Between the Flowers: A Novel

Chapter 28

·28· BURR-HEAD awakened him, bright eyed and eager for the trip to Hawthorne Town. Marsh quieted him with a sh-shsh -ing for he knew that Delph would never awaken so early; the morning was still more black than blue. But Burr-Head bounced and jiggled on the bed, until Marsh got up and tiptoed shoeless to the kitchen and built a fire. He dressed Burr-Head, and though it was hardly light enough for walking, he and the child went to the barn to feed the mules and wait until Delph should waken. They stood in the barn hall and listened to the crunching sound of mules feeding, and watched the coming of the red autumn dawn. The light warm wind still blew out of the west and rustled the yellow blades of the late garden corn, and high in the east one star hung large and pale above the river hill. "I like it now, don't you, Marsh?" Burr-Head whispered, and Marsh nodded, soothed in spite of all the misery in his heart by the feeling of security and achievement and peace that his great wellfilled barns gave him in autumn. It was good to smell the clean hay and new corn and think of the winter, know that however hard it might be, he and all that looked to him for keep would be safe and warm and fed. "I want to see th' sun rise," Burr-Head said, and they climbed in darkness to the haymow and crawled over the high mound ofhay to a small eastern window. There, they lay in silence and watched the round red sun roll over Dorie's chimneys. "I guess Delph will be up now," Marsh said, and slipped down the hay, but stopped when he felt something by his foot. He reached and drew the object into the 410 411 red light and saw a book, a pretty thing bound in red leather, filled with curious pictures of people like those out of fairy tales, and in a strange language-German he guessed it to be. "That's one a Sam's books," Burr-Head explained. "How-why is it up here?" "He used to read to us here in th' hay-on rainy days when people thought you might die-but I knowed differ'nt. He'd read an' we'd all eat apples, him an' Delph an' me.-Sometimes I'd get tired an' go away. Poetry, I think it was. Then he'd just read to Delph." Marsh left the book on the hay. He explored and found another one, and left it also. When Burr-Head said, "We'd better take 'em back to Delph," he only answered slowly, "We'll leave 'em there." Burr-Head came reluctantly away. "He thought a sight a that red one, he said. It's old an' come from over th' ocean. He'd read it an' Delph would laugh so." "Ifhe wants it he'll come." "Mebbe I can tell him goodbye. I wisht I hadn't gone to sleep last night, when I heared his car.-I hope he comes again." "He will-most likely-but we'll be gone to Hawthorne Town." "But Caesar won't bite him an' chase him away. He likes Sam." "Delph, she'll be here." "Oh-I thought she was goin' to Town. But she can tell him goodbye for me." "Yes-she can-tell him goodbye." Burr-Head looked up at the haymow in the direction of the pretty book. "Sam liked Delph. Maybe he left th' books on purpose for her." "Yes-maybe he did." Burr-Head looked into his father's face, studied it a moment and seemed to find something he had never seen. He turned away and did not speak of Sam again. Something in Delph's face made him want to be good. Her eyes were big and she looked tired, and all through breakfast she hardly said a word, just passing food to him and Marsh, asking Marsh if he wouldn't have another hot biscuit or a little more coffee or a bit of plum jelly, and Marsh always shaking his head. When he was getting ready for the trip to Town, he washed his face so carefully and scrubbed his ears so well, that when Delph examined him as she BETWEEN THE FLOWERS always did, she smiled...