Ellen studied her son that evening. They took the meal out under the crab apple tree. Its leaves, not yet green, were coated with soft white hairs. Its pink flowers were like the wild rose, their spicy odor hovered where the five children gathered to be fed. Penny’s smallest child, Melinda, climbed on a stool, reaching her hands to the food. Blossom stood by Anse, who was four now and tall for his age, his dark head looking down on Simon’s blond one. And Clate was the leader and spoke what they all should do. “If it wasn’t for Clate,” Penny said, “I’d ne’er get this troop together. And we’ll have another Dougherty come Christmas. Seems I be e’er in this strait.”
Standing about the table, the children were eating corn pone and bacon and beans. There was milk and a honeycomb. Melinda sucked her sticky tiny fingers and crumbled the pone. Penny was cleaning the child’s hands with a damp rag, laughing, “I got plenty of pullets now, Ellie. Luke built a hen house. I trade eggs just like you Gaddys now. But say, the store’s paying low this spring.”
Ellen saw that Simon’s cheekbones and hair were like those of Christian Ay. He had Anton’s long chin. But there was the look of Christian about his eyes and high cheeks and broad mouth. “I wonder at him, Penny.”
“You’re thinking of his pa, aren’t you?”
“I allowed I’d forgot what he looked like. Time goes so fast. But Simon calls him back to mind.”
“Soon you won’t see it. It’ll just be little Simon.”
“I reckon.”
“I see Luke coming. We’ve been lucky. Webster laid off most of the hands when times got bad, but he kept Luke on. He’d let them all go before Luke.” Penny’s look wound itself about the man moving up the path, her love like a warm wind.
“He’ll be short and stout. Strong like a bull.” Ellen was watching Simon, who leaned against the table, his cheek on one fat hand while the other spooned beans unsteadily into his mouth.
Luke slept in the mow of the shed that night so there would be a place for Ellen. The women lay in the narrow bed. The baby girls were in cribs, the three boys in the attic room. “If you should have a trouble sometime, Penny,” Ellen said, before dozing off, “or there’s a sickness or a way I can help.”
“We’ll miss Simon. He’s quiet. He can milk Tiny even. He coaxes me to let him. He does real good for four years.”
“Those little hands.”
“And he’s one with the donkey. Why, I missed him once and hunted till I found him sleeping under it and it standing like a rock.”
Ellen awoke after midnight; she lay still until it came to her where she was. An owl called, deep-toned, “Whoo-whoo-tooo-oo-oo.” She went into the yard, walking down the lane in the warm dark. The owl shrieked suddenly from the catalpa by the road, in a voice like a woman. On noiseless widespread wings it was flapping toward her and passing. “There he’ll be, following me about the farm.” She stayed in the night until she reached the end of her fears. “Whate’er comes, it’s right to bring him home and tell he’s mine.”
In the morning Simon had on bleached canvas pants, well patched. The sleeves to his nubby sweater were too short. They were waiting for Luke to come in a truck to take them to the station. Simon’s eyes were wide. He shrank from Ellen. Penny was washing his face again. “Take your ma’s hand, now.” But Simon shook his head, threw himself upon his foster mother. “You can have this. It’s Anse’s.” Penny was handing him a yarn ball she had made by winding bright colors around a piece of cloth. “If you’ll go now with your ma.” So then Simon took Ellen’s hand. She led him while he dragged his feet, gazing back to Penny and her brood.
“Where’s Simon going,” asked Clate, “with Anse’s ball?”
“It’s his ball now.”
On the train the boy clutched his toy and looked away. At last Ellen took a piece of string and showed him how to play cat’s cradle. He was lifting the twine from her hands and biting his lip. He cast his blue eyes on her. “I like that.”
“I do too, Simon.” The sun fought through the streaked sooted windows. The train rushed through the greening land, coming into the valleys and hills of Kentucky.
Anton was there with the buckboard. He ordered them into the high seat. He had laid his faded kerchief under his black round hat to catch the sweat from his balding head. The corners of the red cloth were draping about his florid face. “Whole county can get a look at Gaddy’s youngen toting her bastard home.”
The horses trotted down the macadam main street, past store-fronts, out onto country roads. Ellen spoke timidly, “This is your granddaddy.”
“Quit jawing.”
