'Yeah,' I tell her. 'Sunk. Down at the bottom of the pond, drownded. I guess maybe during the night they forgot to keep treading water or something.'
She didn't say a word. She just strides down the path to the duckpond and looks into it and sees the four ducks. They are big, horrible things with kind of red Jimmy Valentine masks over their eyes, and they are lying at the bottom of the pond. She wades in, still without a word, and fishes them out. She gets a big shiv out of her apron pocket, slits the ducks open, yanks out their lungs and slits them open. Water dribbles out.
'Drownded,' she mutters. 'If there was snapping turtles to drag them under …but there ain't.'
I do not understand what the fuss is about and ast her if she can't sell them anyway. She says no, it wouldn't be honest, and I should get a shovel and bury them. Then there is an awful bellering from the cowbarn. 'Agnes of Lincolnshire!' Mrs. Parry squawks and dashes for the barn. 'She's dropping her calf ahead of time!'
I run along beside her. 'Should I call the cops?' I pant. 'They always get to the place before the ambulance and you don't have to pay them nothing. My married sister had three kids delivered by the cops—'
But it seems it's different with cows and anyway they have a different kind of flatfoot out here that didn't go to Police Academy. Mrs. Parry finally looks up from the calf and says 'I think I saved it. I know I saved it. I can tell when an animal's dying. Bub, go to the phone and call Miz'
Croley and ask her if she can possibly spare Brenda to come over and do the milkin' tonight and tomorrow morning. I dassn't leave Agnes and the calf; they need nursing.'
I stagger out of the cowbarn, throw up two-three times and go to the phone in the house. I seen them phones with flywheels in the movies so I know how to work it. Mrs. Croley cusses and moans and then says all right she'll send Brenda over in the Ford and please to tell Mrs. Parry not to keep her no longer than she has to because she has a herd of her own that needs milking.
I tell Mrs. Parry in the barn and Mrs. Parry snaps that Mrs. Croley has a living husband and a draft-proof farmhand and she swore she didn't know what things were coming to when a neighbor wouldn't help another neighbor out.
I ast casually: 'Who is this Brenda, ma'am?'
'Miz' Croley's daughter. Good for nothing.'
I don't ast no more questions but I sure begin to wait with interest for a Ford to round the bend of the road.
It does while I am bucking up logs with the chainsaw. Brenda is a blondie about my age, a little too big for her dress—an effect which I always go for, whether in the Third Ward or Chiunga County. I don't have a chance to talk to her until lunch, and then all she does is giggle.
But who wants conversation? Then a truck comes snorting up the driveway. Something inside the truck is snorting louder than the truck.
Mrs. Parry throws up her hands. 'Land, I forgot! Belshazzar the Magnificent for Princess Leilani!' She gulps coffee and dashes out.
'Brenda,' I said, 'what was that all about?'
She giggles and this time blushes. I throw down my napkin and go to the window. The truck is being backed to a field with a big board fence around it. Mrs. Parry is going into the barn and is leading a cow into the field. The cow is mighty nervous and I begin to understand why. The truckdriver opens the tailgate and out comes a snorting bull.
I think: well, I been to a few stag shows but this I never seen before.
Maybe a person can learn something in the country after all.
Belshazzar the Magnificent sees Princess Leilani. He snorts like Charles Boyer. Princess Leilani cowers away from him like Bette Davis.
Belshazzar the Magnificent paws the ground. Princess Leilani trembles.
And then Belshazzar the Magnificent yawns and starts eating grass.
Princess Leilani looks up, startled and says: 'Huh?' No, on second thought it is not Princess Leilani who says 'Huh?' It is Brenda, at the other kitchen window. She sees me watching her, giggles, blushes and goes to the sink and starts doing dishes.
I guess this is a good sign, but I don't press my luck. I go outside, where Mrs. Parry is cussing out the truck- driver. 'Some bull!' she yells at him.
'What am I supposed to do now? How long is Leilani going to stay in season? What if I can't line up another stud for her? Do you realise what it's going to cost me in veal and milk checks—' Yatata, yatata, yatata, while the truckdriver keeps trying to butt in with excuses and Belshazzar the Magnificent eats grass and sometimes gives Princess Leilani a brotherly lick on the nose, for by that time Princess Leilani has dropped the nervous act and edged over mooing plaintively.
Mrs. Parry yells: 'See that? I don't hold with artificial insemination but you dang stockbreeders are driving us dairy farmers to it! Get your—
your steer off my property before I throw him off! I got work to do even if he hasn't! Belshazzar the Magnificent—hah!'
She turns on me. 'Don't just stand around gawking, Bub. When you get the stovewood split you can stack it in the woodshed.' I scurry off and resume Operation Woodlot, but I take it a little easy which I can do because Mrs. Parry is in the cowbarn nursing Agnes of Lincolnshire and the preemie calf.
The next morning at breakfast I am in a bad temper, Brenda has got the giggles and Mrs. Parry is stiff and tired from sleeping hi the barn. We are a gruesome threesome, and then a car drives up and a kid of maybe thirty comes bursting into the kitchen. He has been crying. His eyes are red and there are clean places on his face where the tears ran down.
'Ma!' he whimpers at Mrs. Parry. 'I got to talk to you! You got to talk to Bonita, she says I don't love her no more and she's going to leave me!'
'Hush up George,' she snaps at him. 'Come into the parlor.' They go into the parlor and Brenda whistles: 'Whoo-ee! Wait'll I tell Maw about this!'
'Who is he?'
'Miz' Parry's boy George. She gave him the south half of the farm and built him a house on it. Bonita's his wife. She's a stuck-up girl from Ware County and she wears falsies and dyes her hair and—' Brenda looks around, lowers her voice and whispers '—and she sends her worshing to the laundry in town.'
'God in Heaven,' I say. 'Have the cops heard about this?'
'Oh, it's legal, but you just shouldn't do it.'
'I see. I misunderstood, I guess. Back in the Third Ward it's a worse rap than mopery with intent to gawk. The judges are ruthless with it.'
Her eyes go round. 'Is that a fact?'
'Sure. Tell your mother about it.'
Mrs. Parry came back hi with her son and said to us: 'Clear out, you kids. I want to make a phone call.'
'I'll start the milkin',' Brenda said.
'And I'll framble the portistan while it's still cool and barkney,' I say.
'Sure,' Mrs. Parry says, cranking the phone. 'Go and do that, Bub.' She is preoccupied.
I go through the kitchen door, take one sidestep, flatten against the house and listen. Reception is pretty good.
'Bonita?' Mrs. Parry says into the phone. 'Is that you, Bonita? Listen, Bonita, George is here and he asked me to call you and tell you he's sorry. I ain't exactly going to say that. I'm going to say that you're acting like a blame fool …' She chuckles away from the phone and says: 'She wants to talk to you, George. Don't be too eager, boy.'
I slink away from the kitchen door, thinking: 'Ah-hah!' I am thinking so hard that Mrs. Parry bungles into me when she walks out of the kitchen sooner than I expect.
She grabs me with one of those pipe-vise hands and snaps: 'You young devil, were you listening to me on the phone?'
Usually, it is the smart thing to deny everything and ast for your mouthpiece, but up here they got no mouthpieces. For once I tell the truth and cop a plea. 'Yes, Mrs. Parry. I'm so ashamed of myself you can't imagine. I always been like that. It's a psy-cho-logical twist I got for listening. I can't seem to control it. Maybe I read too many bad comic books. But honest, I won't breathe a word.' Here I have the sense to shut up.
