The Boar Read online

  Jumping down from the wagon, I raced upstairs to the room over Doc Travis’s office. I was yelling before my fist started knocking.

  Doc Travis came pronto. He was pulling on his robe when he stepped out of the doorway and onto the porch.

  “It’s Mama,” I said. “She’s bad off. Old Satan’s given us a scare tonight.”

  “Let me by, son,” Doc Travis said, and tying the belt of his robe, he went down the steps and I followed after.

  Part Two

  One

  I slept that night in a chair and Ike slept on the floor on the blankets from the wagon. It wasn’t a good sleep I had, and it wasn’t just due to the chair. I was worried sick about Mama, about the baby. I also determined something. I was going to kill Old Satan.

  It wasn’t like I didn’t owe it to him. He’d killed my dogs, chased me through the woods, and caused Mama to fall ill, not to mention he’d wrecked some of our corn. If ever a critter had earned him a killing, it was Old Satan. Demon or not, I was going to get him. I had been certain of it when he killed Roger, but if the idea had lagged any, or might have lagged any in the future, what he had made happen to Mama had signed his death warrant.

  Doc Travis came out of the back room, and since I was only half-dozing, it woke me up. It was near dawn and a few rays of sunlight were creeping into the room, falling over Doc Travis. It was the first time I’d ever really noticed just how old Doc Travis looked.

  I got up from the chair and went over to him.

  “I thought you was sleeping.” he said softly.

  “Can’t, not soundly anyway. How’s Mama?”

  “Resting good now.”

  “She going to be all right?”

  “I think so.”

  “The baby?”

  “I don’t know, Richard, just to be honest with you. I think we need to get Leonard back here. I’m going to send out some feelers today, find someone who can hunt him down for me. Till he gets back, I want you boys and your mama to stay here with me.”

  “Thanks, Doc Travis, only I can’t stay. Mama and Ike ought to, but I got to go back to the house. I got some things to do.”

  He looked at me for a long moment. “Like what?”

  “Bury the dogs.”

  “What else?”

  “Whatever needs to be done.”

  “You ain’t thinking about hunting down Old Satan now, are you boy?”

  When I didn’t answer, he went on. “That ain’t no pen pig, boy.”

  “I know that, sir”

  “Yeah, reckon you do. But I’m figuring you’re thinking about trying to hunt that old hog down.”

  “If it happened to your family, wouldn’t you?”

  “Reckon so. But why don’t you wait until your Papa gets back?”

  “Might be a few days. That hog could hurt someone before then.”

  “You, maybe.”

  “You going to make me stay here?”

  Doc Travis shrugged. “I don’t rightly see how. You’re darn near a man now, son. And I figure if I tried to make you stay you’d just slip off and do what you’re going to do anyway. But I’m asking you not to. If something happened to you… well, you think your mama is bad off now… I don’t know if she could take that blow.”

  “Ain’t nothing going to happen to me.”

  “You got that arranged with Old Satan, son?”

  “Doc, I got to do what I got to do. Papa told me to watch over the place. I’m the man of the house now. That hog’s hurt too many already.”

  “You’re bound and determined?”

  I licked my lips. “No way around it, sir.”

  Doc Travis nodded. “You’re more like your Papa every day. Never could tell that hardhead a darn thing either once he made up his mind. But I’ll say this now. I’m against it, and I’m advising against it. You go out to the house if you must, bury the dogs, and forget this boar. Wait until your papa gets home. Promise me you’ll think about it. Promise.”

  “All right, I’ll think about it.”

  “I mean really think about it.”

  “I will. I’m going to go on now. I’ll leave the wagon, but I’ll ride Clancy back. When I get finished doing what I got to do I’ll bring him back. Or maybe Ike and Mama can rent a mule or something.”

  “You just take the wagon. I’ll worry about them getting home.”

  “It’s Felix I’m thinking about. I don’t think one night’s rest is enough for that old mule.”

  Doc Travis nodded. “Have it your way.”

  “Take care of Ike and Mama for me.”

  “You know I will. And son, leave that Old Satan alone. You think over what I’m saying. That hog is crazy and a born killer. It tore up the best hunter in these parts and left him a cripple. Men have tried to kill it for years without luck. Not putting you down, son, but don’t get to thinking that a youngster like yourself can kill a demon like that.”

