smile.
Just now he seemed embarrassed by the flutter his presence was creating as the girls pressed closer about him, and I wondered why all the fuss?
“I’ve got gooseberry tarts in my basket, Justin,” said one of the girls coyly, and another hinted about her raisin pie; a third, making sheep’s eyes, asked if he were partial to stuffed eggs.
“Who will it be today, Justin?” the first asked, putting her hand on his arm. “Yes, who will it be?” said the second; then they were all demanding to know of Justin who he thought “it” would be.
There were more voices and laughter as other girls joined the circle, and calls and shouting, and constant comings and goings, and more newcomers. Worthy Pettinger arrived on his tractor, and from the expressions of some close by, it appeared the noisy gusto of his old John Deere was an affront to their ears.
“Ain’t Missy the prettiest thing in her dress,” cried Irene Tatum in her gravelly voice, while others agreed, parting and forming an aisle through which Tamar Penrose led the child onto the Common. “Did you pick your sheep, Missy?” someone asked respectfully, and “Good Missy,” another said, reaching to touch her ribbons.
Pallid, thin, with bony joints and brittle-looking limbs, and oblivious to the interest her arrival was causing, the child was regarding me gravely. Even braided and in ribbons, her red hair looked lank and limp, and I noted again the spattering of freckles across her nose.
Next to appear was Jack Stump. He wheeled his peddler’s rig onto the grass with a cacophony of tinware, sprang from his seat, and hopped about dropping the canvas tatters that passed for awnings on his cart and lowering the panels to display his wares. Now he produced a scratched and battered fiddle from one of the compartments, and then a soda-pop box, which he stood on as he began sawing away on the instrument.
The music was suddenly and thoroughly drowned out as, with horn blatting, a car careened in a wide circle at the edge of the Common; I recognized the pink Oldsmobile belonging to the Tobacco City group. Doors banged open and the five big and beery-looking Soakes boys got out; then, from behind the wheel, came bristling Old Man Soakes himself. Their arrival caused evident consternation to the musician, for the fiddling ceased abruptly, the instrument was whisked from sight, Jack Stump scrambled onto his seat, and, with kettle-ware crashing, he disappeared into the crowd.
Old Man Soakes’s look was grim as he waited while his offspring freed a galvanized tub of ice and beer from the trunk of the car and lugged it into the shade of a tree, where they flopped on the grass and began popping tops and passing the cans among themselves. Then the father busied himself at the trunk, bending to set out for sale an assortment of home-sewn stuffed canvas decoys.
Making my way through the crowd that now separated us, I found Beth and Kate talking to Worthy Pettinger.
“Worthy’s offered to show us around the fair,” Beth said, and as we moved off together I saw that Kate’s lively interest in the boy was masked by an elaborate show of indifference as he pointed out various sights. We watched the livestock competition, which had already begun; then the pie contest, where Robert Dodd was chief among the judges; then the trained bear; and the Punch-and-Judy show, a small, cheapjack affair that reminded me of one Beth and I had seen years before in Paris. While Judy assaulted Punch from one side of the stage, a white wraith-like figure beat him with a stick on the other, and the sorry victim fended off both spouse and ghost with equal vigor. When we left the tent, I made further reference to the battling phantom, and asked if Worthy had heard tales of ghosts around Cornwall Coombe.
“You mean the Ghost of Soakes’s Lonesome?” He shrugged. “Folks around here are dumb enough to believe all kinds of things. I guess ghosts are the least of ‘em.”
As we went along, Beth’s attention was continually diverted by the various home arts and handicrafts displayed at the booths: quilted bedspreads, crocheted counterpanes, hand-woven materials, figures cleverly carved and whittled from pine, little dolls, basketwork. “They could make a fortune selling these down in New York,” she said.
