Em's turn to cook and she banged down the plates and the coffeepot. She had boiled up some jerky and some dried corn and that was all they had to eat. Dorothy thought she must have seen them, that she must know. The silence was terrible, but Em did not notice anything unusual. For Em, the silence was always there, and always terrible. Em was oblivious to her own rage, but Dorothy ate in suspense. Later, Dorothy went out into the darkness and threw up, quietly, so Em couldn't hear. There is no pit, Dorothy thought, no hole in the ground deep enough and black enough to cover me. There was a hook on which they hung the bodies of the hogs. It went right up through their guts. Dorothy thought of putting the hook through herself.
Once again, Henry did not come for her after school. Dorothy had known that he would not. He'll be scared, she thought, beginning to feel contempt for him. He'll keep well away. He might be so scared, he won't do it again. Either way, she knew she could no longer count on Henry for anything. He might send her away. He might want to keep her near and do it again. He might ignore her and pretend that nothing had happened. There was nothing good that either one of them could do. She hitched a ride home with Max Jewell. He had grown up nice and polite and was very interested in Dorothy. He asked her all sorts of questions about Manhattan and tried to catch her eye. Dorothy saw Uncle Henry in him and answered coldly, yes or no.
It took a week. Uncle Henry let other people take her back home for a whole week. Neither one of them said anything to Aunty Em.
Max had found repeated excuses to come out to town, in order to give her a lift back. That in itself was ominous. It might be good to discourage Max.
Finally Uncle Henry showed up, waiting at the bridge. Max was there too. Max called hello to Henry, somewhat unwillingly, and his quick crumpled smile in Dorothy's direction was one of apology. Max assumed quite rightly that she might not want to ride with some smelly old man.
Dorothy felt herself go into abeyance. She watched herself. What, she wondered, am I going to do? She saw herself climb down from Max's wagon.
'Thank you, Max,' she murmured. It sounded like a farewell.
She got into the wagon. Henry waved Max away. Henry pulled hard on the reins to keep the wagon still. Henry waited until Max was out of sight, disappearing over the top of Prospect.
'We don't share no blood,' Henry said solemnly. 'We're not blood kin.'
That meant nothing to Dorothy. Did he mean that he had no bad blood? Did he mean that only she did? She waited, as an animal waits when it is cornered by a predator.
'I'm just older than you, that's all.' He tried to smile, but there was a shaking in him. 'You aren't going to do nothing, are you, Dorothy? You aren't going to go away, are you? 'Cause old Henry, he needs you. You are the light of his life. You are the only beautiful thing. And a man needs that, Dorothy.'
He paused and looked at the wall of trees, full of spring buds, climbing the side of the hill. The buds gathered together on the trees looked from a distance like a slightly purple mist. 'We'll have to be careful of her. We'll just have to watch our step. In summer, the corn will be as high as you like.'
He means we'll do it in the corn, thought Dorothy. He'll wait for me here, and we'll go into the corn. He wants to go on doing it.
'She can't live forever.'
He wants Aunty Em to die.
Then he gave her a ride home, a chaste distance from her. It was already late, so they walked into the house, Dorothy first, Henry a few minutes later. Chores, he told Dorothy. Got a few things to do. You just go right on in. He was lying.
The next day, they went into the barn. 'I got to do it,' said Henry, grinning. 'I just can't keep away. You are a wicked, wicked little thing.' He smiled and rubbed his nose against her, and she went still and cold and quiet as ice.
'You like that, you like that, don't you?' he said, and it made no difference that she didn't answer.
It went on and on and Henry got rougher and rougher with his raw hands. Yes, I'm bad, thought Dorothy. I'm bad, I'm bad, I'm bad. She could feel herself twist inside. She hated Henry's smell, she hated his body, she hated the barn. And she wanted Aunty Em to see them.
She wanted Aunty Em to see them, so bad she could taste it. Her so God-fearing, her so church-loving, to walk in and see her husband pig-backing a kid, pig-backing me, doing what you should be doing Em, you old dried piece of beef jerky. You should see this. I can just hear you yelping.
So she pulled up Henry's shirt, and she pushed his trousers down, so that there would be no mistaking. No one hugs a child with their milkwhite bottom bare in early spring unless they're doing that.
And one day, muddy, bleak, not so cold, his trousers were down around his knees, and he kept pulling them up, chuckling, 'Don't do that, honey,' and Aunty Em yelled out, real close to the barn.
'Henry, where are you?'
Henry gasped and ducked away, scuttled around behind the bales of hay. Dorothy stayed where she was. Her dress fell back down by itself, but she would not have pulled it down. Her flannels were still down around her thighs. She leaned against the post and waited.
Aunty Em came in, carrying a pan. Mocking her, Dorothy made a coy little-girl motion with her hips and head. Little old me do anything wrong?
'You seen your uncle?' Em asked.
'Sure, he's just around there,' said Dorothy and pointed.
Em looked between Dorothy and the hay. 'What you doing there?' said Em to Henry. 'Why didn't you answer?'
Henry stood up. Down on his knees, he had managed to hoist and fasten his trousers. 'Thought I saw a rat,' said Henry, looking straight at Dorothy. Dorothy's eyes went wide. Did I do something wrong, Uncle?
'Well, get up off the floor and tell me when we can get into Manhattan. I can't use this pan. It's finally gone through.'
