“I reckon.” She was patting the cat, inwardly disturbed.
“Well, if she was smart,” Sudduth mocked, “she’d run the other way fast, wouldn’t she Pop?”
The old man cackled. Ellen felt stiff and plain, smiled faintly as Dan walked out. I’d never be that Star.
On weekday nights Dan played the piano. His energy was contagious, it was as if his day had just begun. In the lamp glow their faces turned to where he sat.
There are many flags in many lands There are flags of every hue But there is no flag however grand Like our own red white and blue
The family were joining in, swept away by his exuberance and health. Sometimes Ellen sang with them.
Then hurrah for the flag, our country’s flag Its stripes and white stars too There is no flag in any land Like our own red white and blue
She was saying, “I know a languishing one, Dan. ‘Lord Lovel.’ You know it?”
“I can play the tune if you’ll sing.”
“All right.” He found the keys easily.
They like me here. She dwelled on it. It’s not like home where Pa jeered when I sang Penny’s songs and Ma never heard me.
Lady Nancy she died as it might be today Lord Lovel he died tomorrow Lady Nancy she died out of pure pure grief Lord Lovel he died out of sorrow
It was the first week in March, on a warm windy day, when the bees swarmed. Pop had on an old hat decked with a bee veil, he was wearing long gloves and had tied strings around the bottoms of his overalls. He carried a smoker to still the swarm that hung like a living sack on an oak branch. Ellen saw him from the window. He stooped and moved until finally the bees were in the new hive, their angry droning muffled, subsiding. The old man came in, taking off the veil. “Hee. Only got one sting.”
“My sister Frankie and me used to beat pie pans and make a racket when our bees wanted to swarm.”
“How come?”
“That’s so the workers can’t hear the queen calling.”
“Did it keep them in the home hive?”
“Two-three times it did. But the queen’s call is strong.”
“Don’t tell the boys. They’d call it a superstition. They go by the book too much for me.” His teeth flashed through his beard.
Before going up to bed, Ellen went out into the night. There was a light fog. She was curious about the bees, went to listen to the new hive. From it came a faint contented purr. She laid her hand on the wood. It’s like they’re one creature, like the whole drove’s got but one mind. Her hand was feeling the movement within, the insects changing position endlessly. While she was standing enclosed in the darkness, she heard Dan humming as he came back from the barnyard. His boots rasped on the pathway. She was waiting for him to pass but he sensed a presence, and stopped. “Who is it?”
“It’s me. Ellen.” She could see the coal of his cigarette. The air was balmy, brought up during the day from the south.
“The wind’s laid,” he said. Overhead a twisted sliver of moon was freeing itself from dodging clouds. The starlight was dim, pulling at the mist gently. “What are you doing?”
“Feeling the bees move. The hive’s like an animal.”
“That’s so. It is.” She heard his body settling against a tree trunk.
“Like it’s bedded down for the night.”
The silence dwelled while she waited on him. “What happened to your husband, Ellen?”
“He died.”
“How?”
She was seeking his face, but there was blackness. “He was killed.”
“I see. How?”
After a while she said, “It was in the haying time. He was down on the wagon bed.” The words were dragged up from some other part of her. She watched that part of her talk on, fumbling, “He had a watch-eye man hired to him. That man pitched the fork down and it stuck him between the shoulders.” The fog was rising, the moon slid away in clouds. Her tongue stumbled along of itself. “When they reached him, they say he was dead already.”
“I’m sorry.”
Something welled in her then, born of loneliness. It caught high in her throat. “No. I ne’er had a husband.” She wept. But she was eased. She was speaking of Christian Ay and how she couldn’t recall if he was tall or if his hair was brown. It had happened to her when she went to see a horse belonging to the farmer he worked for. Her letters had come back unopened. Ellen’s tears stopped then, and her voice. She began to hate the man hidden behind the black curtain. A shame was rising in her so she felt her face heat.
His voice was flat. “Windy days like this one’s been can bring on a cyclone.” He hummed slowly.
Some call her Lady Nancy Belle Some call her the Lady Nancy, Nancy Some call her the Lady Nancy
A twig broke under his foot, he ceased in the middle of the tune. “A cyclone’s a sight to see, Ellen. You should watch my kid brother run when one comes. You ever have them in Kentucky?” He paused for an answer, and resumed, “Star’s home was right in the path of one last year. Her father lost a bull valued at five thousand. He’s a big Jersey breeder.”