As they neared Millville, Ellen spoke again. “Penny said to tell you howdy. Her husband told me about a dog that grinds axes and things.” She spoke too rapidly, lines drawing on her forehead. “This man’s got a treadwheel. He runs a belt from it to his grindstone. The dog runs there in the big wheel, grinding sickles and knives too. Luke said the dog waits for the man to whistle.” She appealed to Anton.
“Haw.” They had passed Love’s store, turned down Sweetincreek Road for a mile.
She broke the silence once more. “Luke heard of a cat too.” And holding Simon in her arm, she felt him press close. He laid a chubby arm across her lap. “It turned a churn, treading a wheel for the lady of the house. Now think, Simon.”
Jack met them barking. The dog’s eyes were nearly on a level with Simon’s; the child laid his face in the fur. When Anton drove the team to the barn, the boy watched him covertly. Maria was coming on the porch in her shapeless Mother Hubbard dress. “Now here’s your granny,” called Ellen.
Maria glanced at the boy, felt her bun. “The census taker came, Ellie. I had a day. I told him all he asked. I wish he’d come again.”
“I’m glad it’s o’er, Ma. You know if Sam did my chores?”
“I gave him a cup of tea and some of that butter-cake you made. I told him all he asked.”
15
June dawdled by. Lilacs faded and roses unfolded. Simon went behind Ellen, dropping pumpkin seeds in the young corn rows. He wore new overalls that she ordered from the catalog, and shirts she made for him. He ran barefoot at her heels. In his pocket he kept the colored ball that had been Anse’s. He spoke seldom, but Ellen would hear his piping voice when he was with the geese or with Jack and he had no fear of the heavy work horses.
Frankie had written, “We’ll be down Independence Day. My friend is coming with me for two weeks’ vacation. Oh, the dear farm and dear Ellie. Why didn’t you tell me I had a nephew, Ellie? I can’t wait to see him. You cunning sister.”
When Joe Burwell told his son that Frankie was coming, Dyke drove up the Gaddy lane in his Oldsmobile to offer the use of his car to meet the train. “It’ll be a pleasure to see Frankie again, Mester Gaddy.”
“Stay for supper with us, Dyke,” Ellen invited him, cordial.
The two men went to the station. Ellen had hung the calico curtain across her parents’ bedroom to make the guest chamber. Simon had taken over Frankie’s old bed upstairs. She was placing a vase of catalpa blooms by the bedside on the marble-topped table. A heady fragrance seeped from the spikes of creamy scalloped blossoms specked with purple and yellow.
The car was returning. Ellen and Simon were going into the yard. Frankie threw her arms about Ellen. There was perfume in her hair, her face was accented with eye-shadow and penciled brows, her lips vivid. She was kneeling by Simon. “I’m Auntie! See what we brought you.” She took his hand and they went to Dyke’s car.
Frankie’s companion was talking with the two men. Her black hair was shingled. She was heavy-hipped, her face appearing almost delicate above her squat body. She wore no make-up and held her head back to eye the men squarely. Anton waved his hand while talking, and she nodded again at him. They came toward Ellen. “This here’s Genevieve Wheeler,” Anton said. “Did I get that name right? Haw. And from the way Frankie wrote at first I thought it was a fellow.”
“Pleased,” Ellen said shortly. The woman’s hand was warm and dry.
“Certainly do admire your father, Ellen. The farmer’s the backbone of America.”
“Haw.” Anton was shrugging. “Go on in and get settled, you-all. We’ll be back when we finish the chores. Coming, Dyke?”
Frankie opened the screen door for Simon. She called, “Ellie, he’s cute.”
Ellen followed the men to the barns. Dyke, in his black suit, was feeding the cows. Later Simon came out. He stroked the big shoulder of the brown cow that Ellen was milking. “I like Auntie, Mama,” he lisped. “She brung me this.” He wore a stiff yellow visor cap. He straightened it.
“Let’s go tend the goats, Simon.”
The boy strutted beside her, looking up. “I’ll milk Leona for you, Mama.”
“See if you can get it all this time.”
Leona had a high round udder and gave her milk down easily. “How come Leona’s white, Mama?”
“Because her daddy was a white one.”
Simon sat on a stool, leaning into the goat’s side and squeezing the teats so the milk came in little squirts. The animal turned to sniff the new cap and lick Simon’s neck where the tow hair curled. Then it wheezed as it brought up its cud.