Authors: High on a Hill
“Do you play baseball?” Annabel sat with her elbows on the table, watching the boy eat. His face lit up while talking about the game.
“It’s all I ever wanted to do, but I know now that only a few are good enough to make a living doing it.”
“Chicago is a long way from here.”
“You’re telling me. I rode the train to Chicago when I left home, but I walked and got rides on the freights when I left there to go to St. Louis. I thought there’d be a chance for me there.”
“No luck?”
“No. I worked at anything I could find to do in order to eat, and finally saved enough to go home. I wandered into the wrong place and got the money taken away from me and had to start all over again.”
“What happened this time?”
“I’d been feeling poorly and decided to cut through the woods toward the river to spend the night. While I was sleeping someone went through my pack.”
“And stole your money,” Annabel said dryly as she brought a loaf of freshly baked bread to the table, cut and buttered a slice. She placed it on his plate.
“Yeah. They stole my shirt, coat, baseball and mitt too. If I ever see that mitt, I’ll know it’s mine and I’ll get it back.” Jack’s eyes turned cold and he looked at her.
“Have you ever planted a garden, Jack?”
“I’ve done most everything that’s to be done on a farm, ma’am. My pa saw to it that us kids did chores by the time we were table-high. Me and Joe—he’s my brother who’s a couple years older than me—got to where we could do most things Pa could do by the time we were twelve.”
“We just moved here. Is the middle of June too late to put in a garden?”
“No, ma’am. I reckon you have as long a growing season here as we do at home.”
“I’ll pay you, Jack.”
“No, ma’am, you won’t. I owe you for what you’ve already done. Pa’d be shamed if he knew I’d let myself get in such a fix that I had to ask for something to eat and was unable to work for it.”
“We’ll talk about it later. My father will be back in a few days. At that time we’ll have to make other sleeping arrangements for you. Spinner is going to build another bunk in the corner of the barn that’s been fixed up as living quarters for him and Boone.”
“I heard one of them talkin’ that it wasn’t fit for me to be in here with you. I agree, ma’am. I’m fit enough now to sleep in the barn if you’ll allow me to stay.”
Annabel got up from the table and looked out the back door when she heard a truck drive in.
“Boone is here.” She went out onto the back porch. Jack followed.
Boone’s dark eyes swept the yard as he stepped from the truck. Spinner came to the door of the barn and lifted a hand, a signal that all was right here.
“Brought ya some smoked fish and a hunk of deer meat,” he called out to Annabel. Then he spoke to Jack as he came out onto the porch. “Looks like ya got yore feet back under ya.”
“Yes, sir. I feel much better.”
“Jack’s going to help me put in a garden. I bought seed when I went to town with Papa.”
“I told ya I’d spade up a spot for ya.”
“Spinner plowed it. He was going to help me rake it today but said he had to work on the truck. Have you had breakfast?”
“A bite, but I could use a hot biscuit or two.”
After giving the package of fish to Annabel, Boone took a bundle from the back of the truck. Jack stepped out to take it. Boone noticed that he winced when he used his left hand.
“What am I going to do with deer meat?” Annabel asked as Jack took the meat into the kitchen.
“Cook it.”
“I don’t know how.”
“The boy does. Raised on a farm, wasn’t ya, boy?” Boone’s dark eyes honed in on Jack when he came back out onto the porch.
“Yes, sir. Ma’am, I can tell you how my sister Julie cooked it.”
“Well, glory be. How was that?”
“Papa would cut off a big hunk for Sis to cook right away and put the rest in the smokehouse. She would soak the fresh meat overnight in salt water. In the morning, she’d put it in a pot with fresh water, add a hot pepper or two and boil it until it was tender. Then she’d take it out and put it in the oven and bake it for a long time. We looked forward each fall to Papa getting a deer.”
“We don’t have any hot peppers.”
“Ya got some sage leaves, ain’t ya?” Boone asked. “That’ll work.”
“I’ll give it a try.” Annabel smiled fondly at Boone. “Now come on in.”
“First I got to put some water in my radiator. I got to head back in a couple hours.”
“I can do that.” Jack stepped off the porch, picked up a bucket and headed for the horse tank. Boone looked after him for a minute before following Annabel into the kitchen, where the aroma of freshly baked bread filled his nostrils.
“He’s a nice boy,” Annabel said as soon as Boone had washed and was seated at the table. “I’ve asked him to stay on and help me put in the garden.”
