Winter Run (5 page)

Charlie asked softly, “How can we keep her from jumping out? She might go over to Clarence.”

But before Matthew could answer, they heard the clacking of bulldozer tracks coming from the pond lane. The yellow Allis-Chalmers came into view after running over the cattle guard and breaking loose, as it turned out, two pipes. It was the first time a machine that big had ever been on Silver Hill. It was covered with dust. Clarence didn’t have a truck big enough to haul it, so Jake, his son, just drove it cross country on the old logging road, knocking down anything in the way. Some of the trees on that road were twenty years old, because that was the last time it had been used for logging.

“Boy, look at that thing, Matthew. Don’t it look neat? I’ll bet it can pull a lot of logs out in a big hurry. Don’t you think?”

“I reckon so,” Matthew replied. “And make a big mess, too.”

Charlie was afraid of Clarence and his crew. He stayed away from the barn and the woods, except to watch from the loading chute in the evening as the horses were brought in and fed and then turned out for the night. The second night, when the mare called Molly was slow going into the barn, Clarence whirled around and kicked her in the flank while yelling in his strange voice, “You better get your goddamn ass up in here, mare, before I sure enough kill you.”

One day, nearly two years later, Charlie’s pony was
being willfull, refusing to jump a little jump in the barn lot. It was hot. Charlie was angry, the pony was being stubborn, and suddenly he yelled in a high, strange voice, “You better get your goddamn ass up in here, mare, before I sure enough kill you.”

Matthew was hoeing in the garden patch next to the barn lot. He looked up shocked. “Charlie Lewis, what cause you got to talk to that mare like that? I’m half a mind to give you a licking …”

But then he saw Charlie’s face go white as it always did when something awful happened. He hurried into the lot as the boy slid down from the pony. He was staring somewhere far off and back in time. “What is it, Charlie? What you seeing? Tell me!”

“It was Clarence,” he said quietly. “One evening when they were here logging, Molly didn’t go into the barn fast enough. He said those words. Those exact words. He kicked her and yelled those words at her. It was awful. I hated it.” Fists clenched, he shouted again, “I hated it! I hated it!”

Then Matthew was speaking to him about it being bearable because Charlie knew better, knew enough to cry. He swayed back and forth as he held the boy in his arms, until Charlie stopped sobbing. It was almost nothing, really, compared to what else happened.

Tuesday of the second week, when the big power skidder still hadn’t come, and Clarence was getting behind, Charlie noticed a bullwhip hanging from the collar of Molly’s harness. It was black leather and
the handle was thick. Once in the village, Charlie had seen Jimmy Price showing off with one like it to some little kids. Charlie had been fascinated. It made a loud noise when Jimmy cracked it. The handle was heavy. Jimmy said it would knock you out if he hit you with it. If a lot of black leather on a black handle could be said to be ugly, this was ugly.

Charlie ran for Matthew who, because it was early morning, was in the milking barn. “Clarence has a bullwhip hanging off of Molly’s collar. He’s going to whip her with it. I know he is. You have to do something. Quick! Now!”

As always when Charlie came in during milking, Matthew looked up and pushed back his leather baseball cap. “Charlie, that horse belongs to him. I can’t go in there telling a man what to do with his property. He’d got to do something pretty awful before the law would come. Laying a whip on her ain’t awful enough. There just ain’t nothing to do so far.”

That evening as he watched from the chute, Charlie could see the welts on Molly’s back. They looked like tracks of black hair through the red dust on her dark hide. He could see the welts on the others, too, but Molly’s were the worst. Clarence was in a rage, yelling in his whispery voice to no one in particular, “If that goddamn son-of-a-bitching skidder don’t come quick, I’m going to end up just like that shithead George—in a hole.” And then to his son, Tommy, “These goddamn horses got to work tomorrow. We got to get caught up. If that lazy-ass Molly don’t pull tomorrow,
I’ll knock her head off.”

In the morning Charlie left early, before Clarence and his crew were even at the barn. He circled around behind the summerhouses to where they were logging. The bulldozer was parked at the edge of the woods. Charlie hadn’t been there since George had left. The place was a mess. The earth was gouged out where the bulldozer had made ruts while pulling out the logs. The laps were left where they had been cut instead of pulled to the open and piled for burning. Cans and bottles were all over the area where the men ate lunch. The woods looked dirty.

