The Choiring Of The Trees Part 26

Somehow, the way he asked that, I knew he really didn't know anything about it. Maybe he had done it in his delirium, but maybe he hadn't done it at all. "Nail," I said, "day before yesterday morning, right down the trail yonder, Sull Jerram was shot off his horse with a .22 bullet."

The way Nail looked, I knew he was, if not innocent, ignorant of the act. "What was he doin up here?" he asked.

"Followin Viridis to find your hidin-place, I reckon," I said.

"Who shot him? Did she do it?"

"No, I thought it was you, but maybe it wasn't, if you weren't even here day before yesterday."

"Where was he hit?"

"Right yonder, jist beyond that big white ash tree."

"No, I mean where in his body did the bullet hit him?"

I touched a spot behind my ear. "Right here," I said.

Nail shook his head. "Was he hurt bad?"

"He's dead, Nail."

"No."

It got awfully quiet up there in that cavern; all you could hear was the sound of the waterfall. Finally I made some conversation: "They buried him this mornin up at the Jasper cemetery, but your sister wasn't even plannin to go to the funeral, and I don't reckon n.o.body else went neither, 'cept the preacher and maybe the sherf." Nail didn't comment on that, so I went on: "You never saw such a happy bunch of folks as everbody in Stay More. We threw a big squar dance up to the schoolhouse to celebrate." Nail managed a smile but didn't say anything about that either. "The sherf locked up your brother Waymon at the Jasper jail, but Waymon has got a good alibi because he was gone plumb to Harrison at the time it happened, to get some medicine for your dad."

"How's my dad?" Nail asked.

"I reckon Doc Swain can tell ye all about that," I said. "I better go git him right now." Then I suggested, "Why don't I jist take that .22 with me and hide it somewheres off from here?"

"No," Nail said. "Leave it where it is. I want Doc Swain to see it."

"You're crazy," I said.

He smiled. "So are you, Latha. Comin up here like ye done. Takin keer of me. Warmin me up like ye done. Weren't ye scared there was a danger I could've raped ye like they thought I done to Rindy?"

I smiled. "I wush ye had done somethin to me. And now I won't never git me another chance. Good-bye, Nail." I turned and fled.

I wondered who to tell first: Viridis or Doc Swain. As it turned out, I didn't have to decide, because when I went into the village looking for one or the other, I found them sitting together out on the porch of Doc Swain's clinic, enjoying the shade and the afternoon breeze. I don't know what they'd been talking about as I strolled up, but they'd become pretty good friends and could have been talking about anything under the sun.

"Howdy, Latha," Doc Swain said.

"Howdy, Doc," I said.

"Hi, Latha. How are you today?" Viridis said.

"Hi, Viridis. I'm pretty good. How are you?"

"Fine."

"I wish it would come a rain," Doc Swain said.

"We could use one," I allowed.

"I wish it would come a man named Nail," Viridis said.

"We could use one of them too," I said. I timed a few beats before adding, "And it looks like we've done finally got one, sure enough."

Doc and Viridis both raised their eyebrows at me. "How's thet?" Doc asked.

"He's back," I said.

Doc looked up and down the main road of Stay More. "Sh.o.r.e," he said. "On a big fine white horse, in a full suit of steel armor and chain mail."

"No, he's flat on his back, with alternate-day malaria," I said.

Doc said, "Huh?" and Viridis said, "Where?"

"At the waterfall," I said to her. And then I had my story ready for her: "I thought I'd seen you on Rosabone riding by, heading that way, and I figured you'd looked for me and not found me, so I ran off after you, but I couldn't catch up, and so I went on to the waterfall by myself, and there he was, in the cavern."

Viridis jumped up. "Really?" she said.

"Yes, and he's got a bad case of alternate-day malaria, and this is the alternate day, with chills and fevers and sweats."

Doc Swain jumped up. "Really?" he said. "That's sh.o.r.e enough the symptoms. Where is this cavern?"

"Just beyond where you went day before yesterday morning."

Doc and Viridis exchanged looks, and I knew they were thinking what I had thought, and I said, "But I don't think it could've been him who done it. I don't think he even got here until sometime last night."

Viridis was leaving the porch. "I'll saddle Rosabone," she said.

Doc was leaving the porch. "Let me get my bag, and then I'll get my horse too."

I was not leaving the porch. They hadn't invited me. I waited to see if either of them would think to invite me. I didn't have a horse, and I'd slow them down if I rode behind Viridis on Rosabone, and I was prepared to refuse the offer if she made it. But she didn't. She reappeared very shortly, astride the mare. She hadn't bothered to stop to change into her jodhpurs but was still wearing her dress and had hiked it up immodestly to get her legs over the mare's back. Doc Swain appeared on his horse, with his gladstone bag strapped behind the saddle. His dog tried to go with them, but Doc said, "Sit, Galen. Stay," and the dog obeyed.

