Stork Bite

by Simonds, L. K.

  Big Sherman put his hand on David’s shoulder. “Now the cotton’s laid by.” He whistled for Peg to follow and headed to the barn.

  Over the next few days, the Tatums discussed what to do with the idle weeks until time to pick the cotton. The options were pulling stumps or picking up extra cash at the sawmill in Baldwin, an hour’s walk from the farm.

  “We gots us a opportunity we ain’t never had before,” said Big Sherman. “Me ‘n Sherm could do some loggin’ this year. If’n Jacob stay here with Mama and the young’uns, we wouldn’t have to come home ever’ evenin’. Loggin’ pay a lot better’n the mill.”

  “Ain’t no reason for him to lay off workin’,” said Sherman. “Why ain’t he goin’ with us?”

  “Because somebody need to stay with Mama and the young’uns.”

  “They been by theirself before.”

  “Not durin’ the night. Don’t want ‘em here alone at night, way things are these days.”

  “Papa’s right,” said Audie, and that was that.

  The next time they were alone, David thanked Big Sherman for not pressing him to leave the farm.

  “I reckon we best not be traipsin’ you all over creation,” Big Sherman said.

  Chapter Eleven

  After the men left for logging camp, Audie was dressed and out of the cabin every morning before David and the boys woke. David didn’t know if she felt as awkward with him as he did with her or if she was just taking advantage of the early dawn.

  When David had arrived on the farm in winter, he had thought the Tatums were too poor-minded to throw away the many dirt-filled tubs and troughs in various states of ruination that were scattered around the yard. Or to tear down a dilapidated arbor that surely would’ve collapsed were it not for the dead vines climbing each side and intertwined across its arch.

  But as soon as the days grew warm, colorful flowers spilled from every tub and trough. The vines on the ancient arbor budded as suddenly as Aaron’s rod, and soon the arbor disappeared beneath a canopy of heavy purple wisteria blossoms that perfumed the entire yard. The boys and Whip spent hot afternoons dozing in its shade to the white noise of bees buzzing overhead.

  Tall sunflowers sprouted up alongside the walls of the cabin and the barn, and along the split-log fence that surrounded Audie’s garden. The furry plants wove themselves between the rails, and the fence seemed to come alive with rough green leaves and dish-sized yellow blossoms.

  Audie fertilized her flowers with chicken droppings and watered them every morning, lugging bucket after bucket from the well, a chore David helped with when he rose early enough. She swept the fine, khaki-colored dust of the yard daily, leaving brush strokes as elegant as an artist’s.

  Rabbits and squirrels were abundant, as was David’s ammunition, and he hunted every day. Audie panfried the game David shot and made luscious gravy from the drippings. They had so much food that she frequently sent Zach and Luke off to one neighbor or another to share the bounty. There seemed to be plenty of everything, including time, with the Tatum men gone.

  David helped Audie carry boxes of canning jars from the barn into the cabin. He looked suspiciously at the clouded, chipped glass and the discolored tin lids. His mother’s canning jars had been crystal clear, and they had equally clear glass lids that fastened down with wires.

  David remembered a cash-strapped family who had paid his father with food preserved in a jar such as the ones Audie had. The blackish contents inside were almost hidden by thick red wax that covered the top. “No telling what’s in there,” Gramps had said, holding the jar up to the light coming through the window of the general store. He handed it to David. “Go empty it in the woods for whichever of God’s creatures is brave enough or hungry enough to eat it. And don’t let Huck get at it.”

  David picked up one of the jars Audie had set on the table. “Looks like this one might have a hairline crack. Just there,” he said, holding it up.

  Audie snatched the jar from his hand. “Is you gonna stay un’erfoot all day? Ain’t you got chores to do?”

  “I thought you might need some help.”

  “You can help me by gittin’ outta here. Now shoo.” She swiped at him with her rag and ran him out the door.

