Great Jehoshaphat and Gully Dirt! Part 23

"No, I don't! It's a disgrace to be a old maid! And you better not get a baby 'fore you get married, neither!"

"Well, well, you don't say. In that case, it looks to me like a girl's got little choice. 'Bout all she can do is avoid the extremes and keep her eye on the altar!"

"What does that mean?"

"Means we'd better have another tune. Or, maybe you'll dance some for us. How 'bout that?"

"I can't dance."

"How come?"

"I don't know how. 'Sides, it's a bad sin!"

"Who told you that, Bandershanks?"

"I just been knowing it."

"Why, Jim-Bo," Hi said, "it ain't been six months since Brother Milligan preached a whole sermon on dancing!"

"Oh, yeah. I remember that sermon, now."

"I bet you remember it! You probably weren't listening to one word he said!"

"I was, too! I can tell you his very words!"

Jim-Bo let me slide from his knee so he could stand up. He began talking, and he tilted his head to one side and reared back, waving his arms and shaking his fists-just like Brother Milligan when he was up on the pulpit stand.

"My good people of Drake Eye Springs," he shouted out, his voice cracking and trembling, "I warn you, dancing is a sin! Some would seek to justify it on the grounds that it is a graceful movement of the body. But I say to you: graceful movements can lead you down the road to d.a.m.nation! My good people, both brethren and sistern, as surely as I stand here in this pulpit today, and as surely as my name is Josiah B. Milligan, dancing is a sin of the first water! It is nothing in G.o.d's world but artificial arm and leg crossing, invented by Old Split-Foot himself!"

"Boys, boys! Y'all oughtn't say things to confuse your little cousin. Hon, don't you worry. Sins change. Maybe when you get big enough to really dance, it will be a fine thing to do. Back when I was a young girl, it was a sin to read a novel. I don't know, though, whether I ought to mention that, 'specially since your mama and I read one once!"

"What about some more music?" Jim-Bo asked.

"No, it's late. Bandershanks, we've got to get you off to bed. Thank the musicians and this self-appointed 'hat man' for a wonderful concert!"

"Y'all, much obliged for the concert."

Jim-Bo just grinned at me. Then he put one hand behind his back and bowed low. "The pleasure was all ours, Lady Bandershanks!"

Sat.u.r.day when I got home, Shoogie was waiting for me. So was Mama. The first thing Mama said was, "My, my, we've been missing you!"

The first thing Shoogie said was, "Bandershanks, let's go pick us some goobers!"

"Yeah! Mama, can we?"

"I suppose so. I'd rather for y'all to be eating peanuts in the hayloft than playing outdoors in this wind. It turned cold this evening."

We ate some peanuts and stuffed more in our pockets. Shoogie said they'd taste a sight better if we made a fire and roasted them in the ashes.

"Come on, Bandershanks. I's got plenty o' matches."

"Where we gonna cook them?"

"Down yonder side o' the road."

"Mama won't lem'me play at the road no more."

"We ain't gonna be on the road. We'll be in that gully where there's sand. See, iffen we get a pile o' sand hot, our goobers'll cook quick. Come on, Bandershanks!"

Shoogie gathered up leaves and sticks and struck match after match, but she couldn't get a fire going.

"We needs us some pine straw, that's what. Come on, Bandershanks, there's plenty right down yonder round the bend.

See them big trees?"

We hurried down the hill toward the pine thicket, following the road and the winding gully. After we had rounded the bend, we slid down into the gully and walked along the bottom till we got to the first of the pine trees. Straw was lying matted on the ground, thick and deep. Easy to rake together in big wads, Shoogie said.

She showed me how to hold my skirt out with both hands so she could pile on a big armful of the dried straw. Then she heaped up a bundle in her skirt, and we started back to our sticks and peanuts.

Shoogie was walking in front, and I was being careful to step in her tracks.

"Bandershanks, what's that roarin' racket I hears?"

"I don't hear no roaring. Yeah, I do too! I hear it! That's a automobile motor coming, Shoogie!"

We dropped our straw and ran to the edge of the road.

"If you don't know what a motor sounds like, you're a silly goose! Wiley said so!"

"Bandershanks, you knows I ain't no goose!"

"Ain't you seen one of them automobiles yet?"

"No."

"I have! My brother rode one! Shoogie, here it comes!"

Shoogie didn't say anything.

"That's the same one Wiley rode!"

"Who's that man makin' hit go?" Shoogie whispered.

"It's- It's- It's Mister Ward! We'd better run!"

"Not yet! He's lettin' hit go slow so's we can see hit."

Mister Ward made the automobile come to a stop right in front of us, but he didn't make it be quiet or quit rattling and shaking.

He was grinning as he got out. His red, bushy hair was hanging down nearly to his eyes.

"How'd you little gals like to ride in Mister Hicks's automobile?"