“If we could only see that agreement with the Indians,” mourned Major Westall.
“It will be part of their evidence,” reminded Colquitt, “and if it mentions an agreement about the grave it’s vastly different from the deed he made out for you. That in itself will damage him greatly, as I think.”
Westall glanced toward Jason, who listened eagerly. “Your young friend is all ears for this,” he observed. “After what he did for Parks in that Parham matter, maybe he can suggest something for us.”
Jason laughed and shrugged. “I’m all ears as you say, Major, not very much mouth. I wait to hear what will happen next in this case.” .
“What will happen next is a refusal of Enderby’s latest suggestion,” replied the old man harshly. “He has sent to say that, if I’ll drop the suit, he’ll give the town a slice of land where we can build the courthouse, and charge not a penny.”
“Come, that sounds generous if he’s honest,” said Colquitt. “Where is that land he offers ?”
“Where but on his own property, next to the western edge of town?” barked out the Major. “That’s where houses are fewest. And more would spring up around the courthouse if it was built there. Enderby would have the selling of the land to house-builders.”
“Aye, and he would sell or give it to his friends,” suggested Colquitt. “He wants political power in Moshawnee, does Asper Enderby.”
“With nobody to look right or left unless he gives them leave,” wound up Westall. “Write to him, Squire, and say that the town won’t have his gift of land.”
But if there was little new in the courthouse matter, Jason had much to do in preparing cases for the autumn’s term of circuit court in half a dozen county seats. Clients came to the office to discuss criminal and civil suits, and Jason drew and copied papers, recorded fees, credits, and debits in a ledger, and wrote volumes of letters for the Squire.
Between jobs in the office, and after supper each night, Jason applied himself to his law books. Blackstone, whose work he had read years before, he reviewed thoroughly. The statutes of Alabama were his next most constant study. Table conversation on his part took the form of questions about the interpretation of law. Squire Colquitt answered these, and sometimes Betsy offered intelligent opinions.
“I don’t despair of your being admitted to the bar very soon,” said the Squire one evening, sipping coffee. “You need only satisfy two properly qualified examiners—two judges of circuit court, or men appointed by them. With any applicant of fair sense and earnest study, winning the license is pretty much a matter of course in this new country. But I want you ready to prove yourself afterward.”
“You mean, in court itself,” said Jason.
“Aye, in court itself. We have some haphazard attorneys hereabouts, heaven knows.” Squire Colquitt made a rueful face. “A man whose knowledge of law comes from having been a justice or constable back home in Virginia or the Carolinas or Georgia can sometimes squirm through his examination. It’s like an unscrupulous horse doctor setting up as physician and surgeon, with no knowledge of human ills.”
“I’ll not be like that, sir,” Jason promised.
“No,” nodded the Squire, “for, if we have fools at the bar, it is not so on the bench. A judge like old Hemphill can detect a false lawyer a mile away, and he usually makes such gentry sick of their own pretensions.”
“I wish he’d make Kinstrey sick,” said Betsy, with more sharpness in her voice than Jason had thought possible.
“Give Kinstrey his due, he’s no raw hand at the law,” replied her uncle, with a grave smile. “To get the best of Kinstrey, you must rise up mighty early in the morning.”
He glanced at the old clock that stood on the mantelpiece. “Speaking of the morning,” he added to Jason, “why don’t you take tomorrow off from your struggles with the books ? I won’t need you at the office, and it’s getting on for summer, with these woods asking to be rambled in.”
“Sir,” said Jason eagerly, “if I really might—”
“Go on with you, my boy.” .
At first peep of the sun next day, Jason dressed in the old clothes he had once worn for his work around the Andrew Jackson House. He borrowed Squire Colquitt’s fowling piece, a powder horn, and a leather flask of small shot. After a quick breakfast, he strolled out and away.
As if of themselves, his feet turned toward the new home of the Moshawnee Sentinel. Alexander Kift was already up, sweeping the square-hewn log that did duty for threshold. He and Jason exchanged good-mornings, and Jason walked on toward the stream at the town’s edge. Along its bank he walked into the green woods. A squirrel chattered above his head, but when Jason peered up and brought his fowling piece to the ready the little creature sagely slid out of sight around a great fork of its tree. Birds sang here and there.
