XI
It was the first of October, which in the mountains means clear and frosty nights and days like rare old wine. The pointed shadow of bald Picketts Dome was reaching for the jagged summit of the Big Blackfern; it was, therefore, almost four o'clock. Granny Wolfe sat huddled low in the doorway on the sunny side of her old cabin; she was trying hard for a nap. Her little black dog Wag lay at her feet, now and then snapping at a bothersome fly.
The old hillwoman was in an irritable mood. She had slept almost none the night before, which had been occasioned by her worrying over the day when the little railroad would reach Devil's Gate, the basin's mouth; she feared, and with good reason, that blood would be shed then. Her son Buck was harder than ever, more grim, more silent, more terrible than ever.
"Wag, drot ye," she said indistinctly, "ye'll gi' me fleas, ye little devil."
There came then a long drawn, lonesome sound from somewhere near the foot of Big Blackfern Mountain. It is no common thing to hear the mournful cry of a whip-poor-will in the daytime. Granny Wolfe rubbed her aching eyes and looked up in sudden anxious interest. Less than a week had passed since Sarah Wolfe had told her that Preacher Longley Thrash's wife's sister had said that her husband's uncle had said that the cry of a whip-poor-will when the sun was shining meant a death within three days unless the bird was killed promptly.
Granny Wolfe rose with a rheumatic groan, took down from its wooden hooks over the doorway an old, old rifle that her departed husband had loved next to her, and went toward the foot of the Big Blackfern.
"I'll git ye!" she mumbled to herself. "I'll git ye, drot ye!"
It came again when she had gone a hundred yards: "Whip-poor-will!"
"Plague on yore pickcher of ye!" she muttered, quickening her step so much that her little dog was forced to trot in order to keep up with her heels. "Ye imp o' Satan, ef I don't shoot a hole through ye wi' this here old rifle o' Sack's big enough fo' a bay hoss to jump through, I hope I may sink! Consarn ye to thunder! I hain't a-havin' enough bad luck, I reckon," bitterly, "and so you had to happen along."
Shortly afterward, she drew back the hammer of the old rifle and limped into the border of laurel. Something moved slightly on a log a few rods up the mountainside, and she saw it. She rested the long barrel in the fork of a sapling, and began to try for an aim, when a cracked old voice came down to her.
"Don't ye shoot me, Jane Wolfe!" half laughing, half afraid. "Heh! Don't ye shoot me, Jane Wolfe!"
"Ef it hain't Grandpap Bill Singleton, the Prophet!" Granny Wolfe cried, greatly relieved. "Why, Bill, 'at's jest the way you used to call me down to the big beech on the creek when you and me was both young and frolicsome, ain't it? My pap he didn't like it fo' you to come to see me, ye'll rickollect! Now I might ha' knowed, dang the luck, what it was when I fust heerd it!"
She went on soberly, "Now what'n the name o' goodness do ye want to see me about, Bill? You shorely hain't a-courtin'!"
"Heh! No, not a-courtin'," he said.
He moved slowly toward her, and shenoted that he carried a worn leather-backed Bible under one arm.
"Yes," he told her, "it was me a-whistlin' like a whip-pore-will fo' you, Jane. I didn't much like the idee o' goin' down thar in the inemy's country to see ye, Jane. I wanted to have a talk wi' ye. About the lumber track. Jane, Little Buck he told me 'at the track it would shorely git to the basin tomorrow!"
Because Granny Wolfe had known that already, she expressed no surprise. She leaned the rifle against a tree, and rested her hands on her thin old hips.
"I'm a-listenin', Bill," she reminded him. "You ain't done a-talkin'."
"I wondered, Jane," thoughtfully, "ef the' was anything on earth you and me could do to stop the bloodshed afore it comes."
"The' hain't!" Granny Wolfe exclaimed. "Bill Singleton, the's a-goin' to be trouble sech as even me and you never seed afore. My son Buck he has done passed his word 'at the railroad shain't never come into the basin; Little Buck, bless his heart of him, has passed his word and promise 'at it shall—and they're both Wolfes. Little Buck he's got to put the thing through or die a-tryin', ef he's a-goin' to be hon'rable to them 'at sold all o' their property to back him up. He cain't call the law in to help him, acause that would—you know, Bill, jest what it would mean. May the Lord ha' mussy on us all, Bill Singleton! I jest don't know what to do! I've done wore mighty nigh it all the hide off my pore old screakin' knees a-prayin' fo' peace. I've talked to my son Buck ontel I was as black in the face as my dawg.
"And I've tried to pe'suade the rest o' the Wolfes to foller Little Buck 'stid o' Old Buck," she went on gloomily. "But they won't do it. They're like sheep a-follerin' a bell-sheep. All but Nathan, that is. Nath he's allus loved Little Buck, somehow. And Nath he tried to talk his pap into a-seein' the crookedness o' his ways, but it never done no good at all. Lord ha' mussy on us all, Bill Singleton!"
