Part 47 (2/2)
”I have business with ye,” Boardman said, setting his cup on the table so sharply that the fluid sloshed over the rim. ”You may hev heard I'm fixin' to be married?”
”I may and I may not,” said Old Nathan, rocking slowly. He wasn't as much a part of the casual gossip of the community as most of those settled hereabouts, but when folk came to consult him he heard things from their hearts which a spouse of forty years would never learn. He recalled being told that Sally Ann Hewitt, the storekeeper's daughter from Advance, was being courted by rich Newt Boardman's boy among others. ”Say on, say on.”
”Sally Ann wouldn't have a piece from my daddy's cleared land,” said the boy, confirming the name of the girl-and also confirming the intelligence and strength of character Old Nathan had heard ascribed to Hewitt's daughter. ”So I set out to clear newground, the forty acres in Big Bone Valley, and I did that.”
”Hired that done,” said Old Nathan, rocking and sipping and scratching the dog.
”Hired Bully Ransden and his yoke uv oxen to help me,” retorted Boardman, ”fer ten good silver dollars-and where's the sin uv thet?”
”Honest pay fer honest work,” agreed Old Nathan, turning his hand to knuckle the dog's fur. Ridges of callus bulged at the base of each finger and in the web of his palm. ”No sin at all.”
”So I fixed to plant a crop afore raisin' the cabin, and in the Fall we'd be wed,” the boy continued. ”Only my horses, they wouldn't plow. Stood in the traces and s.h.i.+vered, thin they'd bolt.”
Boardman tried a sip of his coffee and grimaced unconsciously.
”There's milk,” his host offered with a nod toward the pitcher on the table beside the bowl of mush. ”If ye need sweetnin', I might could find a comb uv honey.”
”This here's fine,” the boy lied and swallowed a mouthful of the coffee. He blinked. ”Well,” he continued, ”I hired Bully Ransden t' break the ground, seein's he'd cleared it off. But his oxen, they didn't plow but half a furrow without they wouldn't move neither, lash'em though he did. So he told me he wouldn't draw the plow himself, and best I get another plot uv ground, for what his team wouldn't do there was no other on this earth thet could.”
”Did he say thet, now?” said the cunning man softly. ”Well, go on, boy. Hev you done thet? Bought another track uv land?”
”Sally Ann told me,” said Boardman miserably to his coffee cup, ”thet if I wasn't man enough to plow thet forty acres, I wasn't man enough t' marry her. And so I thought I'd come see you, old man, that mayhap there was a curse on the track as you could lift.”
Old Nathan said nothing for so long that his visitor finally raised his eyes to see if the cunning man were even listening. Old Nathan wore neither a smile nor a frown, but there was nothing in his sharp green eyes to suggest that he was less than fully alert.
”Well?” Boardman said, flexing back his shoulders.
”There's a dippin' gourd there by the tub,” said Old Nathan, nodding toward that corner. ”Fetch it back to me full from the stream and I'll see what I kin do.”
”There's water in the tub already,” said Boardman, glancing from the container to his host.
”Fetch me living water from the stream, boy,” the older man snapped, ”or find yer own way out uv yer troubles.”
”Yessir,” said Boardman-Boardman's son-as he came bolt upright off the chair and scurried to the dipper. It was thonged to a peg on the wall. When the boy s.n.a.t.c.hed hastily, the leather caught and jerked the gourd back out of his hand the first time.
The cunning man said nothing further until his visitor had disappeared through the back door of the cabin.
The cat gave a long glower at the b.i.t.c.h, absorbed in licking her own paws, before leaping to the floor and out the swinging door himself.
”Hope the boy's got better sense'n to cut through Spanish King's pasture,” Old Nathan muttered.
”Oh, he's not so bad for feeding,” said the dog, giving a self-satisfied lick at her own plump side.
”You were there at the newground, weren't ye, when the plow team balked?” asked the old man. He twisted to look down at the b.i.t.c.h and meet her heavy-browed eyes directly.
”Where the bull is, you mean?” the dog queried in turn.
”Bull? There's a bull in thet valley?”
