Me and Billy (10 page)

“I don’t know what I’ll do with the money,” Billy said. “Maybe I’ll buy a van and go traveling around the countryside. What about that for an idea, Possum?”

“Not me,” I said. “No more vans for me. You know what I was thinking of?”

“What?”

I kind of hesitated, for I figured he might laugh at me. “I was thinking about buying the Home off Deacon and letting the boys run it themselves the way they want to.”

He didn’t laugh, for he saw I was serious and didn’t want to hurt my feelings. “That’s okay, Possum. Me, I wouldn’t waste any money on those kids. They’re mostly no good, anyway. But maybe you’d have some left over for yourself.”

“I reckon there’s going to be plenty,” I said. I felt sort of embarrassed to talk about it. “We better get going,” I said.

We were lucky in one thing, for we happened to run out the side of Plunket City toward the mountains. They were dead ahead of us, rising up into the sky, kind of hazy purple. There were three of them in a row—or maybe you’d say it was one mountain with three peaks.

We started off walking toward them. “How far do you think they are, Possum?” Billy said.

“A good piece, I reckon. Probably farther than they look. Ten miles, anyway.”

“That’s not so bad,” Billy said. “We could get there by nightfall, maybe.”

We walked on. We were now well clear of town and into farm country. Cornfields all around us, here and there a field of hay or a woodlot. Plenty of cows, too, which looked up from grazing as we passed by. It was people that were sparse. The farmhouses were half a mile apart and sometimes farther. All pretty much the same—veranda across the front, paint peeling off here and there; brown barn and a couple of sheds out back; with an outhouse and woodpile somewhere in
between. Sometimes we’d see a woman moving around inside the house or the farmer out back pitching manure out of the barn.

“You know, Possum,” Billy said, “we haven’t come across anything like a store for a couple of hours. How we going to buy dinner?”

“I didn’t think of that,” I said. The truth was, I’d kind of been daydreaming about how it would be with the boys running the Home their own way. “There’s bound to be a store somewhere. These farmers have got to shop somewhere.”

“I don’t know. Maybe they grow all their own stuff.”

“Let’s just keep on. Maybe we’ll come to something.”

But we didn’t. An hour went by and then another hour, close as we could figure. The sun was getting way over in the sky, hanging just above the purple mountains. “I figured we’d of reached those mountains by now,” Billy said. “If you was to ask me, I’d say they’re farther off from us now than when we started out.”

“That can’t be, Billy. But they sure don’t look any closer.”

“I’m mighty hungry,” he said. “One way or another I got to get something to eat. Do you reckon that corn’s ripe?”

“I doubt it. Not this time of year. Let’s stop at the next farmhouse and see if they’ll sell us something. They’re bound to have milk and eggs, I figure.”

On we went. We still hadn’t come across a farmhouse when we saw a wagon and a mule out in the middle of a hay field. “Must be a farmhouse somewheres around here,” Billy said. We picked up our pace, and as we got a little farther along we could see somebody out in the field where the mule and wagon were, swinging a scythe. We went on. When we came abreast of the field, we climbed over the rail fence and started across the mowed stubble. “Looks like a kid,” Billy said. We walked on. “Why, it’s a girl.”

We came up to her. She stopped swinging the scythe and looked at us. It was a girl, all right, about our age, as close as I could judge. She’d got her dress pulled up and tucked into her belt so as to give her legs free play for mowing, and her brown hair was tucked under a straw hat. She was sweating pretty good, and there were bits of seeds and hay dust stuck in the sweat on her face.

Even so, she was mighty pretty. Suddenly I wished I’d cleaned up a little before we climbed over that fence. I reached around back and tucked in my shirt. Billy just stood there staring at her, but I knew more about manners than he did. I sort of bowed. “Howdy, ma’am.”

She leaned on the scythe to rest. I figured she’d been at that scything all day, from the amount she’d cut. “Where’d you fellas come from? We don’t get a whole lot of strangers out in these parts.”

I wasn’t about to tell her the exact truth. “From Plunket City. We’re heading for the mountains.”

“Plunket City? That’s twelve miles.”

Billy finally caught on that she was pretty and got into the conversation. “We got run out of there,” he said. That was exactly what I didn’t want him to say, and I gave him a quick knock on his arm. But he was proud of it. “We were working with a fella skinning folks with this elixir, and somebody took a shot at him.”

