Teeftallow/Chapter 34

ALONE in the dimly lighted room, Abner Teeftallow, even if he was, as he admitted, "ordinary," still realized that a remarkable thing had happened. A girl of the hills had asserted the validity of sex along with the other values of life. When in doubt as to her own emotions, Adelaide had frankly experimented. Reared as Abner had been amid the shamed and secretive treatment of sex, Adelaide's attitude toward it was like a fresh breeze blowing through a swamp. Clearly she belonged to herself and would find happiness in any way she could.

Very probably at this moment she was in the ballroom, making a decision against him, promising to marry the other man. This thought brought a twinge in Abner's chest. The notion of losing her was painful. Yet while Adelaide dazzled him, still, after all, the stolid hillman felt there was something absurd about her gesture. A courtship could not be conducted like a shopping tour. A girl could not go around trying on man after man, like gloves. . . .

In this mood Abner crossed mechanically to the door which Adelaide had pointed out and entered without knocking. He did not think of knocking. In the hills intramural signals are not used. When a hillman enters a house—he is in it.

The teamster found himself standing in a large library looking at the huge back of Railroad Jones. The magnate was in his shirt sleeves wearing a fresh striped shirt that puffed up between the cross of his suspenders and gave him a freshly bathed look. He was standing beside a cabinet filled with mineral specimens and held a reddish-looking stone in his hand. The fat man dominated his library com​pletely; beyond him Abner barely distinguished some sectional bookcases; an electric spray overhead shining down on him, and at the farther end of the room a library table with a shaded light.

For several moments Abner stood awkwardly looking at the puffed shirt between the braces, and finally attracted the fat man's attention by saying, "Mr. Jones, Adelaide said you wanted to see me."

Railroad Jones turned his bulk with the waddling movement of the very fleshy.

"Why, yes, I wanted to see you, Abner; glad you come in." He replaced his specimen and explained in his burring voice, "Addy put these rocks in here—they've all got names—you kain't find a single little rock out in the hills, Ab, but what it's got a name"—the fat man gave an abdominal chuckle at the absurdity of the thing—"another fool way of weakening the brain, Ab, namin' the rocks." The great square-cut face with the small eyes burnt in it took on such a droll expression that Abner laughed outright.

"I suppose they have to teach girls things ordinary folks don't know," opined Abner, "so folks'll realize they are educated."

"Mostly show," agreed the magnate from deep in his throat. "Have a cigarette." He moved to the table.

Abner followed him and had one. It had a cork tip, an oval shape, and a flavour Abner had never tasted before.

"Sit down," stewed out Jones, and Abner sank into bottomless upholstery.

The rich man waved a puffed hand. "This is all Addy's idyah: books, rocks, pictures, things to git your mind off yore business. I tell her she'll never be a business woman. She says she's goin' to marry an' turn that over to some man; says she's goin' to raise childern herself. I told her to hit her pace. I didn't keer what she done so long as she kep' on livin' here with me. I don't propose to have her leavin' this house, Ab. I want her to keep on livin' here, married or single—I like to watch her."

​The magnate stewed all this out between deliberate cigarette puffs, opening and closing his eyes, which were fixed on Abner.

This pointed discussion of Adelaide's matrimonal future brought a certain suspense and suggested very enticing possibilities to Abner. He glanced around the handsome library and felt a dawning proprietary interest in it. The youth almost said—he had it on the tip of his tongue to say, "Mr. Jones, I wouldn't think of taking Adelaide away from you," but an indeterminate atmosphere about the rich man suggested that Abner wait a little further, which the youth did, leaning back in his chair, and letting go the breath with which he had meant to talk.

"What I wanted to see you about," rebegan Mr. Jones, "is a little trouble I'm having with my men in winding up the railroad work."

Abner looked his disappointment at this abandonment of the theme of Adelaide.

"What's the matter with your men?" he asked without interest.

"Well, they've been tryin' to engineer a strike for a long time, but now Perry Northcutt's got behind it an' it's goin' through."

"I hadn't heard it."

"No, you've been pretty busy in society here in Lanesburg lately." This was said in Railroad's usual burring voice, but Abner thought he detected a faint sarcasm in it. He looked at the broad yellow face.

"You wanted to see me about that?"

"Yes."

"What can I do?"

"I thought maybe you would be interested in this family keepin' some of the value my railroad is bringin' into this county, Abner. Ever'thing I've got now is in that railroad. If it was finished I could git a line of credit on it an' pay Perry off, but if it's tied up in a strike I kain't do it, an' nachelly ​Perry will git it all. Then me an' Addy will be down jest where I started fifty years ago."

The fat man stated his position impassively, scrutinizing the young man in the chair opposite him.

"An' what do you want me to do?" questioned Abner with more interest.

