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diff --git a/41723-0.txt b/41723-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..52af129 --- /dev/null +++ b/41723-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,4112 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 41723 *** + + THE DUCK-FOOTED HOUND + + _By Jim Kjelgaard_ + + + [Illustration] + + ILLUSTRATED BY MARC SIMONT + + THOMAS Y. CROWELL COMPANY New York + + _Copyright_ © _1960 by Eddy Kjelgaard_ + + All rights reserved. No part of this book may be + reproduced in any form, except by a reviewer, + without the permission of the publisher. + + Manufactured in the United States of America + by the Vail-Ballou Press, Inc., Binghamton, New York + + Library of Congress Catalog Card No. 60-9160 + + First Printing + + * * * * * + +Old Joe was the biggest, fightingest, craftiest coon in the Creeping +Hills. No one had ever been able to catch him; not even Precious Sue, a +bluetick hound peerless in tracking down coons. + +But Harky felt that this autumn the hunting would be different. Old Joe +was in for trouble. Precious Sue had a pup who looked like a +natural-born coon hunter. With his web-footed paws he was as skillful in +the water as any coon. And on land, Duckfoot had a nose that beat every +other hound hollow. + +Harky had a few troubles of his own. First there was school. Miss Cathby +was nice, but she was a teacher. She called Old Joe a _rac_coon. And she +said he could not live forever because he was mortal. + +Then there were girls. More specifically, there was Melinda--the +bossiest, uppitiest young lady for miles around. And she wanted to +_hunt_. + +Jim Kjelgaard's story of people and hounds captures all the glory and +excitement of coon hunting on a crisp autumn night. Marc Simont has +illustrated the story with wit and brilliance. + + * * * * * + + + + +CONTENTS + + + OLD JOE 1 + + HARKY 16 + + SUE 31 + + HARKY GOES FISHING 46 + + DUCKFOOT 59 + + THE SUMMER OF OLD JOE 74 + + MISS CATHBY 89 + + MELINDA 106 + + OLD JOE UP 118 + + THE FALL OF MUN 132 + + IMPASSE 146 + + HARKY'S PLOT 158 + + AUTUMN NIGHT 172 + + + + +THE DUCK-FOOTED HOUND + + + + +[Illustration] + + + + +OLD JOE + + +At twenty minutes past nine on a Friday night, just after the dark of +moon, an owl in the topmost branches of the huge hollow sycamore saw Old +Joe come out of his den. + +The ancient sycamore's trunk, rooted in gravel beside a brooding slough +filled with treacherous sand bars, was five feet in diameter at the +base. With only a slight taper, it rose for twenty-five feet to the +first crotch. Peering down through leafless twigs and branches, the owl +saw the entrance to Old Joe's den as a gaping dark hole squarely in the +center of the crotch. + +The owl was not aware of the precise second when the hole became filled. +It was an unnerving thing, for the owl had long ago learned that it is +the part of wisdom to know what comes and to recognize it when it +appears, and because he was startled he fluttered his wings. + +He recovered almost instantly, but remained tense and alert. A noted +raider himself, the owl was the rankest of amateurs compared with the +old boar coon whose masked face filled the den's entrance and whose +black nose quivered as it tested the night scents. + +Old Joe, the biggest, craftiest, fightingest coon in the Creeping Hills, +had slept in the hollow sycamore since the frigid blasts of mid-December +had draped the hills with snow and locked the ponds and creeks in ice. +But it was as impossible for him to remain asleep during this January +thaw as it was for the sycamore not to stir its roots and make ready to +feed new sap to its budding leaves. + +He came all the way out and sat in the crotch. A little more than +thirty-six inches long from the end of his tapering nose to the tip of +his ringed tail, he stood thirteen inches high at the shoulder and +weighed a pound for every inch of length. His fur, shading from light +gray to deep black, was lustrous and silky. + +The owl saw beneath these external appearances and knew Old Joe for what +he was: part burglar, part devil, and part imp. + +The owl flew away. He knew his superior when he met him. + +Old Joe, who'd seen the owl in the upper branches before that +night-faring pirate knew he was coming out, did not even bother to +glance up. Owls, the terror of small birds and beasts, merited only +contempt from one who'd been born with a knowledge of the pirate's craft +and had refined that knowledge to an art. Old Joe would happily rob the +owl's nest and eat his mate's eggs when and if he could find them, and +if he had nothing more important to do. This night there was much of +importance that cried for his attention. + +Like all raiders with