Old Caravan Days Part 9

"Now, these kind of critters, they're as smart as human bein's if you only knowed it. And that was enough. The katydid, she said she felt pins and needles in her back whenever Ant Red looked at her; and the snake-feeders said she shot arries at 'em when they was flyin'

over a craw-fish hole. All the beetles and wood-bugs complained of bein' hit with witch-bells, and the more Ant Red acted careful the more they had ag'in her.

"Well, the spider he told her to come into his den and live, and she'd be safe from hangin', but she wasn't sure in her mind about that. Even the gra.s.shopper jumped out of her way, and bunged his eyes out at her; as if she could harm such a great big gray lubber as him!

She was gittin' pretty lonesome when she concluded to try a projic."

"What's a projic?" inquired Robert Day.

"Why, it's a--p'epperation, or--a plan of some kind," explained Zene.

"So she invites Big Ant Black and all her family, and the spider and all his family, and the beetles and bugs and all their families, and the snake-feeders and Miss Katydid for young folks, and don't leave out a neighbor, to an apple-bee right inside the orchard fence.

"So it was pleasant weather, and they all come and brung the babies, the old gra.s.shopper skippin' along as nimble and steppin' on the shawl that was wrapped round his young one. And the snake-feeders they helped Miss Katydid over the lowest fence-rail, and here come Big Ant Black with such a string behind her it looked like a funeral instead of a family percession and she twisted her neck from side to side as soon as she see the great big apple, kind of wonderin' if they couldn't carry it off.

"Little Ant Red had all her children's heads combed and the best cheers set out, and she had on her good dress and white ap.r.o.n, and she says right and left, 'Hoddy-do, sir? hoddy-do, marm? Come right in and take cheers. And they all shook hands with her as if they'd never dreamt of callin' her a witch, and fell right on to the apple and begun to eat. And they all e't and e't, till they'd made holes in the rind and hollered it out. And Big Ant Black she gits her family started, and they carries off chunk after chunk of that apple till the road was black and white speckled between her house and the apple-tree.

"Little Ant Red she walks around urgin' them all to help theirselves, and that made them all feel pleasant to her. But Big Ant Black she got so graspin' and eager, that what does she do but try to help her young ones carry off the whole apple-sh.e.l.l. It did look jub'ous to see such a big thing movin' off with such little critters tuggin' it. And then Ant Red got on to a clover-head and showed the rest of the company what Ant Black was a-doin'. Says Ant Red: 'You ain't e't more'n a mouthful, Mr. Gra.s.shopper.'

"'No, marm,' says he.

"'I s'ze to myself,' says Ant Red, 'here is this polite company, and the snake-feeders don't touch nothin,' and everybedy knows Miss Katydid lives on nothin' but rose-leaf b.u.t.ter, and the bugs and beetles will hardly take enough, to keep 'em alive.' 'And I s'ze to myself,' says Ant Red, 'here's this big apple walkin' off with n.o.body but Ant Black to move it. This great big sound apple. And it looks to me like witchcraft. That's what it looks like,' says Ant Red.

"They all declared it looked just like witchcraft. Ant Black tried to show them how holler the apple was, and they declared if she'd hollered it that way so quick, it was witchcraft certain.

"So what does they do but pen her and her young ones in the apple-sh.e.l.l and stop it up with mud. Even the mud-wasps and tumble-bugs that hadn't been bid come and took part when they see the dirt a-flyin'. Ant Red set on the clover-head and teetered.

"Now, down to this present minute," concluded Zene, "you never pick up an apple and find a red ant walkin' out of it. If ants is there, it's one of them poor black fellers that was shut up at the apple-bee, and they walk out brisk; as if they's glad to find daylight once more."

CHAPTER IX. THE GREAT CAMP MEETING.

Towards evening of the next day the broken wagon wheel was replaced.

By that time the children were not more anxious to move forward than was Grandma Padgett. So just before sunset they broke up camp and moved along the country road until the constellations were swinging overhead. Zene took the first good crossway that led to the 'pike, and after waiting to be sure that the noses of Old Hickory and Old Henry were following, he jogged between dewy fence rows, and they came to the broad white ribbon of high road, and in time to the village of Somerford, having progressed only ten miles that day.

