THE Nick Adams STORIES (8 page)

“They've only got proof on one thing,” Nick told her. “But I guess I have to go away for a while.”

“Can I go?”

“No. I'm sorry, Littless. How much money have we got?”

“Fourteen dollars and sixty-five cents. I brought it.”

“Did they say anything else?”

“No. Only that they were going to stay till you came home.”

“Our mother will get tired of feeding them.”

“She gave them lunch already.”

“What were they doing?”

“Just sitting around on the screen porch. They asked our mother for your rifle but I'd hid it in the woodshed when I saw them by the fence.”

“Were you expecting them?”

“Yes. Weren't you?”

“I guess so. Goddam them.”

“Goddam them for me, too,” his sister said. “Aren't I old enough to go now? I hid the rifle. I brought the money.”

“I'd worry about you,” Nick Adams told her. “I don't even know where I'm going.”

“Sure you do.”

“If there's two of us they'd look harder. A boy and a girl show up.”

“I'd go like a boy,” she said. “I always wanted to be a boy anyway. They couldn't tell anything about me if my hair was cut.”

“No,” Nick Adams said. “That's true.”

“Let's think something out good,” she said. “Please, Nick, please. I could be lots of use and you'd be lonely without me. Wouldn't you be?”

“I'm lonely now thinking about going away from you.”

“See? And we may have to be away for years. Who can tell? Take me, Nickie. Please take me.” She kissed him and held onto him with both her arms. Nick Adams looked at her and tried to think straight. It was difficult. But there was no choice.

“I shouldn't take you. But then I shouldn't have done any of it,” he said. “I'll take you. Maybe only for a couple of days, though.”

“That's all right,” she told him. “When you don't want me I'll go straight home. I'll go home anyway if I'm a bother or a nuisance or an expense.”

“Let's think it out,” Nick Adams told her. He looked up and down the road and up at the sky where the big high afternoon clouds were riding and at the white caps on the lake out beyond the point.

“I'll go through the woods down to the inn beyond the point and sell her the trout,” he told his sister. “She ordered them for dinners tonight. Right now they want more trout dinners than chicken dinners. I don't know why. The trout are in good shape. I gutted them and they're wrapped in cheesecloth and they'll be cool and fresh. I'll tell her I'm in some trouble with the game wardens and that they're looking for me and I have to get out of the country for a while. I'll get her to give me a small skillet and some salt and pepper and some bacon and some shortening and some corn meal. I'll get her to give me a sack to put everything in and I'll get some dried apricots and some prunes and some tea and plenty of
matches and a hatchet. But I can only get one blanket. She'll help me because buying trout is just as bad as selling them.”

“I can get a blanket,” his sister said. “I'll wrap it around the rifle and I'll bring your moccasins and my moccasins and I'll change to different overalls and a shirt and hide these so they'll think I'm wearing them and I'll bring soap and a comb and a pair of scissors and something to sew with and Lorna Doone and Swiss Family Robinson.”

“Bring all the .22's you can find,” Nick Adams said. Then quickly, “Come on back. Get out of sight.” He had seen a buggy coming down the road.

Behind the cedars they lay flat against the springy moss with their faces down and heard the soft noise of the horses' hooves in the sand and the small noise of the wheels. Neither of the men in the buggy was talking but Nick Adams smelled them as they went past and he smelled the sweated horses. He sweated himself until they were well past on their way to the dock because he thought they might stop to water at the spring or to get a drink.

“Is that them, Littless?” he asked.

“Yeah,” she said.

“Crawl way back in,” Nick Adams said. He crawled back into the swamp, pulling his sack of fish. The swamp was mossy and not muddy there. Then he stood up and hid the sack behind the trunk of a cedar and motioned the girl to come further in. They went into the cedar swamp, moving as softly as deer.

“I know the one,” Nick Adams said. “He's a no good son of a bitch.”

“He said he'd been after you for four years.”

“I know.”

“The other one, the big one with the spit tobacco face and the blue suit, is the one from down state.”

“Good,” Nick said. “Now we've had a look at them I better get going. Can you get home all right?”

“Sure. I'll cut up to the top of the hill and keep off the road. Where will I meet you tonight, Nickie?”

“I don't think you ought to come, Littless.”

“I've got to come. You don't know how it is. I can leave a note for our mother and say I went with you and you'll take good care of me.”

“All right,” Nick Adams said. “I'll be where the big hemlock is that was struck by lightning. The one that's down. Straight up from the cove. Do you know the one? On the short cut to the road.”

“That's awfully close to the house.”

“I don't want you to have to carry the stuff too far.”

“I'll do what you say. But don't take chances, Nickie.”

“I'd like to have the rifle and go down now to the edge of the timber and kill both of those bastards while they're on the dock and wire a piece of iron on them from the old mill and sink them in the channel.”

“And then what would you do?” his sister asked. “Somebody sent them.”

“Nobody sent that first son of a bitch.”

“But you killed the moose and you sold the trout and you killed what they took from your boat.”

“That was all right to kill that.”

He did not like to mention what that was, because that was the proof they had.

“I know. But you're not going to kill people and that's why I'm going with you.”

“Let's stop talking about it. But I'd like to kill those two sons of bitches.”

“I know,” she said. “So would I. But we're not going to kill people, Nickie. Will you promise me?”

“No. Now I don't know whether it's safe to take her the trout.”