"What did Old Buck say to Nath?" the Prophet wanted to know, one palsied hand burying itself in his patriarchal white beard.
"He never said nothin' to him," was the answer. "He hit him in the mouth wi' his fist. Pore Nath! Bill, I was jest so sorry fo' Nath, and so durned mad at Buck, 'at I could jest—I could jest ha' died right thar in my tracks."
"Well," Grandpap Singleton said hopefully, "mebbe it'll all come out right in the end. Le's me and you both go to Old Buck and talk to him; heh? Both o' us together, Jane. It may not do no good; but ontel we've done it we hain't done all we could do, Jane. What do ye say; heh?"
"All right," Granny Wolfe nodded. "He's out the mountain thar a-makin' a run on his moonshine 'still. He'll be mad when he sees us together, mebbe; but ef you don't keer, I shorely don't. Bill Singleton, hain't it a dad-burned shame fo' a man as good as him to be as lowdown mean as he is?"
"Yes, Jane, yes. Ha' ye got a weensy teensy bit o' pipe tobacker about ye, Jane? I fo'got to bring mine along, and I'm jest a-sufferin' fo' a smoke."
"I ain't never without it, Bill, shorely," the old woman told him. "I plants my tobacker afore I plants my bread cawn. We hain't got no fire to light our pipes with, though."
"Good excuse fo' a-goin' out to Buck's still," said Grandpap Singleton. He fished a blackened clay pipe from a trousers pocket. "The tobacker, Jane."
She took a dry twist of homegrown tobacco from a pocket in her faded calico dress, and passed it to him. He courteously filled her pipe first. Then they went limping out the side of the Big Blackfern, these two, over ground carpeted softly with leaves of brilliant saffron, pale yellow, mottled scarlet, deep red, and several shades of brown. Neither spoke, for each was saddened by a keen realization that it was autumn for them in more ways than one.
After fifteen minutes of traveling thus, they entered a narrow and deep, dark gash filled with hemlocks and laurel, through which flowed a very small, clear stream of water.
"Why, the still it hain't far from the fambly buryin'-ground, is it, Jane?" observed Grandpap Singleton as they steppedinto a path that wound its way dimly through the undergrowth.
"Which is jest as it should be, Bill, honey," returned Granny Wolfe, her voice heavy with meaning.
"Heh! Yes, Jane," her companion agreed.
Old Buck Wolfe was in no good humor that afternoon. For one thing, he had been absentmindedly allowed a "run" to boil over, and the whisky tasted like pickled beets. The decrepit pair found him on his knees before the crude little stone-walled furnace; he was lustily blowing the fire to make it catch to fresh wood. Another run was on.
Grandpap Singleton walked up silently, to all appearances unaware that he was on forbidden land. He bent stiffly over and scooped a live coal into the bowl of his pipe. A few puffs lighted the tobacco for him, and he passed the coal to the pipe of the old woman. Then he very calmly seated himself on a downward-turned mash tub.
"Buck," he said seriously to the moonshiner, who had been eyeing him hard, "whar are ye a-goin' to when ye die?"
"I am a-goin' to a place," very readily, "which is knowed as a three-by-seven, a grave, a hole in the ground, a last restin'-place, and a last ditch, whar I'll rot down to plain dirt."
He sat back on his heels, and stared at Grandpap Singleton in open defiance.
"Oh, no, Buck," and the aged mountaineer shook his snowy-white head emphatically. "You hain't a-goin' to stop thar. No, sirree. Ef you hain't quick to blaze a new trail, Buck, you're a-goin' as straight to Hell as a honey-bee to its comb."
"How doyouknow?" snapped Old Buck Wolfe.
The Prophet took his worn Bible from under his arm, put it flat on his outstretched left hand, and touched it with a shaking forefinger as each word was formed on his lips.
"I knows it by the Word o' God, sir." After a silent moment, he continued, "Buck Wolfe, in some ways you're a most pow'ful smart man."
"I'm smart enough," the moonshiner replied, "not to be ketched a-believin' in things I cain't see, anyhow."
"And so you hain't a-believin' the's anything in the nachur of a hereafter, Buck?"
"Nor no Heaven, nor no Hell," the leader of the Wolfe clan snarled—"nor no God."
His mother began to wring her hands. "Buck, honey, it skeers me to hear you talk that a-way," she moaned. She sat down on the leaves, took the red bandana from her white head, and wiped nervously at her eyes.
"My friend," said Grandpap Singleton, his voice ready to break, "you shorely are mistaken. Didn't ye ever look at the stars at night, and think about the beginnin' of 'em, and the endin' of 'em? Didn't ye ever think 'at they was allus new, as old as they are—heh? Who else but a God A'mighty could ha' made them stars—and the sun, and the moon, and the earth?
