the wall and held it in front of Essie. “See how purty you look!”
The little girls had never seen a mirror before.
“Oh!” they exclaimed. “Lemme see me in it!” They stuck out their tongues at their reflections and laughed.
Shoestring sat down. Birdie reached over and ran the comb through the boy’s tousled black locks. Soon she encountered snarls. “Rats’ nests!” she cried, jerking.
“Ow-w-w!” cried Shoestring backing off. “Don’t you dare rake me with that ere currycomb no more!”
The comb and mirror were not the only wonders. When Mrs. Boyer showed Mrs. Slater over the house, she exclaimed: “Sich fine fixin’s you-all got!”
“They got a bed-kiver on their eatin’ table, Ma,” said Essie.
“Hit’s a table-cloth,” explained Birdie.
As Shoestring stared at the red and white checks, his face turned sullen. Then he burst out: “Guess oilcloth’s good enough for anybody.”
“I mean!” sniffed his mother.
Mrs. Boyer took down a pretty flowered plate from the shelf.
“Don’t bother to show me no more of them fancy things,” said Mrs. Slater, backing away. “Guess we seen enough of your fine fixin’s. Guess we know now how biggety you folks is, without seein’ nothin’ more.”
“But, ma’am,” begged Mrs. Boyer, “I didn’t mean no offense.”
The Slaters marched out through the breezeway without further words.
Mrs. Boyer quickly filled a cup with brown sugar and ran after them. “Here’s the sweetenin’ you come to borrow, ma’am!”
But Mrs. Slater did not turn back or offer to take it. Down the path she strode, her baby squalling and bouncing on her hip, as she dragged the little girls along. Shoestring stalked behind, his hands deep in his overall pockets.
“We got some right purty-lookin’ plants,” cried Birdie desperately. She pulled off a geranium slip and ran after Mrs. Slater. “Hit’s a right purty pink, this geranium is, and Ma’s got a Seven Sisters rose …”
Mrs. Slater shoved the gate open. It had an old flatiron hanging on a chain for a weight. It closed behind them with a loud bang. The Slaters plowed the sand with their bare feet and vanished in the palmetto thicket.
Birdie went back to her mother, who was standing on the porch. She looked at the cup of sugar in her mother’s hand and the geranium slip in her own.
“Reckon we can give ’em to her next time she comes,” she said.
CHAPTER II
Fences
“WHOA THAR!” CALLED BIRDIE. “Whoa, Semina!” The white mule stopped. The girl thrust the plowshare into the ash-white soil again.
“Giddap, Semina!” The mule started on.
Again and again the mule had to stop. The soil was too light to hold the plow down, so she had to shove it in with vigorous thrusts.
The sun shone with merciless brightness. Birdie mopped her hot face under her sunbonnet. She started once more around the plot of ground with her plow. Her bare feet were black from the mucky sand.
Suddenly she noticed somebody hanging on the rail fence of the cowpen. It was the black-haired Slater boy. He had jumped off his horse and turned it loose to graze near by. She wondered if he would speak to her.
“Hey!” she called.
“Hey!” came the answer. “What you doin?”
“I call myself plowin’,” replied Birdie. “Wanna help?”
“Shucks—no!”
“Big ole lazy, you!” retorted the girl.
The white mule pushed on through the sandy soil. Birdie shoved the plow in deeper and watched the sand roll up in a high furrow. When she had made the round to the cowpen, she pulled up.
“What you plowin’ for?” asked the boy.
“To grow things. Crops’ll make mighty good here. This used to be part of the cowpen.”
“Cowpen?” The boy looked blank.
“We been pennin’ our cows up nights ever since we moved here,” explained Birdie, “to git their manure scattered round.”
“That what these rail fences is for?”
“Yes,” said Birdie. “Pa fenced in this long lane first. Then he put fences across it to make pens. We got this whole piece manured that-a-way.”
“You bring your cows up every night?” asked the boy.
“Shore do,” said Birdie. “Ain’t you seen me ridin’ Pa’s horse? But when we keep the calves penned up, the mother cows will come back at night of theirselves, so most of the time I don’t need to bring ’em in.”
The boy’s face showed surprise. “Never heard o’ no sich doin’s as that. We let our cows run loose all year round. Don’t bring ’em up but oncet a year. What you fixin’ to plant?”
“Sweet ’taters, peanuts and sich. That’s sugar cane over there,” explained Birdie, pointing. “Pa and Buzz planted it when we first bought the place. It’s doin’ real well. We’ll be grindin’ cane shore ’nough, come fall. Right here we’re fixin’ to set strawberries.”
“I mean! Strawberries!” Shoestring’s eyes opened wide.
