The Black Fawn Page 7

  chapter 7

  From the school bus the blacktop road looked to Bud like a frozen blackriver between the banks of snow cast aside by the snowplow and hepretended that the poles indicating culverts were channel markers. TheBarston farm buildings to the left and a hundred and fifty yards fromthe highway seemed to him an island in the sea of snow and the Barstons'orchard looked like a great mass of seaweed.

  Soon he tired of daydreaming and stared stonily out of the window. WhenChristmas had still been weeks away, he had been able to tell himselfthat it might never come. But now that only a few days remained beforeChristmas, there was no more hope. This was the last trip the school buswould be making until after New Year's, for the Christmas vacation wasbeginning and in just three days Gram and Gramps' children andgrandchildren would arrive and there would be no place for an outsider.

  It would have been far better, he thought bleakly, if he had never cometo Bennett's Farm and probably it would be better if he left now. Butalthough Bud's imagination could whisk him anywhere at all, the harshrealities of life as he had lived it sobered him. He could dream of theFrench Foreign Legion, the carefree existence of a cowboy, theadventurous career of a seaman or the unhampered life of a trapper inthe arctic north, but he knew in his heart his dreams would never cometrue. Twelve-year-old boys had run away from the orphanage, but none hadstayed away for more than three days before they had returned of theirown accord or had been brought back by the police. A youngster travelingalone without resources had less than one chance in a thousand ofremaining undetected, and Bud knew it.

  Besides, he was stubborn and unwilling to back away from any situation.He would face the assembled Bennetts and do the best he could. In oneway or another, he had faced giants before.

  To take his mind away from the ordeal ahead of him, Bud turned back tothe hunt for Old Yellowfoot and the day Gramps had been stricken in thekitchen.

  He had been frightened then, too, but not with the stark fear he hadknown the day he and Gramps had hunted for grouse and Gramps had becomeill while they were in the woods. That day Bud had been alone, but nowthere was Gram. Things might still go wrong now, but not altogetherwrong if she was there.

  He remembered how Gram had walked calmly over to Gramps as soon as hewas stricken and said quietly,

  "You're tired, Delbert. Now you just sit right there and take it easy."

  Then she had gone to the telephone and, after she had spoken to Dr.Beardsley, returned to sit beside Gramps. Only her eyes had shown thetorment she was enduring. Bud had hovered in the background, not knowingwhat to do, but ready to do anything. Gramps raised his head again andthere was that terrible convulsive cough, but afterward he breathed moreeasily. The blue color that had invaded his face began to fade. Hestarted to sweat and Gram wiped his face gently.

  "Gosh blame nonsense," Gramps gasped.

  "Of course," Gram said. "That's just what it is. You sit there anyway."

  "Why?"

  "Maybe because I like your company and you have been gone all day."

  Only later had it occurred to Bud that she was deliberately resorting tosubterfuge to make him sit still until Dr. Beardsley arrived. Grampswould never have accepted a doctor otherwise. As it was, he gave anoutraged growl when Dr. Beardsley finally came.

  "What the blazes do you want?" Gramps grumbled.

  Dr. Beardsley said calmly, "To see you, Delbert, and I don't have allnight. Open your shirt."

  Dr. Beardsley had hung out his shingle in Haleyville when he wastwenty-two. He was seventy-two now, and there was little in his halfcentury of practice that he hadn't dealt with. He had learned long agothat he would be obeyed if he expected obedience and tolerated nothingelse.

  "While you're about it," the doctor said, "roll up your sleeve."

  Grumbling, Gramps did as he was told. Dr. Beardsley took his bloodpressure and thrust a thermometer between Gramps' lips. When Gramps madea face, he said,

  "That's a thermometer, Delbert, not a stick of peppermint. Don't try tobite it in half."

  While Gramps mouthed the thermometer, Dr. Beardsley applied astethoscope to his chest, then to his back. He removed the thermometerand, after he read it, he washed it at the sink and dipped it in asterile tube before putting it back in its case.

  "I suppose you were hunting today?" he asked Gramps.

  "You know anybody who wasn't?" Gramps said.

  "I know some who shouldn't have been, and I know at least one who isn'tgoing again until next year. His name's Delbert Bennett."

  "Blasted nonsense!" Gramps snorted. "You doctors ever talk anything'cept nonsense?"

  "Seldom," Dr. Beardsley admitted cheerfully, "but it just so happensthat I'm talking sense at present. It isn't too serious, but it will beif you don't take care. The truth is your heart isn't as young as itused to be. With reasonable luck it will last you another twenty years,and I fully expect you'll grow more cussed every year. But right now itneeds rest, which means that you're going to take it easy for the nextsix months. In addition to your regular night's sleep, lie down for atleast three hours every day. We'll see after that."

