The Shepherd of the Hills Page #2

Just keep her throat clear and keep her wrapped

up warm, and she'll be all right tonight.

By tomorrow, she'll be beggin' to wade the creek

and askin' what makes the sky blue, won't ya?

Your daddy will be gettin'

anxious, won't he, Sammy?

Stranger?

Did you ever get to feel

how good mud is?

No, but I wish I had.

I almost stepped on a cloud.

Morning, and howdy to ya, Sammy!

Same to you, Kip.

Wife mendin'?

Fine. She's talkin' like a windmill.

Goggle-eyes!

Yeah. Catched 'em

down by the ol' Beany.

Grasshopper bait?

No. Noodlin'!

Yeah?

Hello, Mrs. Schulz. How's the baby?

Just fine, Sammy. Wait,

Sammy. I wanna go in the store.

We might need more money

when we get up to Mathews'.

Corky? He won't lend you no money.

He won't even let you look at none.

I don't want to borrow any money.

I only want to cash a check.

A check? Yeah. A check is

a piece of paper, a note.

Like a mortgage?

Well, no, not... not exactly.

A check is a... A check is an exchange.

You mean, like a swap.

Well, uh, yes, in a way.

You see, a check is...

A check is a letter,

a letter to the bank

where I have my money,

tellin' them to... to pay cash

to whoever has that letter.

Is it honest?

Yes, if you have the money

in the bank.

All right,

I'd like to see you do it.

Hello, Hank!

Hello, Sammy.

Let's see, Mrs. Palestrom.

Hello, Mrs. Kundy.

I got Coleby's Cholera Tincture,

Miss Wassop's Soothing Syrup,

Kittredge's Salve and Wahoo Tonic.

Could be she might

be needin' worm cakes.

Nope, 'tain't that. I put a dried tater

chip and two crawdad legs in her bed,

but she's still got that seldom feelin',

complainin' from head to heel.

How much is them?

I'm gettin' tired of soakin'

sugar s-s-sops.

Better do somethin' about

that neck rash you got there.

'Tain't rash. It's the dye

from off my shirt.

I didn't souse it enough in lye water.

You oughta see our young'uns

just like a passel of pure redskins.

Them's 30 cents.

The mouthpiece is for nothin'.

Thirty cents!

Howdy, Sammy.

Been wantin' to meet your cousin.

Hello, Mr. Howitt.

How do you do, sir?

He wants to cash a check... one of them letters

to where he's got money in the bank.

How much do you reckon

to want, Mr. Howitt?

Well, if it's convenient,

I could use a hundred dollars.

You could use a hundred dollars?

Yes, if it's convenient.

Well, uh...

I have letters of

identification here.

Well, uh, Sammy's say - so

is all right with me.

I... I'll look around.

Smart.

Twenty-five, 30, 35, 40.

Forty-five.

It's Confederate.

Forty will do me fine.

I didn't dig into my real reserves.

They ain't here.

There you are, sir.

Thank you very much.

Look out, Al.

You know about them

city telephone machines for talkin'?

Yeah. What about 'em?

Seems foolish to me.

Ain't nobody in the Ozarks don't know

you got a hundred dollars right now.

Remember now, you keep shut.

I'll do the talkin'.

Anything you say, Sammy.

It ain't gonna be so pleasant,

on account of Aunt Mollie, it ain't.

She always looks at ya

like a sheep-killin' dog.

How 'bout Old Matt?

Oh, him?

When he finds out you got a hundred dollars, his

eyes will get bigger than buckets of hog lard.

Don't open it.

They'll shoot ya

clean back to the valley.

Hello!

Hello, there!

He ain't totin' no gun.

Come on.

I told you afore you ain't wanted here.

Where's your woman?

Down by the hog scald.

So you're the cousin, eh?

What do you want?

He wants to buy some dirt land.

Go on in.

I'll fetch my woman.

While I worry him,

you head for the house.

He's ornery, just like

them he watches for.

He ain't educated to city talk.

You gotta twist him around a pole

or somethin' to get what you want.

You see?

Yes, I do.

Friends, Pete.

Won't nobody hurt ya.

That's Pete.

He ain't right.

Pete? Mollie and Old Matt's boy.

Young Matt's cousin.

Well, pretty near it.

Aunt Mollie, this is Mr. Howitt.

Strangers ain't wanted.

What brung you here?

He wants to buy some Mathews land.

He's my cousin.

He's got a hundred dollars.

Shucks.

For a hundred dollars, we can let you have that

finger of land down by the twisted sassafras.

No?

No!

If it's a question of more money,

Mrs. Mathews,

I'd be glad to give you a hundred dollars

cash and something each month.

We got them uplands on the sun side.

Ain't been brushed off yet.

But if you're lookin' for...

He ain't!

I'd like to buy Moanin' Meadow.

Shut up!

Not for no hundred dollars.

No.

It'd take more money

than you'd ever have.

It'd take a thousand dollars.

All right, I'll pay a thousand dollars,

if you'll allow me

to give you the hundred dollars now...

and $75 a month

until the thousand is paid.

You'll pay... a thousand dollars?

Yes.

Have you pen and paper?

You unbounded your word and spoke.

That's what ya done.

A hundred dollars and promised more.

You made a swap

with a bad tangle in it.

Smell.

Besides which, on account

of you disobeyin' me,

you bought an unhappy land.

Well, you see, Sammy...

Moanin' Meadow. Won't nobody come

to pay you company there...

nor warm by your fire with ya.

Well, it might be that unhappy land,

like unhappy people,

needs someone to care for it.

I beg the good omens I've had through the

week to counter the spell of the spirits...

who seek to dampen the wishes I've knotted in

yarn or darken the luck of pulley-bone's charm.

One and one is two, and three add to five.

Dead spirits stay dead and live ones alive.

Listen, Sammy...

See that buck brush, Mr. Howitt?

Well, up past it into them chinkapins,

then you travel up the steep hill,

down past the deer lick

into them low, big gaps.

That's Moanin' Meadow. Good-bye, Mr.

Howitt. Sammy, there's no sense to all this.

I'm tellin' you for

the last and final time,

them that goes in there has daylight

dreams and always disremembers.

And there's poison plants and poke berries

and nightshades dancin' with the bats.

Good-bye, Mr. Howitt.

That snag in your shoulder ailin'?

Not any.

It's just that from the time I was

shucked out of knee britches,

I ain't been so

crowded 'round with notions.

I brung ya a brand-new kiss for luck.

Restin' up from devilment?

Nope. Just committed some.

Brung you that lace neckpiece

for your throat.

These pants is got thorns in 'em.

Like you was sayin', Jim,

a blue-eyed filly is

the most worrisome kind to gentle.

- What?

- No mind what you do,

you never get a

friendly whicker out of'em.

Well, the last I recollect, we was

speakin' of notions. That's what I mean.

You get to whisperin' to yourself...

when there ain't

a single word to say.

Bees bumblin' at ya,

you get all tongue-tied,

start smilin'sidewise.

And you see plumb fancy

with your eyes shut tight.

Feelin' that way, a man most

generally falls off to sleep.

I... It don't make a speck of sense.

Oh, it 'tain't the sleepin' or the

talkin' back and forth in your dreams.

It's... It's the wakin' up

and findin' out...

you been dreamin' to suit yourself.

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