The Healer

"I suppose this is the road," said the fat man, slowing the car and looking apprehensively at the rutted dirt surface. "I don't know why nobody seemed to want to tell us where your uncle lives. They're right when they call these Pennsylvania Dutch dumb."

The boy beside him made no answer. He might have been fourteen or so but he seemed younger, for he was so painfully thin that he looked small. He had a rather pale complexion with earnest blue eyes and a splash of freckles across the base of his nose. His hair was reddish and stood up straight in defiance of brush and comb.

The man turned the car off the concrete highway and threaded it between two great beech trees whose branches met above them. The roar of traffic faded away behind them together with the twin rivers of concrete lanes, billboards and roadside stands. It was as though they had passed through a doorway into another world. There were no noises here. Sugar maples grew on either side of the lane so close together that they seemed to be driving down a tunnel. Between the trunks the boy could see fields where black and white cows grazed and, beyond the pasture lands, fields of yellow wheat already tinged by autumn. They passed a huge red barn ornamented with brightly colored hex signs, and near it a tiny white house. A little stream, winding like a snake with colic, ran beside the lane and huge weeping willows at each bend leaned over the stream where it had worn away at their roots. For the first time, the boy sat up and began to look around him with some show of interest.

"Here's one of those Dutchmen now," said the man, curiosity and contempt in his tone. Coming toward them was a black, boxlike buggy drawn by a swiftly pacing chestnut horse. As it passed they could see the driver, an old man with a beard that came down to his chest, peering at them from under a flat hat with a broad brim.

"Talk about horse-and-buggy days," said the man. "These people haven't changed in four hundred years. I can't understand how they still keep going."

"Will my uncle look like that?" asked the boy, turning to watch the disappearing buggy.

"I don't know what he'll look like, but I know he's not going to stand any nonsense from you like your mother and I have. He's really your great-uncle and your mother says he's a real old-timer. He's going to make you work and it'll do you a lot of good. You cause him any trouble and he'll use a buggy whip on you."

The boy lost his momentary flare of interest and slouched back in his seat, assuming his former wooden expression. The lane followed the stream, twisting so much that the man swore as he tried to negotiate the curves. Ahead was a red covered bridge, a large pool beneath it fringed with joe-pye weeds and touch-me-nots. By the bridge stood a single gigantic swamp maple, its leaves blood red from the first frost. Beyond the bridge the lane turned sharply to the left. On the right was a high ridge completely enveloped with trees.

The boy was sitting up now, looking about him with delight. Several times he was about to speak, but thought better of it. They went through the bridge, the planks rumbling under the car's weight, and followed the curve of the road around the ridge. Now there were woods on either side of the road, and suddenly a red bird with black wings glided across in front of them. It was gone in a flash but the boy had seen it.

"A scarlet tanager!" he screamed in excitement.

The man threw an irritated look at him. "How do you know?"

"I saw a picture of one. It looks just like the picture." He twisted around hoping to see the bird again.

"You'd better forget about animals and start thinking of your own future. You've got a good mind but you've been failing in school."

"I'm not failing in science."

"No, because that crazy science teacher has a regular zoo and lets you play with the animals. Where's that going to get you? You were turning your own room into a zoo. It isn't healthy to have those guinea pigs and jerboas and parakeets in a bedroom. Well, I got rid of those."

The boy said with deep resentment, "I'll never forgive you for that—never."

"I don't care if you forgive me or not. I did the right thing. You're not my son, you know. When I married your mother after your father's death, I tried to make you into a decent, normal kid, but I can't figure you out. Neither can your mother anymore. Well, your uncle said he'd take you. He's about the only relative you have here in the East. We couldn't ask my folks in California to take you."

The boy said nothing. He seemed to shrink into himself. The face was drained of all expression.

The country was wilder here. Instead of the whitewashed post-and-rail fences and well-planted pastures, there was only an occasional snake fence, often so overgrown with blackberry bushes and honeysuckle that it seemed like a brier patch. They drove for some time without seeing a farmhouse and then came on two children, a boy and a girl, trudging along holding between them a basket half full of berries. The children obviously were Amish, for both were dressed in miniature editions of their elders' garb—the girl in a long skirt that came down to her high-buttoned shoes, shirtwaist, and a sunbonnet. The boy wore black trousers and coat, with a broad-brimmed, flat-topped hat. The fat man stopped the car beside them, the children staring curiously at the vehicle.

"You kids know where Abe Zook lives?" he asked.

The children looked at each other in astonishment and the boy said unbelievingly, "You want Abe Zook, the braucher?"

"He's some sort of farmer. Is that what a braucher is?"

The children hesitated. At last the girl said, "A braucher is else again. No one is going there."

"What's the matter with him?"

Neither child answered. They seemed frightened. Finally the boy pointed down the road. "It makes half a mile to the stump of the big oak. There the lane to his place goes off."

"Thanks," said the man irritably. As he started the car the girl called after them, "Better it is you come away before it makes dark."

"Crazy kids," muttered the man as they drove away. He glanced at the boy. "You want to grow up stupid and uneducated like those farm kids? Well, unless you straighten up, that's the way you'll be."

They drove on in silence, the boy staring sullenly ahead. Only once he came to life when a woodchuck sat up by the road, looked at them for a moment, and then dropped down and ran into the roadside tangle. The boy was about to ask a question just as the man snapped, "Look at the size of that rat. I'll bet this place is full of them." The boy said nothing, only stared at the weeds where the 'chuck had disappeared.

