3stalwarts (110 page)

The boats wound on beside the towpath, one behind another. Sweat had come out upon the teams, as the morning grew, and the snow turned soft underfoot. The hoofs of the horses picked up great clots of it, which they kicked free. Seen from across the valley they appeared to the farm folk an orderly procession, creeping with the slowness of an ancient habit, as boats had passed, year in, year out, as long as they remembered. For now the boisterous blowing of the horns had begun to fade out.

But in the faces of the people the unpent joy of moving shone as freshly. Their own lives had been given to them again. Winter had died. For the farmers it still lay upon the fields; for the boaters it had gone. The canal had opened.

Haircut

In a day, life on the Sarsey Sal had reassumed the pleasant routine of the preceding autumn. All day long they were hauling now, alternating the two teams in three-hour shifts. The first night in Rome the big horses had been nervous about going aboard. The black, which Dan had taken first to the gangplank, hung back, distrusting its narrowness. So, after a minute, he had tried the brown. The big fellow was eager for his stall, and, once Dan had stood upon the planking, he set his own forefeet upon it, slipped them forward inch by inch, and then, with a deep, satisfied grunt, went aboard, turning round inside to face the hatch. The black had looked on anxiously, but, once the brown was inside, no living power could have kept him on the dock. When he crowded round he found the other already started on his supper. After that they needed no leading, and the black somehow managed always to be the first on board. He found that, if he was, he could snatch at least one mouthful from the brown’s manger.

In the gorge of the Lansing Kill they came against shrill winds with a breath of ice out of the woods. The Kill roared in its course under the trees with a deep power that reverberated on the snow. The high falls at the head leaped far clear of the overhanging lip.

Old Ben, at the Five Combines, went about his duties with a subdued fury, swinging his long staff and shouting militant hymns over the gorge, where his deep voice met and mingled with the uproar of the falls. The cold days reddened his hands and brought blue chapped patches on his cheeks; but his long beard had a warmth in its whiteness against the blue shadows of the snow.

At the next lock Ethan Allen McCarthy came out, wearing mittens. He nodded his head toward the Five Combines and told them, “Ben thinks it’s spring come when the boats commence to move. His religion’s festered his mind all up. I tried to get him to wear a hat, but he told me to get out. The poor old rooster ain’t even got room left in his head for a cold.”

The Sarsey Sal went on down the gorge. The sound of Dan’s horn was thin through the cry of the wind and the roar of the Kill. They stopped at Delta, late one afternoon, to get a load of ploughs from the factory.

The shipping superintendent gave Dan his orders. The ploughs were to go through to Buffalo. They tied up for the night at the Delta dock. Sleighs brought the ploughs in crates from the factory— a mile haul. The arm of the feeder had not yet been built to the village, so that all boats loaded here, which made good trade for Denslow’s Delta House.

Fortune Friendly wheedled all through supper for an advance on his wages. A quack doctor, peddling gout removers and corn cure, had put up for the night. There was a chance for pinochle. Denslow had a great thirst for the game.

“But he never won nothing off me,” Fortune said. “The doctor thinks he’s a master hand, but he ain’t never come up against me. Come on, Dan, don’t be a tight-fist farmer.”

Finally Dan let him have the money, and within five minutes the game was under way. Dan looked through the door after supper. Denslow was nursing his cards in both hands, frowning at the corners, his lips forming figures to himself; and by the look of him Dan judged that the figures were small ones. The quack leaned back in his chair. His high black hat stood bottom up beside his feet, and his face wore his customary encouraging smile. He played as if he had a faith in better things. The old ex-preacher sat between them, his thin nose drawn down, his manner sober; but when he looked up Dan saw a gleam of seraphic happiness in his eye. His luck was in.

Dan went back to the Sarsey Sal. The night was blustery, a cold wind under stars and no moon. The waves slapped sharp along the shore and chugged against the side of the boat. The teams were restless; he could hear one of them stamp.