"Well, bein' as you was a frien' of Addy's, I thought you'd be interested in seein' her keep the proputty her daddy got together for her. I allowed you'd be more interested in seein' it go to Addy than to Perry Northcutt. The fact is, Ab, I'm old. I kain't start at the bottom agin an' set Addy up where she is now. If I could make it a-tall, I wouldn't be in time. She's a young lady now, an' anything that money can do fer her happiness has got to be done now. Like all right-minded gals, Ab, she'll marry soon. With money she can have her pickin' choice of whoever she wants, and I want her to have that feller, whoever he be. Any man she picks will be all right with me. That gal's got more sense in a minute than most folks has in a year. She's got too much sense to pick for mere book l'arnin', Abner. He's got to be a man!" His guttural voice came down on the word "man" with an emphasis that picked Abner out and nominated him for the position.

"Look here," said the teamster earnestly, "what can I do in this business?"

"If the strike comes off like it's billed, we'll need men to take the strikers' places. You've already worked down there; you'd be a valuable man to break in raw labour. Sheriff Bascom is goin' to be with you fellers; so are most of the deputies in the county."

"You mean there's liable to be a fight?"

"I hope not, nachelly, but when one set o' men steps up an' says nobody can work unless they say so, seems to be it's time to decide whether we're all rabbits or bulldawgs. I thought I'd speak to you about it. I shore don't think it's right fer me to spen' my life makin' a fortune for Addy, ​an' have Perry Northcutt git it. I thought you might feel like doin' somethin' to keep Addy from bein' beat out o' her right; specially as Northcutt has already done you a pretty mean turn."

At the prospect of rescuing Adelaide's fortune for her, something quivered in Abner's chest. He nodded earnestly.

"Now you've said it, Mr. Jones. I may have a little money, but I ain't forgot how to do a honest day's work, nor, by God, how to put up a fight, neither."

"Of course, I hope they won't be no fightin'," said Railroad, waving a hand, "but what is to be will be. I'm Babtis' enough to b'lieve that; an' sence it shore is goin' to happen, my plan is to hit fust an' make it happen to the other feller."

"I do, too," said Abner to this commendable creed.

The magnate arose and came forward, extending a puffy hand to his guest.

"I'm glad you feel like that. I knowed yore gran'dad when he owned putty near all this county. I was jest gittin' my teeth whetted to do a little bitin' myse'f then—a fine ol' man—an yore mammy goin' crazy, too—you come from fine stock, Abner. I thought I'd find a man when I put my han' on you."

"I'll go down with Bascom any time an' up agin anything," said Abner with a slight swagger.

"Much obliged. I appreciate that, Abner, an' Addy will, too."

They moved together to the outer door of the library. Before Abner went out on the porch, Railroad Jones paused again.

"By the way, Abner, if I was you I don't b'lieve I'd push them partic'lar lan' claims you got agin my estate right now. Me an' you can make a settlemint, any time, you know that." He nodded intimately at the youth. "You don't want to force a sale o' my lan's just before the railroad makes 'em jump in price. I haven't the money to settle off with you right now—if you ever do want a settlemint with my estate."

​"Why, s-sure," stammered Abner, thrilled at this intimate suggestion. "I'll do anything in the worl' I can to accommodate you an' Adelaide, Mr. Jones."

"I knowed you would, Abner, so I jest wish you'd tell Buck Sharp to lay off them lands which belong to me. When you need money you can proceed aginst the other places aroun' here. Yore gran'daddy owned the old Coltrane place, the Beshear place. I understan' Ditmas is wantin' the timber on the Coltrane place. You ort to be able to compromise an' sell it to him straight out."

The mention of Mr. Ditmas introduced a discordant note into the sacrificial mood of the youth.

"I saw Mr. Ditmas a few days ago, an' he seemed mighty cut up over a trade he made with you." Reproach coloured the ex-teamster's tones. "He was sayin' somethin' about the South's not tradin' fair and whitecaps, or somethin' like that."

"Whitecaps an' the South not tradin' fair?"

"Yeh, somethin' like that."

"Well, now, Abner, I was lookin' out for my side o' that trade, an' nachelly I supposed he was lookin' out for his'n. When I trade with a man, Abner—I mean a man outside my own fambly—I nachelly make as good a trade as I can, an' I mean fer him to do the same. I thought that rule was understood North, South, East, West, an' ever' other direction."

"Sure," agreed Abner, for Railroad's logic was as clear and convincing as Mr. Ditmas's had been cloudy and involved. "Well, I don't guess Mr. Ditmas really meant anything by what he said, he was drunk when he said it."

That ended the Ditmas analysis of the South and the nation. It passed from Abner's mind and never returned.

The young man and the old one stood talking a few minutes longer in the chill autumn night. Then they shook hands again and Abner crossed the porch and started down the gravelled path to the front gate. He would walk home. ​In the Jones parlour the jazz band still caterwauled, and Abner gradually left it behind.

As he walked he looked up at the cold stars and saw himself rescuing Adelaide's fortune. He imagined himself standing beside Sheriff Bascom and the deputies, defending the last of the railroad construction. Also, he would be defending Adelaide in her fine home, with her fine car, and her fine, unashamed passion seeking happiness for herself, and for her children who were yet to be.

"If I knowed I'd git killed an' never git to marry her a-tall, still I'd do it for her," mused Abner, "because—because . . ." His thoughts lost the form of words and became a feeling of what Adelaide was to him; a fresh heartsome breeze, blowing on him amid the exhalations of a swamp.