“Blame you, Billy,” I whispered.

He grinned. “We had to run for it. We don’t know if the fella’s dead or just wounded.”

“They shot him?” she said. “What on earth for?” She stopped short. “Oh, glory, my skirt.” She blushed all pink under the hay dust, which only made her look prettier, and jerked her skirt from under her belt. “Pa’d kill me if he knew some boys saw me like that.” She took off her hat, and her hair fell down to the middle of her back. With her fingers, she combed it out a little. Then she took a handkerchief out of the pocket of her skirt and wiped the sweat and hay dust off her face.

I decided I was going to fix Billy’s wagon for him. “Don’t mind what Billy says, ma’am. He can’t always help himself.”

Billy grinned. “Possum’s right. You can’t trust anything about me.”

She looked at me. “Is your name really Possum?”

I was glad she asked me instead of Billy, but I wished she’d lighted on a different subject. “Yes,” I said. I changed the subject. “How far do you reckon it is to those mountains?”

“How’d you get a name like that?”

But before I could think of what to say, Billy told her. “When they first brought him to the Home, he was curled up in a basket like a possum, so they called him that.”

“I’ll get you, Billy,” I whispered.

“The Home?”

I could see that Billy had made up his mind to make a nuisance of himself, and I figured I’d better take over as much as I could. “The Deacon Smith Home for Waifs,” I said. “You have to be pretty smart to go there.” I blushed and cursed myself for blushing. I just couldn’t get the hang of lying. “Well, maybe that’s putting it too strong.”

“It’s for kids whose pa and ma don’t want them,” Billy said.

“Glory,” she said, shifting her attention to Billy. “You mean your ma and pa didn’t want you?”

“You don’t know if they didn’t want us, Billy. They could have died. Or were just too poor to feed us and figured we were better off in the Home, where we’d eat regular. Maybe the tears were running down their face like a faucet when they took us to the Home.”

“Then how come they never came to visit us?” Billy said, giving me a look.

“Maybe they had to move away because they were too poor to live there anymore,” I said. “Let’s get off this subject.” I didn’t mind if Billy talked to her some, but I was the one who started talking to her. “Now we told you our names, you got to tell us yours.”

“Betty Ann Singletary,” she said. “Listen, fellas, I got to get this hay in before dark.”

“How come you got to do it by yourself?” Billy said.

“There’s just me. The mule kicked Pa and busted his leg. He’s better, but not good enough to swing a scythe.”

“What about your ma?” Billy said.

I had a feeling he shouldn’t have asked that question, and I was right. Betty Ann looked down at the ground. Then she looked back up at us. “Ma’s not up to it,” she said.

I started to change the subject. “Maybe we could help—”

But Billy busted in. “What’s wrong with her?” he said.

Betty Ann looked Billy smack in the eye. “She’s just not up to it.”

I tried again. “Listen, Betty Ann, if we help you get the hay in, would you sell us some eggs and such?”

She looked at me, so’s to shut Billy off. “Pa’d never let you pay for a meal. But I’d be real glad of the help.”

“That mule wouldn’t of kicked me,” Billy said. “The Professor always said, ‘Billy, you manage them mules like you was born to it.’”

“Except when you’re poking yourself in the eye with the whip handle,” I said.

He gave me a quick look, then back to Betty Ann. “You’ll see, Betty Ann.”

He didn’t say anything further, and we started pitching the hay into the wagon. Being as we were town boys, we didn’t have any real knack for farmwork, but we’d cleaned out the stable at the Home often enough and knew how to handle a pitchfork. We got the job done. I climbed up onto the pile of hay in the wagon, but Billy got onto the driver’s seat and picked up the reins. “You just set there and rest, Betty Ann. I’ll drive the mules. Which way is home?”

She didn’t climb up but stood there holding the pitchfork, frowning. “I doubt if they’ll do what you tell them. The only ones they’ll obey are me and Pa.”

“Don’t you worry,” Billy said. “I got a way with mules.” She shook her head, but she climbed up onto the wagon beside Billy. He snapped the reins. “Gee up.” The mules turned away like they’d seen enough, dropped their heads down, and began to chew at the stubble. “Gee up, I said.” The mules didn’t pay him any attention but went on chewing. I couldn’t see Betty Ann’s face from where I sat on the hay pile, but I could tell that she’d got her hand over her mouth. Billy shot her a look. “These are just about the dumb
est mules I ever did see.” He snapped the reins again. “Blame you, gee up.”