“I'll take them to her.”

“No. They're too heavy. I'll take them through the swamp and to the woods in back of the hotel. You go straight to the hotel and see if she's there and if everything's all right. And if it is you'll find me there by the big basswood tree.”

“It's a long way there through the swamp, Nicky.”

“it's a long way back from reform school, too.”

“Can't I come with you through the swamp? I'll go in then and see her while you stay out and come back out with you and take them in.”

“All right,” Nick said. “But Íwish you'd do it the other way.”

“Why, Nickie?”

“Because you'll see them maybe on the road and you can tell me where they've gone. I'll see you in the second-growth wood lot in back of the hotel where the big basswood is.”

Nick waited more than an hour in the second-growth timber and his sister had not come. When she came she was excited and he knew she was tired.

“They're at our house,” she said. “They're sitting out on the screen porch and drinking whiskey and ginger ale and they've unhitched and put their horses up. They say they're going to wait till you come back. It was our mother told them you'd gone fishing at the creek. I don't think she meant to. Anyway I hope not.”

“What about Mrs. Packard?”

“I saw her in the kitchen of the hotel and she asked me if I'd seen you and I said no. She said she was waiting for you to bring her some fish for tonight. She was worried. You might as well take them in.”

“Good,” he said. “They're nice and fresh. I repacked them in ferns.”

“Can I come in with you?”

“Sure,” Nick said.

The hotel was a long wooden building with a porch that fronted on the lake. There were wide wooden steps that led down to the pier that ran far out into the water and there were natural cedar railings alongside the steps and natural cedar railings around the porch. There were chairs made of natural cedar on the porch and in them sat middle-aged people wearing white clothes. There were three pipes set on the lawn with spring water bubbling out of them, and little paths led to them. The water tasted like rotten eggs because these were mineral springs and Nick and his sister used to drink from them as a matter of discipline. Now coming toward the rear of the hotel, where the kitchen was, they crossed a plank bridge over a small brook running into the lake beside the hotel, and slipped into the back door of the kitchen.

“Wash them and put them in the ice box, Nickie,” Mrs. Packard said. “I'll weigh them later.”

“Mrs. Packard,” Nick said. “Could I speak to you a minute?”

“Speak up,” she said. “Can't you see I'm busy?”

“If I could have the money now.”

Mrs. Packard was a handsome woman in a gingham apron. She had a beautiful complexion and she was very busy and her kitchen help were there as well.

“You don't mean you want to sell trout. Don't you know that's against the law?”

“I know,” Nick said. “I brought you the fish for a present. I mean my time for the wood I split and corded.”

“I'll get it,” she said. “I have to go to the annex.”

Nick and his sister followed her outside. On the board sidewalk that led to the icehouse from the kitchen she stopped
and put her hands in her apron pocket and took out a pocketbook.

“You get out of here,” she said quickly and kindly. “And get out of here fast. How much do you need?”

“I've got sixteen dollars,” Nick said.

“Take twenty,” she told him. “And keep that tyke out of trouble. Let her go home and keep an eye on them until you're clear.”

“When did you hear about them?”

She shook her head at him.

“Buying is as bad or worse than selling,” she said. “You stay away until things quiet down. Nickie, you're a good boy no matter what anybody says. You see Packard if things get bad. Come here nights if you need anything. I sleep light. Just knock on the window.”

“You aren't going to serve them tonight are you, Mrs. Packard? You're not going to serve them for the dinners?”

“No,” she said. “But I'm not going to waste them. Packard can eat half a dozen and I know other people that can. Be careful, Nickie, and let it blow over. Keep out of sight”

“Littless wants to go with me.”

“Don't you dare take her,” Mrs. Packard said. “You come by tonight and I'll have some stuff made up for you.”

“Could you let me take a skillet?”

“I'll have what you need. Packard knows what you need. I don't give you any more money so you'll keep out of trouble.”

“I'd like to see Mr. Packard about getting a few things.”

“He'll get you anything you need. But don't you go near the store, Nick.”

“I'll get Littless to take him a note.”

“Anytime you need anything,” Mrs. Packard said. “Don't you worry. Packard will be studying things out.”

“Goodby, Aunt Halley.”

“Goodby,” she said and kissed him. She smelt wonderful when she kissed him. It was the way the kitchen smelled when they were baking. Mrs. Packard smelled like her kitchen and her kitchen always smelled good.

“Don't worry and don't do anything bad.”

“I'll be all right.”

“Of course,” she said. “And Packard will figure out something.”

They were in the big hemlocks on the hill behind the house now. it was evening and the sun was down beyond the hills on the other side of the lake.

“I've found everything,” his sister said, “it's going to make a pretty big pack, Nickie.”

“I know it. What are they doing?”

“They ate a big supper and now they're sitting out on the porch and drinking. They're telling each other stories about how smart they are.”

“They aren't very smart so far.”

“They're going to starve you out,” his sister said. “A couple of nights in the woods and you'll be back. You hear a loon holler a couple of times when you got an empty stomach and you'll be back.”

“What did our mother give them for supper?”

“Awful,” his sister said.

“Good.”

“I've located everything on the list. Our mother's gone to bed with a sick headache. She wrote our father.”

“Did you see the letter?”

“No. It's in her room with the list of stuff to get from the store tomorrow. She's going to have to make a new list when she finds everything is gone in the morning.”

“How much are they drinking?”