Encouraged by his father’s toleration of his presence, Charlie sought him out again next Sunday morning when Abe had inspected the empty stalls of the barn; the horses had long since been fed, the cows milked, and both turned out into the pasture which ran north for two whole miles, comprising now eighty acres.
Thence Abe meant to go to the west field, to circle it–a walk of five miles–and to see the young wheat in that part of his holdings. There had been no rain for a week; and though the plants did not yet suffer from lack of moisture, a little rain would not be unwelcome, to keep conditions as nearly ideal as they had been so far.
The morning was bright and clear. It seemed almost too bright and clear; not a cloudlet showed: a rare thing for a Manitoba summer day which is normal only when flat-bottomed, round-topped clouds sail whitely through the blue.
As Abe turned to the gate, Charlie took his hand and hopped along by his side. They passed through the gap in the wind-break, now twenty feet high, and out on to the road. Towns were dotting the distant skyline, raised by the mirage. Silver-white vapour mirrors were overlying the land. Every blade of grass sparkled with dew.
They passed the wind-break and the pasture; Horanski’s house, north of them, made almost the impression of an independent farm. Here, Abe meant to turn into the fields; but there was a tug at his arm.
“Daddy,” said a sing-song voice, “I know a vesper sparrow’s nest on the road past the field. Won’t you come along to see it?”
“Can’t you go alone?” Abe had stopped.
“Sure. But I’d like to show you, daddy.”
Abe felt vaguely flattered. “What’s a vesper sparrow?”
“Don’t you know?”
“Did you before you went to school?”
“Didn’t they teach you about birds when you were a boy?”
“They taught us to read and write and figure.”
“We learn lots of things besides.”
“Well, you haven’t answered my question, sonny.” Abe never called Charlie “sonny” except when he was teasing him. On such occasions, the word had become habitual since years ago when Abe had happened to use it Charlie had tearfully protested, “I am no sonny.”
“A small bird as big as a sparrow, with white stripes in his tail.”
“Haven’t all sparrows white stripes in their tails?”
“Only juncos and vesper sparrows.”
“That so? And where do they build their nests?”
“On the ground.”
Even at this point the conversation had become an adventure to Abe–an excursion into the mysterious realms of childhood. “Well,” he asked, “where is that nest of yours?”
The boy led the way west, south of the farm. They had left Horanski’s place a few hundred yards behind when the child exclaimed, “Oh, look, daddy! There on the fence. That’s a vesper sparrow.”
“Is that the one from your nest, do you think?”
The boy considered. “No. It’s too far.”
“How far is it?”
“Quite a piece. More than half a mile.”
They went on. Both were in their Sunday clothes, though Abe wore no coat. The sky was undergoing one of those sudden and subtle changes which follow a cloudless sunrise; it lost its polished appearance and became dull. A breeze sprang up from the north-west.
“I’ll tell you,” said Abe. “Maybe we had better go another day. It looks like a shower. What do you say?”
“Oh no, daddy! Come on.”
The sky became whitish. But they went on along the trail which lost itself in the prairie. Now and then there was a tug on Abe’s arm; for the child picked up clods of earth and shied them across the ditch to their left into the meadow beyond. For every step Abe took, the boy took two or three, jumping ahead and doubling back. Abe mused. He was making this child happy; and that made him happy in turn: with a happiness unknown to him at less magic times: this hour was fraught with something which redeemed the workaday week. Why had he never enjoyed it before? With a pang he realized that he was missing much in life.
He felt poignantly that he loved the child; that he approved of his very existence; that he must tie him to his heart by a bond. The boy was himself re-arisen; finer, slenderer, more delicate, more exquisitely tempered. It affected him like a miracle bursting on earthly eyes.
As they approached the south-west corner of Abe’s holdings, Charlie abandoned his other pursuits and stayed by his side. “Ssh!” he said and, with the exaggeration of childhood, began to walk on tiptoe, sideways, restraining his father as if they were stalking game. “There!” he whispered tensely as, a rod ahead, a bird flew up with a startled chirp.