At least, both Doc and Viridis thought to wave good-bye to me.

I was hungry, I hadn't had any dinner, but I just sat there on Doc's porch. The least I could do, I thought, was act as his receptionist; in case any patients came, I could tell them the doctor was out on a call and would be back shortly. How shortly I didn't know, but I sat there for a long time on Doc's porch. Galen slept. No patients came. Some of the men who gathered every afternoon over on the porch of Ingledew's store drifted into the village and took their places, sitting on crates, nail kegs, and odd chairs, whittling with their pocketknives and spitting, and scarcely throwing me a glance. Doc Plowright, who had his clinic practically right across the road from Doc Swain's, stepped out on his porch and stared at me for a bit, wondering what a patient of his was doing sitting on the porch of his compet.i.tor. Then he went back inside. He didn't have any patients today either.

The afternoon pa.s.sed. Rouser showed up from wherever he'd been, following my trail and finding me. Rouser and Galen argued for a while but decided it was too hot for a fracas. They lay together on the porch floor and went to sleep. To entertain myself, I had a few pretty good daydreams, with real people in them, Viridis and Nail, the woods, the trees, the moon and the stars, forever.

By and by Doc Swain returned, stopping his tired horse in the yard of his clinic and getting down. He came up and sat with me on the porch. "Latha," he said, "I do believe you were absolutely right. It sh.o.r.e enough is the two-day ague, or alternate-day malaria, as you call it. But he's gonna be all right. I gave him some quinine and some advice. He's gonna be all right. Them two are gonna live happy ever after."

On.

The trees are singing. She notices it as soon as they reach the tall white ash beneath which Sull Jerram fell. She hears the ash itself, who starts the chorus. As she and the doctor ride between or beneath them, those last hundred yards, the trees one by one pick up the song until all of them, white ash, oak, hickory, maple, walnut, beech, chinquapin, elm, locust, and even cedar are harmonizing in their serenade of her.

The smaller dogwood, redbud, persimmon, and sa.s.safras try to join in but are almost drowned out.

"Sh.o.r.e is purty way back up around in here," Doc observes.

"Listen at that waterfall."

"That's not the waterfall, Colvin," she tells him.

He stops his horse, dismounts, listens. A smile of pleasure comes to his face. "I do believe you're right," he says. "It's something else. Angels, maybe."

The late-afternoon light from the west breaks into long rays through the boughs of the high trees; the black hole of the mouth of the cavern is illuminated as if by spotlights. The singing swells. Doc's halloo overrides it, cuts into it.

"h.e.l.lO THE CAVE!" he calls. "Nail! It's us. It's Colvin Swain and yore ladyfriend."

The singing of the trees m.u.f.fles whatever reply comes from within, a feeble acknowledgment or welcome.

She walks behind Doc, partly afraid. If the sight of him is truly awful and causes her to stumble, she can stumble against Doc's back and he will turn and catch her.

But it is Doc who stumbles, on the scree or talus of the cavern's lip. She is thoroughly familiar with every step of the way, but he is not, and falls. She helps him up. He is embarra.s.sed. "Kinder pre-carious there," he remarks. She waits to let him go on ahead of her.

It takes a long moment for their eyes to readjust from the spotlight beams of afternoon light to the cavern's dim interior. While the two of them are blind, the trees, seeing her disappear, m.u.f.fle their cantata to a murmur. She is aware of the quiet and the dark and the nearness of Nail. Then she sees him: he is making a great effort to get out of the bed. He has his feet outside the bed, on the ground, but the bed is not much higher than the ground itself, and he cannot rise up. Colvin Swain moves to him quickly and puts a hand on his shoulder. "Here there, boy, jist lay easy! Don't ye try to git up." The doctor forces him to lie back down but notices the dampness of the bedclothes and exclaims, "Woo, you sh.o.r.e wet the bed!"

"Sweat," says Nail. It is his first word, but as he lies down he fixes his eyes upon hers and smiles. "Howdy, Miss Monday," he says, with mock formality. "Glad ye could make it."

"Good afternoon, Mr. Chism," she returns, with careful politeness. "I'm proud to be here."

"Heck," says Doc Swain. "I thought you two knew each other better'n that. Don't ye even want to shake hands? I could turn my back, I reckon, if ye want to do more than that."

"We can wait," Nail says.

"Wal, let's take yore temper-ture," Doc says, and sticks a thermometer into Nail's mouth. Then he begins his examination, palpating the spleen. After a while he removes the thermometer and studies it and says, "Hmm," and begins asking Nail several questions. How many days now has he had this trouble? Has he had any diarrhea? Has he lost consciousness?