  “I’ll think on it hard,” I said.

  I got the Winchester, got Clancy out of the back lot, and borrowed one of Doc Travis’s old bridles from the tack room. Doc Travis hadn’t had a horse in years, and the bridle was stiff and hard to use. But I found some oil and used that to limber it up some. I fitted it on Clancy, patted Felix good-bye, and went out of the lot leading the mule.

  When we reached the street, I turned to look up at Doc Travis’s place. He was standing at the top of the stairs.

  “I don’t like what you’re doing, son. I ought to make you stay.”

  “No disrespect sir, but it’s like you say. You couldn’t.”

  I pulled myself and the Winchester onto Clancy’s back and clucked to him. We started toward home.

  “Shoot straight, darn you,” Doc Travis called after me. “You hear, shoot straight?”

  I waved a hand over my shoulder without looking back. The sun was coming up and it made the red clay street look like it was on fire. I put my heels to Clancy’s flanks and we began to trot.

  Two

  I was starved when I got to the house. I’d missed supper last night and I hadn’t had any breakfast. I was so hungry I could see cornbread walking on the ground.

  First thing I did, however, was feed Clancy and turn him loose in the lot. Then, before getting a bite to eat, I got a shovel and an old tarp and went out to bury the dogs. I put them on the tarp and pulled them out to a spot near the bottoms. I dug a hole, wrapped them in the tarp and buried them. Since they’d always been close in life, I figured they wouldn’t mind each other’s company in death.

  When I’d patted down the grave with the back of the shovel, I felt like crying, but nothing would happen. It was like I was all dried up inside. I said some words over the grave, just in case God had a place for dogs to go to, and went back to the house.

  In the bread box I found a tin of cornbread. I cut a piece open, poured some ribbon cane inside it, and ate. Finally I finished off the whole pan that way. I was sitting at the table, feeling some better with my belly full, trying to come up with some sort of plan about Old Satan, when there was a knock on the door and I heard Abraham calling, “Hallo, the house.”

  I went to the door and opened it.

  “My lands,” Abraham said, “you look like someone whupped you with a mad rattlesnake.”

  I was a mess. I was worn slap out and my clothes were darn near torn to pieces from all the limbs and brush that had snagged them when I was following after Roger and Old Satan. Doc Travis had taken a few minutes to clean some of my cuts up last night after he’d gotten Mama settled, but I still looked pretty ragged.

  “We had a visit from Old Satan,” I said. “Come on in.” We went over to the table and sat down.

  “So did we,” Abraham said. “He killed Jesse.”

  “What?”

  “Yeah. He come along not more than a couple hours after you left for home. Papa heard him grunting around and he went out to take a look, had his shotgun with him. That’s when we heard the squealing out at the hog lot, out at that special pen Gra
ndpa built for Jesse. Then we heard Papa’s shotgun go off”

  “Did he kill him?” I asked quickly. I wasn’t sure if I hoped he had or he hadn’t. It was awful strong in my head to do the deed myself.

  “That’s the crazy part, Ricky. We was all scared to death about what was going on out there, but pretty soon Papa came back. His face was gray, and I tell you, he looked scared. I ain’t never known Papa to be scared of nothing.”

  Nor had I. Abraham’s papa was six-four and weighed well over two hundred pounds, all of it muscle. I’d once seen him grab a bull by the horns and throw it down to keep it from going wild and busting through a fence. Let me tell you, that ain’t no easy task.

  Abraham took a deep breath and went on. “Papa told us Old Satan had torn Jesse’s pen apart… and Jesse too. Said there wasn’t a thing he could do for Jesse cause it happened so fast. But Old Satan did run out in the open and Papa got a shot off, hit him broadside. Had to have hit him, he said, on account of they were so close and him using a shotgun and all. But the only thing it did to Old Satan was make him mad. He came after Papa, and Papa tossed the shotgun down and climbed on top the outhouse. That crazy hog rammed the door off it, like he was a bull or something, just butted it off. Shook the outhouse so bad Papa nearly fell off. Then, just as fast as he’d come, Old Satan went away. Papa said he was running crazy, zigzagging, hopping along like he was full of the devil or his guts were on fire.”