Charlie crawled behind a huge fallen tree. Time passed. The men and horses came and began work. Charlie said later that from the beginning Clarence was furious at his two sons and the other white man he didn’t recognize, telling them over and over what they already knew—that the skidder was not coming for another week. The horses felt the strain. They would jump sideways at Clarence’s slightest move. Even the air was full of tension. High billowing thunderheads slowly moved in from the west, above Burdens Mountain.

The bullwhip hung coiled on Molly’s collar. Charlie watched. The logs that they were skidding out of the woods were the huge ones. The four horses struggled. Clarence seldom let them rest. Then a really big log caught on a root. Without turning to see what had stopped the log, Clarence jerked the whip from Molly’s harness, stepped back to get the distance, and
began to whip the four horses, cursing them steadily. Molly was the smallest. She gave up first. Clarence slowly coiled the whip in his left hand, keeping the handle in his right. With a horrible sound, he lunged at the mare and started beating her in the head with the handle, his voice raised to a shriek, his baby face contorted in rage.

The instant he hit her in the eye the first time, Charlie was up and running at him, screaming, “Stop!”—his loud voice already clouded with hysteria and tears, covering the hundred feet before Clarence was aware of what was going on. Charlie threw himself at Clarence’s arm, but he was too late. The butt of the handle had knocked out Molly’s right eye like breaking an egg.

Clarence turned and shook the boy off his arm. When he realized who his assailant was, he even smiled as he recoiled the whip. “You just stay there, you little shitass, and I’m going to teach you to mess with me. Thinking you’re so high and mighty with that damn professor—him and that nigger you go around with. Well, he ain’t here to take care of you now.”

Charlie was still on the ground, transfixed by the language and the horror of Molly’s eye. Clarence got the distance and raised the whip. Tommy hurled himself at his father, “No, Pap, if you hit the little son of a bitch, they’ll call the law on us, and you’ll go to jail and they’ll take everything we own.” By this time Tommy had hold of his father’s arms. So the stroke of the whip was deflected.

Charlie got up and ran toward home, screaming for Gretchen and Matthew. He found her first. By the time the two of them found Matthew, Gretchen was nearly hysterical herself because she couldn’t imagine what had happened. It wasn’t until they were all in the professor’s study that Matthew started to get the story. At the part about Molly’s eye, Gretchen started to sob uncontrollably, until she looked up and saw the pain on the professor’s face, as if he himself had been there and let it happen.

The professor called the sheriff and gave him the gist of the thing. Twenty-five minutes later, Sheriff Cook came in the lane in a cloud of dust with the siren on. He had two deputies with him. He was very excited. Everyone knew Clarence Flint.

“Do you reckon he has a gun?” asked the sheriff. They all looked at Charlie who shook his head no. No one questioned how Charlie would know. They just went. Matthew said by the time the car had bounced across the field the deputies had out the sawed-off shotguns, ready for anything.

All they found was Clarence and his two sons. The fourth man had run. Clarence was sitting on a log, like he was waiting for them, elbows on knees, chin in hands. He looked exhausted. His child’s face looked smooth and blank, like polished stone. The two boys looked as if they wanted more than anything in the world to go home. The four horses were exactly where they had stopped. Molly had her head almost to the ground. Her ears were pulled back in pain. Every few
seconds she shook her head. The fluid from her eye had run down her cheek like she had shed a monstrous tear. Sheriff Cook picked up the whip and for a second looked like he would use it. He threw it to a deputy and motioned for Clarence to get in the car.

“Now you boys listen to me and listen good,” said the sheriff to Clarence’s sons. “You take them horses down to the barn and get the harness off them and clean up that mare’s eye. Stay there until the veterinary comes. And do what he says. And God Almighty help you if you run off. Because if you do I will hunt you down like dogs …” He struggled for composure. He said later that never before in his life as sheriff had he wanted to hurt someone. He said the picture of that mare with her head hanging down to the ground would stay with him for the rest of his life. And Shirley Cook had seen some pretty awful things in his day.