  On Sundays, when Audie and the boys headed across the field to church, David walked with them as far as he could without being seen. He stopped in a stand of oak trees, where he watched them join their neighbors. When the service began, David sat with his back against an oak, listening to the congregation sing.

  Some days, David could hear the preacher’s deep, booming voice well enough to catch snatches of the sermon. On other days, he made do with hearing the gist of the message from Audie and the boys when they met him and walked home together. After dinner, Audie, David, and the boys sometimes sang the hymns the congregation had sung that morning. None of them could carry a tune in a bucket, but the old songs made David feel good anyway.

  One day Audie opened one of the sideboard’s drawers to take something out, and David saw a massive, ornately embossed Bible.

  “Audie, is that a Bible? Can I see it?”

  She lifted the book from the drawer and placed it on the table.

  “Why didn’t you tell me you have a Bible? Surely you knew I can read.”

  “Yes sir. I knew it.” She sat beside David on the bench. He opened the cover and turned to the births, marriages, and deaths.

  “Are these your people?”

  “No sir. They the people my granny—” Audie stopped. “My granny brought it from Virginie.”

  “These dates go back to the seventeen hundreds, almost to the Revolutionary War.”

  “If’n them young’uns find out you can read, they be all over you to read to ‘em.”

  “I can teach them to read,” David said.

  “We cain’t pay you back, and we’s already indebted.”

  “Pay me back?”

  Audie pursed her lips. “Didn’t mean no offense,” she said.

  “I can teach you to read too, Audie,” David said quietly.

  She hesitated, then said, “We’ll see.”

  In the late afternoon, Audie called the boys in from playing. David was waiting for them at the table with the big Bible open to First Samuel. Audie busied herself while David read the story of David and Goliath to the boys.

  “And David said to Saul, ‘Let no man’s heart fail because of Goliath. Your servant will go and fight with this Philistine.’ And Saul said to David, ‘You are not able to go against this Philistine to fight with him, for you are only a boy, and he has been a man of war since he was a boy.’”

  “Hold on,” Audie interrupted. “Where’s the thees and thous?”

  “What?”

  “Where’s the arts and eths? You ain’t readin’ it right.”

  “I’m changing it to the way we talk today.”

  “No sir. You gots to read it like it’s writ.”

  “The old King James English is a relic,” David said, quoting his mother. He turned to the Bible’s title page. “See, sixteen eleven. It’s three hundred years old. People don’t talk like that anymore.”

  Audie pointed to the Bible and said, “Ain’t one jot nor tittle a that book’ll pass away before heaven and earth pass away.”

  “Yes, but?”

  “Ain’t no buts. You gots to read like it’s writ. Or else you ain’t gonna read it at all. Un’erstand?”

  “Yes’m,” David said.

  He continued reading the story of young David’s rise to fame, including every jot and tittle of the King James lexicon.

  When Audie went outside to fetch something or other, Zach leaned toward David. “Welcome to the fambly,” he whispered.

  A week later, David told Audie the boys needed easier books to read. “Your pastor might have some books we can borrow.”

  “What books?”

  “Well, there’s Tom Sawyer or Huckleberry Finn. Either one of those would be real good. Or Treasure Island. I could write them
down if we had a pencil and paper.”

  “We ain’t got no pencil or paper.”

  “That’s okay. Zach can remember the titles. He has a good memory.”

  “Lemme think about it,” Audie said.

  Audie surprised David the following Sunday afternoon when she said the pastor would bring her some books. “If’n we borry them books,” she said, “we gots to take real good care of ‘em. We gots to give ‘em back in the same condition they was in when we got ‘em.”

  “We’ll be careful,” David said.

  Late Monday morning, when David was walking back from the woods with a few rabbits, he saw a strange horse tied to the wagon. The cabin door stood open, as it always did to catch any breath of wind. He wondered if he should turn around and go back to the woods before he was seen. Instead, he decided to hide in the barn, where he could keep an eye on things.

  David hung around inside the barn for a while, but he became worried about Audie and the boys. Some kind of watchman he was, only worrying about his own skin. He picked up his rifle, squared his hat on his head, and marched through the open door, gun at the ready.