  "I never heard so blame much foolishness!" Gramps tried to roar, but hewas too weak and could only blink indignantly at Dr. Beardsley.

  Gram said quietly but firmly, "He'll do as you say, Doctor."

  "Clobber him if he doesn't."

  "I will."

  Dr. Beardsley packed his stethoscope and sphygmomanometer back in hisbag and wrote a prescription, which he handed to Gram.

  "There's no emergency about this; the youngster can bring it when hecomes home from school tomorrow. After that, see that he takes hismedicine according to the directions that will accompany theprescription and refill it before it runs out."

  "Medicine!" Gramps said. "You pill peddlers can't think of anything elsewhen you don't know what to do."

  "He'll take the medicine, Doctor," Gram promised.

  Dr. Beardsley said, "I leave you in care of your boss, Delbert," andwent out into the night.

  That had been that; hunting Old Yellowfoot was over for the season.Gramps grumbled and growled, but he took his medicine and accepted histhree hours of daily rest. Bud shouldered as many of the chores as hecould.

  Then the school bus stopped, and as Bud trudged up the drive, he toldhimself sullenly that at least he was beholden to nobody for he had paidhis way. But in his heart he knew it wasn't as simple as that, and thathe would gladly work as many hours a day as he could stay awake to helpGram and Gramps.

  For the past week the kitchen had been a heaven of tantalizing odors.Bushels of cookies and rows of fruit cakes had emerged from the greatoven. Gram and Helen Carruthers had been busy from daylight until afterdark. Gram was taking another tray of cookies from the oven when Budcame in and she smiled at him. Helen Carruthers, a tall, graying womanwho seldom smiled, was mixing something in a pan. She nodded at Bud andtold him to help himself.

  Bud grabbed a handful of cookies and went to his room to change hisclothes. As he went out to the barn, Shep came running to meet him andinside he found Gramps sitting on a bale of hay. The barn had becomeGramps' refuge. The old man nodded glumly.

  "Dogged if I know how she does it," Gramps said plaintively. "I'msupposed to take that stuff Doc Beardsley gave me, and it's a wonder itdon't kill a body, every four hours. So every four hours, no matter howbusy she is, Mother's right on deck with it. Pah! A man can't be himselfany more."

  "You should have your medicine, Gramps."

  "Medicine, yes, but that ain't any medicine. Now you take sassafras rootand slippery elm bark; that was medicine when they was boiled togetherby somebody who knew what he was doing." Gramps fell into a glumsilence. Then he said, "Anyhow, they didn't get Old Yellowfoot."

  "How do you know?"

  "Everybody'd know if they got a buck that big. He'll be waiting for usnext year."

  "That's good!" Bud said with feeling.

  "Ain't it," Gramps said sourly. "It'd be a heap better if next deerseason wasn't such a passeling ways off. I felt in my bones that thiswas our year to get Old Yellowfoot, and we'd of had him if it hadn'tbeen for this blasted nonsense. Oh well, we'll be howling a long spellif we howl about it. Want to help me fetch the Christmas tree tomorrow?"

  * * * * *

  The next day they set off across the snow with Shep frolicking besidethem. Bud carried an ax and a rope. Gramps led the way to a younghemlock that, because it grew in the open, was evenly formed on allsides and sloped to a nearly perfect top. Bud felled it, then hitchedthe rope around its trunk and slid it home across the snow. UnderGramps' direction he sawed the chopped end off squarely and nailed awooden standard across the trunk. Gram and Helen Carruthers took over assoon as Gramps and Bud had carried the tree into the living room andstood it in a corner. The tree had to be moved this way and that, seldommore than two inches in any direction, until Gram and Helen were finallysatisfied and the top could be secured with string.

  Even while he was helping with the Christmas preparations, Bud feltdetached. He was convinced that they were being made solely for theBennetts' children and grandchildren, in whose eyes he would be no morethan an interloper. And so Bud walked grudgingly forward when the firstof the real family arrived, forcing himself not to surrender to animpulse to run. As soon as he had mumbled "Pleased t'meetcha," he fledto the barn.

  By Christmas morning the house was filled with Bennett relatives andmore would be there in time for dinner. It was still dark when Budawakened, and he slipped quietly out of bed and into his clothes. Then,shoes in hand, he padded softly down the stairs. He wanted to escapefrom the house and be out with the stock. Also, Gramps needed rest, andif he were not disturbed, he would sleep late enough so that Bud couldfinish the chores. Otherwise, Gramps would insist on helping. Bud knewby the light seeping through the crack under the kitchen door thatsomebody had preceded him. It was Gram.

