Читать книгу The Sojourner - Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings - Страница 10

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The early morning mist filled the valley. The willow trees along the stream lifted through it like cloaked and long-armed travelers rising from a night of sleep beside the water. The mist was milky, holding a subtle nourishment for the young leaves of maples and the pale timid buds of wild apples. Oak and beech and elm still brooded, leafless. The earth in late April was expectant. The winter wheat pushed up green spears anxiously, long confined by snow. A lone phoebe spoke from the woods, not quite singing.

The team of horses snorted the damp air from their nostrils. Ase’s feet behind the plow sank deep into the moist loam. He was reverent before the first spring plowing. It was better than anything except the harvesting. The growing period was too disturbing, with its threats of undue rains or untimely drought, of unseasonable frost, sometimes of summer hail. No, it was the sowing time was best. Who knew then, scattering the seed, what fabulous crops, what strange magnificent ear or head of grain, might not follow? He felt so, too, about his unborn children.

The sun brushed the last of the mist from the willows. The thin pendulous arms showed a pale green covering. A flight of red-winged blackbirds circled over the marsh, late this year, Ase thought, in their homecoming. Turning at the end of a furrow, he looked up at the house. He saw Nellie come into the side yard and begin hanging out the washing. At this distance, she was a little girl pinning up doll clothes. He saw Shep race around the corner and make off with a blue shirt from the basket, the wet arms trailing. He reined in the horses to watch Nellie give chase, around and around, her curls flying, until Shep allowed her to catch him. Then she was bending over him, and when she released him, the dog was wearing the blue shirt, his front legs through the sleeves, the collar buttoned around his shaggy neck. He heard Shep’s barking and Nellie’s impish laugh.

He clucked reluctantly to the team. His grave young face was as softened with its smile as the square house with the morning brightness. The shirt would need to be washed over again anyway, and Nellie must have her fun. She was a constant and incredible delight. She had plunged into her home-making with gayety and zest. She was a lamp in a dark house, a fire on a cold hearth, food on a bare table, and she had brought him in from the outerness to light, to warm, to nourish him. Ase was a little eased of his fears for her content. Yet his knowledge of their shared loss kept his brother always in his mind. He plowed abstractedly all the morning until he heard the ringing of the great bell calling him to dinner. The massive iron bell was hung above the loft of the carriage barn beside the house, and he smiled again, thinking how Nellie made a game, too, of ringing it, falling clownishly flat as she pulled each time on the heavy rope.

The noon meal was on the table when he had finished his slow stabling, watering and feeding of the team and had washed up at the outside pump. Nellie was pouring coffee. He took the pot from her and set it back on the wood range. He tousled her curls with his big hands. He kissed the back of her plump moist neck. She was not for the moment amorous and she squirmed away. She pushed the two big cups of coffee into his hands and he took them to the dining-room. She followed with hot biscuits. She would indeed seem a little girl playing house, except for her efficiency and talent. She moved with the quickness of a wren and had the house immaculate within an hour each morning, except on the strenuous weekly cleaning day. Even his abstraction about food recognized her genius as a cook. The winter supplies were going fast, but she worked miracles with ham and bacon and poultry, with puddings and pies and tarts from her wild berry jams. The windows had come to life with her curtains, with ferns and potted geraniums and fuchsias. She pointed to the table bouquet of wilting spring violets.

“Bring me back something fresh this evening. Trillium’s nice, the red ones.”

He had smelled arbutus under the leaf-mold in the hemlock wood by the bog, but by the time he had finished the slow chewing of his mouthful of food, to tell her, she was chatting about her garden plans.

She said, “Listen!”

It was seconds before he heard the wheels on the road, the “Whoa!” and a wagon stopping. Nellie looked the table over quickly, estimating the amount of food, and was at the back door at the moment of the unmistakable peddler’s rap. It was to be hoped it was the familiar tinker, for the Linden house pots and pans were too meager for her needs, but it was a stranger. He was a little man with red cheeks and nut-brown eyes. Shep greeted him amiably, recognizing the good earth smell of clothes and body. The peddler cradled a bundle of twigs in his arms.

