The Education of Little Tree

by Forrest Carter

  The Indian never fishes or hunts for sport, only for food. Granpa said it was the silliest damn thing in the world to go around killing something for sport. He said the whole thing, more than likely, was thought up by politicians between wars when they wasn’t gittin’ people killed so they could keep their hand in on killing. Granpa said that idjits taken it up without a lick of thinking at it, but if you could check it out—politicians started it. Which is likely.

  We made fish baskets out of willows. We wove the willows together and made baskets maybe three feet long. At the mouth of the basket, we turned the willow ends down and sharpened them into points. This way, the fish could swim into the basket, and the little ones could swim back out, but the big fish couldn’t come out through the sharp points. Granma baited the baskets with meal balls.

  Sometimes we baited them with fiddle worms. You get fiddle worms by driving a stob in the ground and rubbing, or “fiddling,” a board across the top of the stob. The fiddler worms will come out on top of the ground.

  We toted the baskets up the Narrows to the creek. There we tied them with a line to a tree and lowered them into the water. The next day we would come back and get our fish.

  There would be big catfish and bass in the basket … sometimes a brim, and once I got a trout in my basket. Sometimes we caught turtles in the baskets. They are good when cooked with mustard greens. I liked to pull up the baskets.

  Granpa taught me to hand fish. This was how, the second time in my five years of living, I nearly got killed. The first time, of course, was working in the whiskey trade when the tax law might near caught me. I was more than certain sure they would have taken me to the settlement and hanged me. Granpa said, more than likely they wouldn’t have as he had never knowed such case to happen. But Granpa didn’t see them. They wasn’t chasing him. This time, however, Granpa nearly got killed too.

  It was in the middle of the day, which is the best time to hand fish. The sun hits the middle of the creek and the fish move back under the banks to lie in the cool and doze.

  This is when you lay down on the creek bank and ease your hands into the water and feel for the fish holes. When you find one, you bring your hands in easy and slow, until you feel the fish. If you are patient, you can rub your hands along the sides of the fish and he will lie in the water while you rub him.

  Then you take one hold behind his head, the other on his tail, and lift him out of the water. It takes some time to learn.

  This day, Granpa was laying on the bank and had already pulled a catfish out of the water. I couldn’t find a fish hole, so I went a ways down the bank. I lay down and eased my hands into the water, feeling for a fish hole. I heard a sound right by me. It was a dry rustle that started slow and got faster until it made a whirring noise.

  I turned my head toward the sound. It was a rattlesnake. He was coiled to strike, his head in the air, and looking down on me, not six inches from my face. I froze stiff and couldn’t move. He was bigger around than my leg and I could see ripples moving under his dry skin. He was mad. Me and the snake stared at each other. He was flicking out his tongue—nearly in my face—and his eyes was slitted—red and mean.

  The end of his tail began to flutter faster and faster, making the whirring sound get higher. Then his head, shaped like a big V, begun to weave just a little, back and forth, for he was deciding what part of my face to hit. I knew he was about to strike me but I couldn’t move.

  A shadow fell on the ground over me and the snake. I hadn’t heard him coming at all but I knew it was Granpa. Soft and easy, like he was remarking about the weather, Granpa said, “Don’t turn yer head. Don’t move, Little Tree. Don’t blink yer eyes.” Which I didn’t. The snake raised his head higher, getting ready to hit me. I thought he would not stop raising up.

  Then, of a sudden, Granpa’s big hand come between my face and the snake’s head. The hand stayed there. The rattler drew up higher. He begun to hiss, and rattled a solid whirring sound. If Granpa had moved his hand … or flinched, the snake would have hit me square in the face. I knew it too.

  But he didn’t. The hand stayed steady as a rock. I could see the big veins on the back of Granpa’s hand. There was beads of sweat standing out too, shining against the copper skin. There wasn’t a tremble nor a shake in the hand.

  The rattler struck, fast and hard. He hit Granpa’s hand like a bullet; but the hand never moved at all. I saw the needle fangs bury up in the meat as the rattler’s jaws took up half his hand.

