Moosemeadows/Chapter 4
IV
THOMAS DEBLORE led me straight to the big front door, though the foot-worn path went off to the left and around a corner. From close up, the big house looked even older and more unkempt than it had from a distance. Thomas lowered his burden to the first of the three steps of stone which led up to the big door.
"It hasn't been kept up the way it should be," he said. "It's been neglected for years. Help's scarce." He glanced to his right and left. "This was all lawn, in the old days."
At that moment the door opened, disclosing to view a grotesque person. He stood on the threshold, with the dusk of the old hall behind him, staring at me with one hostile and inquisitive eye. The other eye was tight shut and sunken. He was of medium height, or better, very thin and sharply stooped from the hips. He looked ninety years old, at least; and all his remaining fire appeared to be concentrated in his left eye.
"Who you got thar?" he asked. "Whar'd 'e come from?"
"Who do you think?" retorted Deblore, with heat. "Not that it's any business of yours," he added.
The other cupped a hand behind an ear.
"I didn't kitch the name," he said. "Sing it out, Tom. I be a mite hard o' hearin' in one ear an' stone deef in t'other."
Deblore turned to me and said, "He's a liar. He's no more deaf than you nor me." And then, to Ruben, "It's Captain Gidwicke Swayton, who's been away to the war. He's kin to the Deblores from away back, an' he's come to stop with me just as long as he wants to. He's come by invitation—which is more than can be said for some others."
Thereupon, Deblore reshouldered his load, and barged by old Ruben, brushing him aside. I followed. The hall was narrow and dark, and musty. We ascended the narrow staircase, each step of which was soft with dust. The handrail was slender and of mahogany. There was light at the top, from the open door of a front room; I followed Tom into this room; and he immediately deposited his load on the floor and shut the door.
"We live mostly in the wing," he said. "It's warmer—but this'll be warm enough from now on till winter. You can make a fire if you ever feel chilly." He stepped closer and whispered, "We'll be rid of old Rube Glashner before winter, if I have to kill him."
"Why do you whisper?" I asked.
"So he won't hear. He's spyin' at the door, like as not."
"Spying? What does he want to know? And if that's his kind, why don't you kick him out?"
"Public opinion." His whiskers moved convulsively and his eyes flamed. "We're not popular; and if I turned that old fool out, there's no saying what might happen. He pretends a claim on me, because Henry married his daughter."
At that moment, something scratched at the door. Tom stepped over and opened it; and the big tawny dog stalked into the room. Tom closed the door and came back and shook my hand warmly.
"This is a good man, you see," he said, addressing the dog. "Good friend, Lion. You take care of him, d'y 'understand?" The dog regarded me fixedly for a few seconds, then wagged his great brush and approached and sniffed my knees and disengaged hand. I patted his massive head, which was fully six inches wide between the ears.
"He doesn't look as old as I thought him," I said. "From the way he walks I got the idea he was on his last legs. He takes his time."
"Yes, he does that—when there's plenty of time. But when there's need of haste, he shows the speed. He's a great dog, Lion. Seven years old, and knows more than most men. Born and bred right in this house. I wouldn't be surprised if he grabbed old Ruben by the gizzard some day."
"What is he?" I asked.
"That I can't say, exactly. There's some Newfoundland in him, and maybe some wolf, and I don't know what else. But it's what you might call a fixed strain, now. He weighs a hundred and forty, all bone and muscle."
Deblore and I spent the balance of the morning in walking over the cleared areas of the estate. We were accompanied by the big black dog and the small black-and-white. I asked why Lion was not with us, and was told that one or other of the large dogs was always left to help old Amy Bear guard the house, and that, since Ruben Glashner's arrival, Lion had always done the duty. "He's up to some mischief, and Lion knows it as well as I do," explained Deblore. "Duster's a good dog, but not sharp enough for that old cuss."
"What mischief can he possibly be up to?" I asked.
"I wish I knew," was the reply, given without an accompanying glance. "I wouldn't put anything past him."
We visited old Sol Bear at the plowing on the ridge. Sol looked like a pure-bred Indian; but what man, old or young, of unmixed Maliseet blood, would work on a farm day after day, month after month, year in and year out? Deblore assured me that Sol did so.
"There isn't a lazy bone, nor an unreliable one, from his scalp down to his heels," he said. "And it's the same with Amy. They've been with me going on eight years, so I know."
Sol paused in his work for long enough to shake hands with me unsmilingly, fill his pipe from my pouch with an air of profound gravity and nod gravely to a question or two from his employer. Then he dropped his hands again to the sweat-polished curves of the plow-handles, clicked his tongue to the horses and resumed his unwinding of rusty stubble into straight brown furrows.
Tom, old Glashner and I ate our midday meal at a small table in a corner of the big dining-room. There were only two places set at this table when the master and I took our seats, and for a moment I feared that Amy Bear was not pleased with my arrival. Tom said nothing, however, and served me to bacon and eggs from a cracked platter with a large crested spoon of massive silver. Then Ruben came in and fairly bored a hole in the table with his single eye.
"Looks like the squaw'd forgot all about you, Mr. Swayton," he said. "Or maybe she can't count. But crows kin count up to three."
"Don't fool ourself, Glashner," said Tom. "Amy can count; and there is no danger of her ever forgetting her duty. If you're still here, fetch yourself a plate. There's still plenty to eat, praise the Lord!"
