Arthur Ownby’s eyes swam slowly across, fixed upon him.
Yessir, he said.
Get in that car over yonder. Let’s go.
The old man had stopped. He was looking at the man, and then he was looking past him, eyes milkblue and serene, studying the dipping passage of a dove, and beyond, across the canted fields of grass to the green mountain, and to the thin blue peaks rising into the distant sky with no crestline of shape or color to stop them, ascending forever.
You hear?
The old man turned. You don’t keer if I trade first, do ye? he said.
You’re under arrest. You don’t need to trade nothin.
The old man turned back toward the store with an empty gesture, holding the sack of ginseng in his hand.
Let’s go, the man said again.
So he started down off the porch with a forlorn air and the dog, bland, patient, turning behind him with myopic and near-senseless habituation until, led by the man in the starched and rattling clothes, they reached the car. The man swung the door open and the old man fumbled and climbed his way onto the front seat. As the door was closing it began to occur to him that the dog was still out and apparently not under arrest as he was and he flailed violently at the glass and upholstery swinging toward him and checked it. The man looked at him questioningly.
He didn’t know how to begin so he sat there for part of a minute with his jaw going up and down as if he couldn’t breathe and the man said, Well, what now?
The old man nodded his head to where in the gravel the ancient hound stood gazing up at the machine before him with a baffled look. What about him? the old man said.
What about him?
Well, you don’t keer if he rides, do ye?
You’re resistin arrest, Ownby, now get on in there. He slammed the door but the old man’s cane was hanging over the runningboard and in mutual defeat the door rocked open again as the cane cracked. The old man pulled it in the car with him and studied the lower part of it, stooping to examine the whiskers of wood standing up from the break. The man slapped the door again and it bounded in snugly upon the old man and all but took his breath.
The man was coming around the car and he hadn’t much more time so he pulled at the handles and got the right one and opened the door again and leaned out and called to the dog, standing off a few feet now and rocking back and forth in consternation.
Hya, Scout, the old man whispered. Come on, get in here.
Hey! the man called. What in the hell you think you’re up to now?
The dog started, backed away. The man paused midway in his passage from door to door, returned. The old man straightened up and watched him come.
I told you oncet, the man said, coming up fast and reaching for the door. The old man recoiled, waiting for it to buffet shut against him, but instead it wrenched outward and the man’s face jutted in and stared at him in a mask of classic anger. You tryin to excape? he wanted to know.
Nosir, the old man said. I was jest gettin my dog in …
Jest what! Dog? He turned and seemed to see the hound for the first time. They said you’s crazy. Dog’s ass, you cain’t take no dog …
He cain’t shift for hisself, the old man said. He’s too old.
I ain’t no dog catcher and this ain’t no kennel, the man said. And I wadn’t sent here to haul no broken-down sooner around. Now get in the goddamned car and stay put. He said it very slowly and evenly and the old man really began to worry. But he suffered the door closed to once more and didn’t mention it again until the man came around and got in beside him.
It wouldn’t hurt nothin for him to ride, he said. I cain’t hardly leave him jest a-standin there.
Old-timer, the man said, I advise you jest to set still and hush up cause you in plenty of trouble already. He cranked the engine and slid the gearshift upward and the old man felt himself rocketed backward violently with a welter of dust boiling and receding before him and the dog standing there in the drive with the gravel dancing about him and then they cut one long rattling curve and were on the road and leaving, and the old man, clutching his cane, holding the dirty little sack between his knees, looked back at the dog still standing there like some atavistic symbol or brute herald of all questions ever pressed upon humanity and beyond understanding, until the dog raised his head to clear the folds above his milky eyes and set out behind them at a staggering trot.
Warn blew little cone-shaped thistles into the fur. No, he said. Ten maybe. See here—he blew again, cotton mink. Takes a first-class mink to bring twenty dollars. The boy nodded.
Fur’s slippin, Warn said. Whew, here. He handed the mink back. Sure raised hell with it, didn’t he?
