Neal Barrett - Through Darkest America

Only, that couldn’t be.

A boy didn’t look in the water and see an animal. Howie had, though. For a quick second, it was the same—and no matter how much he told himself it couldn’t be that way, it was.

That was how the nightmares started, and for a while he didn’t think they’d ever stop.

“That’s how questions come to you, Howie,” his father went on. He reached up and pulled a sprig of oak leaves from the branch above. “Things that might seem the same is lots of times altogether different.”

He turned the sprig of leaves between big fingers and held them up to Howie. “Now suppose you was on that ridge up there,” he nodded to the west, “no more’n two hundred yards away. An’ I was standing right where I am and I yelled out and said ‘Howie, I’ll give you a copper if you can tell me what kind of leaf I’m holdin’ up here.’”

Howie grinned. “I’d sure do that!”

“And what kind of leaf is it?”

“It’s a oak.”

“What kind of oak, though?”

“It’s a live oak, for sure.”

“That it is. But if you was a couple hundred yards up on that ridge and I was to hold up a bunch of different leaves— a white oak, say, and then a red oak—what’d you say then?”

Howie frowned. He could see the copper in his father’s story vanishing quickly. “I don’t know,” he said honestly, “might be I couldn’t say for sure.”

“ Might be’s right,” Papa grinned. He rubbed a rough hand over Howie’s hair. “They’d all seem the same, wouldn’t they? Only they’re not. And you don’t even have to get up on that ridge, boy. S’pose you didn’t live here, and you just come in from somewhere they don’t have no trees at all. No oaks or pines or maples or elms or anything. And I showed you leaves from a white oak and a red. Reckon you’d know the difference?”

Howie shook his head, imagining a place where they didn’t have trees.

“Likely what you’d say is they seem just the same. They got the same way of curvin’ in and out, and their acorns is about the same. Reckon they are the same. Only they’re not, are they?”

“No,” said Howie, “they’re lots different.”

“And that’s the way it is with people and stock, Howie. They might look kind of alike in some ways, but they’re not anywhere near the same. You know why that is?”

Howie thought. “They don’t act the same. Or talk or anything.”

“That’s two things. What else?”

“They’re not smart like we are. They don’t know hardly anything.”

“Right,” said Papa, “they don’t. And you know why that is? ’Cause they’re made different , Howie. Their bodies look some like ours, but they’re not the same at all. Remember the oak leaves? How they ’peared like they might be the same, but were different altogether? Well there’s a lot more difference than that between people and stock. More difference than night and day.”

Papa paused, stripping the leaves from his twig and letting them flutter to the ground. He squinted at the sun through thick branches and looked at Howie. “The thing to remember, son, is that what you see on the outside’s not near as important as the part you can’t see. And that’s the biggest difference of all between people and animals. There’s other things, but that’s the biggest. God gave men a mind to think with and the power to reason out the ways of the world. And he give him something else that’s most precious of all, and that’s a soul . Whatever somethin’ might look like, Howie, don’t forget that people has got souls. And that’s something a animal can’t never get. He’s got a heart and blood and lots of other things. But in the end, he’s still all empty inside.”

Howie’s father talked to the other men under the lean-to and drank white corn; then the sun was nearly overhead and Howie wandered over to the pit-pens to watch the feeding. It was a lot bigger job than just slopping a few hundred head. Dozens of the big handcarts rolled out of the cookshed, so heavy it took six men to guide them up the rampways. Long before the carts appeared, though, the stock sensed it was feeding time. They bunched up tight under the edge of the pits, waiting. And those that saw the wagons first made grunting noises in their throats; jumped up and down, and slapped the ground with their feet and hands. Soon, the stock further down took up the cry and the sound swelled toward the bend of the river like rising thunder.

The heaviest carts went to the far end of the yards. The stock there was still being pen-fattened on a rich mixture of cooked grains and cereals heavily laced with meat scraps. The nearest pens got only a handful of the cheapest feed. There was no sense filling bellies that would soon be quartered on the end of a hook, making their way around the heavy plank walls of the cutting room.

The creatures here didn’t look as if they could hold another bite, anyway. Some were so fat they could hardly waddle up to the rim. It was a meal most of them would hardly get digested, but hunger was a strong habit and they scrapped up everything that spilled over the edge. Howie knew, from experience, a stockman always had to keep his whip handy, even at the kill pens. Eating was all an animal had to do and sometimes they’d even go after their own wastes, or each other. You couldn’t watch them all the time, but you had to discourage them when you had a chance.

The trip was near as perfect as you could ask for. There were presents for everyone—a doll for Carolee, the fork and spoon set for Howie’s mother, and for Howie, the fine bone- handle knife he’d set his mind to. Papa hadn’t forgotten. And Howie knew, from his father’s mood and what he’d overheard at the river, that some good trading and studding dates had been set. A lot of hands had been shaken over white corn.

There would be plenty of food for the cold winter, then, and good times for the year to come. Especially if the spring, and summer crops were as good as they should be and the frost came when it ought to. Papa was even talking about extra-fine winter barns for the stock.

Everything would have been fine, and Howie didn’t even mind missing the pictures of Silver Island. Then the thing at the barge had to happen.

Papa had gone aboard to check on his stock and Howie was just carrying the last sacks of salt and ground meal up the narrow gangway. He chanced to look up and catch his mother’s eyes, then saw her face go dead white. He jerked around; Colonel Jacob was right behind him, high on his terrible horse. Howie jumped away, quickly ashamed. The man looked at him and his thin face stretched into a grin.

“I startle you, boy?”

Howie flushed. “No, sir,” he said and felt worse because the Colonel knew it was a lie.

The eyes flicked away from him, then, and rested on his mother. “You’re looking well, Ev.”

“Thank you—Jacob.” Howie could hardly hear his mother.

“What’s it been,” said Jacob. “Eight, nine years? And by God you’re as pretty as ever, Ev. Prettier, maybe. Your girl?”

Howie’s mother tried to open her mouth, but couldn’t. She nodded dumbly at Jacob.

“Looks like you. Going to be a beauty, too. Likely have hair fine as silk, Ev. And skin softern’ rain.”

“Jacob… please!”

Howie looked hard at Colonel Jacob, past the fine boots and the big metal gun at his waist. His fingers were hooked in his belt just above the gun, like he sat that way all the time. His smile seemed cut in his face, as if someone had taken a knife to it and sewn it back crooked. Long after, though, it was the eyes Howie remembered. They didn’t just look at a person like they ought to—they reached. out and touched wherever they wanted. And Howie tightened up inside because he knew plain as day where the eyes were going and his mother couldn’t move away, or do anything at all.