  The preacher—David recognized him—sat at the table with Audie, Zach, and Luke. David stopped, suddenly embarrassed at having entered so brusquely. He removed his hat quickly and placed the rifle by the door.

  The preacher stood. “Howdy do,” he said.

  The boys jumped up and ran to David, holding up books.

  “This is Jacob,” Audie said to the preacher. She looked annoyed.

  “Jacob ain’t his real name,” confessed Luke.

  “Luke, mind your business,” said Audie.

  “Papa call him Jacob because he carryin’ a blessin’,” explained Luke. “Like Jacob in the Bible.”

  The preacher said, “It’s right nice to know somebody’s taking my sermons to heart.”

  If the preacher recognized David from the paper that had been posted at the church, he did not let on, and he did not ask questions. He stuck out his hand and said, “Mo Rawlins.”

  “Pleased to meet you, Pastor Rawlins.”

  Mo Rawlins smiled, and deep crow’s feet beveled the skin between his eyes and his gray hair. He was a slight man and much older than David had imagined from the fire and brimstone he thundered on Sunday mornings.

  “Just passing through, Jacob?”

  “Yes sir. I’m staying ‘til the cotton’s in.”

  “You ain’t said nothin’ about leavin’!” cried Luke.

  Zachary ducked his head. His arms went limp at his sides, and his lower lip came out. David knelt and took the book that dangled from Zach’s hand. “Whatcha got here, Big Man? Call of the Wild. Looky here. This book is about a dog.”

  The boy refused to look up.

  “Hey now. I’m not going anywhere. We’ve got too much reading to do.” David turned to Luke. “And what’ve you got there?” Luke stuck out his book, The Eclectic First Reader. “Well, now. How about this? My mama taught me to read from this book.”

  Zach’s and Luke’s eyes widened. “How’d the preacher get hold of it?” Luke asked.

  “Luke!” cried Audie.

  David laughed out loud, as did Pastor Rawlins.

  David said, “Well, see, they usually make more than one of a book. Sometimes they make a whole bunch of them so lots of children can learn from them.” David looked up at Pastor Rawlins. “Does the church have any extra pencils and paper?”

  “We don’t get much call for such things, but we might be able to scare something up.”

  “We don’t wanna put you out none,” Audie said quickly.

  “But the boys could sure use something to write with besides a stick and Audie’s yard,” David said without looking at her.

  “I’ll see what I can find,” said Pastor Rawlins. “Reckon I better get going. Got a couple a more houses to visit. Pleased to meet you, Jacob.”

  After the preacher left and the boys went outside to play, David said, “Maybe I can go to church with you and the boys now.”

  “Lots a waggin’ tongues there,” Audie said.

  “I just thought . . . now that the cat’s out of the bag.”

  “What cat?”

  “Never mind,” said David.

  Chapter Twelve

  One afternoon Big Sherman and his son walked onto the farm from the direction of the woods where David hunted. David looked up in time to see Audie drop the bucket of water she was carrying and run to greet them. Big Sherman picked up his wife and spun her around, while Sherman stood by awkwardly until his mother freed herself and hugged him too.

  They all sat under the fragrant wisteria listening to logging stories. Big Sherman was no worse for the wear, but Sherman had lost half of his left pinky to a two-man saw. “Ain’t no matter,” Sherman said. “Didn’t use it no way.”

  The boys were keen to examine the nub, which was capped by a ball of pale scar tissue marked with a black X, where the camp’s de facto doctor had pulled the skin together, stitched it closed, and covered the whole affair with axle grease. The men had been paid two dollars a day each and three on Sundays, and they returned home with a small, unobligated fortune.

  “I ain’t gotta turn around and hand it to the general store,” Big Sherman said.

  When Audie went into the cabin to get supper going, Big Sherman wanted David to walk the cotton fields with him. David had watched the cotton bloom white. Afterward, the blossoms turned bright pink then deepened to almost red. Their beauty surprised him and softened him a little toward the crop. The blossoms dried and fell off the plants, and David watched the bolls grow round and eventually burst with fluffy white lint.