enemies that plot their downfall, he'd attended to +his first duty before he ever showed himself. With only his nose +protruding from the den, he'd read the stories the wind carried and +found nothing he must hide from, or match wits with, in any part of it. +The wind had intensified his excitement and increased the urge that had +awakened him and sent him forth. + +Last night the wind had purred out of the north, bringing intense cold +that made trees crack like cannon shots, but tonight the wind was +directly out of the south. The snow blanket sagged, and damp little +rivulets, from melting snow that had gathered on the upper branches, +crept down the sycamore's trunk. Winter was not broken. But it was +breaking, and there would never be a better reason for waking up and +faring forth. + +Old Joe attended to his second duty. While winter had its way in the +Creeping Hills, he had slept snug and warm in the hollow trunk of the +old sycamore. His fur was more disheveled than any proper coon should +ever permit, and meticulous as any cat, Old Joe set to grooming himself. + +The sycamore was anything but a casually chosen den. The men who lived +in the Creeping Hills, small farmers for the most part, did so because +they preferred the backwoods to anywhere else. For recreation they +turned to hunting, and Old Joe had run ahead of too many coon hounds +not to understand the whys and wherefores of such. + +With a hound on his trail, any coon that did not know exactly what he +was doing would shortly end up as a pelt tacked to the side of a barn +and roast coon in the oven. Hounds could not climb trees, but the +hunters who accompanied the hounds carried lights, guns, and axes. A +coon that sought safety in a tree that had no hollow would be "shined" +and either shot out or shaken out to be finished by the hounds. Most +trees that were hollow were not proof against axes. + +The sycamore was perfect. The slough at the bottom, with its shifting +sand bars, could be navigated in perfect safety by anything that knew +what it was doing. Old Joe did. Most hounds did not. Many that +recklessly flung themselves into the slough, when they were hot on Old +Joe's trail, had come within a breath of entering that Heaven which +awaits all good coon hounds. + +Even if a hound made its way to the base of the sycamore, and some had, +Old Joe was still safe. Hunters who would enthusiastically fell smaller +trees recoiled before this giant. The most skilled axeman would need +hours to chop it down. Climbing the massive trunk, unless one were +equipped with climbing tools, was impossible. + +If anyone tried to climb or chop, and so far no one had, Old Joe had an +escape. The west fork above the crotch probed another thirty feet into +the air before its branches became too small to support a heavy coon. +One solid limb leaned over a high and rocky ledge in which was the +entrance to an underground tunnel. This tunnel had two exits, one +leading to a tangled mass of brush and the other to a swamp. Old Joe +could, as he had proved many times, drop directly from the overhanging +limb into the tunnel's entrance. + +So far, though most coon hunters of the Creeping Hills knew that Old Joe +sometimes climbed the sycamore when he was hard-pressed, none even +suspected that he stayed there. From ground level the trunk did not look +hollow, and since no one had ever seen fit to climb the tree, none had +ever seen the den entrance in the crotch. It was commonly supposed that +once Old Joe was in the sycamore he climbed out on one of the branches +overhanging the slough and dropped in. + +Not all coon hunters believed that. Mellie Garson and a few others whose +hounds had been good enough to trail Old Joe to the sycamore swore that +once he reached the topmost branches the old coon simply sprouted wings +and flew away. + +The last hair finally, and perfectly, in place, Old Joe came out of the +tree. This he accomplished by utilizing a natural stairway that benign +providence seemed to have provided just for him. + +Long ago, a bolt of lightning had split the sycamore from crotch to +ground level. Over the years, save for a seam where the spreading bark +had finally met, the tree had healed itself. The seam was no wider or +deeper than the thickness of a man's thumb, but it was enough for Old +Joe. + +Bracing one handlike forepaw against the side, and bringing the other up +behind it, he sought and found a grip with his rear paws and descended +head first. His grip was sure, but he hadn't the slightest fear of +falling anyway. Often he had fallen or jumped from greater heights, onto +hard ground, without the least injury to himself. + +He descended safely, as he had known he would, and when he was near the +ground he halted and