“I didn’t know.”
“Al Webster’s his name.”
“Webster?” Ellen remembered. “Webster’s Stock Farm?”
“That’s it. You’ve heard of it?”
“You know a Luke Dougherty?”
“Sure. Tall fellow, black-haired. Runs one of the barns.”
“Luke’s wife’s a close friend of mine. They live near Weems Crossroads.” All the time the echo of her voice rang in her ears: I ne’er had a husband. I ne’er had a husband.
“I’ll drive you over sometime to see her, if you want. It’s only twenty miles or so. Come along when I go see my girl some Sunday. I’ll drop you off.”
“I hear your girl’s a beauty.” He’ll tell everyone.
“Hell, Star’s got more than beauty. She’s exciting.” His voice was heavy.
Ellen thought how it was full of love. When he goes about the farm here, Star bides in him. She softens his movements like the way Penny and Luke love each other. And when he plants the wheat, his mind’s but a part on his work. And when Sudduth and he laid the cement in the cellar, he was thinking all the while, each day’s bringing me closer to when Star’s my bride. Why did I tell him I wasn’t married?
The yellow flash from a match spurted, making shadows streak over his bent face. The smoke filtered through the warm fog. “It’s just the past year Star’s mother hasn’t had to sit by her bed when she goes to sleep.” He was tender, boastful. “She’s afraid of the dark.”
There came to Ellen’s mind the little donkey Luke had led up the lane. They had gathered around it as a wonderful thing and set baby Clate on its back. Star Webster’s father had given it to Luke when his daughter tired of it.
The red ash glowed. Dan’s harsh voice was there. “Even that’s exciting about her.” His voice drifted in the south air, “I’m glad you kept your son with you, Ellen. Instead of giving him away like lots of women would have done. Shows you’ve got strength.”
“It’s a secret.” It sounded thin and anxious as she said it.
“I won’t let it out.” Then his voice lowered, “Simon’s a good boy. You taught him manners, too.”
“Well. Good night.”
“Good night, Ellen.”
She went into the house and to her bedroom. I’m a jawing fool. In the morning when Dan came into the kitchen she managed to avoid speaking to him. But he shouted down the length of the table, “Can I have the butter, Ellen? Let’s see that grape jelly, Ellen.”
She averted her eyes, passing the plates. I don’t like him one bit.
23
The storm was already forming. The radio reported a twister passing briefly through a small town in Kansas. Throughout the troposphere of the Midwest certain conditions prevailed as the ancient pattern of the spawning of the tornadoes got under way. In corners of the Southwest, winds were gathering and moving across the continent; they drove warm wet air before them in a mass hovering close to the earth. In the fluctuations of these winds, gigantic columns of air would rise rapidly, a mile or so in diameter. At the spreading foot of these tall clouds, rain would gather and often local storms occurred under them. To complete the scheme, eight kilometers above ground the cold jet stream was rushing constantly in from the West at tremendous speed. This was the pattern. And when the summit of a rising cloud was hit by the jet stream, it began to twist counterclockwise. The movement was transferred in a spiral down the length of the column into the ugly widespread base. A whirling funnel of great power would lick downward. This was a tornado.
It sucked dust and stones, any object not fastened down. Its duration was from a few minutes to sixty or more. And no one could predict where it would strike. People who lived in these areas had a way of watching the sky during certain months. If there was a sudden drop in temperature or the sky darkened, if the wind rose, they fastened barn doors and herded their families into rooms where shades were pulled, or into cellars. It happened so fast that sometimes there wasn’t enough time and they were caught in the open. And if a noise was heard suddenly like a monstrous machine at high speed, they might pray as they crouched, waiting.
A few miles from Hidden Creek, Illinois, a gray-white cloud pillar was rising now, churning. Rain clouds at its base were low-spread and frowning. Over the land it became so dark that twilight descended though it was mid-afternoon. Ellen Gaddy was gathering eggs. “It’s making up a storm, biddy,” she said to the hens, “I heard the raincrow just this morning.”