Buffalo— he was hauling to Buffalo. Sooner or later he had known that he must stand up to Jotham Klore, if he was to hold Molly. It seemed that the time would be at hand. He wished, however, that it had not come so soon. He was not afraid, but he was not eager. Though Molly had been happier in the last few days than he had ever seen her, he had felt a change in her kindness for him. Her happiness lay in the breaking of winter, as if she were leaving it behind; and the winter had been the hap-piest time he had had. He felt a new strength in himself; but at the same time he was aware of an aloofness in Molly, not physical, for the spring was in her, but mental, as if she stood aside to watch the spring. It roused his hunger, but strangely it did not make him anxious to find Klore and settle her between them. It was as if he smelled defeat, as he could smell the old snow on the earth. He knew that there was one way in which the question could be settled.

When he went into the cabin, he found her drying her hands after finishing the dishes. Her face was flushed from bending over. As soon as he entered she read the question in his eyes, and a dread bordering on panic swept her down. But she rallied.

“Do we start early?” she asked.

“Tomorrow morning first thing.”

“Buffalo?”

“Yeanh.”

The blood came into her cheeks again; her eyes were frank with pleasure.

“I always like going out there, Dan.”

“I’ve never been,” he said.

“Where’s Fortune?”

“Pinochle.”

He sat down and looked at her.

“Molly …”

She had turned to the mirror and was poking a wisp of her hair back into place. Now she wheeled round with the lithe motion he loved.

“You didn’t get your hair cut, Dan, when we was in Rome. It looks awful. I declare I’d be ashamed to have a friend see it. What would Lucy Gurget say?”

He fingered the back of his neck and said seriously, “I guess it is kind of long. I didn’t have no time.”

“You won’t have time going out, either, and when we get to Buffalo it’ll be as long as Ben’s.”

He grinned sheepishly.

“I’ve got a mind to do it myself, Dan.”

“Well, it couldn’t look no worse.”

“Don’t sass.”

She gave one of her small decisive nods.

“I will do it, too.”

“All right.”

She laughed.

“I’ve got a pair of scissors I keep for myself. Bring the chair under the lamp, Dan.”

He did as she told him, and she covered him over with a pair of towels, tucking them into his shirt collar tight enough to choke him. She pulled her sleeves back over her round forearms; he could see the soft brown down on them in the light of the lamp; and then she tilted his head forward with a sharp push.

“Thank you, mister,” she said, for all the world like a barber.

Her fingers were clever; she cut quickly.

“Molly,” Dan said again. Now that she was occupied near him, she would find it difficult to turn a question.

“Yeanh.”

She turned up the wick of the lamp. In the interval they both heard the wind and the water, and, as it often had before, that peculiar, almost suffocating sense of intimacy entered the old boat.

So close beside him, the feel of her arm touching his cheek, the swift clipping of the scissors in her fingers, her steady, gentle breathing, the warm lamplight over them both, he felt his question rising up in him without his control.

“I want to marry you, Molly.”

He heard her breath catch, but, with her woman’s instinct urging her hands, the scissoring went on. She had thought she could keep the question away from him.

He sat staring toward the window with the quiet preoccupation which she had learned to expect, but which always made her uneasy. Only now the stiff tilt into which she had forced his head made it foolish and somehow whimsical.

“When, Dan?”

Though she had dreaded the question, now that it had come she was pleased with it.

“Right away.”

“But we’ve got to go out to Buffalo. There wouldn’t be any chance.”

He considered this. They would not have time in any port.

“When we get back,” he said, “I’ll take time off.”

She snipped up the back of his neck and followed the curve of the hair over his ear.

“I’m well fixed, Molly, you know that.”

“Yes,” she said. “Put your head over.— It’s awful good of you, Dan. I want to thank you. But there isn’t any call for your breaking your hauling. It don’t bother me, our being this way.”

He realized, as he felt her hand on his head, that she was taking the seriousness from his question.

“I want to,” he said slowly.

Just to see the bend of her elbow made him want her.

“It isn’t as if we needed it on the canal,” she said.

“I’d feel better.”

“Why? If I like it this way, why do you want to change, Dan?”

He couldn’t tell her that.

“Will you stay on the canal?” she asked. There was a challenge in her words which he could not accept honestly.

“I don’t know,” he mumbled. “I hadn’t thought about it.”