  "Allan," she said, "it's only half-past five."

  She must have been up for a very long time. Now she was filling the lastof a row of pies. As he watched her, Bud could not help thinking of thefeast to come--roast turkey, chicken, duck and goose; sweet and whitepotatoes; mince, pumpkin and apple pie; salads and cooked vegetables;cake and ice cream. But he refused to look into the dining room, wherethe big table had been extended to its full length and been flanked bymany small tables. There would be more than thirty at Christmas dinner,and there was room and food for all of them.

  Bud was just as careful to avoid the parlor where gifts were piled inlittle mountains beneath the tree. He thought fleetingly of the sewingkit he had put under the tree for Gram and the book called _Africa'sDangerous Game_ for Gramps. Without resentment, he reflected that therewould be nothing for him.

  He put on his shoes and took his jacket and cap from the closet, and wasabout to go out when he saw that he was being rude to Gram. Even ifChristmas meant nothing to him, it meant a great deal to her. And so heturned and wished her a Merry Christmas as heartily as he could.

  "Why bless you, Allan. And a very Merry Christmas to you," she said,hugging and kissing him. Even though he had no claim on Gram, it lookedas if she had not rejected him completely, and he felt a little better.

  He left the house and stopped on the back porch to hug Shep, whose warm,wet tongue seemed to wash away some of Bud's loneliness. Together theymade their way through the snow to the stable where the four cows, warmin their stanchions, blew softly through their nostrils and turned theirgently welcoming eyes on Bud. Some farmers claimed cows were glad to seeyou only because you gave them food, but Bud knew better, especially onthis Christmas morning.

  He forked hay into the mangers, measured grain into the feed boxes anddrew his stool up beside the fractious Cherub. It seemed a long whileago and scarcely credible that he had once been afraid of her.

  Bud milked the four cows deliberately, working as slowly as possible soas to delay his return to the house in which he had become an alien.Then he fed the horses, took care of the chickens and peered out of thebarn at the winter landscape which was gradually becoming lighter.Although he had already cleaned it once, he cleaned the cow stableagain, carefully sifting anything that even remotely resembled refusefrom the fresh straw he had put down and carrying the refuse out to thelitter pile behind the barn.

  He lingered on in the barn until he knew that if he did not return tothe house Gram or Gramps would come out to find out what had happened tohim. They would want to know what was the matter, and he was determinednot to spoil their happiness at Christmas by letting them know howmiserable he was.

  As soon as he was inside the kitchen, Bud took off his work shoes andput on the pair he wore to school. It was an involuntary and almostunconscious gesture. He and Gramps always came to the table in the shoesthey wore in the barn, and as long as they were clean, neither of themgave it a second thought. But now the house was full of strangers.

  Only Gram seemed to notice his entrance and she came into the kitchenfrom the dining room where the others were and started to cook his baconand eggs.

  "Land sake, Allan, you were a long while at the chores," she said.

  Bud stayed in the kitchen with her, hoping that he would be able to eatthere alone. But when his breakfast was ready, she carried the plateinto the dining room and Bud set his jaw and followed.

  He had no sooner sat down than Gramps came in. He nodded at the table ingeneral and then turned to Bud.

  "Did you do the morning chores, young feller?"

  Bud said, "Yes," in a very small voice.

  "Did you get into that little house, too?"

  "Little house?"

  "The one next the chicken house."

  "No."

  "You'd best kite along and get it."

  Bud left the table, glad to get away, but burning with humiliation. Thelittle house that Munn Mackie had hauled in with his truck had nothingin it. At least Bud thought it had nothing in it. But having been tooproud to ask about it in the beginning or since, he wasn't sure now. Inspite of all his precautions, he had come close to saddling Gramps witha chore that he, Bud, ought to have done without Gramps' having to askhim.

  Bud came to the little house and, seeing a white envelope tied with ared ribbon to the door latch, stood dumfounded. "_Merry Christmas_" waswritten across the envelope and the card inside it read:

  _Merry Christmas to our boy, Bud-Allan. Gram and Gramps_

  Bud opened the door and gasped. Last night after he had gone to bedsomebody must have strewn fresh straw on the floor of the little house.There was a drinking fountain, a mash hopper, a grain feeder and acontainer for oyster shell. A regal young cockerel strutted around sixpure-white pullets.

  Bud entered the little house and pulled the door shut behind him,latching it so no one could intrude on this wonderful moment. His heartseemed to be beating in his throat and tears had sprung to his eyes. Nowfor the first time in his life he knew what Christmas could mean.

  He caught up the cockerel and, as he stroked it, looked around at thepullets and thought of the flock they would become.

  Bud was sure he had always wanted White Wyandottes like these.