From the Valley of the Missing Part 22

Lem remained silent for some seconds; then said:

"Do ye want to come back to the scow, Scraggy?"

"Ye mean to live?"

Lem shoved out his hairy chin.

"Yep, to live," said he.

"Did ye come to ask me back, Lemmy?"

"Yep, or I wouldn't have been here. I've been thinkin' our fambly oughter be together."

"Fambly!" echoed Screech Owl wonderingly.

"Yep, Scraggy. We'll get the boy again, and all of us'll live on the scow."

His swarthy face went yellow in the candlelight, and the huge goiter under his chin evidenced by its movements the emotion through which he was pa.s.sing. Scraggy had sunk to the floor. Now she crawled nearer him, staring at his face with wonder-widened eyes.

"Do ye mean, Lemmy, that ye love yer pretty boy brat well enough to want him on the scow, and that he can eat all he wants?"

"That's what I mean," grunted Lem.

"And that ye mean me to tell him what ye says, Lemmy, and that ye want me to bring him back?"

"Yep."

Scraggy had drawn closer and closer to Lem, her sad face wrinkling into deeper lines. With each uttered word Lem had seen that he had conquered her. Suddenly he dropped his heavy left hand down on the gray head and kept it there.

For the first time in many weary years Scraggy Peterson was kneeling before her man. Now he wanted her! He had asked her to come again to that precious haven of rest, and to bring the child! Scraggy forgot that the babe she had pa.s.sed through the barge window was grown to be a man, forgot that he might not want to come back to the scow with her and his father.

Lem drew her close between his heavy knees and touched her withered chin with his fingers.

"Where be the brat, Scraggy?" he wheedled.

Screech Owl lifted her head and drew back frightened. Something warned her that she must not tell him where his son lived.

"I'll get him for ye," she said doggedly.

"Where be he?" demanded the scowman.

"I ain't tellin' ye where he be now, Lem." Scraggy's tone was sulky.

"Why?"

"'Cause I'll go and get him. I'll bring him to the scow lessen--lessen--"

"Lessen what?" cried Lem darkly.

"Lessen a month," replied Scraggy, "and ye'll kiss the brat, and he'll call ye 'Daddy,' and he'll love ye like I do, Lemmy dear."

Lem was rigid, as the woman smoothed down his s.h.a.ggy gray hair and patted his hard face. Suddenly he started to his feet.

"Ye say, Scraggy, that ye'll bring the boy lessen a month?"

"Yep, lessen a month. And, Lemmy, he be a beautiful baby! Ye'll love him, will ye, Lemmy?"

"Yep. And now ye take yer cat, Screechy, and get back to bed, and when ye get the boy bring him to the scow." He hesitated a moment; then said, "Ye don't know, do ye, where Flea and Flukey run to?"

Scraggy's face dropped.

"Be they gone?" she stammered, rising.

"Yep, for a long time; and Granny Cronk be dead."

"Then ye didn't get Flea, Lem?"

"Nope. And I don't want the brat, Scraggy; I only want the boy." He spoke with meaning, and when he stood on the hut steps he turned back to finish, "Ye'll bring him, will ye, Owl?"

"Yep, Lemmy love, lessen a month."

Scraggy greedily watched the shadowy form move away in the light of the lantern. "p.u.s.s.y, p.u.s.s.y," she muttered, as she closed the door, "black p.u.s.s.y, come a beddy; yer ole mammy be that happy that her heart's a bustin'."

When Screech Owl, although the happiest woman in the squatter settlement, fell asleep with the cat in her arms, her pillow was wet with tears.

Through long days of anxious waiting for Flukey's recovery, Flea struggled with the Bible lessons Ann set for her each day. Yet she could not grasp the meaning of faith. She prayed nightly; but uttered her words mechanically, for the Savior in the blue sky seemed beyond her conception. In spite of Miss Sh.e.l.lington's tender pleading, in spite of the fact that Flukey believed stanchly all that Ann had told them, Flea suffered in her disbelief. Many times she sought consolation in Flukey's faith.

"Ye see, Flea, can't ye," he said, one morning, "that when Sister Ann says a thing it's so? Can't ye see it, Flea?"

"Nope, I can't. I don't know how G.o.d looks. I can't understand how Jesus ruz after he'd been dead three days."

"He did that 'cause He were one-half G.o.d," explained Flukey, and then, brightening, added, "Sister Ann telled me that if He hadn't been a sufferin' and a sufferin', and hadn't loved everybody well enough, G.o.d wouldn't have let Him ruz. 'Twa'n't by anything He did after He were dead that brought Him standin' up again."

"Then who did it?" queried Flea.

"G.o.d did--jest as how He said 'way back there when there wasn't any world, 'World, come out!' and the world came. He said, 'Jesus, stand up!' and Jesus stood up. That's as easy as rollin' off a log, Flea."

She had heard Ann explain it, too; but it seemed easier when Flukey interpreted it.

"If I could see and speak to Him once," she mourned, "I could make Sister Ann glad by tellin' her that I knowed He'd answer me."

"Ask Him to let ye see Himself," advised Flukey, "He'll do it, I bet!

Will ye, Flea?"

"Nope! I'd be 'fraid if He came and stood near me. I'm 'fraid even now when I think of Him; but 'cause I can't believe 'tain't no reason why you can't, Fluke."

She turned her head toward the door and listened.