Little Britches (3 page)

Father had lit the lantern. He set it down, and took Mother in his arms. "Mame," he said, "we'll have to face the situations we find in this country. These fellows can't be too dangerous, or Aultland would have warned us. If the horses were in shape to defend themselves, I wouldn't go. But they're not. I've rolled the wagon across the open side of the barn, so they can't break out again. Coyotes are said to be afraid of a light. I've got to hang this lantern on the wagon."

He picked up the lantern and went out. Mother stood in the open doorway, and we watched the lantern till it disappeared around the barn. The coyotes' howling stopped. In a few minutes Father was back, and said everything looked all right at the barn. Then the howling started again. Mother was still fidgety, and asked, "Where is Moffat, Charlie?"

Father looked at her and answered, "Moffat? Oh, it's in the mountains west of here somewhere. Why?"

"Oh, nothing," Mother said. "I just wondered, that's all."

Mother put the smaller children to bed while Grace and I did the dishes, and she made us go just as soon as we were finished. The coyotes stopped howling after a little while, but we couldn't go to sleep. Grace whispered over and asked me if I thought the mountain lions had come down and frightened the coyotes away. I was afraid they had, but I told her not to worry, because Father wouldn't let them get us. He must have heard us whispering, because he came to the door and said he didn't want to hear any more whispering. Father always meant what he said, so we kept quiet, and I guess we went to sleep pretty soon.

The moon was way over toward the mountains when something woke me up. It woke everybody else, too. My heart was pounding so hard I thought it was going to jump out. Then there was a clatter at the back of the house. Something had knocked the pile of firewood over. Grace shrieked, "The mountain lion!" and all the younger children yelled as though the lion had them by the ears.

Father leaped out of bed and ran to the kitchen for the lantern. I guess he thought Grace had really seen a lion. Mother rushed from one window to the other, slamming them down tight and crying, "Don't go out, Charlie! Don't go out! He'll kill you the way he did the man at Moffat."

Father didn't go out. He sat on the edge of the girls' bed, with Muriel on his knee and one arm around Mother, while he told us there wasn't a bit of danger. Everybody stopped crying pretty soon, but they were all holding their breath as I was. It was so still it almost hurt. But only for a few minutes. Then the most terrible noise I had ever heard came from right outside our window. We were all too scared to make a sound, till I heard Mother whisper, "Oh, God," and knew she was praying. A few minutes later there was an awful racket at the barn. We heard one of the horses squeal, and the sound of heels thudding against boards. Mother had to read to us a long time before we went back to sleep.

At daylight Father went to the barn to see if we had any horses left. In a couple of minutes he was back at the kitchen door, laughing and calling us all to come out to the barn. Cold as it was, Mother let us go without caps or coats. Standing between the two big horses was a Rocky Mountain canary—a little donkey, not much taller than I. He had been our mountain lion of the night, and had squeezed into the barn past the tail gate of the wagon.

That Sunday afternoon our new neighbors came to call. None of them came into the house, but they sat in their buggies and talked a little while. First were the Corcorans. They lived on the same road we did, up west of Fred Aultland's place. Mrs. Corcoran was a little bit of a woman, and did most of the talking—she had a high, sharp voice. Mr. Corcoran was a kind of round-shouldered man with a beard. She didn't let him talk very much. She started asking all kinds of questions about where we came from, and whether we'd bought the ranch, and was Father a lunger, and did we want to buy a cow.

Mother pulled her lips right up tight, but Father began telling them about the donkey—as if he hadn't heard a single question. I don't think Mrs. Corcoran liked it, because she said, "Robert, them cows of mine needs a load of hay before milkin'. It's time you was gettin' at it." Mr. Corcoran didn't say anything. He just fished on the reins a little, and the horses started moving. As they drove out of our yard, Mrs. Corcoran called back, "I hope you folks make out better than them Yankees that moved onto the Peterson place."

The next ones who came were the Aldivotes. They lived down near Bear Creek, behind Corcoran's place. They were nice people. Quiet. And didn't seem to find it easy to talk. They'd heard about Bill and Nig falling through the trestle, and I guess they just came to tell us they were sorry.

It was nearly sunset before Carl Henry drove in with Miss Wheeler. The schoolhouse was in the far corner of our section and Carl's house was in the section beyond. He was an old bach —he must have been nearly thirty—and Miss Wheeler was the schoolteacher. She was prettier than Bessie Aultland.

At first they talked about Grace and me going to school. Then about horses, and fences and ranching. After a while, Mother told them how scared we'd been the night before, and asked Carl how much danger there was from coyotes and mountain lions. He laughed, and told her that the donkey was just about as dangerous as the coyotes, and that he had never heard of a lion coming that far down from the mountains. When they left, they took me as far as Aultland's to get the milk.

I hadn't much more than started back when I heard horses running behind me. I looked around, and there were four honest-to-goodness cowboys coining down the road. They wore ten gallon hats and leather chaps with bright silver disks on them.

As they came closer, I could see holsters with six-shooters in them, strapped to their waists. I was so busy watching that I forgot to move.

They didn't slow up a bit till they were right beside me, then they skidded their horses to a stop on the hard adobe road. One of them leaned over and said, "Want a lift, Sonny?"

I almost bit my tongue before I could make it say, "Sure I do."

He leaned so far out of his saddle that he took the milk bucket right out of my hand without my lifting it. Then he passed it to one of the other fellows, and swung me up behind his saddle by one arm. I had hardly landed when the horses started off. My cowboy said, over his shoulder, "Hang on if you want to burn some trail." I dug my fingers in under his cartridge belt. Somebody yelled, "Yipeee!" and we were off like scared rabbits.