Viridis only half-listens to the conversation, the questioning. She is still trying to hear what the trees are singing, but it is soft and distant. She takes note of the careful array of supplies she's left for him, all of them untouched. She opens the bag containing the spare bed linen and takes out fresh sheets, to replace the damp ones, and a fresh pillowcase.

"This is sh.o.r.e some layout ye got here," Doc observes, to Nail. "You say you think you jist got here last night?"

Viridis explains, "I put all of this here, for him." And she thinks to add, "With Latha's help."

"I see," Doc says. "Been plannin a hideaway, huh?"

"He couldn't very well go right straight to his folks' house, could he?" she says.

"Reckon not," the doctor admits. "The sherf would sh.o.r.e to haul him off to jail purty quick."

"You won't tell where we...you won't tell anybody about this place, will you?" she asks.

"Wal now, that depends," Doc says. "You'uns know that my dad is the justice of the peace, and I sh.o.r.e couldn't tell my own dad a lie." The doctor opens his gladstone bag, rummages around in it, brings out a pair of bottles. "These yere pills is for yore fever," he says. "Take a couple of 'em whenever ye git to feelin too hot, but not more'n six or eight a day. Now, this here blue bottle is the quinine, and I want ye to take a spoonful..." (he turns to Viridis) "...is they a spoon here? okay, a spoonful ever four hours or so, till it's all gone, and then you..." (he turns to Viridis) "...you come and git me and I'll come and give him some more of it, if he needs it, and he probably will. Now, this quinine will probably make ye start hearin things, funny noises that aint real. It's called tinnitus, and it aint as serious as it sounds, but I figured I'd better warn ye. You'd better jist rest and stay off yore feet and get good and well afore ye try to do anything."

"Anything?" Nail says.

Doc Swain coughs. "Anything real strenuous. Anything that you'd have to git out of bed to do. You can do anything ye want as long as it's in bed." He coughs again.

"Right," Nail says. "When can I go see my dad?"

"Not till I tell ye," the doctor says. "I don't want ye to go no further'n that white ash down the trail yonder till I give ye permission."

All three of them glance at the white ash, whose pianissimo murmuring seems audible only to Viridis. She understands the significance of Doc Swain's reference to it, and her eyes s.h.i.+ft, as theirs do, from the white ash to the rifle lying atop the black bearskin.

"I aint never used that on a person," Nail says of the rifle.

"Who said ye did?" Doc challenges.

"You're makin hints," Nail observes. "I jist want ye to know right here and now, I never kilt Sull."

"How'd ye know he's been kilt, if ye didn't do it?" Doc says, almost c.o.c.ky with the knowledge that he'd tripped him up and caught him.

"Latha tole me," Nail says.

"d.a.m.n that gal!" Doc swears. "Why couldn't she of waited and let me do it?"

"You couldn't tell me as nice as she did," Nail says.

"That's a .22, aint it?" Doc demands.

"Yeah, but I aint never used it on a person. I swear."

"How you gonna convince a jury of that?"

"I done already failed to convince one jury," Nail says. "I hope I don't never have to try to convince another one."

"Boy," Doc says sternly. "If this aint a mess. If this aint the beatenest kettle of fish ever I seed. d.a.m.ned if I want to be a goldarned accessory, or even accused of one, but I am gonna take that rifle with me, and I am gonna keep it where n.o.body can find it, and if you'uns have to have you a firearm for keepin off the wolfs and bars at night, I'll bring ye a different caliber next time I come up here."

Surely, she thinks, the other two, the two men, can hear what she hears, the rising chorus of the trees. "Colvin Swain," she says, "you are a very nice man."

"Heck, shoot," the doctor grumbles. "I got to git on back to work. I got to drop in on another patient, Nail's dad, and give him the word. The word is gonna make him well, jist wait and see if it don't. While I'm at it, do you want me to send yore brother Luther up here with anything you need? No, wait, I aint gonna tell n.o.body whar yo're at, not yet anyhow. Not even yore folks. But they'll be mighty proud to hear the news." The doctor snaps shut his gladstone bag and lifts it. He stares at Viridis for a moment before finding the words he wants to say to her. "You take good keer of him, now, hear me? See to it he takes his medicine. Keep him off his feet."

"Yes, sir," she says.

The doctor steps over and takes the rifle in his other hand. "You'uns be good now, hear?"

"Don't be rus.h.i.+n off, Doc," Nail says formally, in the code of backwoods politeness. "Stay more and spend the night with us."

"I'd sh.o.r.e lak to, but I better be gittin on down home. You'uns come go home with me."

"Better not, I reckon," Nail says. "Stay and have supper with us."