The scissors clicked sharply.

“You been thinking about it right along lately,” she said. “I could see it on you.”

He didn’t answer.

“Will you stay in a city?”

“I don’t know.”

“No. You don’t know. Do you like it, Dan?”

“Yeanh,” he said, slowly.

“Then what’re you worrying about?”

“I thought you’d like it if I asked you to.”

She worked in silence for a while.

“I do like it, Dan.”

He could feel her fingers running in the hair on the top of his head. She was not cutting; she was just letting her fingers run through his hair.

“I like it a lot, Dan. I don’t think there’s anybody I’d like better to hear say it.”

She took up the job again, letting him ponder her words.

“I thought you loved me, Molly.”

He did not say it accusingly; but he felt her fingers stiffen. Then, suddenly, she came round in front of him and pushed his head back, the heel of her right hand on his forehead. Her blue eyes were very kind.

“I do love you, Dan. Can you doubt it?”

Looking at her then, he could not doubt it. He saw her as he had seen her in the fall, when she had first come aboard, with all the familiar details of the stovepipe, and the ventilators, and his hat hanging on the door behind her. The clock whirred to strike nine. Involuntarily they both glanced at the proud little figure of the prancing horse.

“No,” he said.

His quiet face, earnest now, and his steady blue-green eyes must have brought back the first days to her, days she had found sweet, when she could see him take what she had to give him and grow stronger for it. She felt her own weakness as the light brightened in his eyes, and she pushed his head down as he settled his feet to rise.

“Just a minute, Dan, don’t get grabby. I ain’t quite finished.”

She brought his hair forward on his forehead and trimmed it back close in a rounded bang, letting the ends fall down on his eyes. Then, as he shook it off, she stepped back laughing, low and husky, as if she were feeling her way toward mirth. As he got to his feet they heard Fortune walking down the dock, whistling “Gamboleer’s Pay.”

They looked at each other silently, her laughter still on her lips. He kissed them and grabbed his hat and the night lantern.

“I want to rub some more hemlock syrup on Prince.” He turned to the door as Fortune came in looking very guileless and satisfied.

“Well!” he exclaimed. “We’ve got a regular barber!”

Dan went forward to rub the black, to prod him with his elbow and slap him good-naturedly and call him all kinds of a loafer.

Fortune hung up his hat, smiling to see the kindness in her eyes.

“The cards liked me, Molly. All the queens kept coming right to me, and the kings came after them to see where they were.” He chuckled.

“I reckon that medicine peddler’s still scratchin’ his head, wondering about the phenomenons of nature,” he went on as she swept the floor. “You’d ought to’ve seen him. I wish that fat woman had been along. For all she’s so lucky, she wouldn’t have stood a show-in. You look pretty well happy yourself, girl. Has Dan been telling you things?”

She nodded, the glow still on her.

“Wants to marry you?” he asked, his shrewd black eyes twinkling.

She nodded.

“What did you do?” he asked anxiously.

“I said we’d leave it be awhile. He’s an awful good boy, Fortune. I almost thought I’d tell him I would. I don’t know; maybe I will yet.”

“He was looking happy, all right, when he went out,” he said.

“Yeanh.”

“But it’s better to leave it be.” He began counting his winnings. Then he looked up. “You certainly did a good job cutting his hair.”

She smiled.

“He looks nice with it cut short that way, don’t he?”

“He does. Where did you learn to cut it?”

Her body sagged and she leaned on the broom heavily.

“I learned it cutting Jotham’s hair.”

They stared at each other hopelessly. Then, mechanically she stooped to sweep the loose hair up in the dustpan. She slid it into the stove, where it fizzled a moment. The she put back the lid, hung up the dustpan and broom on their respective nails and went to bed.

“You poor fool,” Fortune said to himself. “You old gibbering rooster. Oh, lord!”

He put his money back in his pocket.

Coming in later, Dan found the cabin empty and silent. He sat awhile, as if he expected Molly to come out. But she did not come, and when he went into the cuddy she was lying quiet on her side, as if she slept.

The Chase Westward

Cold winds still blew out of the north, reminding them that winter was still hard in the mountains.