When they reached the nest, built of dry blades of grass and cunningly concealed in a hummock, a few inches above the surrounding level, the boy went into ecstasies of delight. “Oh, daddy, come quick, come quick! They’re hatched. Look at the little ones! They’re all mouth! Oh, come, daddy! What’s that yellow stuff around their beaks?”
Abe came and bent over the boy who was on his knees.
They stood and looked, the mother bird anxiously fluttering near and perching plaintively on the wire of the fence.
Suddenly Abe felt a heavy drop of rain and straightened. From the north-west a low-fringed cloud came sweeping along, aquiver with lightning. Half a mile ahead of them the long, silky grass was wildly waving in the wind which had not reached them yet. Abe felt worried. As for himself, he might spoil a suit of clothes; but the child was apt to take vicious colds. In the corner of the wild land ahead stood the remnant of a haystack.
“Run,” he said, leading the way in huge strides to the stack.
The child followed, putting forth all the powers in his thin body to keep up with his father. It took only a few minutes; but they had barely reached the shelter when the squall struck. The fact that they were in a pocket of calm gave them a delicious feeling of being saved and of an isolation which they shared. As the rain swept over, it blotted with veil after veil all things to the east. Abe scooped a hollow in the wall produced by the hay-knife. There they squatted as in a cave.
A brief rattling shower passed east, shot with hail and followed by a lull. Then, with a sharp flash of lightning and a simultaneous bellow of thunder, a steady downpour began, slanted by the wind. Abe winced at the flash; but the child remained unconscious of the storm. He was dancing about from foot to foot in front of his father. “Oh, daddy, it makes me so happy to see those little birds!” And, after a while, “I wonder, will they get wet?”
“I don’t think so,” said Abe. “The mother is sitting on the nest.”
“Mr. Blaine says we must never disturb a bird when it rains.”
A second flash was followed by a long, rolling peal of thunder which ended with a sharp, detached explosion. The boy laughed at the peculiar rhythm. “That sounds like a crocodile lifting his tail,” he said.
Abe joined in his laugh.
The boy snuggled against his father’s knee. “Like this,” and he ran his hand along Abe’s thigh, using two fingers as legs; then, laying hand and forearm down and bending his fingers up, backward, “Like that,” he said.
“Do you know what a crocodile is?”
“Of course!” And, turning, he looked out from under the shaggy roof of the cave. Drops were falling from the edge of the opening. “That’s like a curtain of beads.” He was never at rest, twitching with vitality.
Abe felt as though he had been lonely for years. He drew the boy between his knees. “Do you like to go to school?”
“Yes.” But it was said without enthusiasm.
“Much?”
“Ye-es.” This time there was distinct hesitation.
“Why?”
“That’s where Mr. Blaine is.”
“You like him, do you?”
Charlie turned, playing with his father’s watch-chain. “Don’t you?”
Abe laughed. “I don’t matter. Do all the children like him?”
“Some do; so
me don’t. Some say he’s too strict.”
“That’s what a teacher is supposed to be.”
“The Hartley kids have been to school elsewhere. They say it’s nicer to have a lady teacher.”
“You think so too?”
“No.”
“Well, you’ll keep Mr. Blaine.”
They remained where they were till the storm was over. Pools of water dotted the prairie. They could not get home dry-shod. But the clouds were dispersing, and the sun shone through their rents. When they reached the first cross-ditch, a black, turbulent current was running into the master ditch south of the trail.
They came to the nest. “I wonder,” said Charlie, “whether they are all right? Oh, daddy!” he cried as the mother bird flew up. “They’re quite dry. There’s water all around; but the nest is dry.”
“The mother bird knows where to build. She knows about rain.”
When they entered the yard, Abe felt a poignant regret that the hour was over….
A week later, a Presbyterian minister held divine service at the school. Although Abe was indifferent, he took his family. During the following night Abe was in the deepest of his sleep when he felt a pull at the covers of his bed. “Yes,” he said, starting up into a sitting posture. And a moment later he became aware of Charlie standing by his side, barefooted, shivering in his night-gown. “Daddy,” he whispered, “I had such a terrible dream. May I come into your bed?” Abe threw his blankets back; and the child dived in.
