The Best Short Stories of 1915 Part 30

"_Comment_?"

"A weaver? Makes cloth--like this?" I held up the corner of the tablespread.

"_Corpo_, no!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed the astonished Pigalle. "Handy ees violinist-a."

HEART OF YOUTH[12]

BY WALTER J. MUILENBURG

From _The Midland_

[12] Copyright, 1915, by John T. Frederick. Copyright, 1916, by Walter J. Muilenburg.

The boy on the cultivator straightened as the horses walked from the soft, spongy ground of the cornfield to the firmer turf at the side of the road. He spoke sharply to the plodding team and turned the cultivator around, lowering the blades for another row. Then, when the horses had fallen into a slow walk, he slouched down, and with bent head watched the hills of young corn pa.s.s beneath him.

He could not have been more than sixteen or seventeen, for his eager eyes looked out from under soft lashes, and his face showed the smooth, healthy tan of a boy. His brown hands were so small that he could barely keep a firm grasp on the heavy levers. When he raised the blades, his fingers became streaked with red and the corners of his mouth drew back and grew hard with concentrated effort. Occasionally he tugged at the reins knotted about his shoulders, but, except for his low, abrupt commands to the horses, he was silent. At the end of the row he raised the shovels, got off the cultivator stiffly, and stretched himself out in the new spring gra.s.s of a little rise by the roadside.

All around him the world was full of soft color and light. Close by, in the sun the corn-field was a sea of s.h.i.+mmering green, while the more distant fields of grain were dark against the light ash of plowed land.

Above, the sun shone slanting from the blue of an early June sky. The air, clean and clear, was already pervaded with the drowsy la.s.situde of noon.

The boy looked listlessly out over the long rows of corn still to be cultivated. Near at hand the young stalks seemed strong enough to win in their struggle toward the sun, but the distant corn lay like a filmy shadow of green on the black soil. Behind the cultivator, a flock of blackbirds fed in the fresh-turned earth. The boy watched them with half-shut eyes. When one of the birds had fed, it would hop upon a lump of wet, black earth, and being satisfied that it could eat no more, would skim in rapid, undulating flight to the row of willows in the next pasture. On a fence-post, a meadow-lark filled the silence with a liquid flow of music. As it laid back its head in an abandon of joy, the boy noticed how the sun accentuated the vivid splash of black on its yellow throat.

The meadow-lark flew away. The boy got up and climbed listlessly into the cultivator seat. The tugs straightened and the horses walked again into the corn. One of the team, however, a heavy, powerful bay, lagged continually, at times almost stopping.

The cultivator slid sidewise, and the blades tore the corn out by the roots. The boy jerked the reins, slapping them over the horse's back.

"Get along there, Jim!" he called. Jim pulled evenly for a moment, then lagged again. In sudden violence of anger, the boy pulled cruelly at the horse's mouth, cursing in low, abrupt sentences. The horse stopped, the blades slipped, again tearing up a hill of corn. From sheer rage the boy was silent, then he jumped from the cultivator, and gathering the slack of the reins, hit the horse about the head with all his might. His face was dry and white, his eyes blazing. As he continued to strike the horse, he found expression.

"You d.a.m.n, lazy brute, you! I'll show you who's running this job--you or me!" His words came sharply, in gasps, between blows. Then he cursed again; cursed the work and the horse. Fine lines of fatigue showed in his face. At last he stopped. A slight color had come to his cheeks.

For a moment he watched the horse, which stood with muscles moving in quivering ripples of pain and fear; then he walked soberly back and climbed upon the cultivator seat. The horses moved on. They walked evenly now, starting at any movement of the boy, who stared steadily at the swiftly moving ground, two red spots still burning through the tan of his cheeks.

They went once across the field. On the return, the boy stopped impetuously by the road and jumping down from the seat walked to the horse he had beaten. The horse quivered and s.h.i.+ed toward its mate. The boy stroked its neck.

"Whoa, Jim! Whoa, boy!" he repeated.

He hesitated a moment, then went across the road to the meadow and picked an armful of young tufts of clover. He fed it to the horses, a handful at a time. They ate eagerly, all trace of fear gone as they reached out their necks for the young gra.s.s. Over the boy's face pa.s.sed a conflict of expressions. At one time the cheeks were soft, and a boyish look lay in his eyes. Then came a strange, dry expression, as of age, which formed tense lines about his mouth; but as he climbed up to the seat of the cultivator, the softer expression remained.

The horses were beginning to draw at the tugs when the boy heard a horse galloping on the road behind him. He looked back. One of the neighbor boys, Bill Symonds, was riding furiously down the hill. The boy turned quickly about in the seat as if he had not seen Bill and tried to hurry the horses. What did Bill want, anyway? It was like him to blunder along when he wasn't wanted! His big, greasy face shaded by the long hair falling unkempt over his forehead had always made the boy dislike Bill.

He tightened the reins.

"Hey, Frank, wait a minute!" Bill slid awkwardly from the colt's back.

