The Giver of Stars(41)
With the first frost in Baileyville came hog-slaughtering time. The mere words made Alice, who couldn’t tread on a bug, feel a little faint, especially when Beth described, with relish, what happened in her own home each year: the stunning of the squealing pig, the slitting of its throat as the boys sat hard on it, its legs pumping furiously, the hot dark blood pouring out onto the scraping board. She mimed the men tipping scalding water over it, attacking the bristles with flat blades, reducing the animal to flesh and gristle and bone.
‘My aunt Lina will be waiting there with her apron open, ready to catch the head. She makes the best souse – that’s from the tongue, ears and feet – this side of the Cumberland Gap. But my favourite part of the whole day, since I was small, is when Daddy tips all the innards into a tub and we get to choose the best bit to roast. I’d elbow my brothers in the eye to get to that old liver. Put it on a stick and roast it in the fire. Oh, boy, nothing like it. Fresh roasted hog liver. Mmm-mm.’
She laughed as Alice covered her mouth and shook her head mutely.
But, like Beth, the town seemed to greet the prospect with an almost unseemly relish, and everywhere they went the librarians were offered a lick of salt bacon or – on one occasion – hog brains scrambled with egg, a mountain delicacy. Alice’s stomach still turned at the thought of that.
But it wasn’t just the hog-slaughtering that was causing a frisson of anticipation to run through the town: Tex Lafayette was coming. Posters of the white-clad cowboy clutching his bullwhip were all over town, tacked hastily onto posts, and scrutinized by small boys and lovelorn women alike. At every other settlement the name of the Singing Cowboy was spoken like a talisman, followed by – Is it true? Are you going?
Demand was so great that he was no longer booked to appear in the theatre, as originally planned, but would perform in the town square, where a stage was already being constructed from old pallets and planks, and for days beforehand whooping boys would run across it, imitating playing a banjo, ducking their heads to avoid the flat hands of the irritated workmen as they passed.
‘Can we finish early tonight? Not like anyone’s going to be reading. Everyone for ten miles yonder’s already headed to the square,’ said Beth, as she pulled her last book from her saddlebag. ‘Shoot. Look at what those Mackenzie boys have done to poor old Treasure Island.’ She stooped to pick up the scattered pages from the floor, cursing.
‘Don’t see why not,’ said Margery. ‘Sophia has it all under control, and it’s dark already anyhow.’
‘Who is Tex Lafayette?’ said Alice.
The four women turned and stared at her. ‘Who is Tex Lafayette?’
‘Haven’t you seen Green Grows My Mountain? Or Corral My Heart?’
‘Oh, I love Corral My Heart. That song near the end just about broke me,’ said Izzy, and let out a huge, happy sigh.
‘You didn’t have to trap me –’
‘For I’m your willing prisoner –’ broke in Sophia.
‘You didn’t need a rope to corral my heart …’ they sang in unison, each lost in a reverie.
Alice looked blank.
‘You don’t go to the picture house?’ said Izzy. ‘Tex Lafayette has been in everything.’
‘He can bullwhip a lit cigarette out of a man’s mouth and not leave a scratch on him.’
‘He is a grade-A dreamboat.’
‘I’m too tired to go out most evenings. Bennett goes sometimes.’
In truth, Alice would have found it too strange to be beside her husband in the dark now. She suspected he felt the same way. For weeks they had taken care that their lives crossed as little as possible. She was gone long before breakfast, and he was often out for dinner, either on work errands for Mr Van Cleve or playing baseball with his friends. He spent most nights on the daybed in their dressing room, so that even the shape of him had become unfamiliar to her. If Mr Van Cleve thought there was anything odd about their behaviour, he didn’t say: he spent most of his evenings late at the mine, and seemed largely preoccupied with whatever was going on there. Alice now hated that house with a passion, its gloom, its stifling history. She was so grateful not to have to spend her evenings stuck in the dark little parlour with the two of them that she didn’t care to question any of it.
‘You’re coming to Tex Lafayette, right?’ Beth brushed her hair, and straightened her blouse in the mirror. Apparently she had a thing for a boy from the gas station but had shown him her affection by punching him twice on the arm, hard, and was now at a loss to work out what to do next.
‘Oh, I don’t think so. I don’t really know anything about him.’
‘All work and no play, Alice. C’mon. The whole town is going. Izzy’s going to meet us outside the store and her mama has given her a whole dollar for cotton candy. It’s only fifty cents if you want a seat. Or you can stand back and watch for free. That’s what we’re doing.’
‘I don’t know. Bennett’s working late over at Hoffman. I should probably just go home.’
Sophia and Izzy started to sing again, Izzy blushing, as she always did when she found herself singing to an audience.
‘Your smile’s a rope around me
Has been since you found me
You didn’t need to chase me to corral my heart …’