extended a front paw to touch the thawing snow. Old +Joe chittered his pleasure. + +Nature, in designing him, seemed to have started with a small bear in +mind. Then she decided to incorporate portions of the beaver and otter, +and at the last minute included certain characteristics of the monkey +plus a few whims of her own. With a bear's rear paws and a monkey's +hands, Old Joe was at home in the trees. But he found his life in the +water and took a fair portion of his living from it. He had had his last +swim in Willow Brook the night before it froze, and that was too long to +go without a bath. + +Old Joe buried both front paws in the soggy snow, then let go with his +rear ones and rolled over and over. He rose with dripping fur and racing +blood, not even feeling the cold. + +The proper course now would be to smooth his fur by rubbing his whole +body against the trunk of the nearest tree, but he was too wise to +return to the sycamore. Old Joe had long since learned that he left +telltale hairs wherever he rubbed, and coon hairs on a tree are an open +book to even a semi-skilled woodsman. Old Joe made a belly dive into a +puddle of slush, exulting in the spray that scattered. + +He knew also that he was leaving tracks, but he did not care. He had no +intention of returning to the sycamore tonight and perhaps not for many +nights, and coon tracks meant only that a coon had passed this way. +Besides, tracks would disappear when the snow melted. Hair clinging to +the sycamore's bark would not. + +Old Joe went happily on. + +Though he had eaten nothing in almost seven weeks, he was not especially +hungry, and hunger alone never would have driven him from the den tree. +There was something else: an irresistible urge that he could not have +denied if he would. Old Joe was on the most important and compelling of +all missions, a mission that had begun when time began and would endure +until time ended. On this warm night, he must go out simply because he +could not stay. + +With little side excursions here and there, but always heading directly +into the wind, he traveled almost due south. When a bristled dog fox +barred his path, Old Joe did not swerve at all. The fox bared its fangs, +snapped its jaws, and at the last second, yielded the right of way. + +The Creeping Hills were Joe's beat and would remain his beat. He would +go where he pleased, for he feared no other wild creature. Even his +distant cousins, the black bears that shared the Creeping Hills with +him, had never succeeded in keeping Old Joe from where he wished to +venture. The bears were bigger and stronger than he, but they could not +climb so fast nor swim so far, and they did not know all the hiding +places that Old Joe had discovered before his second birthday. + +Old Joe was a match for anything in the Creeping Hills except hunters +with guns. Hunters were to be parried with wits rather than force, since +force alone could never hope to prevail against firearms. But hunters +gave spice to what, at times, might have been a monotonous existence. +The chase was usually as welcome to Old Joe as it was to any hounds or +hunters that had ever pursued him. + +Three-quarters of a mile from the sycamore, Old Joe halted and gravely +examined a new scene. + +The slough at the base of the sycamore remained frozen. But Willow +Brook, with its due proportion of still pools and snarling riffles, had +overflowed the ice that covered it and had surged up on both banks. No +more than two yards from the tip of Old Joe's nose, three forlorn willow +trees seemed to shiver on a high knoll that was ordinarily dry, but +that was now a lonely little island besieged by the overflow from Willow +Brook. + +Quivering with delight, Old Joe rippled forward. He belly-splashed into +the water, swam across, and climbed the knoll. He rubbed himself against +each of the willows, groaning with the luxury of such a massage. Then he +jumped down the other side of the knoll, plunged into the swift water +that flowed over Willow Brook's ice, and without yielding an inch to the +current emerged on the far bank. There he halted. + +The owl that had sat in the top branches of the sycamore and watched Old +Joe come out of his den had known that he was part burglar, part devil, +and part imp. The owl had not known that, depending on circumstances, +Old Joe could be any of these three without regard to the other two. +Reaching the far bank, he was all imp. + +He knew everything about the Creeping Hills, including the location of +each farm, the character of the farmer and his family, the gardens +planted and the crops that would grow, and the number and species of +livestock. + +A sagging barbed-wire fence two yards from the edge of Willow Brook +marked the