The boy twisted the reins about the levers and turned in the seat.

"How are you, Bill," he answered without animation.

Bill tied the colt, a bay, to the willows.

"Well, what do you think of my new colt?" He came closer and lounged forward against the fence. "I broke him in myself--all alone, too! Now, that was a job, Lord! You ought t' seen him buckin' an' standin' on his hind legs!"

They were silent for a moment. Bill amused himself by flinging clods at the colt, which jumped wildly each time one struck him, his body quivering, his eyes white and distended.

After a few clods Bill turned to the boy.

"I guess maybe I'll be leavin' soon."

The boy looked up quickly.

"Yep. I'm goin' off to my brother's ranch in Dakota. I'm gettin' tired of the work here--it's too hard. It's work, work, work all the time with a little while for eatin' and sleepin'. All summer you c'n work your head off and then in winter you can lay off for a couple of months and don't know what to do."

The boy looked out over the fields. Even Bill could go away. The heavy, flabby cheeks, from which the small eyes peered inquisitively, disgusted the boy. Bill picked up another bit of turf and threw it so that the colt jumped wildly, pulling the young willows almost to the ground.

The boy turned to Bill, his face flushed.

"Say--if you want to stay around here you got to cut out firing stones at that colt. You'll never get 'im tame that way--you thick-headed fool!"

Bill stood quiet for a moment. The boy saw an expression of incredulous surprise on Bill's face. Then it became brick-red. He did not wait for Bill to answer but started the horses.

When he looked back, Bill was riding away over the top of the hill, his body swaying with the rhythm of the gallop. The boy was glad that Bill was angry. He didn't want people around. And besides, why did Bill have a chance to go away? His eyes grew hot.

The morning pa.s.sed slowly. When finally the shadow of the cottonwood tree at the corner of the pasture pointed directly to the north, the boy unhitched, cleaned the cultivator shovels carefully with a handful of gra.s.s and placed them upon the hooks. With the reins about his back, he trudged up the long slope of the hill, through the warm dust, swinging his water-pail in cadence with his steps. They reached the top of the hill. The house was only a short distance from the road.

He could see his father carrying a basket of wood to the house. He hoped that his father would not come and help him unharness the horses.

He wanted to be alone; he dreaded facing their conversation at the dinner-table. His eyes grew hot again. Everything was so old to him!

He always came home just at dinner time, his father always worked about the barn, finis.h.i.+ng work a little before so that he might help unharness the horses. And dinner was always ready when they came in the house. The boy kicked a clod viciously.

At the water trough he stopped and the thirsty horses drank deeply. His father came out of the barn, a pitchfork in his hand, and sat down on the edge of the trough, fanning himself with his hat. The boy noticed that his father seemed more tired than usual. His brown hair was already mixed with gray and was damp where the hat had rested. His eyes seemed less cheerful than usual, and his face less red.

When the horses raised their heads from the trough, the boy led them to their stalls. His father followed him.

"How was cultivatin', Frank?" he asked as he stepped into the barn.

"Oh, it wasn't bad."

"The ground was pretty hard, wasn't it?"

"Not very."

In silence they unharnessed the horses, which buried their heads in the newly-cut hay and blew the fragrant, spicy dust from their nostrils. As the boy unloosed the collar of his horse, it slipped and fell upon his foot. His face writhed in a flash of temper and he began cursing in a low tone, heavily and deliberately. Then he picked up the collar and struck the horse. Under lowered eyelashes he saw his father stand in the doorway, his face white with repressed anger. The boy stopped suddenly.

He had never seen his father look like that before. He heard him turn in the doorway.

The horses fed, they walked through the hot, deserted farm-yard to the house. As they entered the shaded living-room, his mother came from the kitchen, humming a bit of tune. Her eyes lit up when she saw them. She talked cheerfully as she worked. The boy said nothing. He seemed to be looking out of the open window into the orchard; instead, through his lowered eyelashes, he followed his mother's movements about the room as she set the small table for three, still humming as she worked. The boy saw that she stopped often to cough. This was not unusual, but once the cough became so strong that it left her face colorless. Uneasily sympathetic, he noted that after this she did not hum again. Whenever she looked his way, the boy turned his head, not so soon but that he could see and feel the half-fearful appeal that darkened her eyes.

After the gla.s.ses had been filled, the three drew up to the table. The dinner was eaten in silence. The eyes of the boy constantly returned to his mother's face. Somehow she seemed different to-day. He wished that she didn't wear that black dress, it made her face look too white and her eyes too large and bright. He ate rapidly. Why didn't his father and mother talk? They used to tease him about one of the neighbor girls. But they had not for a long time now. He wondered why. Why didn't they say something? It was too still.

As soon as he had finished his meal, he drank the water left in his gla.s.s and pushed back his chair. His mother looked quickly at his father. The boy watched them closely and uneasily. Both seemed to be shrinking from something. His father carefully folded and unfolded his newspaper. Then he laid it beside his plate and cleared his throat. He turned in his chair.