On Saturday, Abe said to Ruth at dinner, “Let Charlie put on his good suit. I’m taking him along to town.”
Ruth did not reply. She had grown still stouter. The features of her face had hardened, heavy, unlovely; her waist-line had disappeared. She had abandoned the last attempt at making herself attractive.
On the way to town, Abe was in no hurry. Haying was in full swing; but a competent man was in charge; never had he put as much confidence in any one as in Horanski. The season still remained ideal.
Abe was thinking of that night when the child had come to his bed. He had not closed his eyes again. Why had the boy not gone to his mother? Was it the new relationship between father and son?
“What were you dreaming about,” he asked when they were well on their way, “that night when you came to my bed?”
“Devils,” said Charlie succinctly.
“What?”
“Devils.”
“What are they?”
The boy fidgeted, various expressions chasing each other over his delicate features. “Oh, I can’t tell. Terrible things.”
Abe looked at the child. What was going on in that little head with its fine, fair hair? Love him as he might, he could only feel what the boy permitted him to feel.
But Charlie became confidential. “Daddy, can God do anything He wants to do?”
“I suppose so.”
The child pondered, “I’ve been praying for something; ever since we went to church the other day. But I haven’t got it.”
Abe felt overwhelmed with the difficulty of the situation. He must not even smile at the child. “We know nothing about God,” he said hesitatingly. “I don’t. But there are people who think they know all about him. They tell us that sometimes, when we ask for a thing, we don’t get it because it wouldn’t be good for us to have it.”
“Oh!” The boy pondered again; and, with sudden irrelevancy, “Daddy, how do children come into the world?”
Abe was thunderstruck. Of all questions this was the one he was least prepared to answer. He realized at once that his relationship to the boy had reached a crucial point. He could not refuse to answer; he could not evade; he could not deceive; for the child would detect any reluctance, any evasion, any untruth. The boy had had contact with others; the school had interposed itself between parent and child. On his reply would depend which way, in years to come, this boy would turn for truth, to his father or to his classmates. Abe must make a bid for the child’s absolute and utter confidence. It seemed a daring thing to do, contradicting all conventions. Like a tremendous weight, the responsibility of parenthood settled down on Abe. So far he had given more thought to municipal problems than to the welfare of his children. No other course, therefore, remained open but to trust his instinct.
“I don’t know,” he said slowly, “how much you can understand of this. You saw Beaut, the mare, in the spring, didn’t you?”
“Before she had the colt, you mean?”
“Yes. And you’ve seen a change since the colt arrived?”
“She isn’t so big.”
“Exactly. That colt, you see, had grown inside her body.”
The boy laughed; and the laugh sounded almost silly; but Abe divined that it sprang from excitement.
“In the same way a child grows within the mother.”
Again the boy laughed his excitedly silly laugh. “Then only mothers can have children?”
“Only mothers.”
For the third time came that laugh. Then a thoughtful pause; and next an almost pouting question. “But, daddy, how does it get in? And how does it get out?”
“That I’ll tell you when you are older. Listen, Charlie.”
“Yes?”
“Other boys will tell you things. They don’t know. You didn’t know. How could you? Few parents tell their children.”
“I have asked mother.”
“Have you? Now let’s make an agreement. I promise you to tell you the truth as far as you can understand it. I may tell you to wait. I may tell you I don’t know myself. But I won’t tell you an untruth. In return I ask you one single thing. Don’t ask other boys for information which they can’t give. Come to me. Will you do that?”
“Yes,” Charlie said; and once more he laughed, but in a different key. Then, boastfully, “Sure! I’ll always come to you, daddy. You tell me the truth. Now I know. Shall I tell you what I’ve been praying for?” He was standing and playing with the lapel of Abe’s coat.
“Well?”
“But you mustn’t laugh! I’ve been asking God for a baby.”