Mother used to recite "The Charge of the Light Brigade." With all the guns and running horses, I was sure I was in it. They put me down right at our back steps and raced away. There wasn't a drop of milk spilled when the cowboy passed me the bucket.

MONDAY morning Grace and I went to school, and the attendance went up a fifth. Bessie Aultland came for us and drove us over to the little brick schoolhouse, a mile and a half from home.

When Bessie took us in to Miss Wheeler, she said, "I tried to tell Molly just to let them come in overalls and frock, not to get them all dressed up like they were going to Sunday school; but she wouldn't think of it. Doesn't Ralph look cute in his little Buster Brown suit? Molly made it herself." Bessie didn't really talk loud, but her voice was clear and rang in the little room.

There were ten pupils in the school—I was going to say, children, but I couldn't, because Rudolph Haas was nearly as tall as Father. He was in the eighth grade. They all watched us like chicken hawks while Miss Wheeler had us read and do numbers for her. After we were done with the numbers, she decided Grace belonged in the fourth grade and I in the third.

Recess didn't go a bit good for me. Before we left home, Mother had taken us into the front room and said, "I am not going to have you children grow up to be rowdies and ruffians just because we live on a farm. Ralph, if you get into a fight in this new school, I shall give you a hard thrashing when you come home. The Bible says that if your enemy smites you on one cheek, you are to turn the other. I want you to follow that teaching absolutely. And Grace, I want you to promise me on your word of honor that you will tell me if he ever raises a hand against any other child at school."

She must have heard about Freddie Sprague. He was in the second grade, but he was bigger and fatter than I. We hadn't been out to recess a minute when Freddie put a stick on my shoulder and then knocked it off. "Wanta fight?" he said.

Grace was standing right behind him, and hollered, "If you do, I'll tell Mother."

I knew she would, too, so I said, "No, my mother won't let me."

I don't know why the Bible picked out cheeks, but that's right where Freddie hit me. I wanted to hit him back, but I didn't dare to. Mother could spank pretty hard if I did something right after she'd told me not to. I just let my hands stay down and turned my face around. Freddie hit that side, too. And he hit it hard.

When I started to cry, somebody sang out, "Molly, Molly." Then all the boys, and even some of the girls, started yelling it.

Grace came over and wiped my face with my handkerchief. "Don't cry," she said. "Mother will be proud of you." Then Miss Wheeler rang the bell for us to come in, and said Freddie should be ashamed for hitting me. Every time she wasn't looking the rest of the morning, he kept making faces at me.

Noon was worse than recess. Grace had brought a rubber ball to school with her. She knew how to play jackstones with it, but the other girls didn't. As soon as we got out at noon, she divided our lunch and went off with the other girls to hunt for the right-sized stones. Mother had baked us each a cup custard. I laid my two sandwiches and piece of cake on top of my cup and went to look for a place to eat it. When I was halfway out to the carnage shed, Freddie came running with another stick to put on my shoulder. I spilled my sandwiches and cake trying to get away, and he knocked the cup out of my hands, yelling, "Fight, Molly!" All the other boys laughed at me. Some of them yelled, "Hit the little sissy, Freddie, make him fight." I had to run away to the far corner of the yard.

All the other youngsters either rode to school or drove in old buggies. There was an open shed where they backed the buggies in at one end and tied the horses at the other. Willie Aldivote rode a funny-looking grayish-white donkey with big yellow splotches. After they had eaten their lunches, the other boys got the donkey out and started to ride him. They would hold him by the ears until some boy got on, then they'd let him loose and tickle him with a switch. He would buck like sixty. Sometimes the boys stayed on and sometimes they fell off.

I had come back to the corner of the shed where I could watch. When Freddie saw me, he hollered, "Let's put Molly on him," and they did.

I wasn't very much afraid. I hadn't fallen off the cowboy's horse, and thought I could cut the mustard. Anyway, I was willing to take the chance. Mother hadn't said I couldn't ride a donkey, and I wanted to show the boys I wasn't a sissy. My ride lasted about half of the donkey's first buck jump. He kicked his heels up, and I pitched off between his ears. I landed right on my face in the gravel. I skinned my nose and bit my tongue. I couldn't help crying a little, but I didn't make any noise.

Mother nearly went frantic when we got home from school. My Buster Brown suit was pretty well messed up from the bloody nose I got when I fell off the donkey, and Freddie had given me a good working over after school. I guess it hadn't helped my looks very much. Grace was so busy telling Mother about my being a good boy and not fighting that, until after I was all cleaned up, she forgot to give her the note Miss Wheeler had sent.

Mother's eyes got all full of tears when she was washing my face and putting court plaster on my nose. She told me that she was proud of me for being a little gentleman, and that she would see to it that those ruffians didn't attack me again. Grace hadn't seen me try to ride the donkey, and I thought it would be best not to mention it to Mother.

Father came in from digging post holes just after Grace had remembered about the note. Mother was madder than ever and read it aloud to him. The teacher said that Grace had adjusted herself very nicely with the other girls and she was sure I would soon make my adjustment, but she would suggest that I wear overalls to school like the other boys.

Mother tossed the note down on the table and slapped it with her hand. Her lips were pinched together and she said, "The fact that I am going to bring my children up on a farm isn't going to prevent me from bringing them up to be ladies and gentlemen. Ralph wearing overalls to school! The very idea! I shall see that teacher the first thing in the morning."

Father shut his eyes and scratched the back of his head. Then he said, "There might be some reason in what she says, Mame. And, you know, there have been some gentlemen in overalls." Mother's lips pinched tighter than ever, and she never said a word.

Father and Mother sat up in the kitchen till after I went to sleep. I don't know what they talked about, but the part that was about me must have ended in a compromise. Mother didn't go to see the teacher, and I didn't wear overalls to school.