The boy took it and pitched it underhand back up onto the shelf in the woodshed. He clambered down the pile of logs and they went out together. Some wasps were hovering beneath the eaves with their long legs dangling. Small buds already on the locust trees. It would soon be nothing but bones, but he wouldn’t come to see, like when he dug up the flying squirrel he had buried in a jar and found only bones with bits of fur rolling around inside the glass like bed-lint.
They took the road to Warn’s house, the fields still too wet to cross, passed the store.
You got any money? Warn asked him.
No, he said. I ain’t sold my hides yet. You?
Naw. I sold my hides but I ain’t got nothin left. I blow it in quick as I get it. Got me some new shoes for school is about all.
What you get for em?
For the hides? I don’t know; two dollars on most of em. That big rat got three I think it was and some of em the man said was kits and they didn’t bring but a dollar. I had eighteen hides and I think it come to thirty-one dollars.
I should get six dollars, the boy said. I owe out two. Who you owe?
Sylder. He loant me the money for traps when Gifford got mine. I’d done signed a paper to buy em uptown—on account of the man let me have those first ones I bought at lot price.
You keep messin with Sylder and signing papers uptown and sech shit as that and you goin to get your ass slung in the jail after all. Lucky Gifford didn’t do it.
Gifford’s chickenshit.
Oh, Warn said. I didn’t know you had him scared of you.
Warn had his own room in the back of the house. The boy sat on the bed while he went through the top drawer of an old-fashioned sewing cabinet. He dredged up: a hawkbill knife, three arrowheads, a collection of rifle-balls velvety gray with oxidation, a scalpel, rocks, some dynamite caps, miscellaneous pieces of fishing tackle, dried ginseng, a roll of copper wire … Rifling through the mass he at length came up with a thin and dog-eared pamphlet, its cover decorated with an archaic and ill-proportioned ink sketch of a trapped lynx. Across the top in black script was the title TRAPPING THE FUR BEARERS OF NORTH AMERICA. Warn handled the treasure reverently. I got this from Uncle Ather, he said. It’ll have something in it.
Under a section entitled Lynx and Bobcat Sets they found a plan of such devious cunning as appealed to their minds. The bait was to be suspended from a limb and overhanging a stump. The trap would be set on top of the stump, so that when the victim stood—the illustration depicted a great hairy lynx sniffing at the bait on hind legs—his paw would come to rest on the stump and so into the trap—also illustrated, in broken-line, straining beneath a handful of leaves.
Warn nodded in solemn approval. That’s the one, he said. The boy studied the set carefully and then Warn tucked the book away in the sewing cabinet.
You reckon it really was a bobcat?
I don’t know what-all else it could of been, Warn said. Ain’t nothin else around here got sharp claws that I know of.
I sure could of used that ten dollars, the boy said.
The desk sergeant studied Marion Sylder’s angular frame with a hurt look, as if he were being put upon. Sylder looked back at him with a suggestion of good humor. The desk sergeant rebent his head to his papers, his lips working in patient disgust. He pondered for some minutes, rep
laced a folder in the filing drawer of the desk and reached for a pen. Name, he said, gazing at the inkstand with weary boredom.
Fred Long.
Marion Paris Sylder. Occupation.
Iron and steel …
None. Married?
No.
Married. Address.
Red Mountain Tennessee.
Route Nine, Knoxville. Mm … Age.
Twenty.
—eight. Previous convictions.
Silence.
Previous convictions.
The sergeant looked up at Sylder as if surprised to see him there. Previous convictions, he said again, slowly.
Again a moment or two of silence. Far to the rear of the building a remote clanking sound. The sergeant waited. Then he nodded wearily to the patrolman sitting in a chair by the door. The man rose and sauntered over to the prisoner, something of the laconical about him. Sylder turned to look at him. When he turned back to the man at the desk the patrolman jabbed his nightstick into his ribs.
Ow! Sylder said.
The patrolman looked aggrieved. Previous convictions, droned the sergeant, stifling a yawn.
You seem to know all about it, Sylder said. Oof!
The patrolman studied his face with an eager look, holding the stick in readiness again.
Previous con—
None, Sylder said.
None.
