The Black Fawn Read online

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  The Black Fawn

  _Other books by_ Jim Kjelgaard

  THE LAND IS BRIGHT

  THE LOST WAGON

  BIG RED

  REBEL SIEGE

  FOREST PATROL

  BUCKSKIN BRIGADE

  CHIP, THE DAM BUILDER

  FIRE HUNTER

  IRISH RED

  KALAK OF THE ICE

  A NOSE FOR TROUBLE

  SNOW DOG

  TRAILING TROUBLE

  WILD TREK

  THE EXPLORATIONS OF PERE MARQUETTE

  THE SPELL OF THE WHITE STURGEON

  OUTLAW RED

  THE COMING OF THE MORMONS

  CRACKER BARREL TROUBLE SHOOTER

  LION HOUND

  TRADING JEFF AND HIS DOG

  DESERT DOG

  HAUNT FOX

  THE OKLAHOMA LAND RUN

  DOUBLE CHALLENGE

  SWAMP CAT

  WILDLIFE CAMERAMAN

  WOLF BROTHER

  RESCUE DOG OF THE HIGH PASS

  The Black Fawn

  by Jim Kjelgaard

  Dodd, Mead & Company

  New York

  (C) 1958 BY JIM KJELGAARD

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

  _Tenth Printing_

  NO PART OF THIS BOOK MAY BE REPRODUCED IN ANY FORM WITHOUT PERMISSION IN WRITING FROM THE PUBLISHER

  _The characters, places, incidents and situations in this book are imaginary and have no relation to any person, place or actual happening_

  LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOG CARD NUMBER: 58-13083

  PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

  To my wife

  because, in twenty years together, the longest days I've ever spent were those when we were not together

  The Black Fawn

  chapter 1

  Evening shadows lowered like a cool, dark wing folding gently over theday, but the coming of night brought no change in the refrain that overand over again kept running through Bud Sloan's brain.

  "I must not let them know I'm afraid. I must remember my manners. I mustnot let them know I'm afraid! I must remember my manners! I mustnot . . ."

  He clenched his teeth as though somehow that would clamp down on theunwanted words and shove them back into the dark recesses where theybelonged. But they were in his brain, not his mouth, and clenching histeeth only seemed to make the refrain ring all the more loudly. Heopened his mouth and said before he could stop himself,

  "I must not . . ."

  "You must not what?" Gram Bennett asked.

  She sat at the side of the little table in the kitchen and not at thegreat one in the dining room as when all the Bennetts' eleven childrenwere home. Then Gramps sat at the head of the table and Gram at thefoot. But the little table was big enough now that there were only threeof them for most meals.

  "Nothing." Bud choked. "I--I was just thinking out loud."

  "You needn't be afraid to speak up, Allan. If there's something you mustnot do, you have only to say so."

  Gram spoke very gently, but Bud squirmed. He did not wriggle on hischair for he had learned to hide as well as he could what he reallyfelt. To show your feelings was to show your weakness, and there wasalways somebody ready to pounce on a weakness. He should have knownbetter than to talk out loud.

  "Tell us, Allan," Gram coaxed.

  "There's nothing to tell," he said, looking down at his plate andfeeling his cheeks flush.

  * * * * *

  He had come to live with Gram and Gramps only yesterday morning and itseemed an eternity since the bus driver had stopped on the blacktop roadand pointed out the rutted drive leading to the Bennetts' huge oldfarmhouse.

  "That's it, son," he had said.

  With his little bundle of belongings wrapped in a spare shirt and tuckedunder his right arm--the orphanage did not furnish suitcases when theyfarmed you out--Bud started up the drive with his head high and withwhat he hoped was a fearless, manly tread. But his insides felt likejelly that has stood too long in a warm place and his feet seemed toweigh five hundred pounds each. If he had been sure no one was looking,he would have burst into tears. He could not be sure, and not for aninstant must he forget that weakness made him an easy prey for whoeversaw it. He did not think of running.

  Bud was twenty yards from the house when Gramps Bennett came around onecorner. Bud stopped in his tracks and grasped his bundle so tightly thathis knuckles whitened.

  At first glance Gramps seemed to be a huge man, but after a second lookyou saw that he merely seemed huge because he was short. He stood fivefeet six in his work-scuffed brogans, faded blue jeans and an equallyfaded denim work shirt. He seemed to be almost as big around as he wastall. Hamlike hands hung from his shirt sleeves, a short, thick neckrose from the collar. A stubby white beard almost hid Gramps' lips andhe had an aquiline nose, piercing eyes and a leonine mane of white hair.Gramps' voice sounded like a lion's roar as he said,

  "You the boy from the orphanage?"

  "Yes, sir," Bud said, still trying to conduct himself as a man should.

  "Got a name?" Gramps asked caustically.

  "Yes, sir," the boy said. "Bud Sloan."