”Oh, you won't catch me coming in hornsweep uv that 'un,” said the dog as she got up and ambled to the water tub again. ”Mean hain't in it, and fast. . . .” Anything further the dog might have said was interrupted by the sloppy enthusiasm with which she drank.
”Well, thet might be,” thought the cunning man aloud as he stood, feeling the ache in the small of his back and in every joint that he moved. Wet mornings. . . . ”Thet might well be.”
Old Nathan set his coffee cup, empty save for the grounds, on the table for later cleaning. He frowned for a moment at the mush and milk remaining in his bowl, then set it down on the floor. ”Here,” he said to the b.i.t.c.h. ”It's for you.”
”Well, don't mind if I do,” the animal replied, padding over to the food as Old Nathan himself walked to the fireboard.
The soup plate there had the same pattern as the five cups. The cunning man took it down and carried it with him out the back door.
Boardman was trudging up the slope from the creek, a hundred yards from the cabin. His boots were slipping, and he held the dipper out at arm's length to keep from slos.h.i.+ng his coat and trousers further.
Old Nathan's plowland was across the creek; on the cabin side he pastured his two cows and Spanish King, the three of them now watching their master over the rail fence as their jaws ratcheted sideways and back to grind their food.
”Not so bad a day, King,” said Old Nathan to his bull while his eyes followed the approach of his stumbling, swearing visitor.
”No rain in it, at least,” the bull replied. He watched both Boardman and the cunning man, his jaws working and his hump giving him the look of being ready to crash through the hickory rails. The fence wouldn't hold King in a real rage. Most likely the log walls of the cabin would stop him, but even that was a matter of likelihood rather than certainty.
”Any chance we might be goin' out, thin?” Spanish King added in a rumble.
”Maybe some, maybe,” Old Nathan admitted.
”Good,” said the bull.
He wheeled away from the fence, appearing to move lightly until his splayed forehooves struck the ground again and the soil shook with the impact. King stretched his legs out until his deep chest rubbed the meadow while his tail waved like a flagstaff above his raised haunches. His bellow drove the cows together in skittish concern and made Boardman glance up in terror that almost dumped the gourdful of water a few steps from delivering it.
”You hevn't a ring in thet bull's nose,” said the visitor when he had recovered himself and handed the gourd-still half full-over to Old Nathan. ”D'ye trust him so far?”
”I trust him t' go on with what he's about,” said the cunning man, ”though I twisted the bridge out'n his nose t' stop it. Some folk er ruled more by pain thin others are.”
”Some bulls, you mean,” said Boardman.
”Thet too,” Old Nathan agreed as he emptied the gourd into the soup plate and handed the dipper back to his visitor. ”Now, John Boardman, you carry this back to its peg, and then go set on the porch fer a time. I reckon yer horse is latherin' hisself fer nervousness with the noise.” A quick nod indicated Spanish King. The bull had begun rubbing the sides of his horns, one and then the other, on the ground while he snorted.
”Well, but what's yer answer?” Boardman pressed.
”Ye'll git my answer when I come out and give it to you, boy,” said the cunning man, peevish at being questioned. Some folk 'ud grouse if they wuz hanged with a golden rope. ”Now, go mind yer affairs whilst I mind mine.”
Nathan's cat reappeared from the brushplot to the west of the cabin, grinning and licking his lips. The old man walked over to the pasture fence, spinning the water gently to the rim of the shallow bowl to keep it from spilling, and the cat leaped to a post. ”He thinks he's tough,” said the cat, ears back as he watched King's antics.
”Now, don't come on all high 'n mighty and git yerself hurt,” the cunning man said. ”Never did know a tomcat with the sense t' know when to stop provoking things as could swaller'em down in a gulp.”
He paused at the fence and closed his eyes with his right hand open in front of him. For a moment he merely stood there, visualizing a pocketknife. It was a moderate-sized one with two blades, light-colored scales of jigged bone, and bolsters of German silver. Old Nathan had bought it from a peddler and the knife, unlike the clock purchased at the same time, had proven to be as fine a tool as a man could wish.
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