Teeftallow/Chapter 2

WHEN Railroad Jones had disappeared in the courthouse, Mr. Sandage said he had some electioneering to do, and that Abner might fool around and watch the crowd or do whatsoever he wished. According to the sardonic hill view of life, simple human leisure was a fooling around, a futility.

Abner's fooling consisted in leaning against the bole of one of the live oaks in the courtyard and watching the play of the square under his eyes. He stood as still almost as the trunk of the tree itself, for he was only a generation removed from Indian fighters and wild-game hunters, and the woodsman's manner of observing still clung to him.

Numberless things entertained Abner's simple eyes: the horses and mules strung along the courthouse fencel the hogs of the townspeople which ran at large in the streets and rooted in the droppings of the livestock; country dogs beneath their masters' wagons growling at the town dogs on the outside, for the antipathy between country and village extended down to the very dogs themselves.

On the inside of the courtyard groups of men stood about talking loudly or shouting from one group to another. Women and girls were seated or stood on the grass in the peculiar silence of hill women in public places. Where two or three acquaintances sat together they occasionally would lean over and whisper a remark and then relapse into their motionless watching. One or two held babies in their arms. If one of these infants whimpered, the mother would loosen her bodice, lift out one of her breasts, and suckle the child as unself-consciously as a cow her calf, and continue her silent gazing at the scene.

​One girl especially attracted Abner. She was a tall, rather bony girl with a milky face and hair the colour of corn silk. Her eyes were a lake-blue against her pale complexion. She, too, was standing watching the crowd, and her only movement was an occasional shifting of her weight from one foot to the other; and alternately throwing her right and left hip into a little undue prominence after the listless fashion of the hills.

Out of perhaps a score of women on the grass this girl alone drew Abner's eyes even for a return glance. The others appeared to be just people; strangers whom he had never seen before and with whom he had nothing in common; but something in this girl's face established in Abner some vague understanding of her or sympathy for her. The boy gazed at her fixedly, with an odd impression that he knew her, that somewhere he had seen her before. But with the exact placement of the hill folk for faces, he knew he never had, and this puzzled him and now he stared at her, trying to solve this faint mystery.

Presently, as if she felt his prolonged scrutiny, the girl looked around at him. The youth withdrew his eyes with a faint sense of embarrassment. But although he looked at the lively scene in front of him he did not see it any longer. He continued his speculations about the girl: who she was, what was her name, where she lived. He fancied she must be rich; something about her hat, which was not quite countryfied, suggested it. From this stepping stone he proceeded to the time-honoured hill-country deduction that she was "stuck up" and thought herself too good to speak to him. But when he glanced at her again something in the gentleness and wistfulness of her face denied this defamation. She was not "stuck up"; she was sweet and pensive, and, it seemed, a little sad. Well . . . Abner didn't know who she as; he never would know who she was. He wished he could know her; just as boys see and sigh for attractive faces every day and babies reach out for the moon; but that was impossible. And plan to meet her and speak to her was ​completely outside of Abner’s social resources. As far as Abner knew, men met only those women who lived on neighbouring farms. A certain inarticulate criticism of such narrow intercourse was beginning to arise in the youth when a voice beside him said, "Hello, Abner, you up to court—what they got you up about?"

Abner took his eyes from the girl with a little start and was forced to stare for a second or two before he recognized the rough-cut face of Zed Parrum. Zed was grinning at the poorhouse youth with a kind of odious admiration on his face that Abner should have so asserted his manhood on the poor farm as to get into trouble before the Grand Jury.

"Nothing brought me up here," denied Abner. "I jest come."

"Uh," Zed nodded and removed his grin. The fellow’s eyes were a little brightened with whisky, but he was sober. He looked around and then said, "That ain’t a bad-lookin’ gal you was kinder noticin’ when I come up."

"Nope," agreed Abner woodenly, but his face warmed and he wished Zed would go on away.

"Know who she is?"

"Nope."

"Want to know her?"

"Nope."

"Well," opined Zed, "I guess you ralely air too young to begin sparkin’ yet, but that shore is a purty gal. She'll make a high-steppin’ woman when she gits broke to harness."

Abner replied nothing at all to this.

Zed was not discouraged by taciturnity; it was usual among the hill folk. He struck off on another tack,

"I hear the Gran’ Jury got a true bill agin Solon Askew fer public drunkenness and disturbin’ public worship." He paused a moment and then added, "Solon shore raised hell at Big Bethel over on Moccasin. I was with him—tryin’ to ca’m him."

This was interesting; there was a certain glow of adventure ​about rousing a churchful of people which would appeal to any hill youth. "Is that so?" said Abner.

"Yep, a juryman told me confidenshul so's I could git the boys out of harm's way before the officer reached 'em. This same feller told me also that the Gran' Jury had billed me agin for totin' concealed weepins an' disturbin' public worship." Zed gave a disgusted snort. "That comes of tryin' to ca'm some fool who ralely is disturbin' public worship; and as fer totin' concealed weepins, how'd anybody know I had a gun if it was concealed? That's one kind of bill that don't make no sense, Abner."