  “He’s sure he hit him with that shotgun?”

  “Didn’t know how he could have missed standing at that range.”

  I thought about Mama and me taking a shot at Old Satan when we were standing at the door. I wondered if either of us had hit him. And if we had, I wondered why it hadn’t hurt him. Was he really a devil or demon? That didn’t make much sense, but then a hog like this one didn’t make much sense either.

  “Where’s your mama and Ike?” Abraham asked.

  I told him everything that had happened last night, and that I aimed to kill Old Satan myself. Today if I could.

  “That’s what I come over here for, Ricky. I couldn’t tell Mama or Papa, they’d be against it. But I got to do this for Grandpa. It ain’t going to bring Jesse back, but I can make sure Old Satan don’t kill nothing else. Grandpa, he won’t even eat. Won’t get out of bed. He used to use his crutches to go out and hitch Jesse up, and have that hog pull him around places where them crutches wouldn’t carry him. That hog was his legs. Now he don’t even act like he wants to live.”

  “I reckon we ought to form a pact,” I said.

  “A what?”

  “An agreement. I read about it in a story once, about these two fellows who were going to go off and make their fortunes and be kings. They signed a pact to do that, and to help each other.”

  “We’re going hog hunting, Ricky, not fortune hunting.”

  “Well, maybe we don’t need to sign nothing, but we’re going to shake on it.”

  We clasped hands. “This is to the idea of killing Old Satan on account of the harm he’s done us,” I said. “We’re going to go after him and we ain’t going to come back until it’s done, and ain’t nothing going to stop us.”

  “Deal,” Abraham said. But when we quit shaking, his face fell. “We got us one problem, Ricky. Neither of us know the first thing about hunting no wild hog.”

  He had a point there.

  And that’s how Uncle Pharaoh came into the picture.

  If there was any person that ought to have been able to tell us how to hunt a wild boar, and Old Satan in particular, it was Uncle Pharaoh.

  But would he?

  We were afraid he wouldn’t. And worse yet, we were afraid if he didn’t help us, he’d spoil our hunt by telling Abraham’s mama and papa. It was, to say the least, a tricky situation.

  Though we didn’t want to go against the best wishes of the adults, because of the whipping we might get over it, we were bound and determined to do what we intended. Old Satan was going to get hunted if we had to walk over every inch of bottom land and climb every tree in East Texas looking for him.

  Still, it would be a whole lot easier if we had some notion of how a wild hog acted on the hunt and in the woods. Abraham and I weren’t green hunters, but Old Satan and a squirrel or possum were quite some different.

  We didn’t go straight to see Uncle Pharaoh. We rode Clancy out to where I’d left Roger in the fork of the tree and buried him. Then we went to the tree house and left the shovel and Winchester there. That way, if the adults decided against our plans, they couldn’t take the rifle away from us. I didn’t tell Abraham, but no matter what happened with him and his folks, I was going after that hog. With Papa gone, Mama not able to stop me, and Doc Travis at least two or three days away from finding Papa, I had my chance to get Old Satan. I’d probably get a switching to end all switchings later, but that didn’t matter.

  In the tree house I saw that Abraham had been busy since early morning on his shield. It was near finished and ready to hang on the wall. Though I figured since what happened last night, along with him getting up early to work on it before coming to see me, he had other plans for it first.

  When we got to the Wilson house, it was as quiet as a funeral on Sunday morning. Most of the time the place sounded like it was being attacked by wild Indians on account of all the kids and Mrs. Wilson clanging pots and pans and bustling about, or yelling the little ones out of trouble. Not today. Jesse had been like one of the family and no one was feeling particularly lively.

  Mr. Wilson had already gone off to do field work, but Mrs. Wilson was at the stove cooking lunch, working in a quiet way, not banging pan a’one.

  When we came in she smiled and asked if I was staying to dinner. Since that cornbread and syrup had already burned itself out, I told her I reckoned I would.

  I didn’t tell her about the boar and what he’d done, or about Mama being at Doc Travis’s.

  “You heard about Jesse?” she said.