The sergeant leaned back with closed eyes, a rapt and serene look. The patrolman returned to his post at the door. From the cells to the rear of the building came bits and pieces of a sad voice singing. The sergeant turned papers over. In the outer corridor men were coming in, stamping their feet arid rattling their raincoats, cussing the weather. A furnace pipe clattered.
At length the sergeant regarded Sylder again. I reckon that’s all for now, he said. You’re booked on illegal possession—untaxed. I got somebody comin down wants to see you, have a little talk kindly.
Who’s that? Sylder said.
Fella name of Gilford. Ever hear of him?
Jailer!
Sylder’s third visitor was the boy, wide-eyed and serious before the smirking usherance of the jailer.
Here’s your uncle, the jailer said. Little buddy come a-callin.
The boy stared at the man seated on the steel bunk. The jailer followed his gaze. Well now, he said, he don’t seem too peart, does he? Looks kindly like he’s been sortin cats. Step on in and say howdy. Cheer the poor feller up some.
The boy stepped in. Sylder’s eyes focused onto him, he managed a small grin, a nod. Howdy there, Hogjowls, he said. The door rattled to behind them, the jailer departing, heelclack, keyjangle, echoing down the corridor.
Howdy, said the boy. What happent to you?
Well, I had a little disagreement with these fellers … as to whether a man can haul untaxed whiskey over tax-kept roads or whether by not payin the whiskey tax he forfeits the privilege of drivin over the roads the whiskey don’t keep up that ain’t taxed or if it was would be illegal anyway. I think what they do is deeport you.
No, the boy said, I mean … you wreck?
Oh. No … I was wrecked all right, but I didn’t wreck. He fingered sorely the particolored swellings on his cheek and forehead. Kindly a bang-up job, ain’t it? Mutual acquaintance helped out with the decoratin … the deacon Gifford. With two buddies to hold me. Wadn’t even much spirited about it till I kicked him in the nuts. Now they got to worry about gettin me unswole so as I can appear in court. I got some busted ribs too that they don’t know about yet. I’m sort of holdin em for a ace. Here, set down. He grimaced and dropped his feet down off the bed to clear a seat.
The boy hadn’t said anything else. He lowered himself onto the bunk, still staring at Sylder. Then he said:
That son of a bitch.
Ah, said Sylder.
How’d they … you said you never wrecked, how did they …
Catch me? It wadn’t hard. I had my choice though, I could of jumped off the bridge. They live ever oncet in a while.
What?
Water in the gas. A little too much rain, I reckon. Too much for old Eller’s leaky-assed tank leastways. There’s one bill the son of a bitch’ll play hell collectin.—It quit in the middle of the Henley Street Bridge.
Oh.
Sylder had leaned back against the concrete wall and was tapping a cigarette from its package. Ain’t that a hell of a note? he said.
I’ll get him.
Hmm?
I’m goin to get the son of a bitch.
What! That old fart? Why I’ll be dipped in … Then he said Oh.
That’s right, the boy said. The deacon.
The smile had fallen from Sylder’s face. Wait a minute, he said. You don’t get nobody.
Him, the boy said.
No, Sylder said. He was looking very hard at the boy but the boy knew he was in the right.
Why? he said.
You jest stay away from Jefferson Gifford, that’s all.
You hear?
You jest think I’ll get in trouble, the boy said. That I …
Stubborn little bastard, ain’t you? Look.
Sylder paused, he seemed to be trying to think of something, a word perhaps. Look, he said, what’s between him and me is between him and me. It don’t need nobody else. So I thank ye kindly but no thank ye, you don’t owe me nothin and I ain’t crippled. I’ll tend to my own Giffords. All right?
The boy didn’t answer, didn’t seem to be listening. Sylder lit the cigarette and watched him. He turned and looked once at Sylder and then he seemed to remember something and he reached into the watchpocket of his jeans and took out two folded dollar bills and handed them to him.
What’s that? Sylder said.
The two dollars I owe you. That you loant me for traps.
Naw … Sylder started. Then he stopped and looked at the boy still holding out the two dirty bills. Okay, he said. He took the money and crammed it into his shirtpocket. Okay, that makes us square.