  “It’s time,” Big Sherman said.

  After dinner, as David and the boys had rehearsed countless times, Luke stood and announced that he had something to say. He spread his feet, placed his hands on his hips, and sang the alphabet song, finishing with,

  Now I know my ABCs

  Next time won’t you sing with me?

  He then took the Eclectic Reader from the top drawer of the sideboard, opened it, and read,

  The dog ran.

  He turned the page and read a little more haltingly,

  Is the cat on the mat?

  The cat is on the mat.

  He closed the book, took a bow as David had taught him, and sat down. Big Sherman looked at Audie, who put her finger to her lips. Zachary stood in Luke’s place and took Call of the Wild from the open drawer. He opened the book and read,

  Buck did not read the newspapers, or he would have known that trouble was brewing, not alone for himself, but for every tide-water dog, strong of muscle and with warm, long hair, from Puget Sound to San Diego.

  “Buck’s a dog,” Luke said.

  Zach did not stumble over a single word, even though Call of the Wild was too advanced for beginning readers. But it was what they had to work with, and better than King James English, in David’s estimation. Zachary had proven to be a quick study when it came to phonics and recognizing words by sight, but David had been most impressed by the boy’s comprehension, especially since he had almost no experience with the world outside the farm.

  “I want to see that place,” Zach had told David one afternoon while they were mucking the barn.

  “What place?”

  “The place where Buck was. The Yukon.”

  “You will one day,” David said. He might’ve added that he wanted to see it too, except he felt as if he already had.

  Zachary took a bow and sat down, and Big Sherman looked at Audie, who nodded.

  “Whose chil’ren is these?” Big Sherman asked.

  “These is your sons,” Audie said.

  Big Sherman opened his mouth to speak, but his eyes welled up. He pulled both boys to him and held them close. Even Sherman, who David thought would be jealous and small about it, smiled. “You boys done good,” he told his little brothers.

  “Can you teach ‘em to cipher too?” Big Sherman asked David.

 
; “I sure can.”

  “Well then, I reckon ain’t nobody got nothin’ on the Tatums.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  Big Sherman spent three of their hard-earned dollars on a new scale so they could weigh the sacks of cotton before emptying them. He commandeered one sheet of the paper Pastor Rawlins had supplied and told David to keep a tally of what they picked. Big Sherman watched as David drew six columns and wrote each person’s name at the top. He had never seen their names written before, and he took the paper from David’s hand and studied it for a long time.

  Sherman attached sideboards to the wagon, doubling its capacity and cutting in half the periods of respite David had looked forward to while Big Sherman and his eldest son hauled the cotton to the gin in Baldwin.

  Audie outfitted David with a nine-foot pick sack that hung from a shoulder strap. The first boll David touched broke the skin of his fingertips with its thorn-sharp points. He pressed his forefinger against his thumb and watched a droplet of blood form.

  “Hurts, don’t it?” Zach said.

  “It surely does.”

  David gingerly closed his fingers around the cotton, avoiding the boll’s sharp points. He tugged until the lint came loose. He picked another the same way. It wasn’t too bad, but it was too slow. David quickened his pace, his arm jerking back reflexively every time the bolls stuck his fingertips. He inched down the row—doubled over to reach bolls that were mere inches from the ground—dragging the pick sack behind him. The strap rubbed against David’s neck, and he constantly tugged at his shirt collar to try and keep it between the rough fabric and his skin.

  Big Sherman called David to the scale every time a pick sack was filled. Big Sherman hung the bag on the hook and watched while David slid the pea across the iron bar until it was level. David wrote the number on his paper, then stuffed pencil and paper back in his pocket and returned to his own pick sack, lying in the dirt between the rows. Big Sherman was a cotton-picking wonder. His pick sacks consistently topped a hundred pounds and he filled three bags for everyone else’s two.