Bobaday and Corinne were so sleepy, and their departure from Somerford next morning was taken at such an early hour, that they remembered it only as a smell of tallow candles in the night, accompanied by a landlady's head in a ruffled nightcap.

Very different was Springfield, the county seat of Clark County.

That was a town with people moving briskly about it, and long streets could be seen, where pleasant houses were shaded with trees.

Zene inquired the names of all small places as soon as they entered the main street, and then, obligingly halting the wagon at one side, he waited until Grandma Padgett came up, and told her. He learned and announced the cities long before any of them came into view. It was a pleasure to Bobaday and aunt Corinne to ride into a town repeating its name to themselves and trying to fasten its ident.i.ty on their minds. First they would pa.s.s a gang of laborers working on the road, or perhaps a man walking up and down telegraph poles with sharp-shod heels; then appeared humble houses with children playing thickly around them. Finer buildings crowded on the sight, and where the signs of business flaunted, were women and little children in pretty clothes, always going somewhere to buy something nice. Once they met a long procession of carriages, and in the first carriage aunt Corinne beheld and showed to her nephew a child's coffin made of metal. It glittered in the sun. Grandma Padgett said it was zinc. But aunt Corinne secretly suspected it was made of gold, to enclose some dear little baby whose mother would not put it into anything else.

At New Carlisle, a sleepy little village where the dogfennel was wonderfully advanced for June, Zene took the gray from the wagon and hitched him to the carriage, subst.i.tuting Old Hickory. The gray's shoulder was rubbed by his collar, and Zene reasoned that the lighter weight of the carriage would give him a better chance of healing his bruise. Thus paired the horses looked comical. Hickory and Henry evidently considered the change a disgrace to them. But they made the best of it and uttered no protest, except keeping as wide a s.p.a.ce as possible between themselves and their new mates. But the gray and white, old yoke fellows at the plough, who knew nothing of the dignity of carriage drawing, and cared less, who had rubbed noses and shared feed-boxes ever since they were colts, both lifted up their voices in mournful whinneys and refused comfort and correction. The white turned his head back over his shoulder and would have halted anywhere until his mate came up; while the gray strained forward, shaking his head, and neighing as if his throat were full of tears every time a tree or a turn in the road hid the wagon.

The caravan moving to this irregular and doleful music, pa.s.sed through another little town which Zene said was named Boston, late on a rainy afternoon. Here they crossed the Miami River in a bridge through the cracks of which Robert Day and Corinne looked at the full but not very wide stream. It flowed beneath them in comparative silence. The rain p.r.i.c.ked the water's surface into innumerable puckers.

"Little boys dancing up," said aunt Corinne, in time-honored phrase.

"No; it's bees stingin' the water," said her nephew, "with long stingers that reach clear out of the clouds."

These sky-bees stung the dusty road until it lay first in dark dimples and last in swollen mud rows and shallow pools. The 'pike kept its dignity under the heaviest rains. Its very mud was light and plaster-like, scarcely clinging to the wheels or soiling the horses'

legs. Its flint ribs rung more sharply under the horses' shoes.

Through the damp dusk aunt Corinne took pleasure in watching the fire struck by old Henry and the gray, against the trickling stones. They pulled the carriage curtains down, and Grandma Padgett had the oilcloth ap.r.o.n drawn up to her chin, while she continued to drive the horses through a slit. The rear of the wagon made a blur ahead of them. Now the 'pike sides faded from fresh green to a general dulness, and trees whispering to the rain lost their vistas and indentations of shade, and became a solid wall down which a steady pour hissed with settled monotony. Boswell and Johnson no longer foraged at the 'pike sides, or lagged behind or scampered ahead. They knew it was a rainy October night without lightning and thunder, slipped by mistake into the packet of June weather; and they trotted invisibly under the carriage, carrying their tails down, and their lolling tongues close to the puddles they were obliged to scamper through or skip. Boswell and Johnson remembered their experiences at the lonesome Susan house, where they lay in the deep weeds and were forgotten until morning by the hara.s.sed family; and they rolled their eyes occasionally, with apprehension lest the grinding of the wheels should cease, and some ghostly wall loom up at one side of their way, unlighted by a single glimmer and unperfumed by any whiff of supper.