The deputies stayed in the car with Clarence while Sheriff Cook and Matthew went back into the house to talk to the professor and call Doc White, the veterinarian. Gretchen and Charlie were still there. Mrs. James and Sally had made tea. The professor had put a little brandy in the tea—for Charlie, too. Matthew said they looked like ghosts they were so pale. Mr. Lewis wouldn’t be home till Friday night. Maybe they should spend the night at Silver Hill.

Shirley Cook called the vet and told his assistant what was needed. She said Dr. White would leave town right away, be there in thirty minutes.

Matthew and Professor James and the sheriff stood on the front porch. “You know the law, Professor, you teach it. All I can do is take him down to the court house and yell at him,” said the sheriff. “I can’t lock him up for knocking his own mare’s eye out. Anyway, he would say that it was an accident and the two boys would back him up. He might even try to get Charlie for assault.” He shook his head in disgust. “I swear to God, it was about the cruelest thing I ever seen. What can we do with the mare?”

“Send her to Miss Alice Jackson,” said the professor. “You know how she loves animals, and now that she has let her cow go, she has room. Matthew can arrange it. I’ll take care of the feed and vet.” He paused. “But I still have the problem of getting that damn timber sold …”

The way they worked it out—law or no law—was that the Flints would go back to work the next day. An off-duty deputy would check on them twice a day. The boys would be all right because, curiously, they were more scared of the law than they were of Clarence. Matthew would supervise the feeding of the three remaining horses, morning and evening. Clarence agreed to the plan because he knew that if he didn’t, he’d never get another day’s worth of work in that county. His sullen baby face never changed, though; he just spat out yes. And as planned, Molly would be sent to Miss Alice who was lonely and would be happy to nurse her back to health.

• • •

Matthew returned to the house to tell Gretchen and Charlie what was going to happen. While he was explaining, the sheriff left and the professor started in the front door. Mrs. James was waiting for him. Matthew said that for the first time in his life he saw them have sharp words. The professor even raised his voice a little and Matthew heard him say, “Yes, damn it, we’ll get the money in time.”

Gretchen and Charlie went home the next morning after spending the night in the big house. Sally made a wonderful dinner and Mrs. James was kind. Charlie didn’t go near the barn or the woods. He spent a lot of time with the old mule. He was seen staring at her face. For a week he hardly spoke. Everyone worried. Charlie talking nonstop was sometimes a nuisance, but Charlie silent was unsettling. The skid-der arrived in time to get the timber out, so the professor would get his money by Labor Day.

Molly slowly recovered. Doc White eventually took out the eye and sewed her eyelid shut, and she was fine—just like old Bat, except she didn’t have any eyeball at all. She stayed with Miss Alice because no one wanted her to go back to Clarence and he was afraid to insist.

A month passed and Charlie still was nearly silent. Matthew wondered what else was wrong. Charlie began to come to the little milking barn in the morning and evening. He would sit silent in the corner while
the milk swished into the bucket. He had always liked milking time. He liked the smell of the cow and the sound of her chewing, Matthew’s breathing, and in the summer the buzz of a wasp. One evening, after they were finished and were walking up the path to the gate, Bat was there, facing them. Charlie was in front. He stopped for a moment and then began to shake. Matthew barely had time to put the bucket down before Charlie whirled around into his arms. “Tell me how it happened! Tell me. Did Leonard hit her? Did he beat her? Tell me.”

For an instant Matthew didn’t understand. The boy had gone wild. He tried to restrain him. When Charlie yelled out Leonard’s name, Matthew looked up at old Bat and made the connection.

He grabbed Charlie shoulders. Hard. He put his face close to his. “Charlie! You stop. I can’t tell you nothing if you don’t shut up.” Then louder, “Hush! You hear me?” And shook him. The boy looked at him, at his eyes, with their bloodshot whites and pupils like dark pools. Eyes he had known for what seemed like his whole life. He stopped.

“Turn around, Charlie! Look at her! What you see!”

“I see,” he gasped, because Matthew had such a hold on him, “I see a milky-looking eye that’s blind. Blind! How did it happen? Tell me!”

“Go close. What else you see, Charlie? … What?”

Charlie peered at the eye. “I see a scar on the milky part where something went into it. What was it?”

Matthew let him go and the boy turned again to
face him.