Some distance away, I glimpsed the Widow Fortune sitting behind a booth, talking energetically with Sophie Hooke, and at the same time doing a sharp business in the honey trade. Other booths had pickles and preserves for sale, fresh garden produce and dairy things. Strolling among the tents and booths, I was interested in the workmanship embellishing the canvas sides: primitive, country-type designs, crudely but gracefully executed with the naiveté of cave paintings. There were suns and moons and stars, various animals, a horse here, a cow there, a barn, a stick-figure man. And, everywhere, corn: sheaves of corn and shocks of corn and ears of corn, people growing, harvesting, cooking, eating, storing corn. Corn not only in its facsimile, but in reality, some of the tent entrances being framed by bound shocks and festooned with garlands of dried husks and leaves, and bunches of unshelled ears, their kernels yellow, red, brown, some variegated with all three.
Our guide identified it as Indian corn, breaking an ear off and tendering it to Kate with a smile. He seemed to sense her feeling of awkwardness and kept up an easy line of conversation which, while directed at Beth and me, was designed to make our daughter less self-conscious.
King the Pig, he assured us, was bound to win the hog competition. Farmers thereabouts had a way of letting their pigs stay penned up, leaving them to root among their own filth. He had persuaded Irene Tatum to try a new method, that of building King a movable trailer home. When the ground beneath became soiled, Worthy would drive over with his tractor, hook up, and move the pen to a fresh location.
“Pigs don’t
He went on speaking of the things that were nearest his heart, talking with neither constraint nor pretension, but in a frank, affable manner. He had none of the cruder aspects one might expect in the rural character, revealing a sensitivity to both people and surroundings. Though his frame seemed slight for heavy farm work, his complexion was ruddy and healthy, and he had a lithe, agile way of carrying himself that hinted at untapped reserves of strength.
Next, he pointed out the teams of horses being readied for the horse-drawing contest, and the place where the wrestling matches would be held. One of the largest of the Soakes boys, Roy, had come ‘cross-river to take on Justin Hooke, and though Roy had more weight, Justin was stronger, and sure to win. From the way Worthy spoke, I could see Justin was something of a hero to him, too. Still, he planned to take the pole-shinny competition himself.
“‘Course, it’s better for things if the Harvest Lord wins, but he can’t win
“The Harvest Lord?” Beth asked, and Worthy explained. This singular honor had been bestowed on Justin Hooke at Agnes Fair seven years before. He had been crowned at Spring Festival, and it was this traditional role he would continue to assume through the weeks of harvest; a pageant was to be held in the Grange hall some weeks hence-the Corn Play, as it was called-where his queen would be crowned. She was called the Corn Maiden, and Sophie Hooke had been chosen for this part.
“Who chose them?” I asked.
“Justin was elected by vote, and he chose Sophie himself,” Worthy said.
“Oh, look!” Beth had stopped to admire a collection of ivory jewelry on display at a booth. She picked up a pair of earrings and held them to her ears. “Soup bones,” Worthy laughed. The pieces-brooches, rings, and the like-were made locally, carved and engraved from odd pieces of bone. They were worked in the elaborate scrimshaw fashion of the old whaling sailors, and the ivory-like patina came from patient sanding and waxing.
By now we had made a complete circuit of the fair and found ourselves back where we had started. Beth leaned on the jewelry booth counter to pick a stone from her shoe. “Listen,” she said, “I’m about done in. Why don’t I get the picnic hamper and find the Dodds? We can meet under that big tree and see the matches from there.”
“Maybe Kate would like to watch from the platform with the other girls,” Worthy said, pointing out a wooden structure at the side of the field where the Corn Maiden and her court would be seated for the events. Kate accepted, though she remained silent as Beth invited Worthy to picnic with us. When I had got the hamper from the car trunk and Beth had reminded me not to forget Kate’s Medihaler in the glove compartment, she went to find the Dodds.
“Mr. Constantine,” Worthy said. “I’d like to take Kate to see King the Pig, if it’s all right with you. He’s sure to get a blue ribbon.” He pushed back the wedge of blue-black hair that kept falling across his eyes, and waited politely for my answer.