  "Bud, eh? I've heard worse names. Come meet Gram."

  Without another word or a backward look and with astonishing agility forhis bulk, Gramps turned on his heel and led the way to the kitchen doorat the back of the house. There was also a front door, but that was forcompany use.

  Bud felt better when he saw four cattle in a pasture near the barn. Twohorses raised inquiring heads over the bars of the paddock, pigs gruntedin their sty and chickens, ducks and turkeys roamed at will around thefarmyard. Then a big and furry farm collie came trotting slowly towardthe house.

  Bud almost smiled. He had always understood animals. He did not knowwhy, unless it was because they always accepted him for what he was andnever cared where he came from or who supported him. His most cherishedmemory of the orphanage was a pet kitten he had had there. His firstheartbreak had come when that kitten had been killed by a passing car.Seeing the animals here seemed somehow to remove half his burdens.

  Bud turned for a last look at the dog before Gramps opened the door andhe entered the kitchen to meet Gram.

  "Why, Allan! How wonderful you're here at last!"

  Bud writhed. For although his proper name was Allan, he hated it.

  Gram was taller than Gramps, and slim. Her hair was gray. Sixty yearsand eleven children had left their mark on her face and work-worn hands,but her tread was lithe and easy as she advanced on Bud. When shestooped to enfold him in her arms, she seemed taller than the EiffelTower. Gram planted a resounding kiss on his cheek.

  "Welcome, Allan, and may you be happy with us!"

  Bud sputtered and squirmed away from Gram. It was the first time hecould remember being kissed and he considered it a degrading experience.He looked up to see Gramps regarding him balefully.

  "You told me your name was Bud," Gramps snorted.

  "It is!"

  "Pooh," said Gram. "It's Allan written on the card and it's Allan I'llcall him. Have a tart, Allan."

  She gave him a crisp-baked tart filled with jelly. Bud meant to refuseit, for he neither asked for nor wanted favors. But a boy's hungerasserted itself and he accepted it, mumbled his thanks and began to eatit, looking around the kitchen as he did.

  He noticed only that it was much smaller than the kitchen at theorphanage and that the huge, old-fashioned wood-burning range, thewooden cupboards, the pantry off the kitchen and the worn furniture andscuffed linoleum looked shabby in comparis
on with the antiseptic, modernappointments of the orphanage kitchen.

  Bud finished the tart and, stealing a glance into the adjoining livingroom, saw a mounted buck's head peering glassily back at him. Hastily hewiped his hands on his trousers and looked away.

  "Do you think you'll like it here?" Gram asked.

  "Yes, ma'am," Bud said dutifully.

  "Will you have another tart?"

  "No, ma'am."

  "Yes, ma'am. No, ma'am," Gramps mimicked. "That all they taught you tosay at that there orphanage?"

  "No, sir."

  "Well, if you've had all you want to eat, Bud," Gramps said, lookingmeaningfully at Gram as he emphasized the nickname, "we might as wellput you to work."

  "Now, Delbert," Gram said, "I say that boy ought to rest his first daywith us."

  "And I say he ought not," Gramps said firmly. "He might as well get theidea why he's here from the first, and why he's here is to work. Comeon, Bud."

  Bud said nothing as he turned to follow Gramps out of the kitchen, buthe was not worried. He had known he was coming to work. Tales from otherfarmed-out youngsters had drifted back to the orphanage and some of themwere not pretty tales, but anything was better than continuing as anobject of charity. He was a man and he could stand on his own two feet.Although he might not like what came, he could face it.

  He felt a little better when they came onto the back porch. The big dogthat had been ambling toward the house when he arrived was now lying onthe stoop. It rose, wagged its tail amiably and touched Bud's hand witha moist muzzle. No matter what happened, Bud thought, it couldn't be allbad now that he had a friend.

  Gramps did not stop or look back until they came to a broad cultivatedfield in which orderly rows of fledgling crops had been so carefullyplanted and so precisely spaced that they formed an exact pattern. Thedog, who knew that he was not to walk on cultivated ground, sat down atthe edge of the field. Bud asked his name.

  "Shep," Gramps said, and then he pointed to the field. "Do you know whatthose are?"

  "No, sir."

  "Beans," said Gramps, and the tone of his voice showed pity for anybodyunable to identify a growing bean. "Now stoop down here 'longside me."

  Bud did as he was told and Gramps caught a bean, which had broad leavesand a fragile stem, between his forefingers and held it gently.

  "Have yourself a real good look."

  Bud concentrated on the bean until a full minute later when Gramps said,

  "Know what it looks like?"

  "Yes, sir."

  "Good. Now, everything in this field that ain't a bean is a weed. Everyweed steals from the beans just like a bank robber steals from a bank."

  "I don't understand you, sir," Bud said.