border of the Mundee farm. Its proprietor was Arthur Mundee, +but because no man in the Creeping Hills was ever called by his given +name, his neighbors knew him as Mun. He had a thirteen-year-old son +named Harold and called Harky, and a wife who had gone to her eternal +peace seven years ago. Next in importance was a hound, a bluetick named +Precious Sue. Mun Mundee was a coon hunter so ardent that hunting coons +was almost a passion, and Precious Sue one of the few hounds that had +ever tracked Old Joe to the great sycamore. This had not impressed Old +Joe unduly, or created any special fear of either Mun Mundee or Precious +Sue. + +After a moment's concentration, Old Joe ran his tongue over his lips. +Mun Mundee owned some horses, some cattle, and some pigs. He also owned +some chickens. Old Joe had not been hungry when he left the sycamore, +but neither had he expected an opportunity to confound Mun Mundee. Old +Joe licked his lips a second time. When he thought of the chickens, he +was suddenly ravenous. + +He left Willow Brook and crawled under the barbed-wire fence. He did not +slink or hesitate, for he had chosen his night well; the waning moon +left complete darkness behind it. The Mundees would be asleep in their +house and Precious Sue on the porch. Nobody hunted coons in winter. + +Walking boldly, but with not so much as a whisper of sound on the +thawing snow, Old Joe saw as soon as the farm came in sight that his +analysis was correct. The house was dark. The Mundees and Precious Sue +were asleep. Cattle and horses shuffled in their stalls and pigs grunted +sleepily in their sty. + +Old Joe went straight to the chicken house, and licked his lips a third +time as the odor of sleeping chickens delighted his nostrils. + +He did not hesitate but went straight to the small door that let the +chickens in and out. It was a sliding door that could be raised or +lowered, and it was a combination with which Old Joe had long been +familiar. He slipped a front paw beneath the door, raised it, entered +the chicken house, and let the door slide shut behind him. + +The inside of Mun Mundee's chicken house, like the other chicken houses +in the Creeping Hills, was familiar. Old Joe climbed to the roost, and a +fat white hen clucked sleepily as she sensed something alien beside her. +Almost gently Old Joe opened his mouth, closed it on the fat hen's neck, +and leaped lightly to the floor with his plunder. He let himself out +the same way he got in. + +[Illustration] + +He was halfway back to Willow Brook when, stopping to get a better grip +on the fat hen, he was careless. The hen was good for one last squawk. + +One was enough. Precious Sue, sleeping on the porch, heard and correctly +interpreted. A silent trailer, a hound that made no noise until quarry +was bayed, she came rushing through the night. + +Old Joe did not hurry, for haste was scarcely consistent with his +dignity. But he had not left his den to play with a hound, and there +was a simple way to be rid of Precious Sue. + +Coming to Willow Brook, and still clutching his hen, Old Joe leaped in +and surrendered to the water. A half mile downstream he left the brook, +stopped to feast leisurely on the fat hen, and made his way to a swamp +so dense and thick that even full sunlight never penetrated some parts +of it. + +Deep in the swamp he came to his destination, a hollow oak, a huge old +tree as massive as his sycamore. Unhesitatingly he climbed the hollow, +and the female coon that had chosen the oak as her winter den awoke to +snarl and bite him on the nose. + +Repelled, but by no means resigned, Old Joe found another den in a +nearby ledge of rocks and made plans to meet the situation. + + + + +[Illustration] + + + + +HARKY + + +At twenty minutes past five, just four hours before Old Joe startled the +owl that watched him come out of his den, Harky Mundee peered furtively +around the rear of the cow he was milking to see if his father was +watching. He was. Harky sighed and went back to work. + +Mun Mundee had firm opinions concerning the proper way to milk a cow or +do anything else, and when other arguments failed he enforced his ideas +with the flat of his hand. Harky sighed again. Old Brindle, far and away +the orneriest of Mun's five cows and probably anyone else's, had teats +remarkably like the fingers of a buckskin glove that has been left out +in the rain and then dried in the sun. Coaxing the last squirts of milk +from her probably was not so hard as squeezing apple juice from a rock, +but it certainly ran a close second. + +Since there was no alternative, Harky beguiled the anything-but-fleeting +moments with the comforting reflection that winter, after all, was one +of his favorite seasons. It could not compare