Читать книгу The Long Rifle - Stewart Edward White - Страница 22

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On the veranda Russell faced his new friend with glowing eyes.

“I think she is wonderful!” he cried.

Andy nodded slowly.

“You see what I meant,” said he. His face had darkened again; and he had fallen once more into his somber mood. “Well, come on,” he aroused himself.

He led the way around the house and through the orchard to the pasture on the other side.

“Here’s where I shoot, generally,” he observed. “He doesn’t like me to. Says it’s a waste of time and money. I guess it is; but I like it. It’s the only thing I can do that I do like. He’d stop it, if he could. But grandmother won’t let him. She gives me the powder and ball, too. She doesn’t often get her back up about things, but when she does she has her own way. He tries to take it out of me other ways. Oh, well!”

He leaned the rifle against the fence and laid beside it a heavily laden belt, which also he had taken from the pegs on the wall.

Russell picked it up to examine it and its attachments.

“That was Grandfather’s, too,” explained Andy. “That was his shot pouch and powder horn. And this was his knife and his tomahawk.” He took the hatchet from its sheath. “Come on, it’s getting late. He will be back from town.”

The pasture was still scattered with stumps of the old forest. On one of these Andy, with the tomahawk, clipped a white blaze as a mark.

They shot, turn and turn about. Andy proved to possess almost a nail-driving accuracy. Russell was at first boyishly chagrined over being outdone at a sport in which he rather fancied himself. But the chagrin was soon lost in a generous admiration.

“Oh, I’ve had a lot of practice,” Andy brushed aside his praises. “And I’m used to the gun.”

“I’m more used to percussion locks,” admitted Russell gratefully. “I always thought flintlocks couldn’t be accurate, but you’ve shown me differently.”

“Snap-haunces, Grandmother calls them.”

“Well, this one certainly can shoot. And you certainly can shoot it!”

“So could you, if you got used to it.”

“How about the knife-throwing?”

“I’m not very good at that. But I know how it ought to be done.”

He slipped the knife from its sheath, poised it in the flat of his hand, cast it with a long round sweep of the arm. The weapon turned once in its flight and stuck quivering in a near-by stump.

Russell tried to imitate the cast. The knife hit flatwise and bounded back. Two more trials were equally unsuccessful, one of them landing butt first; the other glancing off at an angle, carrying a sliver with it.

“Show me again,” he urged.

Andrew repeated his feat several times to Russell’s admiration.

“That’s not very good,” the country boy disclaimed the praise. “I ought to hit a pie plate every time at that distance.”

“Well, I’d hate to have you throw it at me!”

“It’s sort of fun. But what’s the good?”

“It’s sport. I’m going to get a knife and practise.”

Andy unbent to explanation.

“I don’t know as you can get one—a proper one,” said he. “You see these old woodsmen made their own knives. To throw right they’ve got to have just the right balance, and a man’s got to know the balance. You’ve got to know just how many times she is going to turn over. This one, with a full-arm throw, turns over twice in twenty feet. You’ve got to guess your distance and then give her a full-arm, or a half-arm, or whatever it is, so as to get her to land point first. Some men liked to have their knives turn every ten feet, others every eight or twelve; and they built them to do that.”

“Why, all that is extraordinarily interesting!” cried Russell. “I never heard of that before.”

“My grandfather taught me,” Andy’s face softened. “He was a wonderful man, as wonderful as Grandmother. After Boone left Kentucky he came here. But he never liked it, I think. Always he used to tell me that when I grew big enough he and I and Grandmother would go out there. Then word came that Boone had died. He used to sit on the veranda and look over there,” Andy waved his hand toward the reddening west. “He was very old. Oh, well!”

He gathered the equipment.

“I’ve got to see to the cows,” he said shortly. “He’ll be back soon. I’ll catch it.”

He had receded to a mood into which Russell could not follow. To Russell’s lively comments on the afternoon’s experience he returned short and distant answers. They returned to where the saddle horse stood hitched to the rail.

“I’ll come again. May I?” begged the city boy, preparing to mount. “We’ll have another shooting match. Perhaps I’ll do better.”

“I don’t expect I’ll have much time, what with the spring plowing.” Then, rousing himself to a sense of his apparent ungraciousness, “Of course I want to see you, Russell. But unless he goes to town I’m at work from dawn to dark!”

“Well, I’ll try it anyway,” returned the latter cheerfully. “And you take a day off sometime and come to see me in town. Promise!”

“I’d like to. I will if I can,” promised Andy, but without an answering smile.

“Well, good-bye,” Russell touched his horse with his heels. At the bend of the lane he turned to wave a hand. But Andy was standing, a dark figure against the sunset, gazing into the west.