  "Think, boy, and quit calling me sir," Gramps said impatiently. "Whatmakes the beans grow big and strong, if not the goodness of the earth?And what else do the weeds live on? For every weed that steals theearth's richness, the beans suffer accordingly."

  "That's wonderful!"

  Gramps looked at him oddly, but Bud was too surprised and delighted tonotice. He had never thought of nature in such terms and it _was_wonderful. Gramps got down on his hands and knees and, supportinghimself on both knees and with his left hand, deftly used his right handto pluck a small weed from among the growing beans. He held the weed upfor Bud to look at.

  "There you are. A pigweed, and a month from now it would be waist highto you. Its roots would be so big and grown so deep that when you pulledit out a half dozen beans would come with it. Now, between the rows wecan hoe 'em out or cultivate 'em. But we can't use either a hoe orcultivator on the rows themselves, and I guess even you can see why."

  "Yes, sir."

  Gramps' tone remained caustic but Bud refused to be ruffled. He wouldearn his own way and the right to hold his head high.

  "Sure you know what a bean looks like?" Gramps asked.

  "Yes, sir."

  "Then I want you to work down all these rows and pick the weeds out fromthe beans."

  Bud got down on his hands and knees and started on the first row. He wasmore interested than he had thought he could be, for what otherwisewould have been an onerous task took on new meaning in the light of whatGramps had told him. He was not just pulling weeds; he was destroyingrobbers bent on stealing for themselves the goodness from the earth thatproperly belonged to the growing beans.

  When he thought he was surely at the end of the row, he looked up tofind that he was less than halfway down it. Then another sight caughthis eyes.

  Beyond the barn and the pasture, where the cattle now stood lazily inthe shade of a single tree and chewed placid cuds, the unbroken greenborder of the forest began. The trees were cutover hardwoods for themost part, but here and there a pine rose above them and an occasionalgaunt stub towered over even the pines. Bud looked and wondered andpromised himself that, as soon as he could, he would go into the forestand see for himself what was there. But now there were weeds to pull.

  After what seemed an eternity, he reached the end of the first row andturned back on the second one. He did not look up again, for he feltguilty about stopping work. He tried to forget the ache in his bent backand the strain on his legs, for he knew he must work. When at last hecame to the end of the second row and turned back on the third, he heardGram saying,

  "I've brought you a drink, Allan. Real, honest-to-goodness ice-coldlemonade. Come have some."

  Bud rose to his knees, trying hard not to wince, and saw Gram, who waswearing a faded gingham dress and a sunbonnet that had gone out of stylea quarter of a century ago. She was carrying a pail from which thehandle of a tin dipper protruded and in which chunks of ice tinkled.Cold droplets clung to the outer surface of the pail.

  Gram smiled as Bud came forward, and he looked at her warily. There wasno telling what might happen when people smiled. But thirst triumphedover caution. He filled the dipper, drained it, and filled it anddrained it again. Ice-cold lemonade was delicious in any case and itseemed twenty times better from a tin dipper.

  "More?" Gram said.

  "No thank you, ma'am."

  "How is it going?"

  "Very well, ma'am."

  "Don't you work too hard," she said, and went off to offer some lemonadeto Gramps.

  Bud went back to his weeding, crawling slowly along the lines of beanswith his eyes fixed on their lower stalks. Anything that was not a beanmust be a weed, Gramps had said, and Bud acted accordingly. By now theromance of what he was doing had faded, but he kept on, determined topay his own way.

  A sudden bellow from Gramps was as startling as the wail of a fireengine. "Hey, Bud. Don'cha eat at noon?"

  * * * * *

  Bud rose and turned to face the old man, who said, "Don't the sun tellyou it's noon?"

  "No," Bud said.

  "When the sun's where she is, and when she don't cast 'nough shadow tohide a grasshopper, it's noon."

  Bud pondered this new and fascinating bit of lore. He looked at the sunand tried to fix its position indelibly in his mind so that foreverafterward he would know when it was noon. Though the sun had never toldhim anything before, from now on it would.

  "Let's move!" Gramps bellowed.

  Bud followed. Shep, who had devoted the cool portion of the morning tosniffing out various creatures in their lairs and had then gone to liein the tall grass when the sun became hot, joined them. Bud and Grampswashed at the old hand pump beside the stoop, rubbed their hands andfaces dry with a rough towel that hung over the pump and went into thekitchen.

  Bud sank wearily into his chair and it seemed to him that he had neverbefore known how good it could be just to sit down. But he had workedtoo hard not to be even hungrier than usual, and he could not ignore thesmell of the food on the table.

  Gram's lunch began with pork chops and mashed potatoes and ended with adelicious chilled product of the kitchen's major concession to modernliving, a big refrigerator.

  There was no time for conversation or anything else
except eating.Gramps emptied his plate first, pushed it back and sighed contentedly. Amoment later when Bud had drained his final glass of milk, Gramps said,

  "How about getting back to work?"