They found the stump and beside it two ruts leading into the woods. Grass was growing between them, and the lane looked as though it was seldom used. The man turned his car onto the ruts and they entered the deep shade.

Instantly the air grew cooler and damper. The boy could smell the woods, and his nostrils expanded as he sucked in the strange, magical odor. The air smelt sweet, so different from the smog and gas fumes of the city. The trees grew in weird shapes and long creepers of wild grape vines hung from them, some as thick as the boy's thigh. It was all so entirely different from the city that the boy felt awed and a little frightened. He wondered what animals might live in these woods and if some of them were dangerous.

They forded a tiny stream, climbed the opposite bank, made a sharp turn, and abruptly found themselves in a small valley, walled around by the forest. There was a square stone house in the middle of the clearing, flanked by two big horse chestnut trees. Behind the house was a stone barn and below it a springhouse, the origin of the little stream they had passed. The place looked as though it had seen better days, and yet it was not actually run down. The fences were mended, the barn painted, and there were no thistles in the pasture. Still, only the essentials had been done and the place did not have the neat, manicured look of most of the farms they had passed.

The man pulled up in front of the house and turned off the engine. As he opened the door, they could hear a sharp, staccato rattle, like someone running a stick along an iron fence. A dozen bluish birds with white heads and red wattles were scuttling along the ground, giving rattling cries. At once a huge black and brown dog, nearly as big as a calf, came bounding out, stopping to throw up his head and give a long, wailing cry. Both the man and the boy stopped short on seeing the dog, the boy with surprised delight and the man with apprehension.

The door of the house opened and a tall, thin man came out. He was bearded and wore the flat-crowned hat with the broad brim that was typical of this country. His face was so wrinkled that it seemed like a pile of chaff, but his blue eyes studied the new arrivals as though he were examining them under a magnifying glass. Yet, curiously, he did not seem to be looking at them as much as through them.

"Be done with your barking," the man said to the dog, who promptly grew still, although he still regarded the two strangers suspiciously.

"Are you Abe Zook?" asked the fat man, watching the dog nervously.

"People have called me many names. Abe Zook is one."

"You have a hard place to find."

"I wish it was harder."

"I'm Abby's husband, Bob."

"Ah—I remember Abby went to the city to be went with, but the boys weren't so much for her. It is good that she got someone else after Jack died."

The fat man seemed annoyed. "She's a very attractive woman. The trouble is with this young man here."

Abe Zook turned his blue, unfocusing eyes toward the boy. "Of him Abby has written me. This is the boy who does not like his school books and wants to be with animals instead."

"That's him. Billy, say hello to your great-uncle."

The boy had been marveling at the great dog, who had come close enough to sniff at him. "What kind of a dog is that?"

"He is of the avengers of blood—a bloodhound."

"A real bloodhound?" The boy nearly danced with excitement. "Can I touch him?"

"Let him touch you. He is older than you and more important. He will decide if you are to be friends."

The boy stood still and the hound moved in to take a deep inhalation. He waved his tail in a dignified way and allowed the boy to scratch his head.

"If you have animals around here, I guess Billy will be happy," said the fat man. "I told him, though, he was going to have to work hard. You live all alone here?"

"I am living alone now. For a long time I lived with John Stoltzfus, the great hex doctor. He taught me all he knew before the police took him away, as they had no feeling for some of the things he did."

Billy was trying to make the dog play with him but the old hound maintained a grave aloofness. Now he looked up. "What did the police take him away for?"

"They said it was against the law for him to use some of the herbs and potions he knew, yet how is it wrong to heal people? Still, Stoltzfus also knew black magic, like all hex doctors, and sometimes used it."

"You aren't one of those hex doctors, are you?" asked the fat man a little nervously.

"I am a braucher, one who heals with herbs and laying on of hands—a powwow man. We practice only white magic, although I know the black art well. When John Stoltzfus learned the skills, these differences were not being made. He claimed to have taught such great hex doctors as Nelson Rehmeyer and John-George Hohman. Perhaps he did. He was old enough to have taught King Solomon. He could talk to animals."

Again the boy looked up. "Can you talk to animals too?"

"To some animals." He gave a sudden series of loud cries that made both the city people jump. The cries were instantly answered and a great black bird swept around the corner of the house, banking sharply on one wing as he made the curve, and floated down beside them. The bird's feathers had a beautiful purple sheen and when he bowed his head, long streamer feathers stood up like a ruff on his neck.

"Is it a crow?" asked the fat man.

"No, no, a raven. A crow is much smaller and not as smart. His name is Grip and he catches mice and sometimes rats in the barnyard."

The delighted boy knelt down and held out his hand. Grip sidled up to him, ducked under the hand, and suddenly gave Billy a peck on the ankle that made the boy yell with pain. Grip immediately went into a kind of war dance, leaping up and down with thrashing wings and chuckling to himself, while Billy angrily rubbed his ankle.

"What did he do that for?"

"To see you jump. He is great for fun."

The bird was still giving his deep chuckle.

"What's he saying?"

"He's saying that he hasn't had so much fun since he pulled the tailfeathers out of the Plymouth Rock."

The bird had stopped his dancing and was stealthily approaching the boy again.

"Why does he want to bite me?"

"Because he is so smart. Ravens are like humans; they like to cause trouble for no reason."