Great Jehoshaphat and Gully Dirt! Part 2

Mama and Miss d.i.n.k were talking about the World War and about Miss d.i.n.k's nephew, who was already fighting way across the waters in some place called France, and about my two big brothers, who went off to the army camp. Then they got started telling one another of long-time-ago things, with Miss d.i.n.k doing most of the telling.

"Well sir, time's a-flying fast. It fair scares me to think it's already 1918. The Mister, he's been in his grave ten years, Nannie. He pa.s.sed in the summer of 'aught-eight. Come the first Sunday in June-and that'll be next Sunday-it'll be ten years, even."

"Mama, Mister Ward said-"

"Shh, Bandershanks, Miss d.i.n.k's talking, hon."

Miss d.i.n.k talked on and on. Mama just nodded her head or said, "Yes'm, that's right" or "Well, I declare to my soul!" or "I reckon so."

"Mama, when is Mister Ward gonna-"

"Bandershanks, get up here in my lap and be quiet! How can me and Miss d.i.n.k talk if you don't be quiet?"

Miss d.i.n.k started telling about hound dogs stealing goose eggs and about how it's easier to pick a goose than a gander when you're making feather beds. She told all about her drove of geese that nipped off the gra.s.s in the cotton fields, and that made her think about the summer the lice crawled off the geese and got all in her hair.

Then Mama remembered that once when she was a little girl, way back in Alabama, she and all the other pupils at Clay Hill School got lice on their heads. The teacher sent word home that every last young'un had to have his head shaved.

Miss d.i.n.k laughed. "Makes me recollect the time Ophelia caught the seven-year itch over at Calico Neck School. I never was so put out over nothing in all my born days. And 'course, Ophelia just know'd she was disgraced for life! But, like I told her, getting the itch ain't nothing, but it's sure a disgrace to keep it! Well, sir, Nannie, I didn't have no notion of what to do. And I couldn't let on to a soul that Ophelia had caught it, not even to Doctor Elton. Finally, I smeared hog lard on her, and that cleared it right up."

Mama let me slide out of her lap so she could stand up and take my hand. "I hate to leave, Miss d.i.n.k, but I promised Jodie's pa I'd take his new GAZETTE by the Goode place so's to read a piece to Mister Malcolm-something about Woodrow Wilson and his League of Nations ideas. Mr. Thad couldn't go himself, this time.

You know he walks over there ever so often to read the war news to Mister Malcolm."

"Mister Malcolm will be proud to hear you read. He's like me: setting there blind as a bat, with no way of knowing what's going on, 'less somebody comes and tells him."

"Mr. Thad says the weekly's got a right sensible column about this new law they're getting up to let women vote. I left the paper out yonder in my buggy, but I'll go get it."

"That rigamarole is all beyond me, Nannie. I'll never live to vote. Anyhow, that ain't women's business! Set back down, Nannie, just for a minute."

Mama let go of my hand and sat down again in the worn-out chair, the only one in Miss d.i.n.k's room.

"Nannie," Miss d.i.n.k whispered, raising herself up on her elbows, "I oughtn't to breathe this, but I know you ain't gonna talk it. Nannie, that devil Ward is running after the Bailey girl!"

Mama caught her breath! She grabbed my hand.

"You know which one I'm talking 'bout, Nannie-Wes and Lida Belle's daughter."

"Not Addie Mae!"

"Yeah! The darkies here on the place-Ned and Eulah-I got it straight from them. Folks say the girl is slow-witted. She must be, to be fooling 'round with Ward."

"Bandershanks, baby, you hurry on out front and be climbing into our buggy."

I was so glad to get to leave I didn't even ask Mama why she wanted me to be in a rush.

Old Dale was standing there in the shade of the tree where Mama had hitched him, his ears dropped down, his eyes half closed, all his weight on three feet. Once in a while he would give his tail a swish to scare away the two horseflies that kept settling on his hind legs.

He didn't even notice when I climbed up into the buggy seat and started playing with the reins. I put one forefinger between the flat, slick leather lines and joggled them up and down with both hands. Then, stretching my legs so I could prop one foot up on the dashboard, like Papa always did, I practiced saying "Glick! Glick!" out of the corner of my mouth, just exactly like Papa.

I eased the whip out of its holder and waved it round and round high in the air. That whip was as old as the buggy but it looked brand new, for Papa and Mama wouldn't ever use it. They said Dale was too decrepit to be whipped. The whip's green ta.s.sel on the wrist loop was still fluffy and soft as silk.

I was squeezing the ta.s.sel to make finger waves in it when I saw Mama coming. I put up the whip quick!

It didn't take Mama long to get Dale untied, waked up, and headed around toward the Drake Eye Springs road.

"What do you know, Bandershanks, Dale actually wants to trot now!'

"How come?"

"His head is turned towards home!"

"Mama?"

"What, hon?"

"Mister Ward's gonna shoot me."

"What?"

"Mister Ward's gonna kill me with his gun."

"Child, what on earth are you talking about?"

"Mister Ward said it!"

"Bandershanks, sometimes I wonder about you! When did you see Mister Ward?"

"I didn't see him good, but-"

"Well, then, you quit imagining things-or telling stories.

It's mean to tell stories, and a sin, besides. You don't want the Old Bad Man to get you when you die, do you?"

"No'm!"

Mama had told me a long time before who the Bad Man was. When Brother Milligan preached about him, he called him "that Old Split-Foot Devil." But Mama said "devil" is an ugly word for ladies to use, so she always said "the Bad Man." No matter what his name, I didn't want him to get me and burn me up, so I quit talking about Mister Ward.

Soon we came to the main road, where we turned into what Mama said was the left fork. She told me if we were to go the other way, and kept on riding eight or ten miles, we'd wind up down in Louisiana.

I never had been to Louisiana.

A few minutes later we met Old Mister Hawk in his narrow wagon. Mama said he was the only man for miles who had a one-horse wagon. He didn't have a horse, though, just a mule.

Mister Hawk made his old, bony, gray mule go over in the weeds and gra.s.s so there would be lots of room in the road for our buggy. When he said "'Evenin', Miss Nannie," he took one hand and lifted his hat clean off his head.

Next, we came to the Baileys' house. Miss Lida Belle was sitting on the front porch, and she waved and called out for Mama to stop. Mama drew up the reins, slowing Dale to a walk.

"'Evening, Lida Belle."

"Lord, Nannie, here I sit barefooted as a yard dog! You caught me resting my feet! Tie up your horse and come on in!"

Miss Lida Belle took her snuff brush out of her mouth and started putting on her shoes.