  “Yes ma’am. I’m real sorry.”

  I thought for a minute she was going to cry, but she turned back to her cooking. “We gonna be eating real soon,” she said.

  “Grandpa still in bed?” Abraham asked.

  “No, he’s out at that grave your papa dug for Jesse.”

  We went out back, behind the barn, and there was Uncle Pharaoh leaning on his crutches looking at the fresh-dug ground.

  “Grandpa,” Abraham said.

  He lifted his head and looked at us. I never thought that Uncle Pharaoh could look any older, but I had been wrong. He looked on the dark side of two hundred that day, like a ragged scarecrow propped up on two sticks.

  “Silly to be upset over an old pig,” Uncle Pharaoh said. “Bucky getting out here digging a grave a’fore daylight for an old pig, and him having to go to work too. Ain’t no sense in it, now is there?”

  Neither of us knew what to say.

  “No sense in it,” Uncle Pharaoh repeated.

  “You can train another one,” I finally said.

  The look Uncle Pharaoh gave me gave light to those old filmed-over eyes. “Ain’t no hog like Pig Jesse, you hear?”

  “Yes sir.”

  “He was special. Smarter than people. Better than most, especially some white folks I know.”

  “He didn’t mean nothing by it,” Abraham said. “He’s just trying to cheer you up some.”

  “Well, you ain’t so good at it, little white boy.”

  “No sir, I guess I ain’t.”

  “Old Satan come to his house last night too,” Abraham said. Uncle Pharaoh turned to look at me. “Tore his dogs up, and caused his mama to have to be hauled in to the doctor. She got such a strain she might lose the baby.”

  “You the little white boy that’s Abraham’s friend?” Uncle Pharaoh said suddenly.

  “Yes sir, I’m still the white boy that’s his friend.”

  “I know’d that,” Uncle Pharaoh said, as if he hadn’t asked the question.

  “What we want,” Abrah
am said, “is… is to know how to kill that hog.”

  Uncle Pharaoh moved his crutches around so he was facing us head on. “How’s that?”

  “We going to kill Old Satan, Grandpa. Me and Ricky, with or without your help, and ain’t nobody going to stop us. But we know you know more about hunting than a coon dog, so we want to know how to hunt Old Satan.”

  “Ya’ll go fishing,” Uncle Pharaoh said.

  “No sir,” Abraham said, “and I don’t mean to sound like I’m sassing. But we’re going after that Old Satan on account of what he’s done.”

  “Didn’t do nothing but kill an old pig,” Uncle Pharaoh said quickly.

  “Ain’t no stopping us. If you tell us how or you don’t, we’re going to get him.”

  Uncle Pharaoh stared at me until I thought my eyes would melt. “That the way it is with you, little white boy?”

  “Yes sir, it is. I reckon I’m going to go after Old Satan if Abraham does or not.”

  “I’m going all right,” Abraham said quickly. “I don’t care if Mama and Papa give me a whupping with a willow limb.”

  “Old Satan, he ain’t like no regular wild pig,” Uncle Pharaoh said.

  “We know that, Uncle Pharaoh,” I said. “That’s why we’re talking to you.”

  “Gonna need some dogs to do this right,” Uncle Pharaoh said.

  “We got a pen full of them,” Abraham said.

  “Those ain’t no experienced hog-hunting dogs.”

  “They’re all we got,” Abraham said. “And besides, there ain’t no experienced hog dogs in these parts.”

  Uncle Pharaoh leaned on his crutches and looked at us for a long time, only I could tell he wasn’t really seeing us. He was considering.

  “This ain’t like running no squirrel,” Uncle Pharaoh said.

  “No sir,” I said, “we know that. We ain’t got no thoughts that it’ll be easy and we ain’t going to be silly about it. What we need is expert advice on how to kill Old Satan. Then we’re going to go out there and do it.”

  Uncle Pharaoh cracked a toothless smile. “I wish I had you boys’ legs, but I’m sure glad I ain’t as dumb. Old Satan, he’s the meanest critter I ever seen, and I’ve killed bears in Tennessee and once helped a fellow hunt down a hog-eating gator in Louisiana. This here’s a bad critter.”