It was a fine thing to be movers' dogs when the movers went into camp or put up in state at a tavern. Around a camp were all sorts of woodsy creatures to be scratched out of holes or chased up trees, or to be nosed and chewed at. There were stray and half-wild pigs that had tails to be bitten, and what could be more exhilarating than making a drove of grunting pigs canter like a hailstorm away into deep woods! And in the towns and villages all resident dogs came to call on Boswell and Johnson. At every tavern Boswell picked a fight and Johnson fought it out; sometimes retiring with his tail to the earth and a sad expression of being outnumbered, but oftener a victor to have his wounds dressed and bandaged by Boswell's tongue. There was plenty to eat at taverns and camps, and good hunting in the woods; but who could tell what hungry milestone might stand at the end of this day's journey?

Grandma Padgett herself was beginning to feel anxious on this subject. She drove faster in order to overtake Zene and consult with him, but before his attention could be attracted, both carriage and wagon reached a broad belt of s.h.i.+ne stretching across the 'pike, and making trees in the meadow opposite stand out as distinct individuals.

This illumination came from many camp-fires extending so far into the woods that the last one showed like a spark. A great collection of moving wagons were ranged in line along the extent of these fires, and tents pitched under the dripping foliage revealed children playing within their snug cover, or women spreading the evening meal.

Kettles were hung above the fires, and skillets hissed on the coals.

The horses, tied to their feed-boxes, were stamping and grinding their feed in content, and the gray lifted up his voice to neigh at the whole collection as Grandma Padgett stopped just behind Zene. All the camp dogs leaped up the 'pike together, and Boswell and Johnson met them in a neutral way while showing the teeth of defence. To Boswell and Johnson as well as to their betters, this big and well-protected encampment had an inviting look, provided the campers were not to be shunned.

A man came up the 'pike side through the rain and kicked some of the dogs aside.

"Hullo," said he most cheerfully. "Want to put up?"

"What is it?" inquired Zene cautiously. He then craned his neck around to look at Grandma Padgett, whose spectacles glared seriously at the man.

This hospitable traveller wore a red s.h.i.+rt and a slouched hat, and had his trousers tucked in his boots. He pulled off his hat to shake the rain away, and showed bushy hair and a smiling bearded face. No weather could hurt him. He was ready for anything.

"Light down," he exclaimed. "Plenty of room over there if you want it."

"Who's over there?" inquired Zene.

"Oh, it's a big camp-meeting," replied the man. "There's twenty or thirty families, and lots of fun."

"Do you mean," inquired Grandma Padgett, "a camp-meeting for religious purposes?"

"You can have that if you want it," responded the man, "and have your exhorters along. It's a family camp. Most of us going out to Californy. Goin' to cross the plains. Some up in the woods there goin' to Missoury. Don't care where they're goin' if they want to stop and camp with us. _We're_ from the Pan Handle of Virginia.

There's a dozen families or more of us goin' out to Californy together. The rest just happened along."

"I'm a Virginian myself," said Grandma Padgett, warming, "though Ohio's been my State for many years."

"Well, now," exclaimed the mover, "if you want to light right down, we'll be all the gladder for that. I saw you stoppin' here uncertain; and there's the ford over Little Miami ahead of you. I thought you'd not like to try it in the dark."

"You're not like a landlord back on the road that let us risk our necks!" said Grandma Padgett with appreciation. "But if you take everybody into camp ain't you afraid of getting the wrong sort?"

"Oh, no," replied the Virginian. "There's enough of _us_ to overpower _them_."

"Well, Zene," said Grandma Padgett, "I guess we'd better stop here.

We've provisions in our wagon."

"How far you goin'?" inquired the hospitable mover.

"Into Illinois," replied the head of the small caravan.

"Your trip'll soon be done, then. Come on, now, and go to Californy, why don't you! _That's_ the country to get rich in! You'll see sights the other side of the Mississippi!"