"Hey? What d'ye say?" cried the unwelcome guest, cupping a hand behind one of his leathery ears.
"Fetch yourself a plate, if you want any dinner," bawled the host, his beak-like nose reddening suddenly and blue fire playing from his eyes. "You know where the plates are kept, I guess—and everything else in the house. If you don't, it isn't for lack of looking."
I expected a counter blast from Ruben, but nothing of the kind occurred. Ruben wagged his head with a puzzled air, then fetched a plate from a cupboard with the manner of one who does not know what all the talk is about, but is anxious to do his best in the way of guessing. Fortified by his pretended deafness—a pretence which he could not fail to realize as futile—he reminded me of the legendary ostrich with his head in the sand. Tom helped him generously to bacon and eggs. For a little while we ate without further speech—but not in silence.
"I be a child of nature," said Ruben presently, turning his one eye on me. "A simple child of nature. I don't pertend to no gentility. I live simple an' eat plain an' drink water an' tea. If ye was to offer me a fortune of money, I wouldn't take it. It's the animals knows how to live. I kin jump into the snow, stark naked, any winter mornin', an' feel all the better for it. With a rub of b'ar's grease into my j'ints I'm fit an' ready for thirty miles of rough goin' any day. Yes, sir, it's the wild beasts knows how to live—rough an' simple."
Deblore snorted. His whiskers moved convulsively. He turned to me.
"You've seen wild animals rubbing bear's grease into their joints," he said. "It's a common sight hereabouts. Damn the fellow! Water and tea! He'd drink the alcohol off a pickled lizard in a museum."
I felt both amused and embarrassed. Ruben, however, didn't turn a hair. If Deblore had been a fly on the windowpane he would not have been less regarded.
"I got only one eye, but I kin see as far as most," bragged the thick-hided old parasite. "When I had 'em both I was as good as a telescope. It was envy an' unchristian jealousy lost me t'other one. I'll tell 'e all about how it happened. What's fer puddin', Tom?"
"If it was poisoned figs with arsenic sauce, you'd be welcome to every spoonful of it," said Deblore.
"Thanky, thanky," returned Glashner. "Dried apples is reel healthy, even if we do have 'em every day. The squaw ain't much on variety. But as I was sayin'"
Amy Bear entered with a large steamed pudding, which she deposited before Tom. Its filling was of dried apples; but old Ruben accepted a large helping of it, slathered it thickly with butter and brown sugar and didn't resume his story until his plate was polished. He sighed and leaned back in his chair.
"It was on Greenwater Brook," he began again. "I was choppin' for Hicks an' Ford. In them days I could fell as much timber in a day as any other two men on the river; an' I reckon I could hold me own with the best of 'em even now. The boss driv 'em to keep up with me, but it was more'n they was able to do"
"Come on!" exclaimed Tom, jumping from his chair and grabbing me by the shoulder. "Lies, every word! Hot air! Let's get out of here!"
I went with him. Outside, he said, "He's the world's champion liar. The truth about his eye is, he did so little work the other men in the camp got sore at him—Sol told me the story—and one of them got hold of his pipe when he wasn't looking and put in a charge of gunpowder under the heel of tobacco. It was intended as a joke—-quite a common trick in the lumber camps in those days—but the amount of explosive that was put in that time exceeded the bounds of humor. He smoked down to it, and it blew his eye out. Hard luck—that it didn't blow his head clean off."
"If I disliked him as you do, I'd run him out of the house and off the place," I said.
He shook his head gravely. "The fools around here would set fire to the barns. They are looking for an excuse to do something of the kind."
"But did they attempt anything of that sort in your brother Henry's time?"
"No! They were afraid of Henry. They are not afraid of me. I've never done them any harm, but they are my enemies, to a man."
TOM went back with an axe on his shoulder, to chop alders out of the corners of a pasture. Sol drove the team afield. Old Ruben took a nap on the big settle in the kitchen, with a red handkerchief over his ugly face. I went up to my room to unpack my dunnage. It was a slow task, owing to the broken blisters on my hands. I was still at it, when a slight sound caused me to glance up, and there was Amy Bear in the room, within two yards of me, with a finger on her lip for silence. I looked my astonishment. She nodded her head, backed and closed the door noiselessly. She was fat and elderly, but her moccasined feet were like feathers.
"What is the trouble?" I asked, in guarded tones.
She came close. "Glashner," she whispered. "Damn bad man. Devil. But you don't tell Tom what I tell you. Maybe he'd kill 'im an' git hung."
"What have you to tell me?"
"You know Lion. Good dog, an' very cute. He watch Glashner all day; an' Glashner don't like it too much. Today I see Glashner t'row Lion one big piece of meat—but Lion, he don't touch 'im. I pick 'im up an' burn 'im in the stove."
"What about it?"
"Pizen."
"Do you mean to say he would poison that dog, that the meat was poisoned? How do you know? Did you see it on the meat?"
"Know Glashner. Lion watch 'im all the time an' make 'im mad."
"What is he here for? What does he want?"
She shook her head. "You watch 'im, but don't tell Tom about the meat. Tom, he git mad p'raps an' kill 'im an' git hung,"
"I'll keep an eye on the old bounder," I promised.