“Don’t ya think ya should talk it over with your pa?”
“Why would he object? Jack’s not a revenuer.”
“Watch how ya throw them words around, missy.”
“When are you coming back to stay for a while?”
“End of the week. Then Spinner will take a turn. Anyone been around?”
“Two men came in a truck for the load of liquor Spinner brought back in the wagon the other day.”
Boone looked up sharply. “Ye’re gettin’ too smart for yore britches.”
“It isn’t polite to discuss a lady’s britches with a young lady.”
“And … don’t get smarty. That kid isn’t dumb. We don’t need him hangin’ ’round.”
“If he does find out something, what can he do? Ring up the Federals?”
“He can spread it around, is what he can do. And, missy, that’d not be good.”
“He’s company, and he’ll help me put in a garden and look after the chickens and cow. He said that he and his brother took turns milking at home. I want him to stay. At least for a while.”
“I run into a feller that’s lookin’ for him.”
“How did you do that? Why is he looking for him?”
“His folks are worried … the feller said.”
“I’ve already told Jack to write to his folks and that I’d mail it.”
“Gettin’ pretty thick with him, ain’t ya?”
Annabel glared over her shoulder at the man seated at the table.
“Boone, you and Papa make me so mad at times. You stash me out here in the country and expect me to sit here and look at the wall. I have to depend on one of you to take me to get groceries, to church … for everything. You don’t want me to have any company. I’m going to tell Papa I want a car and someone to teach me to drive it.”
“Whoa, there. I offered to teach you how to ride a bicycle.” The grin on his face infuriated her.
She turned back to the stove and didn’t see that the grin quickly faded into a frown. Boone went out the door and across the yard to where Jack was coming from the horse tank with a bucket of water.
“We’d better get a rag or a gunnysack to take the cap off the radiator,” Boone called. Then, when he got closer, “She’s goin’ to be hotter than a two-bit whore.”
Jack grinned. “That’d be pretty hot.”
“How’d you know that?” Boone took a gunnysack from the back of the truck and, using it to protect his hand, carefully unscrewed the cap, then sprang back when boiling water and steam gushed up.
“Oh, I hear … things,” Jack explained.
“Yeah? What thin’s?”
“This past year I learned not everyone is bad; most folks are real nice, like Miss Annabel.”
“Don’t be gettin’ any notions ’bout her, lad,” Boone warned.
“Whata ya mean? Like I want her for a sweetheart?”
“That’s what I mean,” Boone said bluntly. He lifted the bucket and poured the water into the hissing radiator.
“She’s a nice lady and I like her … but not like that.” Jack bristled with sudden temper.
“Don’t get on your high horse. I was just warnin’ ya.”
“Consider it done.” Jack picked up the bucket and walked back to the horse tank.
T
ESS CARTER WAS USED TO FEELING ASHAMED of her family, herself and the place where she lived. She never really thought of the ramshackle house as being her home, because it wasn’t. It was her brothers’ home and they just allowed her to live there and wait on them. Deep down she felt a deep and constant resentment.
Now she was angry with herself for being so taken aback when she met the man on the horse that she had acted like a darn fool. At first she had been ashamed of the old ragged dress she wore and the shoes she’d laced up over her ankles because she was so afraid of snakes. She hoped that he’d ride on by and not see her. When he did see her, her only thought had been to get out of his sight as quickly as possible. The heavy shoes had made her trip and fall face down in the dirt. At that moment, she had wanted the earth to open up and swallow her.
At mealtime Leroy had returned and was adding to her humiliation. He would do or say anything to make himself look big in his brothers’ eyes. He had stretched the story he told Bud and Marvin, making it appear she had been purposely waiting for the man to come by. Bud had lifted a hand to slap her and would have if not for Marvin.
“Calm yoreself. Ain’t no harm been done that I can see. You still watchin’ over there, Leroy?”
“Yeah. Man that left in the big car ain’t come back. Feller came in with a wagon of hay for the horses. Feller in a truck comes once in a while. Got a right good-lookin’ woman over there, Marvin. She’s got good tits, white legs and swings her skinny ass when she walks. Keeps herself fixed up too.”
“They fixin’ to do any farmin’ over there?”
“Feller was workin’ on a plow behind the barn.”
“Too late to start plowin’. You watchin’ our corn crop?”
