OLD NATHAN(59)

"Sir, is thet you?" the boy asked cautiously.

"Who en blazes d'ye think hit 'ud be?" the cunning man snapped.

"Don't know thet 'un," snorted Spanish King. His big head swung toward the visitor, and one horn dipped menacingly.

"Ye'd not be here, blast ye," said Old Nathan, slapping the bull along the jaw, " 'ceptin' fer him."

"Yessir," said Bowsmith. "I'm right sorry. Only, a lot uv what I seed t'night, I figgered must be thet I wuz drinkin'."

"Took long enough t' fetch me," rumbled the bull as he snuffled the night air. He made no comment about the blow, but the way he studiously ignored Bowsmith suggested that the reproof had sunk home. "Summer's nigh over."

He paused and turned his head again so that one brown eye focused squarely on the cunning man. "Where wuz I, anyhow? D'ye know?"

"Not yet," said Old Nathan, stroking the bull's sweat-matted shoulders fiercely with the curry comb.

"Pardon, sir?" said the boy who had walked into the circle of torchlight, showing a well-justified care to keep Old Nathan between him and Spanish King. Then he blinked and rose up on his bare toes to peer over the bull's shoulder at the horse. "Why," he blurted, "thet's the spit en image uv my horse Jen, only thet this mare's too boney!"

"Thet's yer Jen, all right," said the cunning man. "There's sacked barley in the lean-to out back, effen ye want t' feed her some afore ye take her t' home. Been runnin' the woods, I reckon."

"We're goin' back home?" asked the horse, speaking for almost the first time since she had followed Spanish King rather than be alone in the night.

"Oh, my God, Jen!" said the boy, striding past Spanish King with never a thought for the horns. "I'm so glad t' see ye!" He threw his arm around the horse's neck while she whickered, nuzzling the boy in hopes of finding some of the barley Old Nathan had mentioned.

"Durn fool," muttered Spanish King; but then he stretched himself deliberately, extending one leg at a time until his deep chest was rubbing the sod. "Good t' be back, though," he said. "Won't say it ain't."

Eldon Bowsmith straightened abruptly and stepped away from his mare, though he kept his hand on her mane. "Sir," he said, "ye found my Jen, en ye brung her back. What do I owe ye?"

Old Nathan ran the fingers of his free hand along the bristly spine of his bull. "Other folk hev took care uv thet," the cunning man said as Spanish King rumbled in pleasure at his touch. "Cleared yer account, so t' speak."

The pine torch was burning fitfully, close to the ground, so that Bowsmith's grimace of puzzlement turned shadows into a devil's mask. "Somebody paid for me?" he asked. "Well, I niver. Friends, hit must hev been?"

Spanish King lifted himself and began to walk regally around the cabin to his pasture and the two cows who were his property.

"Reckon ye could say thet," replied Old Nathan. "They wuz ez nigh t' bein' yer friends ez anybody's but their own."

The cunning man paused and grinned like very Satan. "In the end," he said, "they warn't sich good friends t' themselves."

A gust of wind rattled the shingles, as if the night sky were remembering what it had heard at the Neill place. Then it was silent again.





THE BOX


"What 'm I bid what 'm I bid what 'm I bid?" Sheriff Tillinghast rattled out like a squirrel complaining. "Come on, fellers, a nice piece like this could set in the finest parlor in New Orleens."

What a grotesquely carven chest like the one at auction would be doing in any kind of parlor in New Orleans was an open question, but a rough-hewn man ahead of Bully Ransden and Ellie in the crowd called, "I'll give ye a dollar fer the blame thing!"

"Bid a dolla bid a dolla bid a dolla!" the sheriff caroled. "Who'll gimme two gimme two?"

He paused for breath and a practiced glance around the gathering, checking for anyone who might be on the verge of raising the bid. Nobody. . . .

The sheriff lifted the jug of whiskey from the table beside him, where his clerk marked down the winning bids against the lot numbers. "Who'll gimme two?' the sheriff repeated. "A dram uv good wildcat fer the man as bids two dollars!"

"Two dollars!" cried a fellow down in front. He probably didn't have the money to his name, much less in his pocket, and the auction was for ready cash . . . but the bidding was already too slow for the auctioneer to dare risk stifling the little life it had finally gathered to itself.

"Two dolla two dolla two dolla, who'll gimma three?" prattled the sheriff.

"Ugh!" said Ellie as she hugged herself closer to Bully Ransden. "Who'd hev thet ugly ole thing in their house noways?"