Ase, behind Nellie, said, “Good day, sir.”

The little man bobbed his head politely. Nellie poked his bundle. He lifted one finger, warning of a mystery and a revelation.

“Guess! You’ll never!”

She said, “Fiddle. It’s kindling. I want pie pans.”

“They just look like kindling, child. Oh, but the life’s in them. They’re full of sap.”

He nodded and pulled the sacking aside, as though he showed the face of an infant.

“Apple trees! And peach in the wagon, and pear and plum and cherry. Imagine!”

His zest was contagious. He was as full of sap as he claimed for his twigs. Ase felt an excitement. He had been inquiring where he might buy fruit trees, and now they arrived at his door, an orchard come to him of its own accord. The clock struck half after noon. Nellie bustled to china cupboard and kitchen, laid a place for the visitor, brought coffee and poured buttermilk and water.

“Sit down and have your dinner, and talk your business with Mr. Linden. I’ve an errand,” and she busied herself with a wicker basket and was gone.

The peddler heaped his plate and sighed. He bowed his head an instant, more in gratitude to Nellie than to God. Few tables this time of year were so bountiful.

“You are kind to a traveler, Mr. Linden.”

Ase cleared his throat.

“The name is—?”

“McCarthy, sir. McCarthy.”

He held a chicken leg sidewise, like a fiddle-bow, and Ase knew now what the man would say as he was saying it.

“I have a brother in these parts somewhere. What delicious chicken, juicy inside as my saplings. Heard in Ohio he was around here.”

He lifted the drumstick. “And who do you think told me? If I’m not mistaken, your brother, Ben Linden. Unless there’s other Lindens, ’twas your brother. But no mention of the little lady—your sister, your wife? This gentleman said his brother might be interested in fruit trees. Excuse me,” and he reached for a wing, “and my own brother Tim resided in this township.”

He dispatched the wing and buttered a biscuit.

“If Tim can be said to reside.”

Ase said, “Tim McCarthy works at the farm east of my wife’s people, the Wilsons. He comes here often, when his chores are done.”

“Well, now. I thirst for the sight of him. So my brother’s here and yours is out there. Ohio. Where I raise my beautiful fruit trees. They call me ‘Apple McCarthy’.”

The strawberry preserves drew one hand, the biscuits the other.

“Your brother Ben, now, he was planning to leave Ohio soon. My, these are wild strawberries, ain’t they. Nothing like the wild small fruits for flavor. But my trees are cultivated, grafted, no runts amongst ’em. Biggest apples you ever see, and the peaches, my.”

Ase struggled to ask the impossible question.

“Ben—. My brother.”

“Oh yes, Ben Linden. Didn’t do as good as he expected, he said. Had him something lined up farther out. Heading on west, he said. Years too late for the California gold, he said, but silver was promising. Fine young man. Make his pile some day, sure. Couldn’t decide should he take his Ohio girl with him. Don’t do that, I said, they get prettier farther on you go. How he laughed at that. Right you are, he said. Would that be gooseberry jam? Thank you. Now, the fruit trees. How many can you use? Don’t let me hurry you.”

Not as well in Ohio as he expected—.

What had Ben expected? The Ohio farm lands were said to be so rich that by the time a man finished dropping the seed corn, the first kernel had sprouted. But Ben would never look to land to make his fortune, unless to buy and sell it. That too would seem dull to him. He was forced on, to the west, toward gold and silver, toward some fabulous cave of diamonds. Ase wondered if the Pacific Ocean would halt his brother. Perhaps when he reached that far watery line, he would turn and retrace his steps. But years from now. Years from now. Ben would make the continent last him a long time.

McCarthy said, “I especially recommend my Albermarle pippins.”