Zed drew out a red handkerchief and mopped his face which was wet from summer heat and the rising flush of whisky. He wadded the sour handkerchief back into his hip pocket and ruminated, "Well, I dunno whether to skip the country and go to Texas fer awhile, or hire a lawyer and beat my case, or walk up an' pay my fine, or jess please guilty and lay her out in jail. . . ." Zed sucked his teeth calmly to salvage the shreds of an orange as he pondered these four possibilities. The prospect of spending a period of time in jail did not even break the sequence of his customary movements to cleanse his teeth. He opened the blade of his jackknife to a right angle with the handle, and with this instrument got at some of the more inaccessible teeth very handily.

Now Abner was not attending Zed's account of the jury's findings; he was still thinking about Mr. Parrum's question, "Do you want to know her?" As a matter of fact, Abner did very earnestly want to know her, and now he wondered why Zed had asked such a question. The fact that Zed had not called her name told Abner Zed himself did not know the girl, so why should Zed ask, "Do you want to know her?" That sounded as if by some hook or crook Zed knew some way of crossing the conventional abyss which separated Abner from the girl and bringing them together. The boy wondered curiously and with a faint rising excitement how this could possibly be. At last he interrupted a continued ​account of the doings of the Grand Jury to ask, "Uh—Zed—you know, talkin' about that gal—you astin' me did I want to know her—well, how could I git to know her?"

Mr. Parrum halted amid a decameron of rustic misdemeanours.

"So you'd kinder like to set up to her after all?"

"No, I wouldn't," drawled Abner in irritation. "But I'd luff to know how I could!"

"Easy enough," declared Zed, coming back to the idea with the enthusiasm of a touch of alcohol. "All you got to do is jess walk over an' stan' 'in ten or twelve feet of her; jess keep stan'in' there, don't pay no mortal attention to her, an' purty soon I'll come by an' make you acquainted with her."

Abner nerved himself. "Well, I don't know anything about gittin' acquainted with nobody, but, dad burn my riggin', I'll do anything oncet."

"Well, she kain't eat you alive." observed Mr. Parrum cheerfully, "an' if she does she kain't swaller you whole. All right now, here we go!"

With this cheerful prophecy that Mr. Teeftallow would have to be masticated before being swallowed, Zed took himself off and out of the gate and, after a few moments, lost himself completely in the crowd.

Upon the withdrawal of Zed's moral support Abner's courage waned, but pride forced his legs to move slowly, with a fine imitation of inattention, in the direction of the girl. The thought that he was really about to get to speak to the girl with the corn-silk hair set up a queer tremulousness inside of him. He wondered how in the world Zed would ever bring it about. When he reached the spot where he should stop, his courage quite deserted him and he was tempted to continue walking. He felt uncomfortable from heel to scalp. Finally he did pause with an elaborate pretence of inspecting a mule hitched to the fence. He moved his head this way and that as if he were tremendously curious about the opposite side of the mule, but as if unfortunately his legs had ​halted and left him marooned on the spot with a burning but unsatisfied curiosity concerning the colour, shape, and general condition of the other side of the mule. So all he could do was to stare fixedly at the mule's available side and speculate on the animal's entirety as astronomers speculate on the farther side of the moon.

It was hardly a convincing pose. It seemed to Abner that the girl saw through him, had become angry at him, and was wishing for him to go away. He could feel her pushing at his back with invisible arms, shoving him away from her.

The girl herself had become absolutely motionless, as a squirrel "freezes" to a tree when in danger. The utter novelty and uncertainty of the enterprise jangled at the boy's nerves. He was within the specified distance of the girl and now waited tensely for Zed to come and introduce him, yet he dreaded the ordeal tremendously.

Just as a hope began to dawn that Zed had forgotten this social engagement, he saw his friend and two other rustics enter the courthouse gate together. A lump arose in Abner's throat; he cursed himself for not having fled minutes ago.

The three young men entering the gate were in a gale of spirits. All were slightly drunk. One gave the other a hard but playful blow, then started to run. The second thrust out his foot and with a trip sent the first forward in a stumbling fall. Zed headed into the two, and so the three came ricochetting across the grass in this rough horse-play until with a whirl and a shove Zed sent one of the youths flying sidewise at the boy. The next moment Abner was catapulted squarely into the flaxen-haired girl behind him.

Teeftallow tried desperately hard to miss her, but Zed was as good as his word in bringing the two together. Abner struck her in the chest with his shoulder, but succeeded in keeping his feet and even prevented her from falling.

"Lord-a-mercy!" gasped the hill boy in the utmost confusion, "please excuse me; them blasted fellers bumped into me . . ." He got her balanced on her feet.

​The helpful Zed and his two assistants in the receiving line had careered on around the courthouse and were now out of sight.

The girl looked at Abner, her delicate complexion a high pink.

"They're drunk!" she trembled in a furious voice.

"Yeh. . . ." Regard for the truth made Abner add, "I reckon."

"I think it's uh shame—bumpin' into nice folks. They ort to get a bill against 'em!"

Abner pondered what to say and finally volunteered, "One of em's name is Zed Parrum."