  Granpa moved his other hand, and grabbed the rattler behind the head, and he squeezed. The rattler come up off the ground and wrapped himself around and around Granpa’s arm. He thrashed at Granpa’s head with his rattling end, and beat him in the face with it. But Granpa wouldn’t turn loose. He choked that snake to death with one hand, until I heard the crack of backbone. Then he throwed him on the ground.

  Granpa set down and whipped out his long knife. He reached over and cut big slashes in his hand where the snake had bit. Blood was running over his hand and down his arm. I crawled over to Granpa … for I was weak as dishwater, and didn’t think I could walk. I pulled myself to standing by holding onto Granpa’s shoulder. He was sucking the blood out of the knife slash and spitting it on the ground. I didn’t know what to do, so I said, “Thankee, Granpa.” Granpa looked at me and grinned. He had blood smeared over his mouth and face.

  “Helldamnfire!” Granpa said. “We showed that son of a bitch, didn’t we?”

  “Yes, sir,” I said, feeling better about the whole thing. “We showed that son of a bitch.” Though I couldn’t rightly recall as having much to do with the showing.

  Granpa’s hand commenced to get bigger and bigger. It was turning blue. He taken his long knife and split the sleeve of his deer shirt. The arm was twice as big as his other one. I got scared.

  Granpa taken off his hat and fanned his face. “Hot as hell,” he said, “fer this time of year.” His face looked funny. Now his arm was turning blue.

  “I’m going for Granma,” I said. I started off. Granpa looked after me and his eyes stared off, faraway.

  “Reckin I’ll rest a spell,” he said, calm as syrup. “I’ll be along directly.”

  I run down the Narrows trail, and I guess maybe that nothing but my toes touched the ground. I couldn’t see good, for my eyes was blinded with tears though I didn’t cry. When I turned onto the hollow trail, my chest was burning like fire. I commenced to fall down, running down the hollow trail, sometimes in the spring branch, but I scrambled right up again. I left the trail and cut through briers and bushes. I knew Granpa was dying.

  The cabin looked crazy and tilted when I run into the clearing, and I tried to yell for Granma … but nothing would come out. I fell through the kitchen door and right into Granma’s arms. Granma held me and put cold water on my face. She looked at me steady and said, “What happened—where?” I tried to get it out. “Granpa’s dying …” I whispered, “rattlesnake … creek bank.” Granma dropped me flat on the floor, which knocked the rest of the wind out of me.

  She grabbed a sack and was gone. I can see her now; full skirt, with hair braids flying behind and her tiny moccasin feet flying over the ground. She could run! She had not said anything, “Oh Lord!’’ or nothing. She never hesitated nor looked around. I was on my hands and knees in the kitchen door, and I hollered after her, “Don’t let Granpa die!” She never slowed down, running from the clearing up the trail. I screamed as loud as I could, and it echoed up the hollow, “Don’t let him die, Granma!” I figured, more than likely, Granma wouldn’t let him die.

  I turned the dogs out and they took off after Granma, howling and baying up the trail. I ran behind them, fast as I could.

  When I got there, Granpa was laying flat out. Granma had propped his head up, and the dogs was circling around, whining. Granpa’s eyes was closed and his arm was nearly black.

  Granma had slashed his hand again and was sucking on it, spitting blood on the ground. When I stumbled up, she point
ed to a birch tree. “Pull the bark off, Little Tree.”

  I grabbed Granpa’s long knife and stripped the bark off the tree. Granma built a fire, using the birch bark to start it, for it will burn like paper. She dipped water out of the creek and hung a can over the fire and commenced to put roots and seeds into it; and some leaves that she had taken from the sack. I don’t know all of what was used, but the leaves was lobelia, for Granma said that Granpa had to have it to help him breathe.

