The Saints of Swallow Hill(91)

He leaned over to look at the rough, etched out D.R. The house was wallpapered, the same pattern throughout, a cream background with bouquets of flowers. His mother used to say it was her inside garden. The only room different was the kitchen painted in light yellow.

Voices came from there now, and when he went through the door, everyone sat at a long table, drinking chicory coffee with Norma and Joey on each side of their mother, quietly eating fried eggs, tomato slices, and biscuits with molasses.

Sudie May said, “Morning,” and the others did too.

Del nodded. “Morning.”

Sudie May got up and poured him a cup as he sat down, staring around the table and thinking it was like being in another world. Two days ago, he’d been in Swallow Hill, and now, he was here with his sister, her family, Cornelia, and Rae Lynn. What a twist in events he’d never considered coming to pass. He sat back listening while the women resumed talking about the news. Sudie May was reading from a recent newspaper about the WWI Bonus Army camping out in Washington, D.C., awaiting news on their payout, and from an older paper about Roosevelt winning the Democratic nomination. Next, she read about the stock market. It was the lowest it had been since the Crash, and the paper said there’d been an eighty-six percent loss overall.

Amos said, “Read to us about the corn prices.”

Sudie May shuffled a page or two and found it.

She said, “It’s still down about seventy-five percent. Ain’t worth the cost or the trouble.”

Cornelia said, “What a mess.”

Sudie May said, “Can’t see no end in sight.”

Del watched Rae Lynn as she listened, head down, hands folded in her lap.

She said, “We don’t want to be no bother to you. Extra mouths to feed and all.”

His sister, as he knew she would, said, “Oh, now, I told y’all, we got a garden. We’re doing fine. We ain’t gone hungry, and there’s more than enough. ’Sides, y’all will be good company. A couple pairs of extra hands is always needed, ’specially with them two. Don’t let the quiet fool you.”

The kids kept eating, bright eyes fastened on the newcomers. Del figured if they were anything like he and Sudie May had been, those blameless faces and peacefulness wouldn’t last. He gazed across the table at Rae Lynn and found her staring back. She shifted her attention elsewhere, turning red as the tomato on her plate. She sure was twitchy. She could say what she wanted to about where she was from, but he’d bet it wasn’t South Carolina. Something had happened she didn’t want to talk about. Something that sent her all the way to Swallow Hill in that getup. She was a real mystery.

Sudie May leaned forward on her elbows, like Mother would when she wanted to give her undivided attention.

She said, “What will you want do today?”

Del said, “What do y’all think about getting a small turpentine farm going as a way to bring in a little money?”

Sudie May said, “Ain’t nobody around here doing it much no more. Ain’t hardly any of them trees left except what we got, far’s I know. You’d not have any problem selling the gum, I wouldn’t think.”

Del said, “I’d like to try. It’s true. Them trees are near about gone everywhere. I’m glad we got what we got. I thought I’d check on what Granddaddy and Pap planted.”

Rae Lynn was pouring hot coffee in her saucer, and he had a thought that she could come along. He could ask her about herself, maybe find out what it was about North Carolina that put her in such a mood. Sudie May perched on the edge of her chair, birdlike, eyeballing him, and giving him the same look she used to give him when she knew something. Her attention flitted between him and Rae Lynn, and she wisely tilted her chin up. He could hear her in his head, Ah. I see how it is. There was time. No need to seem too eager. He sipped from his cup and burned his mouth. Ignoring his sister, he poured some in his own saucer to let it cool.

Amos said, “If you think them trees is ready, I know somebody who makes barrels. He’s got plenty and can make more. Plus, there’s the steamboat that comes upriver, and it could take your gum to Wilmington.”

Del said, “Where’s the closest landing?”

Amos said, “There’s one down to Rockfish.”

He said, “It’d not be too bad getting it there. I could haul it in a day. I’d like to do some burning first, clear out the underbrush. I reckon I could go back and use the old box method, but I’d rather do like what they done down in the camp we was working at.”

Amos said, “I seen it. Them newfangled clay cups and tin gutters. Ingenious idea.”

Del said, “Sure was. This feller, a troublemaker really, he suggested it at the camp we was at down in Georgia. I swear he loved them trees more’n himself maybe.”

Amos said, “I knew a feller like’at. Hey, use my truck today if you want.”

Del said, “Thankee kindly, but I think I’ll walk, see how it all looks from on foot.”

He rose from his chair, and hugged his sister like they used to do their mother each morning.

Sudie May squeezed him in return and said, “I ain’t gonna cry, but I am gonna tell you every chance I get how happy I am you come home.”

He tugged her hair, and with a nod to the rest of them, he went out the backdoor and stared at the land of his boyhood for a good long minute. God, how he’d missed being here, and hadn’t even known how bad till now. It set his heart on fire, and made him want to run across the yard like he used to when he was a kid, ready to explore the countryside. He went to the wild roses growing along the fence, picked a few, and noticed how the woods beyond appeared more dense and overgrown than he remembered. There was the old barn, and off in the distance, the tobacco barns. Eager to see how the land had changed since he’d last been here, he set off, entering the woods by way of a familiar, yet overgrown trail, almost hidden from his view. Nostalgic, he got to thinking about the times he’d gone with his granddaddy and his pap to check on the longleaf, how they’d dreamed their dreams of what might be one day.