Read Online Spencer's Mountain by Jr. Earl Hamner - Free Book Online Page B

curiosity or if the inquirer honestly wanted to know. He gave the stranger a swift glance of appraisal and decided he was a man who knew a mullet from a mud cat.
    â€œBiten,” Clay replied.
    The stranger’s face lighted up with an eagerness Clay recognized immediately.
    â€œI’ve got some tackle in the car. Where’s the closest place I can get some minnows?”
    â€œRight here,” said Clay and motioned toward his minnow bucket.
    The stranger went back to his car and in a few minutes returned with fishing equipment that Clay noted with approval was well oiled and cared for. Nothing else was said between the two men, but Clay watched as closely as he could without staring directly at the stranger while he made his way quietly down the side of the bank, lifted the minnow bucket just high enough out of the water to select a minnow without injuring the others, closed the clanking tin top with a minimum of noise and plunged the hook through the meaty back of the minnow, then dropped it in the water for a moment so it might recover before he cast it into the deeper water. The minnow swam listlessly for a moment, then with a promising spurt of energy plunged forward and down, making the red-and-white cork bob frantically up and down on the surface. Carefully the stranger lifted the minnow out of the shallow water and cast expertly into a quiet deep-lookingpool just beyond the swirling eddy where the water fell over a rock formation. He laid the rod against a fallen log where it would be secure and sat down.
    â€œThe name’s Goodson,” the stranger said and held out his hand to Clay. “Thank you for your hospitality.”
    â€œSpencer’s mine,” said Clay, “and don’t mention it.”
    A comfortable fisherman’s silence fell between them. Each, absorbed in his own particular bobbing cork, waited patiently and silently for a bite.
    It was Clay who hauled in the first fish, a fierce and outraged six-pound bass that continued to fight even after Clay had taken him from the water and had secured him with a small chain through his gills.
    To celebrate, Clay took a nip from his bottle; Mr. Goodson, elated by Clay’s catch and encouraged by it, joined him.
    ***
    At the Baptist parsonage a group of ladies was busy preparing the house for the arrival of their new minister. The parsonage itself was a white frame house that had been built along a pleasant road about a mile from where the Spencers lived. It contained six square rooms and faced squarely on the highway in much the same manner the Baptists faced their God. The grass of the front lawn was quite green, clipped and proper and kept healthy, if not from God’s good rain at least from frequent baptisms by hose. There were no frivolous zinnias or nasturtiums to mar its green expanse, although some white snowball bushes bloomed on the lawn in early August. In the back were some hollyhocks along the path that went to the henhouse, but that was all the frivolity there was about the house. All told, it was a very Baptist establishment.
    On this particular Saturday afternoon, the Baptist Ladies Aid Society had summoned its members to prepare the parsonage for the new parson’s arrival. If the number of ladies present exceeded the membership of the Ladies Aid Society it could perhaps have been due to the fact that every woman who had a daughter of marriageable age had broughther along, since the one thing they knew for certain about the new minister was that he was not married.
    Mrs. Lucy Godlove, along with her daughter Barbie-Glo, and Mrs. Tillie Witt, along with her daughter Honey-Glo, had drawn the chore of cleaning the kitchen. Neither of the girls had much enthusiasm for their task. It was by no coincidence that both of their minds were on the same thing. They were both thinking about the square dance at Buckingham County Courthouse that was held every Saturday night. Each of them was devising in her mind some