“Yes, strawberries!” said Birdie. “Heaps o’ folks over round Galloway are growin’ ’em to ship north. Pa heard a man called Galloway started it. So we’re studyin’ to raise us some and sell �
�em.
“You purely can’t!” said the boy. “Can’t raise nothin’ on this sorry ole piece o’ land but a fuss!” He spat and frowned. “Sorriest you can find—either too wet or too dry. Not fitten for nothin’ but palmetto roots. Your strawberries won’t never make.
Birdie lifted her small chin defiantly.
“Neighbors hung over Galloway’s fence and said his’n wouldn’t make, neither, but they did.”
She turned the mule around and said giddap. “We’re fixin’ to plant corn and cowpeas between the rows,” she called out. “Three crops offen one piece o’ land!”
“Sorry-lookin’ mule you got!” scoffed Shoestring. “She’s windy—listen to her heave! Sounds like a big ole freight train chuggin’! Why don’t you git a good horse like mine? Better’n ary mule.”
Birdie glanced at the small, wiry animal which was nibbling grass behind him. Its hair was long and shaggy, as if it had never been touched by a currycomb.
“Pony, I call it,” she said, with a sniff. “Little bitty ole sorry pony, no bigger’n a flea! Why, your legs are so long, your feet hit the ground as often as the pony’s do!”
“He’s a cowhorse,” bragged Shoestring, “and I’m a cowman! This is my rope. I can catch ary thing I want to.” He took the rope off the saddle and wound the loops carefully in his left hand. “You’d admire to watch me catch a steer. See that stamp yonder? That’s a wild steer. Be still, steer!” He swung the rope high over his head, then threw it, looping it round the stump.
“Huh! That’s nothin’!” said Birdie. “Stumps don’t move.”
“Dog take it, I kin lasso your ole mule then!” boasted the boy. “Git her goin’!”
Birdie took up the lines and slapped the mule on the back. Semina began to move slowly along the row, pulling the plow.
“Grab that steer there, boy! Grab that steer!” yelled Shoestring. In a second he was over the rail fence, running through the sand. His rope went flying through the air.
“Don’t catch me! Catch Semina!” Birdie dodged, but the rope hit her.
The boy pulled, and the loop tightened round her shoulders, throwing her down.
“I ain’t a steer! You missed your aim!” She jumped up quickly.
Shoestring wound his rope and threw again. This time he lassoed the white mule, and stopped her in her tracks.
“See what a good cowman I am!” boasted the boy.
“Think you’re smart, don’t you?” replied Birdie.
“Maybe you can ride a cowhorse, but I bet you can’t ride Semina!”
“Huh! That ole mule? She’s half-dead already. Ary baby kin ride her.”
“You jest try it,” said Birdie.
The plowing done, she removed the harness and brought Semina out into the lane. Shoestring ran, threw himself over the mule’s back, landed on Semina’s ticklish spot and was promptly thrown headlong in the sand.
“Er-r-r-r, what’d your ole mule do that for?” sputtered the boy as he rose to his feet.
“She don’t like cowmen,” said Birdie. “They brag too much. And neither do I.”
“Birdie!” called Mr. Boyer, entering the field. “What’s a-goin’ on out here? What you been doin’ to that ’ere boy?”
“Semina throwed him, Pa!” said Birdie, laughing. “I was done plowing. That little ole shirttail boy got so biggety, I couldn’t stand it no more.”
Mr. Boyer was a tall, thin, genial-looking man, with a weathered complexion. He shoved his hat back and patted Birdie on the shoulder.
“Serves him dogged right!” he said, with a laugh. “Got rid o’ him, eh?” He pointed his thumb after the retreating figures of boy and horse.
“Seems like them Slaters air hard folks to neighbor with,” said Birdie, remembering Mrs. Slater’s call. “Likely I had orter been nice to Shoestring; likely they won’t come see us no more.”
“They’ll be back direckly; don’t you pay no mind,” said Mr. Boyer. “Tired out with all the plowin’? Little gal like you, no bigger’n a weensy wren, plowin’ a hull big field like this!”
“I ain’t no-ways tired,” said Birdie, “but I’m so hot, I wisht I was a fish in the lake, swimmin’ round nice and cool. When we gonna set the strawberry plants, Pa?”
“Right soon now,” said Mr. Boyer. “I got ’em today. That’s what kept me so long. Had a hard time findin’ whar the ole man lives who sells ’em. Took the wrong turnin’ in the piney-woods and losted myself and like to never got found again. The plants is beauties. Buzz and me’ll git the sweet ’taters and peanuts planted tomorrow, and you and your Ma can start settin’ strawberry plants.”
“How soon do we pick?” asked Birdie excitedly.