The boy was silent for a minute. Then he said:
No.
No what?
No it don’t make us square. Because maybe I lost the traps on your account but that’s okay and I earned em back and paid for em and that’s okay … but you got beat up on my account and maybe in jail too that … and that’s why it ain’t square yet, that part of it not square.
Sylder started to reach for the money, thought better of it and sat up, grinding the cigarette out beneath his heel. Then he looked at the boy. Square be damned, he said. I ast you to stay away from Gifford, that’s all. Will you?
The boy didn’t say anything.
Swear it? Sylder said.
No.
Sylder watched him, the still childish face set with truculent purpose. Look, he said, you’re fixin to get me in worse trouble than I already am, you …
I won’t get no …
No, wait a damn minute.
He did. They sat looking at each other, the man’s face misshapen as if bee-stung, him leaning forward gaunt and huge and the boy perched delicately on the edge of the metal pallet as if loath to sit too easily where so many had lain in such hard rest.
Look, Sylder said, taking a long breath, you want to talk about square, all right. Me and Gif are square.
The boy looked at him curiously.
Yes, he said. I busted him and he busted me. That’s fair, ain’t it?
The boy was still silent, calmly incredulous.
No, Sylder went on, I ain’t forgettin about jail. You think because he arrested me that thows it off again I reckon? I don’t. It’s his job. It’s what he gets paid for. To arrest people that break the law. And I didn’t jest break the law, I made a livin at it. He leaned forward and looked the boy in the face. More money in three hours than a workin man makes in a week. Why is that? Because it’s harder work? No, because a man who makes a livin doin somethin that has to get him in jail sooner or later has to be paid for the jail, has to be paid in advance not jest for his time br
eakin the law but for the time he has to build when he gets caught at it. So I been paid. Gifford’s been paid. Nobody owes nobody. If it wadn’t for Gifford, the law, I wouldn’t of had the job I had blockadin and if it wadn’t for me blockadin, Gifford wouldn’t of had his job arrestin blockaders. Now who owes who?
His voice was beginning to rise and he had about him a look almost furious. But you, he went on, you want to be some kind of a goddamned hero. Well, I’ll tell ye, they ain’t no more heroes.
The boy seemed to shrink, his face flushing.
You understand that? Sylder said.
I never claimed I wanted to be no hero, the boy said sullenly.
Nobody never claimed it, Sylder said. Anyway I never done nothin on your account like you said. I don’t do nothin I don’t want to. You want to do me a favor jest stay away from Gifford. Stay away from me too. You ought not to of come here. You’ll get me charged with delinquency to a minor. Go on now.
He leaned back against the wall and stared at the emptiness before him. After a while the boy got up and went to the door and tried it, and Sylder, not looking up or speaking to the boy, called for the jailer. He heard him come and the clank of keys, the cell door grating open. Then quiet. He looked up. The boy was standing in the doorway, half turned, looking at him with a wan smile, puzzled, like one who aspires to disbelief in the face of immutable fact. Sylder lifted one hand in farewell. Then the door clanged to.
He sat up, half rose from the cot, would call him back to say That’s not true what I said. It was a damned lie ever word. He’s a rogue and a outlaw hisself and you’re welcome to shoot him, burn him down in his bed, any damn thing, became he’s a traitor to boot and maybe a man steals from greed or murders in anger but he sells his own neighbors out for money and it’s few lie that deep in the pit, that far beyond the pale.
Softly and with slow grace her leathered footpads fell, hind tracking fore with a precision profoundly feline, a silken movement where her shoulders rolled, haunches swayed. Belly swaying slightly too, lean but pendulous. Head low and divorced of all but linear motion, as if fixed along an unseen rail. A faint musty odor still clung to her, odor of the outhouse where she had slept all day, restless in the heat and languishing among the dusty leaves in the corner, listening to the dry scratch and slither of roaches, the interstitial boring of wood-beetles. Now she came down the patch obscure with parched weeds shedding thin blooms of sifting dust where she brushed them. At dusk-dark from her degenerate habitation, emerging to make her way down the narrow patch as cats go.
The Orchard Keeper (1965) Page 17