“Jason.”
Cut Nose stood suddenly before him, his old rifle under his arm, as though he had materialized from nothing.
“I see you walk from town,” said the Indian. “Came to meet you. You hunt?”
“I saw a squirrel a moment ago,” said Jason. “Up that tree.”
Cut Nose lifted his wise face to look, too. “Him? He hide, quick. Squirrel smart, like hunter—smarter than some hunter. He know you got gun, I got gun. You won’t get good shot at him.”
“Then maybe at something else?” suggested Jason.
“Come,” invited Cut Nose. “I show you good hunting.”
He turned and headed into the woods. Jason followed as silently, and when they left the trail Jason took care to avoid twigs and leafage that might rustle. His friend stole through a great thicket of canes, skirted a clump of pines, and paused to peer at the ground, then across a clearing. Jason tried to follow Cut Nose’s searching glare, but could see nothing of game. Again the Indian led him away, through new thickets and groves. Once, as they came back to the stream, Cut Nose stopped again and studied a single deer track in the mud. Then, not more than a dozen paces onward, he made an abruptly sudden halt, so that Jason almost bumped into him.
Cut Nose pointed silently, forward and upward.
High in a tulip tree roosted a wild turkey. The sunlight struck shiny green-brown light from its glossy feathers. Cut Nose tapped Jason’s arm, then the borrowed fowling piece, and pointed again. Silently he invited his young comrade to shoot.
Jason raised the fowling piece, then lowered it again. He did not know the accuracy or range of Squire Colquitt’s gun, and the turkey was a long shot away. He nudged Cut Nose in turn, and pointed to the ancient split-stocked rifle that had won first place in the beef shoot. Cut Nose nodded, and passed it to him, then took the fowling piece to hold.
Firmly Jason planted his feet, and then lifted the old gun. It balanced comfortably in his hands, its clumsy-looking stock fitted his shoulder well. Cuddling his cheek on the stock, Jason squinted through the sights. The rear notch caught the front sight accurately, against the center of the turkey’s gleaming body. Jason steadied the rifle and touched trigger.
Bang! And the turkey sprang upward from its perch, somersaulted swiftly in midair, then came fluttering down.
Cut Nose emitted a loud whoop, and both hunters ran forward. Cut Nose reached the turkey, just as it flapped its wings a last time against the leaf mould under the tree. He caught the prize by the feet and held it up.
“Good shot!” he praised. “You make good shot, Jason!”
“This is a good gun, Cut Nose. No wonder Squire Enderby offered to buy it.”
“Hit him in head, far off like that,” elaborated Cut Nose, with a hunter’s frank esteem. “Good shot. Yes—Jason could win beef from best hunters.”
Jason smiled, and shook his dark head. “I’m sorry, Cut Nose,” he said, “but I aimed for him where he was biggest—the body. I reckon I didn’t hold my sights low enough. It was just an accident that I got him in the head.”
Cut Nose darted a sharp look at him. The brown, scarred face frowned and then relaxed in a broad, block-tooth
ed grin. Next moment he and Jason were both laughing heartily.
“Take home,” urged Cut Nose, pushing the turkey into Jason’s hands. “Cook, eat. Make big dinner for friends. Sometime we come back here, you kill more turkey. Shoot at head— hit in body!”
And again Cut Nose shook with laughter. Jason had never before seen an Indian laugh like that.
“Show me how to shoot better,” Jason begged him.
“Can’t teach you,” insisted Cut Nose, with the grin of a friendly goblin. “Me, I only hit where I aim gun. You aim one place, hit better place. Mighty hunter!”
In the best of spirits they hunted on after that, through the bright morning. Jason’s fowling piece added two partridges to his string; but Cut Nose, unerring with his rifle, knocked down three partridges, each with a head shot, and a woodchuck as well. As the sun approached the zenith, Jason turned back toward town. Cut Nose bore him company.
“Where do you live, Cut Nose?” Jason asked.