“Pick! Don’t count your biddies ’fore they’re hatched, gal young un!” Her father laughed. “You won’t be pickin’ no purty red berries till nigh a year from now. Soon as these plants git started growin’, they’ll send out runners enough to cover up the beds. In September, we take off the runners and set ’em out to make more plants. Then they stop runnin’, and long about December, they begin bloomin’ and …”
“Then we pick!” added Birdie, beaming.
“Yep! ’Bout next January we pick! But first, hit’s a mighty hard job settin’ all them plants.”
Her father knew what he was talking about. Birdie agreed after the first day of setting. When she came into the house at suppertime, her knees and legs ached, her back ached, and all her muscles ached. She ate quickly and went to bed without a word.
Succeeding days saw the remainder of the plants set in neat double rows on high ridges in the fertilized land. Frequent rains gave them a good start, and the plants began to green up and stretch out fresh new leaves.
“I wisht that ere Shoestring could see how purty they air!” thought Birdie, filled with pride. “He said they wouldn’t never make. I’d jest mightily like to show him.”
But Shoestring did not come, nor any of the Slaters. Birdie often mentioned the fact, but her parents did not seem to let it worry them.
“They’ll come direckly,” said Mrs. Boyer. “Likely we’ll see more of ’em than we want.”
One day the boy passed. Birdie decided not to speak first. If he was still mad, he would go by without a word.
But he was friendly. He surprised her by handing her a big cooter—a soft-shell water turtle.
“Been fishin’ over to Catfish Lake,” he said agreeably. “Put me out a trout line, with white bacon for bait, and caught me ten cooters. Sold some of ’em, et some, and give some away. Tell your Ma to cook it. My Ma rolls ’em in flour and fries ’em in grease. Mighty good. Know how to clean ’em?”
“Pa does,” said Birdie. “We like cooters when we can git ’em.
“My Pa’s a great hunter,” boasted Shoestring. “I like all kinds of meat they is—reckon I must be part Indian. I’ve et rabbit, frog, goat, possum, gopher, bear, deer, alligator and even rattlesnake!”
“Huh!” scoffed Birdie. “Bet you never ate no rattler. Bet it nigh choked you iffen you did.”
“Tasted like chicken!” boasted the boy. “Alligator tastes like beefsteak, bear meat ain’t much good, possum …
“I don’t want no possum,” said Birdie. “Hit don’t appeal to my notion.”
“Try cooter then,” said Shoestring, and he was off.
After he left, Birdie wondered if he had nothing to do but go fishing all day. Then she remembered she had forgotten to show him the strawberry plants and tell him how nicely they were growing.
After the rains stopped, the strawberries didn’t do so well. The plants began to dry up in the sun’s terrific heat. Birdie carried water in a bucket and dipped it on them with a gourd dipper.
She went out early every morning. But they continued to dry up, and more of them died.
“The strawberries don’t make!” she wailed bitterly. “They’re jest fixin’ to die!”
One morning she saw a horse lying in the middle of the strawberry field. At first she thought it was dead. Benea
th its shaggy coat, it was very lean and bony. She approached it warily. Suddenly the animal raised its head and looked at her. Then it began to roll. Over and over it went, its four feet pawing the air in awkward movements.
By the time it scrambled to its feet, Birdie had found a stick and she gave chase. She flayed it with all her strength. The horse tore about aimlessly, tramping on rows where it had not wallowed.
“Mean little ole pony!” shouted Birdie. “You git outen here!”
Dan appeared, found a stick and began to chase too. Then Buzz and Mrs. Boyer came. They ran the horse off through the woods.
“Cowhorse!” cried Birdie in disgust. “That was Shoestring’s cowhorse. He rounds up their cows with it.”
When she went back to the strawberry field and saw the damage, she cried. Pa put his arm around her and said he would buy new plants to replace the others.
“We belong to build us a fence, Pa!” said Birdie. “Strawberries won’t never make in an open field.”
That same evening they found a bunch of cows with the S circle brand in the orange grove, pulling leaves and bark off the trees. Buzz discovered them while he was stripping Spanish moss off the topmost branches. He slid down and gave chase, whooping loudly. His shouts brought the rest of the family.
Off near the woods, Birdie found little Essie Slater. She had a stick in her hand and was whacking the back of a poor skinny beast, that kept on eating.
“Ole cow won’t go home,” wailed Essie.
The child’s pale hair was more tousled than ever, and her face dirtier. She was the picture of distress. Birdie wiped off her tears, took her to the back porch and washed her face in the washbasin. Then she sent her home through the woods.
Not till then did she notice that her young orange tree was nibbled off to the ground. She saw hoofprints in the soft earth where water had dripped from the pump. One of the Slater cows had gone home by way of the Boyers’ backyard. It had stopped long enough to drink from the trough and eat up the fresh green leaves and branches of the young orange tree.
This time Birdie did not cry. She was too angry to cry.