Betty Ann couldn’t help herself and began to giggle. “I told you,” she said.

Billy gave her another look. He knew he was beat, but he wasn’t ready to give in. He snapped the reins three or four times and shouted, “Gee up you blame idiots.”

Betty Ann laughed out loud. “Billy, you better let me have those reins. Otherwise we’ll miss supper and breakfast, too, like as not.”

The farmhouse was about a half mile away, around a bend in the road. The house was a little more spruce than some of the others. The paint wasn’t wore off quite so bad, the roof looked like it had been patched recent, and hanging from one of the big maple trees around the house was a swing, where I figured Betty Ann had swung when she was little and maybe still did.

But they weren’t rich, either. The barn had never seen a lick of paint, and one of the front windows had a square of wood in it instead of glass.

We swung around back. Me and Billy pitched the hay up into the barn loft, while Betty Ann unhitched the mules and curried them. While we was working, I noticed a fella with a crutch under one arm and his leg
tied up in slats have a look out the kitchen door at us from time to time. He didn’t say anything, just looked.

Then we were done, and Betty Ann led us to the house. The man opened the door for us. “Who you got there, Betty Ann?” he said in a quiet voice, kind of firm, but not sore at seeing us there.

“A couple of fellas from Plunket City. They ran away from an orphan home and shot somebody.”

“We didn’t shoot anybody,” I said quickly. “We got shot at.”

“Somebody got shot, anyway. They’re mighty hungry. They said they’d help me load the hay if we fed them.”

“We’ll pay for it,” I said. “We got a pile of dough.” I took the bills out of my pocket and held them out where they could see them.

The man smiled. “You won’t pay for a meal in my house,” he said. “You just clean up at the pump in the yard, and I’ll carve up a few more spuds.”

So we washed at the pump, dried ourselves off with a piece of burlap that was hanging on the pump handle, and went on in. It was a nice place—homey, I guess you’d call it. Neat and tidy and done up nice. There were a couple of cloth samplers on the wall with mottoes embroidered into them—“God Bless This House,” stuff like that. In the kitchen window there was a jelly jar full of wildflowers. While the potatoes were frying, and sending up just the most handsome smell, Betty Ann took us out to the parlor. In a corner
there was a little whatnot cabinet with curios on it—a couple of Indian arrowheads, a bird’s nest with speckled eggs in it, a piece of crystal that made rainbow colors when you held it up to the light, and some curled-up seashells. There was a horsehair sofa that seemed better suited for display than sitting on, and across the room a little pump organ with a music book on it opened to “The Letter That Never Came.”

“Can you play that organ, Betty Ann?” Billy said.

“Some. Ma was teaching me before...before. She could play real good. She used to play for the church choir before she married Pa.”

Where was Betty Ann’s ma? Was she upstairs sick in bed? What was wrong with her? I was curious, but I knew better than to say anything.

But naturally Billy didn’t. “What’s the matter—”

I leaped in. “Those potatoes smell powerful good to me. I could eat a bushel of them.”

Luckily, just at that minute, Betty Ann’s pa called us into the kitchen. We sat down at the old wooden kitchen table, scrubbed so bare it was almost white. Whatever was wrong with Mrs. Singletary, she wasn’t eating with us, for there were just four plates on the table. I nudged Billy. “Eat nice,” I whispered. “Not like you’re shoveling coal into a furnace.” Back at the Home, Deacon’s sister was always on us about our table manners, the main result being that the boys wouldn’t be caught dead eating nice unless she was staring right at them. I wasn’t any better than the rest,
but now I wished I’d paid more attention to how you were supposed to hold your fork and how to cut your meat.

But good manners or not, considering how hungry we were, it’d be hard to go slow on those potatoes and pork. I was just about to dig in when Mr. Singletary said, “Boys, in this house we always thank the Lord for putting another meal in front of us.”

It didn’t seem to me the Lord had put those fried potatoes in front of us; we’d worked blame hard in that hay field for them. Still, I dropped my fork, put my hands together, bent my head down, and closed my eyes so I couldn’t see those potatoes and that slab of pork in front of me.