Visitor? I was the landlord. I was a little wary of the snorer once he was upright, but if I didn't put my foot down immediately, there was no telling how long they'd stay. "It's mine," I said. My voice squeaked, so I boomed out the next sentence like a bass drum. "By rights, I'm owner of this cabin."
The man began shuddering to his feet.
"It's all right, Paw. It's no more his 'an ours." She gave me a glance. "He's nothing but a little kid talking big."
The man looked me over head to toe as if measuring how big a threat I might be. I squinched my eyes to keep from blinking. He was head, shoulders, and half a chest taller than me.
To my enormous relief and small satisfaction, he broke the gaze. "We was here first," he said to the girl in what was not quite a whine.
"Yeah, Paw," she said. She put one hand on her narrow hip. "We ¡my here and we where. You can jest rest easy on that."
He lurched toward us. I stepped out of the way. I couldn't help it. Then I realized it was the doorway he was heading for, not me. I did another quick sidestep.
"Jest got up," he muttered. "Got to—"
She sort of shoved him out the doorway before he could finish his sentence. So there was some delicacy about her—something girllike. She watched, silent, her back to me, as he stumbled toward the trees to take care of his morning business. I was sure she didn't want me staring, so I walked in toward the hearth, pretending I was looking for something. I was embarrassed for her now, more than sorry for her. The smell of his quilt was a mixture of alcohol and vomit and filth. A drunken old fool for a father. When she turned around again to see what I was up to inside the cabin, I tried to muster up a bit of bravado. "Wal, Vile," I said.
"Violet to you," she barked. But I could tell no one in her memory had ever used her proper name. She was just trying to make herself seem a little less wretched.
I wasn't in a mood to be any kinder than I had been already. "Wal, Vile, Violet, whatever you call yourself, you're just lucky I aim to go fishing this morning. That'll give you time to eat"—she snorted—"and clear out of here before I get back." She snorted again.
We did a little dance as I tried to pass her in the doorway; then she stepped grandly aside and gave me a sweeping bow. I made a wide arc around the noise of the old man in the woods. I didn't want to stumble into him.
Seeing a spruce, I pulled out my pocketknife and pried off a patch of resin. I stuck it in my mouth. Pa says I'm going to sacrifice every tooth in my mouth to chewing resin, but it's free, and I can't afford store-bought gum. Sometimes, when you got a lot of thinking to do, you have this need to be chewing on something.
Pa. I'd hardly thought of Pa while meeting with the squatters at the cabin, but I dug my worms and reached the creek hours before Willie got there, which left me time to think. I started with the pair in the cabin, but too soon I was back home in my mind. A fellow shouldn't have too much time to ponder on things. It ain't healthy. I took a worm from my pocket and threaded most of it onto my hook. There he was, poor thing, dangling helpless from where I'd attached him. What had he ever done to me that I should treat him so cruel?
I chomped down on my wad of resin. Why did the worm make me think of Elliot? I didn't want to think of Elliot at all, much less as a worm. There's a hymn about Jesus' dying "for such a worm as I." I didn't like that line. Elliot might be born simple, he might cause me lots of grief, but he wasn't fish bait. I chomped down harder on my resin. Usually the strong, bitter taste of it made me feel like I imagined a man chewing tobacco might feel. Now it just made me feel glummer. I wanted something sweet in my mouth like maple sugar or candy or store-bought gum.
Pa. My pa crying. Even if in general people think preachers aren't real he-men, I knew most people in Leonardstown looked up to my pa. Else why did they bluster on about their true beliefs and hint darkly that his might be inferior? Wasn't it because they knew in their hearts that he was their superior in every way that really mattered? Even Reverend Pelham had almost admitted as much. Pa's critics were like boys on the school grounds bragging about what their granddaddies did in the Great War. That don't have nothing to do with how fine a person you turned out to be yourself.
That's all bragging about your beliefs amounts to. It's just a matter of trying to assure people you got something superior that they can't see and you don't have to prove. God or no God, it don't hang on what some puny little human beings say or do or think. Any little rooster can puff out his throat and crow the morning in, and he can fool everybody including himself, long as the morning keeps on faithfully coming in on its own. The same way, I reasoned, God, if there was a God, was going to run things His own way. He wasn't going to let mere people tell Him how to run things. God liked for people to be kind and helpful and good. No matter what the Reverend Pelham claimed, God wasn't just interested in how folks crowed.
I sat down there by the creek, and I knew all these things. I had lived for ten years in the knowledge of my pa's true strength. I didn't need to have a hero grandpa, even if I really did. As mad as I might get at him from time to time, Pa was my living hero—until I saw him put his head down on top of my mother's head and blubber like a baby.
Willie finally showed, but I was so talked out in my head, I could hardly speak out loud.
"Elliot all right?" he asked at once. "You didn't really say before."
"Elliot?" I hadn't been thinking much about Elliot just then. "Oh. Yeah. Elliot's fine. Elliot's always fine, ain't he?"
Willie looked at me funny. "Last thing I knew, he was lost."
"Pa found him." I guess I must have snapped the words out.
He was quiet for a minute, looking me over. "That's good," he said. I thought he was about to add Ain't it? But Willie has got sense enough not to push things. I like that quality in Willie; also that he is loyal. A friend who is loyal and knows when to shut up is as rare as a hippo in Cutter's Pond.
We didn't catch anything. The spring drought had been hard on fish and fishermen alike. We stayed, though, until the sun and our bellies told us that it was time for dinner.
Funny, looking back, I never mentioned to Willie anything about the cabin or its new "owners." You'd think I would have, that Willie deserved to know. Was I planning mischief even then? Something I'd be ashamed for Willie to know about? I don't think so. I just didn't quite get around to mentioning it. That's all. That's no crime, is it?
6. The Intruders
IN LEONARDSTOWN MOST FOLKS HAVE THEIR BIG MEAL in the middle of the day. The stoneworkers carry their dinner in pails to the quarry or to the shed, but originally this was a farm community, and farmers come in from the fields after a long morning of work. They need plenty to fuel themselves up for the rest of the day. Nobody in our house does farm work, but we follow the customs of the town. It makes us more a part of the community, though to tell the truth, we've never been quite a part of it. Neither of my parents was born here, for one thing. There are no grandparents or aunts and uncles in easy hailing distance when things go wrong or you want to celebrate. Pa's parents are both dead, and Ma's live up in the northeast corner of the state, away from the rail line. It's a long day's journey from here.
The family had already gathered around the table when I got home. I scurried for my place, which is next to Beth's, at the kitchen table. As I sat down, she pinched her nose, her little finger curling in the air like a comma. "Phew," she said.
"Elizabeth!" Ma was shocked to hear Beth using such an unladylike word.