"Oh, well," the girl tossed her head, "I don't want to git it. A girl wouldn't go before the Gran' Jury."

"No-o," admitted Abner emptily, "a girl wouldn't . . .

Here his small talk ran out and left him pondering something else to say. To gain time he repeated, rather ineffectively, "No, she shore wouldn't . . ." and then for several moments his mind was completely blank. The silence between him and the girl widened and deepened until it impinged upon the very confusion of the crowd in the square. It seemed to Abner that everyone in sight must observe that he had ceased talking. He stood groping tensely for words; finally moistened his lips and said in a rush, "Zed told me they was a-gittin' a lot of true bills this court. . . ."

"Don't git any more than they ort," declared the girl bitterly.

Abner looked helplessly at her delicate complexion, her blue eyes and fair hair.

"I never was here before on court day. . . . I live on the pore farm."

At this the unknown opened her eyes wide with the first interest she had exhibited since Abner had made his introductory assault.

"Do you live on the pore farm?"

​"Yeh. Mr. Sandage brought me up here to-day. He got into trouble on account of not sendin' me to school."

This was still more astounding information. "Why, ain't you never been to school none?"

"Not much."

"Why, when I was a-lookin' at you I thought you must be a awful smart boy and had been to school a lot."

The admission that she had been looking at him and thinking about him struck the first chord of pleasure in Abner's bosom during this interview.

"Well, I aint. . . ." He was sorry to admit it, although, undoubtedly, to stay away from school was the helpful course to pursue.

"How come you not to?" she asked curiously.

"Well, ralely, there wasn't nobody to send me. My mammy died in the porehouse when I wuz jest a baby."

"O-oh!" breathed the girl, and the high pink of her face faded.

"She didn't haff to go to the porehouse for bein' pore," explained Abner quickly; "she went crazy and they wa'n't no place for her at the asylum in Nashville."

"Jess think!" cried the girl, deeply moved, staring spellbound at Abner. "Why, that's jest like a novel!" Wonder was in her blue eyes, reminiscent of the wonders she had found in novels. "I bet you are smart," she added with conviction, "even if you ain't been to school, especially with your mammy goin' crazy."

For the first time in his life Abner was openly admired by a girl, and this one delicately fair.

"I dunno about that," he said, sticking to his modesty even in the face of such flattery. "I know I'd hate to go to school and git to be a edjercated fool like Lem Overall."

"You wouldn't be like him, you'd be some great somebody if you was educated, a big lawyer or something, and you would come back home and marry your old sweetheart." ​The girl was now following the outlines of her hill-country fiction reading.

"Marry my sweetheart—why, I ain't got none!"

"You will have one by the time you are a great lawyer!"

"My granddaddy was a judge," recalled Abner.

"What did I tell you!" cried the romantic one. She smiled at this corroboration, and it seemed to Abner she had the most charming smile he had ever seen.

In the midst of this absorbing prophecy of Abner's future, a stream of cachinnating and guffawing men came pouring out of the courthouse door. In the centre of this hilarious press flowed the large form, ponderous head, and black mane of Railroad Jones. The magnate was grinning amid the mirthful throng, and everyone appeared trying to clap his broad back. A confusion of voices shouted, "Ain't he a sight!" "Ain't he the beatenest man in town!" "Brainiest man in Lane County to-day, countin' in jedge and lawyers. . . ."

It was evident that Railroad Jones had made another great coup in court. It was the sort of thing that would go down in the folk stories of the hill people and would circulate for years after Railroad Jones was dead and gone. The drama, the bigness of the situation rushed on Abner. Without a thought he deserted the girl and went running toward the crowd. He seized the arm of a man whom he did not know,

"What's he done? What's Railroad Jones done now?" shouted Abner in the uproar.

The man slapped Abner's shoulder and guffawed to the skies.

"By gum. There's a man here tryin' to c'lect a bill fer some stoves Railroad bought ten years ago, but Jones showed a contrack with the comp'ny agreein' not tuh c'lect tull Railroad had sold all the stoves. Now R-R-Railroad won't sell the l-last un!" The farmer crimped over, roaring with laughter. "He's holdin' it f-f-fer enough money tuh-tuh pay fer all the rest put together. . . ." ​More guffawing, the man wiped his eyes. "By gosh, brainiest man in Tennessee to-day. . . ." He drifted away from Abner in the hilarious crowd.

Abner himself was tremendously moved and elated over this piece of successful chicanery. Like all public heroes Railroad Jones was pervasive. His feats became everybody's feats. When he escaped payment for a shipment of stoves, everybody escaped paying for stoves.

"Why, gosh all hemlock!" reflected Abner excitedly, "anybody could uh thought of that! I could uh done that, myself!"

Like all great masterpieces, it presented a deceptive simplicity.

The poorhouse boy was drawn into the crowd by emotional suction and followed in its wake toward the magnate's office. He forgot all about the girl, who, perhaps, was waiting to hear the cause of the uproar. Or, since she was a hill girl, perhaps she was not waiting; perhaps she did not expect her chance acquaintance to come back to her any more. . . .