Ase said, “I’ve been wanting a sizeable apple orchard across the road. I want mixed fruit trees for the house. But isn’t fall a better time for setting?”

Speech was not so difficult when he talked of things he knew, of crops and trees and stock.

“I see you know your business, young man. Fall’s much better. But if we get plenty of rain, you’ll have a year’s start. And a young fellow with as strong a back as yours wouldn’t kill himself if he had to water a few acres of saplings. Come on out to the wagon.”

Ase realized that he had forgotten his mother’s dinner and that Nellie had taken it to her at the cabin.

He said, “I’d like my mother and my wife to have a say. I’ll get them.”

He turned back.

“When you give my mother news of Ben—.”

The little man nodded.

“Oh, you can trust me. I carry messages for families clear across the country. Every mother’s son is half Midas and half saint.”

He winked.

“Helps business to bring good news. But you now, you’re a man that draws the truth.”

Because Amelia was not ready to let him go, for fear that he would carry away with him some undelivered word of Benjamin, or from him, Mr. McCarthy was persuaded to stay the night. The evening was the first pleasant one with his mother since Ben had gone. Nellie had been bland in the face of her animus, but the air was constantly tense. Amelia drew from the peddler long and loving messages direct from her son, along with Ohio incidents in which he played a splendid part. She swallowed them whole in her hunger. Amelia turned once sharply, to catch the girl unaware at the talk of Benjamin. Nellie’s pretty face seemed as unconcerned as that of a puss meeting last year’s Tom. When the supper table was cleared, Nellie covered it with a red baize cloth and washed the dishes while the men began their figuring.

Amelia said, “Mr. McCarthy, this farm is mine, but I consider that my elder son holds a third interest. With my third, I must express my choices as representing two people, where I do not agree with my younger son.”

McCarthy asked politely, “Would the land where the orchard’s to go be representing any special third?”

“No, the farm has not been actually divided.”

“Then would you be taking the word of a man wise in orchards, if nothing else in the world? This assortment I have written down here will give the finest fruit for family uses and a large market crop besides, to put money in the bank for all of you.”

Amelia nodded. The list was Ase’s own. Nellie smiled, putting away the extra raspberry tarts in the cupboard. She lifted a finger and McCarthy half-lifted one in return. The little lady would have her snow-apple tree, and the old termagant none the wiser. The list would include Grimes Goldens, Greenings, pippins, russets, Maiden Blush and Northern spies. A crabapple tree would go either side of the smokehouse, and along one line of the enlarged fruit and vegetable garden, a row of pear trees, Bartlett and Seckel, two peaches, a freestone and a cling, a sweet cherry and a sour, a Green Gage plum and a Damson. McCarthy had six grape vines left, Concord, Niagara and Delaware, and an arbor was planned north of the wicket gate. He had a dozen poplar saplings. The Linden house had long needed tall trees before it, for softening. Nellie’s heart was set on maples, but the poplars were almost providentially at hand. The poplar was a sad tree, but it grew sturdily and fast. Ase had always liked the tapering spire, the rustling together, like restless hands, of the leaves. Nellie agreed to the purchase and planting.

McCarthy said, “ ’Tis strange now, this place has been waiting all these years for McCarthy to bring you the fruits of the earth. What a sight ’twill be, all the colors in harvest time of a patchwork quilt. There’s the total figure—.”

Ase studied the column gravely. It would take almost all his reserve cash. He had hoped to hire an extra hand this summer. That would have to wait, and he would have to put in longer hours of his own. But all his seed was paid for, he would soon have lambs and calves to sell. He could spare the coming colt. Nellie had already brought the hens into higher egg production and had half a dozen brood hens setting early.

McCarthy said, “Ten per cent replacement for any dead in the fall. Ten per cent off for cash. ’Tis a good deal for me, for you’ll be taking all my stock before it dries on me.”

Ase brought out the tin cash box. Apple McCarthy looked away tactfully while he counted out the money. Amelia leaned forward and swept it into three rough piles.