with autumn, when corn +rustled crisply in the shock and dogs sniffed about for scent of the +coons that always raided shocked corn. Nor did it equal early spring, +when trout streams were ice-free and the earth still too wet for +plowing. + +But it was far ahead of late spring and summer, with their endless farm +tasks, each of which was worse than the other. Only by exercising the +greatest craft and diligence, and manfully preparing himself for the +chastisement he was sure to get when he finally came home, could a man +sneak away for a bit of fishing or swimming. + +Harky bent his head toward Old Brindle's flank but his thoughts whisked +him out of the stable into the hills. + +Shotgun in hand, he'd spent a fair portion of yesterday tracking a +bobcat on the snow. It was a proved fact that a man on foot cannot catch +up with a bobcat that is also on foot. But it was not to be denied that +all bobcats have a touch of moon madness. They knew when they were being +tracked, but they also knew when the tracker ceased following, and that +kindled a fire in their heads. + +As long as they were tracked they were comfortable in the knowledge that +they had only to keep running. When the tracker stopped, it threw the +bobcat's whole plan out of gear. They imagined all sorts of ambushes, +and cunning traps, and finally they worked themselves into such a frenzy +that they just had to come back along their own tracks and find out what +was happening. It followed that the hunter had nothing to do except rile +the bobcat into a lather and then sit down and wait. + +Harky had waited. But he must have done something wrong, or perhaps the +bobcat he followed had not been sufficiently moonstruck. Though it had +come back, it had not been so anxious to find Harky that it forgot +everything else. Harky had glimpsed it across a gully, two hundred +yards away and hopelessly beyond shotgun range. If only he had a rifle-- + +He hadn't any, and the last time he'd sneaked Mun's out his father had +caught him coming back with it. The hiding that followed--Mun used a +hickory gad instead of the flat of his hand--was something a man +wouldn't forget if he lived to be older than the rocks on Dewberry Knob. +Harky lost himself in a beautiful dream. + +Walking along Willow Brook, he accidentally kicked and overturned a +rock. Beneath it, shiny-bright as they had been the day the forgotten +bandit buried them, was a whole sack full of gold pieces. At once Harky +hurried into town and bought a rifle, not an old 38-55 like his father's +but a sleek new bolt action with fancy carving on breech and forearm. +When he brought it home, Mun asked, rather timidly, if he might use it. +No, Pa, Harky heard himself saying. It's not that I care to slight you +but this rifle is for a hunter like me. + +The shining dream was shattered by Mun's, "You done, Harky?" + +Harky looked hastily up to see his father beside him. "Yes, Pa," he +said. + +[Illustration] + +"Lemme see." + +Mun sat down beside Old Brindle and Harky sighed with relief. When Mun +Mundee could not get the last squirt from a cow, it followed that the +cow was indeed stripped. But Mun, conditioned by experience, never +completely approved of anything Harky did. + +"We'll close up for the night," he said. + +Harky scooted out of the barn ahead of his father and gulped lungfuls of +the softening wind. It seemed that a man could never get enough of that +kind of air. Mun closed and latched the barn door and Harky turned to +him. + +"It's a thaw wind!" he said rapturously. + +"Yep." + +"Not the big thaw, though." + +"Nope." + +"Do you reckon," Harky asked, "it will fetch the coons out?" + +Mun deliberated. A subject as serious as coons called for deliberation. + +"I don't rightly know," he said finally. "I figger some will go on the +prowl an' some won't." + +It was, Harky decided, a not unreasonable answer even though it lacked +the elements of true drama. Harky gulped another lungful of air and +almost, but not quite, loosed the reins of his own imagination. Even +seasoned hunters did not argue coon lore with Mun Mundee, but on an +evening such as this it was impossible to think in prosaic terms. + +They lingered near the barn and faced into the wind. Presently Harky +stood there in body only. His spirit took him to Heaven. + +Heaven, as translated at the moment, was the summit of a mountain ten +times as high as Dewberry Knob. From his lofty eminence, Harky looked at +a great forest that stretched as far as his eyes could see. Each tree +was hollow and each hollow contained a coon. As though every coon had +received the same signal at the same time, all came out. There were more +coons than a man could hunt if he hunted every night for the next +thousand years. + +At