“Yeah. Too early for coons.” Leroy’s eyes honed in on his sister, who was older by eight years. “What we goin’ to do about Tessie meetin’ that feller? She ort to get a swat on her bare butt.”
“Try it, Leroy,” Tess said. “Lay a hand on me, and the first time I catch you asleep I’ll cave your mud-ugly head in with a stove poker.”
“Now, cut that out.” Marvin looked from Tess to his youngest brother. “I’m head man here. If Tessie needs a swat, I’ll do it.”
Tess stood up from the table, remembering other vicious slaps and the beatings her pa had given her. Her frightened heart was pounding, and she prayed that none of the three knew it. She didn’t know if it was courage or foolishness that caused her to look her eldest brother in the eye and defy him.
“I’m taking no more abuse from you, Marvin, and I’m not going to be slapped around by Bud or Leroy ever again.”
“Well, now, what ya think ya’ll do about it?” Bud sneered.
“I’ll shoot you,” Tess said calmly.
The brothers laughed. Leroy laughed so hard, he headed for the back door to spit.
“I knowed it was a mistake. Pa knowed it too. He was agin’ lettin’ ya go to Aunt Cora to be schooled. Shows what happens when ya let a woman get the bit in her teeth. He was plum cloudy-headed over Maw and let her have her way. Pity she didn’t live to see what happened to ya,” Marvin said spitefully.
“Yes, it is a pity,” Tess agreed. “She worked herself to death taking care of five lazy boys and Pa.”
“Ya ain’t better let Calvin hear ya sayin’ that. He was right fond of Maw.” Bud continued to eat. He never let anything interfere with shoveling food into his mouth. He was already so fat he couldn’t mount a mule. “Calvin said it was a blessin’ Maw passed over before ya come back with yore belly swelled with a bastard.” Bud spoke between mouthfuls of food.
“I was raped by Cousin Willard. All of you knew it and did nothing about it.”
“It was yore word agin his’n.” Marvin’s face was a thundercloud, as it always was when this subject came up. “He said ya wanted it, begged him to do it. Willard said ya warn’t no good at it nohow.”
Anger made Tess’s small body stiffen. Her head shot up, her fists clenched. They hadn’t believed her, and they hadn’t believed Aunt Cora. They wanted to believe that no-good, thieving, stinking, nasty-talking Willard Carter because he was a little better off than the rest of the Carters.
“If you had the brains of a crabapple,” Tess said with a sneer, “you’d know that no woman would
want
anything from a fat, unwashed muddle-head like Willard!”
“He be a man with strong seed.” Gravy ran from the corner of Bud’s mouth when he grinned. “He planted one in ya on his first try, didn’t he?”
“And the whipping Pa gave me when I came home shook the evil thing right out of me. I thank God for that!”
“Hear, now, don’t ya be talkin’ like that. It ain’t Christian.”
Tess looked at her fat brother with disgust. “You wouldn’t know a Christian if one jumped up and bit you.”
“She’s bein’ lippy, Marvin,” Bud said. “She ain’t had a switchin’ since Pa died. Pa always said a woman needs her legs switched once a week.”
Tess reached behind her for the butcher knife.
“Yeah. She’s gettin’ plumb feisty.” Leroy tried to sidle behind her, but she backed up.
“Leave her be. Leroy, get on up to the still and siphon off some of that last batch and bring me a jug. I got thinkin’ to do.”
“Ya ain’t goin’ to do nothin’ ’bout what she done?”
“Are you wantin’ me to club ya upside the head? Get on and do what I told ya. Ya ain’t in charge a Tessie. If’n yo’re finished fillin’ yore gut, Bud, go with him.”
“But … Marvin, I ain’t done yet.”
“He won’t be until the last crumb is gone from the table,” Tess said, and Bud looked as if he’d like to hit her, but he didn’t dare with Marvin there.
“Hitch up the wagon, Leroy. Take that case of bottles with you. This is a good batch. We’ll bottle some of it. Send it back with Bud. You stay and let Cousin Arney go home.”
Next to Calvin, who lived on a farm four miles west of them and ruled his family with even a stronger hand, Marvin was the smartest and the best-looking of the Carter boys. The other brother had disappeared when Marvin became the head of the family. The two had never gotten along.
Marvin had never married, although he’d had several dalliances with women from time to time. Tess suspected that they were the ones who did the breaking, because there was not one speck of softness in her brother. He was hard, demanding and cruel. He had taken over when their father died.