Great Jehoshaphat and Gully Dirt! Part 25

"G.o.d 'a mercy! Help!"

The log was breaking, and Mister Ward was falling!

I leaped!

"Help! Somebody, help!" There was a loud splas.h.!.+ "O G.o.d!"

I crawled back to the edge of the bank to look. Mister Ward was down in the red, swirling water, kicking and flailing his arms!

Both ends of the foot log had crashed into the river. The shorter piece rolled over once, pa.s.sed by Mister Ward, and went churning on downstream. The other end, caught against rocks, bobbed up and down.

I didn't wait to see how Mister Ward would crawl out. I had to run! But which way? I couldn't see any way to go. I stumbled into a ma.s.s of vines and briars. In trying to get out of the tangle, I lost one of my shoes, but I couldn't stop to hunt for it. I kept running!

By staying close to the river bank I could go fast. At the water's edge the trees and low bushes were not so thick, and there a little sunlight was still coming through.

I got into a watery place where there were cypress trees.

Trying to wade through all their knees and buckled-up, crooked roots was dreadful! I saw a snake! But I didn't let him see me! I turned and ran the other way and left the river. After that, I had to slow down to a trot. It was getting darker and darker.

How long I'd been going, or how far, I couldn't tell. My legs were hurting, but I was afraid to stop. Mister Ward would catch up with me! So I went stumbling on-falling, getting up, falling again. I was beginning to s.h.i.+ver, and I noticed for the first time that my cloak was wet all over and that my hair had come unbraided and was stringing down. It kept getting caught on limbs and vines, and I kept b.u.mping into saplings. Every time I fell I wished I could just stay down and go to sleep, but I never did fall in a place fit for sleeping. Then I saw what looked like a wide strip of white sand. I could lie down on the sand and sleep.

But it wasn't sand. It was a road!

Once out of the thick woods, I could see a little better. In the dim, shadowy part of the evening, when the sun has gone down and the stars haven't yet come out, it's hard to see anything. I started trying to run again, this time up the middle of the winding road that stretched in front of me like a wide, silver ribbon lost out of some lady's sewing basket.

Way ahead, I could make out what I thought was a house, but when I finally got to it, it turned out to be an old piece of a shack-either a cotton house or corn crib, ready to fall down. No matter. It was a good enough place to hide. Mister Ward would never think about looking for me in a crib.

Inside it was dark. I b.u.mped into what smelled and felt like a stack of dry corn, still in the shuck. Yeah! It was corn, the same kind we had in our crib at home. I could hide in that.

Sleep, too. So I scrooched down in the mound and covered myself with shucks and stalks, leaving only my face out. Now, Mister Ward couldn't find me! Not ever, ever!

Chapter 7

Crowing roosters waked me. I rolled over and opened my eyes.

What had happened to the top of our house? There wasn't any top!

Just sky! Papa was right. He had been telling us for a long time that our roof was going to fall in if he didn't get good crops and build Mama a new house. Papa was 'shamed for Mama to have to live in an old dogtrot house built before the Civil War. The Civil War was Grandpa's war and it happened a long time ago, but we still talked about it. Now, for sure, Papa would build us a new house with a good top on it. Then I remembered! I didn't know where our house was! Nor Papa! Nor Mama! Grandpa, neither! I didn't even know where I was!

I scrambled up from the pile of corn and ran outside.

Right across the road stood a real house! With hound dogs on the porch. And a man. Chickens scratching in the yard. Smoke puffing out of the chimney. Everything a house is supposed to have!

The dogs started barking at me.

"Hey there! Com'ere!" The man had seen me too.

As I ran toward him he made the dogs hush and yelled back at somebody inside: "Set another plate, Mattie! We've got a sorta ragged little visitor! With one shoe on!"

He squatted down to look at me. "Bless your little heart!

Com'ere, sugar! My, my! Mud and leaves and tatters! No tears, now! Wearin' one shoe's all right! Hon, I wear just one-all the time."

The breakfast tasted good, and the man and lady talked to me a lot and said for me to just keep on eating-as long as I could swallow a bite. But I couldn't get down but two biscuits and jelly and some salt meat and a cup of milk.

When I'd finished, the man said, "Now, little girl, try to tell us where you came from."

"Outta the corn crib! And the woods!"

The lady smiled at me. "We can see you've been down in the river bottom. Your little cloak is just tore all to pieces, and your hair's got leaves and sticks all through it."

"Where was you at before you got to the woods?"

"In the automobile."

"Mattie, she must be from town. Sugar, do you live in Union City?"

"No, sir."

"I declare, I wish I knew who you are. Your folks must be wild by this time-you bein' lost all night. Try one more time to tell me who your pa is, sugar."

"He's Papa!"

"Yeah, I know. There must be some way to find out who you are."

"I know who you are."

"Who am I, sugar?"

"Uncle Hiram!"

"Lord, yeah! How'd you know?"

"One of your legs is just a wood peg. And I see your fiddle!

Right yonder on the wall!"

"I'll be hanged!"

"Jim-Bo says you can sure scald-a-dog!"

"Jim-Bo? Jim-Bo Jones over at Drake Eye Springs? You know him?"

"Yes, sir. He's Aunt Vic's baby."

"Mattie, this child belongs to somebody way over in Drake Eye Springs! 'Cross the Arkansas line! I'll go hitch up. Get on your good dress, and we'll take her home. I'll bet her pa's got the Law out combing the woods with bloodhounds! And every man in them parts helpin'! We'll go by to see sister d.i.n.k while we're over that way. Make haste, Mattie, 'cause you know if it was one o'

our'n lost, we'd be outta our minds."

Uncle Hiram hobbled out the back door before I could get a chance to tell him that Mister Ward fell in the deep river. Miss Mattie started was.h.i.+ng my face, and then they bundled me up into the wagon, and away we went.

The first house we got to, we stopped while Uncle Hiram went inside to see about using the phone. But when he came back, he was shaking his head.

"It wasn't no use, Mattie. Couldn't get n.o.body on the Drake Eye Springs line. I reckon they're all out searchin'."