“There. We’ll say the orchard’s owned three ways. You can put the three names on your receipt, Mr. McCarthy.”

Ase stared at the divided cash. The slips of engraved paper, the disks of metal, had been last year’s wheat and corn, to be exchanged in turn for other rich and living things, if only the willing labor of a strong man’s back and hands. The money seemed now not the gift of fruiting vines, but an unclean medium for human division.

Nellie said, “That’s right, Mother Linden.”

She winked at McCarthy. Their quick little minds met like the juncture of two bright brooks. He picked it up.

“Right indeed. You’ll be marking off the unborn orchard, so’s if it has to be watered in a dryness, it’s every man for himself, and God, I suppose, to take care of the watering of Benjamin’s portion.”

Amelia’s spite retreated, like a snake crawling away.

She said, “Why—I didn’t mean it that way. Only to make things clear.”

“And clear they are, to McCarthy surely. The receipts, Ma’am, here you be.”

She said, “I’ll go back to the cabin, Asahel. No, don’t come with me. Just light my lantern. Goodnight.”

McCarthy sighed after her.

“Ah, but families do be a mixed up business. ’Tis that has kept me a bachelor man. There’s more peace amongst the apples.”

The soft spring night was suddenly violated by a dog fight, a mild one, only the token bravery of Nellie’s Shep against an intruder. The intruder proved after all a friend, for it was Tim McCarthy’s little white dog. Tim stopped the argument and came through the door, the two dogs wagging themselves behind him. He looked around timidly.

“I’ve been lurking about ’til the old lady should be leaving,” he said. “Pray God ’twas not some other lanthern flickering down the road.”

He was struck by the stillness, and then he knew his brother.

“Ah—. ’Tis you—. These many years now.”

The two small men, as like as bird eggs in a nest, wrapped short arms around each other, thumped each other’s backs, and wiped away an Irish tear or two.

Ase thought, “This is why I trusted the stranger’s dry twigs instantly. I knew him for the same as Tim.”

An almost physical pain struck him. He longed to have himself and Benjamin enwrapped as closely as these two other brothers.

Tim said, “To the glory of God, I brought me fiddle with me, and Ase here would be having his flute handy, and Brother, did you not bring along your harmonica, I’ll swear I never knew you.”

The music seemed to Ase the best he had ever known. Tim’s fiddle outdid itself, the harmonica filled in all the empty spaces, and his own flute was almost as sweet as he had ever hoped for. It was Nellie, he thought, who made the difference, even more than the new added instrument and the delight of the McCarthys in their meeting. She patted her foot and laughed and tossed her curls at the lively tunes, and when Tim twanged the first notes for a gypsy song, she stood on tiptoe and lifted her arms like a butterfly’s wings, and danced and spun deliriously in the Linden parlor that had so long been gloomy.

She brought cool sweet milk from the cellar, and doughnuts, and they ate with a sleepy satisfaction. The McCarthys separated, Tim to call his white dog to follow him down the road, his brother to the Lindens’ downstairs company bedroom.

Nellie said, “Ase, I don’t like what your mother said about owning the farm. Is it true?”

“Yes.”

“Ben told me he was giving you his share. I thought your father left the property to you two boys.”

“No.”

“Oh. Then she can—. Has she made a will?”

“I don’t know. Nellie, it doesn’t matter.”

“It certainly does matter. I tell you, I don’t like it at all.”

She cleared away the plates and went ahead of him to bed. The house was still. Ase went to the cupboard and brought out Ben’s geography left from the Academy. He turned the pages slowly. The United States of America. Here they were now. Here beyond and south was Ohio. On the broad splayed map it seemed quite clear. Here was the West. He pictured its spread and desolation. The West went farther. Here was the end, the continent ended. This, now, was the Pacific Ocean.

Oh, Benjamin, my brother, he begged, stop there. I shall tend the orchard.