"And about the res'rection, Buck. Take mighty nigh it the least thing in the world, a mustard-seed. You put it in the ground, and it rots back to dust jest the same as the human body does; and it comes up in the spring, and without any o' the rot or the blackness—but, to save yore life, Buck Wolfe, you cain't cut a mustard-seed open and find outwhat makes it grow! I tell ye, the mortal soul has its June as well as the mustard-seed. Buck, any man wi' even hoss sense in his head can argy hisself out of a God ef he only tries. Andto them as thinks the' ain't no God, the' ain't none, so far as they're concerned...."
And after a long, still minute: "Here's another proof, Buck. The' never was a nation on earth but what wushipped somethin', whether it was a image, the sun, or the true and livin' Almighty; and ef that hain't the c'lestial spark handed on down and down from old Grandpap Adam, what is it; heh?"
"Fear!" cried Old Buck Wolfe, jutting out his great, bearded jaw. "Most o'good people is good acause they're afeard not to be, and fo' no other reason. Take yore own case, Grandpap Singleton. It hain't been so many years sence you was counted one o' the wickedest, fightin'est men in the country—'Cracker'-Singleton, they called ye then. You never made a change ontel you seed 'at yore best days was done past. You jumped at the hope o' life everlastin' beyant the grave only atter the confidence you had in yoreself was gone. Deny that, ef ye can!"
Old Singleton's countenance became infinitely sad. "I cain't deny it," he muttered brokenly. "I did put it off ontel I'd done turned the crest o' life's journey. And it's acause I put it off fo' so long 'at I'm a-doin' all I can now to build me a pore little shelter in the skies afore I'm called on to go."
"Humph!" Old Buck Wolfe rose too. "Ef the' is sech a Bein' as you think the' is, Grandpap Singleton, the's a-goin' to be some o' the woolpullin'est times on the Day o' Jedgment ever you seed. I'd shore ruther take my chances as I'm a-takin' 'em; not as a damned coward, but as a onbeliever acause I hain't never had nothin' proved to me. Well, I've got a run o' yaller-cawn licker to take keer of, and I tharfore hain't got no more time to fool away wi' you. Tomorrow's a-goin' to be a busy day here in the basin, as shorely as you're knee-high to a tomtit. You better shell out fo' home, is my guess."
"One more minute," begged Grandpap Singleton. "You shorely hain't a-goin' to give Little Buck any trouble in his lumber business, heh?"
"He hain't got no lumber business," flatly.
"I mean this here little railroad and the sawmill——"
"Hain't I done said 'at they shain't come?" sourly. "You've knowed me long enough to know I keeps my word, hain't ye? And hain't I done told ye I've got a run o' licker to take keer of? You take my edvice, old man, and shell out fo' home."
Grandpap Singleton realized that his mission had failed utterly. The disappointment was so great that it threw his feeble mind into one of its temporary breaks. He knelt and lifted his hands, with the Good Book clasped between them, and began to mutter unintelligibly. Old Buck Wolfe, in a sudden rage, struck down the palsied hands, and sent the Bible flying to the leaves; then he seemed sorry. He lifted old Singleton to his feet, and pointed toward the southern end of the basin.
"Go on home," he said.
The Prophet found his Bible and went off slowly, his shoulders drooping, his head bent low. The moonshiner turned to his mother, expecting another lashing from her sharp old tongue.
"Begin!" he commanded.
She said in tones so low that he barely heard, "My son, you'd ort to take off yore boots, acause you're a-standin' on ground that pore old man's knees made holy."
Before he thought, Old Buck looked downward. He bent over, his eyes suddenly wide, his jaw hanging, and caught his breath quickly. Cut there in the tightly packed earth was the sign of the cross, about seven inches by five!
"Who done that?" he roared, straightening like a jack-in-a-box.
"What? Oh!" frightenedly. His mother, too, had seen the sign. "It's a warnin', Buck, honey—a warnin' to you!"
She wrung her hands. Her son looked about him queerly. Cut in the bark of a nearby tree was the cross again, seven inches by five. And he remembered distinctly that Grandpap Singleton had placed one hand on that tree to steady himself as he went.
"Who done that?" he roared again. "You, mother, you done it. Old Bill Singleton couldn't ha' done it without me a-seein' him. I'd ha' seed him, I tell ye!"
"I didn't, Buck," came promptly. Granny Wolfe was quivering with a fear that was certainly genuine. "It's a warnin' to you—Buck, it's the crook o' His finger!"
Old Buck swore roundly. He caught up an ax and chopped away the sign of the cross that had been cut in the bark of the tree. With his boot-heels he quickly effaced that which had been cut in the ground. Then he knelt before his false god, the moonshine still.
A voice cried out from the laurel, the voice of the Prophet. It seemed to hang in the air, like smoke—smoke of burning incense.
"'He came unto his own, and his own received him not.'"