“In woods. Sometimes one place, sometimes another.”
“You mean, you change camp all the time?”
“Yes.” A nod of the dark, massive head. “Indian way to live.” They were approaching the edge of town.
“We’re friends now, Cut Nose,” said Jason at last. “We’ve had a good time hunting today.”
“Good. You like hunt with me. I like hunt with you.”
“And,” Jason ventured, “I want to talk to you about the grave of Sun Chief.”
Cut Nose halted in his tracks. His face went woodenly expressionless.
“No talk about him,” he said flatly.
“I know you can’t, Cut Nose. It’s the custom of your people. But I won’t make you say his name. Let me ask you, do you remember when he died?”
“Yes.” A quick nod of the head.
“You saw him buried?”
“Yes.” Again the nod.
They walked on.
“Was it where the town is now, Cut Nose?”
“Bury him there, yes.” They were in view of the town. “There, that place.”
Cut Nose pointed with the heel of his hand toward the town square. Along its edge walked Milo Kinstrey.
“Bury him there,” repeated Cut Nose. “Now, I do not talk any more.”
He turned around and tramped back among the trees.
Betsy admired the turkey and the partridges, and Squire Colquitt pursed his lips over what Cut Nose had said about the burial of Sun Chief.
“He told you the burial took place in the town square?” said Colquitt. “Cut Nose is telling the truth, I’ll wager. If so—if Sun Chief’s grave is there—the suit must be withdrawn.”
“You couldn’t win it, sir?”
“I couldn’t go to court with it. I’ve never yet taken a case that I believed to be wrong.”
After the noon dinner, Betsy took her bonnet from its peg.
“Come with me, Jason,” she invited. “I want to buy flour and bacon at Mr. Parham’s. You can help me carry home the baskets.”
The sun was warmly bright, and they began their walk with gay chatter. But, as they approached the square, Betsy fell suddenly and frostily serious.
“Here comes Squire Kinstrey and Mr. Enderby,” she said under her breath. “Pretend you don’t see them, Jason.”
“That will be hard to do,” he demurred.
“I don’t want to listen to any of Milo Kinstrey’s gallant sayings. I have my reasons.”
But Kinstrey and Enderby, approaching from the direction of the tavern, would not let themselves be snubbed.
“You’re studying the square yonder, Mr. Morgan,” said Enderby. “Looking for Sun Chief’s grave, I dare say?”
“I’ve been given to understand that you say it’s there, sir,” replied Jason.
The planter’s long forefinger pointed. “You see the swelling in the grass, almost in the middle of the open space ?”
“Where it grows greener than anywhere else?” asked Jason. “Yes, sir, I see it.”
“That is the grave of Sun Chief.”
“We’re late on our errand, Jason,” said Betsy, and he walked along with her.
But as they reached Parham’s porch, Jason heard Kinstrey call out his name. He paused and turned, while Betsy passed through the door. Kinstrey and Enderby had followed, and as he waited they came up on either side of him.
“You and that Indian Cut Nose were talking together this morning,” Kinstrey began.
“We were,” replied Jason. “We happen to be friends.”
“I saw you,” Kinstrey went on. “He pointed out the square to you, and was saying something about it. May I ask what?”
“You may ask,” Jason said coldly, “but I won’t answer.”
“You’re impertinent, youngster.”
“Hold on, Kinstrey,” said Enderby. “This isn’t what I wanted to talk to young Morgan about.”
“And what did you want to talk to me about?” Jason prompted him.
The planter smiled in a way he may have thought was winning. “You have made a splendid start toward a career,” he said. “Had you come here in Alabama’s early days, you might have become great.”
“I still hope there will be a place for me in Alabama,” said Jason.
“But have you never thought of larger opportunities farther west? In Mississippi, or Arkansas territory? You’re of a sort that will prosper quickly, far beyond what is likely here.”
“Where does this lead, sir?” Jason demanded.
“I was but wondering,” said Enderby, “if you would not accept help to a new fronder. Suppose I gave you a good horse and a hundred dollars—”
“You want me to get out of Moshawnee for some reason,” Jason broke in sharply.