  Granpa’s chest was moving slow and hard. While the can was heating, Granma stood and looked around. I hadn’t seen anything at all … but fifty yards off, against the mountain, there was a quail nesting on the ground. Granma undid her big skirt and let it drop on the ground. She hadn’t anything on under it. Her legs looked like a girl’s, with long muscles moving under the copper skin.

  She tied the top of the skirt together, and tied rocks around in the bottom of the skirt. Then she moved on the quail’s nest like a wind whisper. Just at the right time—she knew—the quail rose off the nest, and she threw the skirt over it.

  She brought the quail back, and while it was still alive, she split it from breastbone to tail, and spraddled it, kicking, over Granpa’s snake bite. She held the kicking quail on Granpa’s hand for a long time, and when she took it off, the quail had turned green all over its inside. It was poison from the snake.

  The evening wore on, and Granma worked over Granpa. The dogs set around us in a circle, watching. Nighttime fell, and Granma had me build up the fire. She said we had to keep Granpa warm and couldn’t move him. She taken her skirt and laid it over him. I taken off my deer shirt and laid it on him too, and was taking off my britches, but Granma said that wasn’t necessary, as my britches wasn’t hardly big enough to cover one of Granpa’s feet. Which they wasn’t.

  I kept the fire going. Granma had me build another fire near Granpa’s head and so I kept them both going. Granma laid down by Granpa, holding close to him, for she said her body heat would help … and so I laid by Granpa on the other side; though I reckined my body wasn’t hardly big enough to heat up much of Granpa. But Granma said I helped. I told Granma I didn’t see hardly any way at all that Granpa would die.

  I told her how it all happened, and that I reckined it was my fault for not watching. Granma said it wasn’t anybody’s fault, not even the rattlesnake’s. She said we wasn’t to place fault ner gain on anything that just happened. Which made me feel some better, but not much.

  Granpa commenced to talk. He was a boy again, running through the mountains, and he told all about it. Granma said this was because he was recollecting while he was sleeping. He talked, off and on, all night. Just before dawn, he quietened and begun to breathe easy and regular. I told Granma the way I see it, there wasn’t might near any way at all that Granpa could die now. She said he wasn’t going to. So I went to sleep in the crook of his arm.

  I woke at sunup … just as the first light topped the mountain. Granpa set up, all of a sudden. He looked down at me, and then at Granma. He said, “By God! Bonnie Bee, a feller can’t lay his body down nowheres without you stripping buck naked and hunching at ’em.”

  Granma slapped Granpa’s face and laughed. She rose and put on her skirt. I knew Granpa was all right. He wouldn’t leave for home until he had skinned the rattler. He said Granma would make a belt for me, from its skin. Which she did.

  We headed down the Narrows trail for the cabin, the dogs running ahead. Granpa was a little weak-kneed, and held Granma close, helping him to walk, I reckined. I trotted along behind them, feeling might near the best I had ever felt since coming to the mountains.

  Though Granpa never mentioned putting his hand between me and the snake, I figured, next to Granma, more than likely Granpa kinned me more than anybody else in the world, even Blue Boy.

  The Farm in the Clearing

  That night by the creek, laying next to Granpa, I guess I was surprised to find out Granpa had ever been a boy. But he had.

  Through the night, his mind taken him back, and he was a boy again. Granpa was nine years old in 1867. He had the run of the mountains. His Ma was Red Wing, full Cherokee, and he was raised like all Cherokee young, which meant he could ramble as he pleased in the mountains.

  The land was occupied by Union soldiers and run by politicians. Granpa’s Pa had fought on the losing side. He had enemies … and so didn’t venture out of the mountains hardly any at all. Granpa run errands to the settlement when it was needed, for nobody paid any attention to an Indian boy.

  It was on one of his ramblings that Granpa found the little valley. It was deep between high mountains and growed up with weeds and bushes and tangled over with vines. Nothing had been planted in the valley in a long time, but Granpa could tell that once it had been planted, for it was cleared of trees.