  "Yes, sir."

  "Delbert," Gram said sharply, "that boy should rest."

  "Pshaw. He'll rest better after he works harder. How 'bout it?"

  "Yes, sir," Bud said without enthusiasm.

  The morning had been hard and the afternoon was torture. But Bud stayedgrimly with the weeds until the sun lowered and Gramps called to himthat it was time for supper. Bud was almost reeling with fatigue and hewas grateful when Gramps pumped a basin of water for him to wash in.Although he happily stuffed himself with Gram's supper, only hisresolution to show no weakness kept him from dozing once supper wasover.

  Evidently as brisk as he had been in the early morning, Gramps bouncedfrom his chair. "If you're done, Bud, how 'bout giving me a hand withthe milking?"

  "Delbert," Gram said, "you're a . . ."

  "I'm a what?" Gramps asked innocently.

  "A Simon Legree. You're working that youngster a sight harder than youever worked yourself."

  Gramps said piously, "The Lord said there shall be a day and there shallbe a night. Man shall work for as long as day shall last. Right offhand,I can't rightly recall if He said anything 'bout working nights, but Iexpect He didn't know much about farmers or He would have. Anyhow, thosecows got to be milked."

  "Until now you've managed very nicely to milk them yourself."

  "But now I got a boy to help me with all the chores I used to do,"Gramps said. "C'mon, Bud."

  Bud trailed the old man to the barn where Gramps flicked on the switchthat lighted it. The first thing Bud noticed was the barn's odor,pungent and sweet, with only a faint suggestion of rancidness.

  Locked in their stanchions, the four cows were either nibbling grainfrom the boxes that stood beside each of them or lustily chewing hay.Bud stood back. Pulling weeds had been strange enough. The cows in theirstanchions were as alien as visitors from another planet.

  Gramps went to the end of the stable, opened a small door anddisappeared through it. He returned with two milking pails. He kept oneand thrust the other at Bud, who took it although he hadn't the faintestnotion of what he was supposed to do with it.

  "Ever do any milking?" Gramps demanded.

  "No, sir."

  "You'll never learn any younger. I'll show you."

  He pulled a stool up beside a placid red and white cow that was so usedto being milked that she did not even move when Gramps began to stripher udders. It looked easy. But when Gramps rose and motioned for Bud totake his place, the best Bud could do was to coax a trickle from oneteat and a few drops from another. Gramps watched for a moment withoutcomment and went to milk another cow.

  Bud continued the uneven struggle but there was less than an inch ofmilk in the bottom of the pail when Gramps returned. He watched a momentand said,

  "Let me do it."

  Bud was thankful, but he tried hard not to show that he was as hesurrendered the milking stool and let Gramps sit down. Milk hissed andfoamed into the pail as Gramps took every last drop of milk from thecow's swollen udders. Bud went with him to the little room at the end ofthe stable and, feeling guilty and ashamed, watched him pour the milkinto a can that stood neck-deep in cold water.

  Back in the house he fell asleep as soon as his head struck the pillow.He was too tired to notice the room or anything except that he was inbed.

  He seemed scarcely to have fallen asleep when he felt someone shakinghim awake. Bud opened his eyes to see the murky dawn at the windows andGramps standing over him.

  "Come on," Gramps said. "We don't lay abed on farms."

  Bud waited until Gramps had gone, for now that he was awake, it didn'tseem possible that he could hurt in so many places and all at the sametime. Then he climbed stiffly out of bed and dressed. When he walkeddownstairs to breakfast, his head was high and his step was as firm ashe could make it.

  The second day was a repetition of the first, except that when the beanswere finished, Gramps set him to weeding onions. But more and more oftenBud raised his head to look at the surrounding forest, and he renewedhis promise to himself to find out what lay behind those trees at theedge of the forest.

  * * * * *

  Bud looked resentfully down at his empty pie plate and, as much as hewanted to, he could not look up again.

  "I guess," Gram said, "that a body needn't tell all he knows and is afool if he does. Whatever it is you mustn't do, don't do it. I'm sureDelbert will do the milking tonight. Why don't you go for a walk in thewoods?"

  He sprang up with renewed energy and went outside. Shep rose to tagalong with him and together they entered the cool forest.

  Bud walked slowly. He did not know how to interpret the things he sawand heard around him, but he did not doubt that all of it was wonderful.He jumped when an owl cried, was frightened for a moment when a deadsnag crashed with an unearthly noise and laughed when a jay shrieked.His confidence mounted so that when he heard two sharp, blasting snorts,he continued to advance.

  Two minutes later he stopped in his tracks. Not twenty feet away, itswobbly feet braced to keep it from falling, a tiny fawn no more than twohours old stared at him in wide-eyed wonder.