Read Online Patrick Henry and the Frigate’s Keel: And Other Stories of a Young Nation by Howard Fast - Free Book Online Page B

will tell you, down on the Delta, that he was born too late. “One hundred year earlier,” they tell you, “that Jean Laffite, he is one great man.”

4
    Neighbor Sam

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    NEIGHBOR SAM
    T HE trouble started the day that young lawyer showed up. First it rained and then it cleared, and then it rained and then it cleared, all in four days, and nobody ever knew any good to come of something like that. And then Pa shot a wolf not more than two hundred paces from the house, when there hadn’t been a wolf in the neighborhood in maybe two years. And, as if that wasn’t enough, the well went dry.
    â€œI never seen to beat that,” Pa said. “I never seen a well go dry in such even weather, first rain, then shine, then rain.”
    â€œEither coax water out of it or dig a new well,” Ma said.
    â€œNot just a scratch well,” Pa said. “Twenty feet deep, and I rocked up the sides.”
    Ma and Jenny and me, we got a rope and lowered Pa into the well. He mucked around in there for two or three hours, and when we pulled him up he was black from head to foot. But he hadn’t coaxed out a drop of water.
    â€œI got dishes to wash and greens to cook,” Ma said, her eyes narrowing. Pa nodded, and wiped some of the mud from his face; I guess he could see that Ma was already looking around and picking a spot for the new well.
    Well, Pa was standing like that, full of mud and peevishness, when Matt Stevens rode up on his old mouse-colored mare. Pa and Matt had never got along since Pa decided against him last spring and awarded four sows in question to Jim Hogan. At that time, Matt called Pa an old idiot and said there wasn’t much hope for a country that put the law into such hands as his. And ever since then he called Pa “Sam,” instead of “Squire,” like everyone else. Pa said Matt came from no-account folk who didn’t know the meaning of respect.
    â€œNow he ain’t here for no good,” Pa muttered.
    Stevens leaned over his mare and grinned at Pa. He said, “Lord, that’s a lot of mud, Neighbor Sam.”
    â€œHonest mud.”
    â€œMaybe so,” Stevens nodded, still grinning.
    â€œWhat’s on your mind, Neighbor Stevens?” Ma asked. She knew that Pa and he had been spoiling for a fight ever since last spring, and now, the way Pa felt, she was anxious to be rid of Stevens quickly.
    â€œNothing—nothing. Just thought I’d stop by and pass the time of day.”
    Pa grunted.
    â€œThought you might not know about the new lawyerman, being as how you’re off the beaten track here.”
    Pa stared. There was no trouble now knowing why Matt Stevens had come by to pay a call.
    â€œWe ain’t heard of any lawyer-man excepting the Squire, here,” Ma said slowly.
    â€œI reckoned you hadn’t,” Matt grinned. “Of course, this feller’s a mite different from the Squire, here. Just come into the village day before yesterday and took the old log house Frank Fellows built. Got it fixed up already and shingle hung out. Elmer Green, Counselor at Law. Parson Jackson been in to see him, and says he’s a right smart young feller. Graduated out of Harvard. Got his degree framed up, and folks been going in and out all day to have a look at it. Got a desk and pen and ink and pile of paper that high. Got a row of law books that long.” He spread his arms as far apart as they would go.
    Pa stared at his hands, rubbing the mud down the length of his fingers. Ma said, “Can’t see that it matters to us how many lawmen set up hereabouts.” But I could see that Pa was worried. Twelve years now, since two months after I was born, Pa was the only lawman in this part of the country.
    Not that Pa was a real lawman with a framed degree; but he was the sort of man other men looked up to. Twelve years past, when the Shawnees came down and burned out Zeke Cooly’s farm and Aunt Elsie Hack’s