Enderby smiled again, and produced a gold snuff box. “That’s harshly and unkindly said, young man. Others have felt friendly toward you—Squire Colquitt, Major Westall, Cut Nose, the people of Moshawnee. May I not feel friendly, too, and look out for your welfare?” He took a pinch from the box and lifted it to his nose. “Will you take snuff with me, Mr. Morgan?”
“No, thank you, I don’t use it. And no, thank you, for your offier of the horse and money.”
“One hundred and fifty dollars,” said Enderby.
“Mr. Enderby,” said Jason, “you’re afraid I may stand in your way in this part of the world. Well, I won’t be bribed into leaving Moshawnee.”
“You’re a bold young speaker!” snarled Kinstrey. “You’ve had a fair offer from us. You may be sorry you didn’t take it.”
Jason looked levelly into Kinstrey’s eyes. “And I won’t be frightened into leaving Moshawnee, either,” he said. “Yet you’ve done me one favor, gentlemen, without meaning to. You’ve shown by your talk that you think I can hurt your side of the courthouse lawsuit.”
“Sir—” began Enderby, his own voice rising.
But Jason walked into the store after Betsy.
10 Bones at Midnight
When squire Henry Colquitt heard Jason’s new adventure with Kinstrey and Enderby, he confessed himself utterly mystified.
“This morning you made me inclined to give up the case as all against us,” said the Squire. “I mean, after you said that Cut Nose told you the grave was in the town square. Now I feel very differently indeed. Enderby and his lawyer want you out of here, for fear you’ll do something to their claims.”
“Kinstrey saw Cut Nose showing me the place where the grave was,” remembered Jason.
“Aye, but Kinstrey didn’t know what Cut Nose said about it, and you refused to tell him,” reminded Colquitt. “I have it in mind that Kinstrey jumped to the conclusion that Cut Nose was telling you something quite different—something to the disadvantage of Enderby’s case. You conducted yourself admirably, Jason, in what you said and what you refrained from saying. They think you know much more than you do.”
“That’s just it, we know so little,” Jason said unhappily. “Up to now, there seems to be a strong case for Sun Chief’s be
ing buried in the town square. But if that’s true, why do Enderby and Kinstrey act so guilty?”
“Perhaps because Sun Chief isn’t buried there, after all,” suggested Betsy. “In spite of what Cut Nose said.”
“Cut Nose told the truth, or thought he did,” insisted Jason. “I’ll talk to him again.”
He went next day to look for his friend, but without success. Cut Nose did not appear in the woods around Moshawnee. Jason inquired here and there, and learned from Parham, the storekeeper, that Cut Nose had traded some raccoon skins for powder, shot, and a sack of salt. Then he had nodded a silent good-by and had departed.
“Buying up supplies like that, I reckon he’s gone on a long, long hunt,” said Parham. “Cut Nose won’t be back in these parts for weeks, if he takes his usual trip.”
“Which way did he go?” asked Jason.
“Don’t I wish I knew?” Parham said, smiling. “Every hunter wishes he knew which way Cut Nose goes, because it’s always good hunting there. But he didn’t say. Old Cut Nose never says. Won’t talk a word more than he has to.”
This was a heavy disappointment to Jason. He sought the office again, reporting what he had heard.
“Now, your Indian friend didn’t want to betray you,” Colquitt made haste to comfort him. “Don’t forget, it’s not his way to be bothered about white man’s law and white man’s disputes. He understands hunting, trailing, and the customs of his people. He understands friendship and honor. He’ll be back.”
“I want him to come and talk to you, if he will,” said Jason. “I doubt if he will,” replied Colquitt frankly. “Cut Nose didn’t pick me out for a friend and brother. To him I’m only another white man, hard to like or understand. Anyway, I’m going to have to leave here on a hunt of my own.”
“A hunt, Squire?”
“Foresby’s still a new county, and lots of county business has to be straightened out,” Colquitt reminded him. “Major Westall and I are going to Montgomery, to see the governor about some county appointments. I’ll be gone for quite a while. That leaves you in charge of things here.”
Manly Wade Wellman - Novel 1956 Page 7