Abe did laugh; and the boy laughed with him. Both laughed at the silly child which Charlie had been….
One day Abe stopped at the school as he passed it. Although these were holidays, Abe found Blaine in the building where he spent most of his time reading. As Abe entered, the old man looked up from his desk, his steel-rimmed glasses on the tip of his nose.
Abe nodded and squeezed his bulk into one of the larger seats. This was an up-to-date classroom, spacious and airy; and the windows, all on the north side, looked out on the prairie east of Nicoll’s.
“Blaine,” Abe said, “I’ve never asked you how the kids are getting on. I didn’t want you to think that as the chairman of the board I asked for special consideration. But I’m beginning to realize that I know nothing about them.”
“I’ve wondered,” Blaine said. “The only one inclined to give trouble is Jim. He doesn’t like school. The girls are up to grade.”
“And Charlie?”
“Well, Charlie!” the old man said slowly, looking queerly at Abe. “I don’t know whether you realize–”
“What do you mean?” Abe asked huskily.
“It’s hard to put into words….” Something passed between the two men, like an electric current.
Abe rose, a lump in his throat. “I know,” he said; and awkwardly he stood for a moment before he nodded and turned away.
Henceforth there was a secret understanding between them.
THE CROP
Throughout that summer of 1912 Abe never ceased worrying about his crop. Things going well, he was apt to feel that some disaster was preparing itself. Never did the grain suffer from excessive moisture or lack of it. Never a blade turned yellow before the second week in August; and then a golden spell brought the very weather for ripening wheat. The straw was of good height but did not lodge. The stand was remarkably thick and even; and not on Abe’s place only but throughout the district and even south of
the Somerville Line and in the river valley to the east. Unless some major disaster intervened, a late hailstorm or a prairie fire, unheard-of wealth would be garnered that fall throughout the southern part of the province. Even though, with such a crop, the price of wheat was bound to fall, there would be plenty. Abe estimated his yield at forty bushels per acre. The grade could hardly be less than Number One Northern, coveted by every grower of wheat. Unless some major disaster interfered, this crop would place him at the goal of his ambitions. But could it be that no disaster was to come? He felt as though a sacrifice were needed to propitiate the fates. He caught himself casting about for something he might do to hurt himself, so as to lessen the provocation and challenge his prospect of wealth must be to whatever power had taken the place of the gods.
He had read of such crops; he had heard tales told. South of the Big Marsh, a man had bought a farm on credit for ten thousand dollars, with only his equipment and his industry on the asset side of his balance sheet; his first crop was said to have paid for the farm. Such cases were used by the great transportation companies to advertise the west. They were on everybody’s lips. But Abe knew that against them stood hundreds of cases of failure, of bare livings made by the hardest work. Was his going to be the one case in a thousand?
Yet, no matter how he looked at things, even allowing the price of wheat to fall to an exceptionally low level, unless some major disaster interfered, he was bound to see his material wishes fulfilled. Twelve hundred acres under wheat! Forty bushels per acre. At, say, sixty cents a bushel–surely, that was the lowest possible price? Thirty thousand dollars were growing in his fields–a fortune sufficient for his needs.
This was the harvest for which he had worked through all these years, since he had first bought additional land. Slowly, as his holdings increased, the plan had dawned on him to arrange the rotation forced on him by the problem of weeds in such a way as to make it possible once in a decade to put his whole area under crop, staking a decade’s work on a throw of the dice: a venture so costly as to make failure seem a catastrophe.
Everywhere the young were elated at the prospect; everywhere the aged, the old-timers, in the Mennonite Reserve, for instance, shook their heads. Wet years had always come in a three-year succession. This year spring had been normal; summer, a marvel of favouring conditions: no human intelligence, endowed with the power of determining seasonal events, could have planned things in a more auspicious way. But there was still time for rains to come; and if they came now, they would come at the one and only time at which they could endanger all Abe’s work. He might not be able to cut his wheat; being cut, the grain might sprout in the stook and be ruined. The fall was his vulnerable point, his only one.
Fruits of the Earth Page 11