  An old house set at the end of the valley, close to the mountains. It had a sagging porch and bricks falling off the chimney and for a while Granpa paid no attention to the house. Then he commenced to see life around it and knew somebody was living in it. He slipped down closer, off the mountain, to watch through the bushes at the people around the house. They wasn’t much.

  There wasn’t a chicken on the place, like most white people had, or a cow for milking, nor a mule for plowing. There wasn’t anything except some broke-down farming tools laying aside an old barn. The people looked about like the place.

  The woman looked frailed and wore-out to Granpa. She had two young’uns who looked worse; little girls with old faces. They was dirty and had stringy hair and legs like canes.

  An old black man lived in the barn. He was bald with a white fringe of hair around his head. Granpa figured he was dying, for he shuffled along, barely walking, and he was stooped over toward the ground.

  Granpa had been about to turn away when he saw somebody else. It was a man wearing what was left of a ragged gray uniform. He was tall and he had one leg. He come out of the house, stabbing along on a hickory sapling that he had strapped to the stump of his other leg. Granpa watched while the one-legged man and the woman walked to the barn. They strapped leather harness on themselves, and Granpa couldn’t figure what they was doing until he saw them going to the valley in front of the house.

  The old black man followed them. He was staggering along, trying to hold up plow stocks. They got in front of the house and commenced to bend and pull in their harness. The old black man tried to guide the plow. Granpa thought they was crazy, trying to pull a plow like a mule. But they pulled it. Not very far at a time—only a few steps—but they pulled it. They would stop and start again.

  They wasn’t doing much good. If the old black man tilted the plow too much, it went deep in the ground, so they couldn’t pull, and so they would have to back up, while the old black man pulled and hauled at the plow, falling down and getting up again, trying to get the plow set again. It was too shallow for real turning of land. Granpa figured they would never get it plowed.

  He left that evening, while they was still at it, pulling and tugging. He come back the next morning to watch. They was in the field when Granpa got to his hiding place. They hadn’t plowed enough ground to even see over the weeds. While Granpa watched, the plow point hung under a root and jerked the old black man down. He stayed down a long time on his hands and knees before he got back up. That’s when Granpa saw the Union soldiers.

  He moved back into a deep fern growth and kept his eye on them. They didn’t scare him, for though he was only nine years old, Granpa was Indian-wise, and could move right through the whole patrol without them seeing him, and he knew it.

  There was a dozen men in the patrol, all on horseback. A big man with stripes of yellow on his arms was leading them, and they were stopped back in a pine grove, watching the plowing too. They watched for a while, then rode on out of sight.

  Granpa went hand fishing on a creek, and come back by late that evening with his fish. They was still at it, but going so slow and tired they was practical crawling. Then Granpa’s hawk eyes cau
ght the yellow flash in the trees. It was the Union patrol leader, back in the pines. He was by himself and he was watching again. Granpa slipped onto a back trail to home.

  That night he got to figuring. He figured the Union soldier with the yellow stripes was up to meanness, and he determined he would warn the people in the old house that they was being watched. Next morning, he set himself to do just that.

  He got to his hiding place, but Granpa was shy of people. He waited, trying to figure how to go about it. They was out in the field, jerking at the old plow again. He had about decided he would leap out in the field, holler what he wanted to tell them, and then run. But he was too late; he saw the Union soldier with the yellow stripes.

  He was still a ways off in the pines, and he had another horse with him but nobody was on it. As he come closer, Granpa saw it was not a horse but a mule. It was the worst-looking mule Granpa had ever seen, hip bones sticking out, and ribs. Its ears flopped down over its bony face, but it was a mule. The Union soldier was driving the old mule ahead of him. Just as he got to the edge of the woods, the soldier strapped the old mule with a whip, and it taken out across the field. The soldier stayed back in the woods on his horse.

  The woman saw the mule first. She dropped her harness and stared at the mule running across the field. Then she hollered, “Lord God almighty! H’it’s a mule. He’s sent us a mule!” She taken out after the mule, running through the bushes. The old black man taken out too, running and falling, trying to catch up.