exactly the right moment, this entrancing scene became perfection. +Deep in the great forest, Precious Sue lifted her voice to announce that +she had a coon up. + +Harky made his way among the great trees toward the sound. He found +Precious Sue doing her best to climb a sycamore so massive that ten men, +holding each others' hands, could not come even close to encircling the +trunk. When Harky shined his light into the tree he saw, not just a +coon, but the king of coons. Sitting on a branch, staring down with eyes +big as a locomotive's headlight, was Old Joe himself. + +The fancy faded, but Harky was left with no sense of frustration because +fact replaced it. Somewhere out in the Creeping Hills--the aura that +surrounded him considerably enhanced by the fact that no human being +knew exactly where--Old Joe really was sleeping the winter away. Suppose +that he really came prowling tonight? Suppose Precious Sue really did +run him up that big sycamore in the wood lot? Suppose Harky really--? +Harky could no longer be silent. + +"Pa," he asked, "how long has Old Joe been prowling these hills?" + +A man who would speak of coons must think before he spoke. For a full +ninety seconds Mun did not answer. Then he said seriously: + +"A right smart time, Harky. There's them'll tell you that even if a coon +don't get trapped, or shot, or dog kil't, or die no death 'fore his +time, he'll live only about ten years anyhow. I reckon that may be so if +you mean just _ordinary_ coons. Old Joe, he ain't no ordinary coon. My +grandpa hunted him, an' my pa, an' me, an' you've hunted him. Old Joe, +he's jest about as much of a fixture in these hills as us Mundees." + +Harky pondered this information. When he went to school down at the +Crossroads, which he did whenever he couldn't get out of it, he had +acquired some education. But he had also acquired some disturbing +information. Miss Cathby, who taught all eight grades, was a very +earnest soul dedicated to the proposition that the children in her care +must not grow up to wallow in the same morass of mingled ignorance and +superstition that surrounded their fathers and mothers. + +Miss Cathby had pointed out, and produced scientific statistics to +prove, that the moon was nothing more than a satellite of the earth. As +such, its influence over earth dwellers was strictly limited. The moon +was responsible for tides and other things about which Miss Cathby had +been very vague because she didn't know. But she did know that the moon +could not affect birth, death, or destiny. + +Old Joe had been the subject of another of Miss Cathby's lectures. He +was just a big coon, she said, though she mispronounced it "raccoon." It +was absurd even to think that he had been living in the Creeping Hills +forever. Old Joe's predecessor had also been just a big raccoon. Since +Old Joe was mortal, and like all mortals must eventually pass to his +everlasting reward, his successor would be in all probability the next +biggest raccoon. + +Harky conceded that she had something to offer. But it also seemed that +Mun had much on his side, and on the whole, Mun's conception of the real +and earnest life was far more interesting than Miss Cathby's. She got +her information from books that were all right but sort of small. Mun +took his lore from the limitless woods. + +"How long have us Mundees been here?" Harky asked. + +"My grandpa, your great-grandpa, settled this very farm fifty-one years +past come April nineteen," Mun said proudly. + +"Where did he come from?" + +"He never did say," Mun admitted. + +"Didn't nobody ask?" + +"'Twas thought best not to ask," Mun said. "Blast it, Harky! What's +chewin' on you? Ain't it enough to know where your grandpa come from?" + +"Why--why yes." + +Confused for the moment, Harky went back to fundamentals. His +great-grandfather had settled the Mundee farm fifty-one years ago. He +was thirteen. Thirteen from fifty-one left thirty-eight years that +Mundees had lived on the farm before Harky was even born. + +Confusion gave way to mingled awe and pride. Old Joe was not the only +tradition in the Creeping Hills. The Mundees were fully as famous and +had as much right to call themselves old-timers. For that matter, so did +Precious Sue. The last of a line of hounds brought to the Creeping Hills +by Mun's grandfather, her breed was doomed unless Mun found a suitable +mate for her. But better to let the breed die than to offer Precious Sue +an unworthy mate. + +Mun said, "Reckon we'd best get in." + +"Yes, Pa." + +Side by side they started down the soggy path toward the house. Precious +Sue left her bed on the porch and came to meet them. + +She was medium-sized, and her dark undercoat was dappled with bluish +spots, or ticks. Shredded ears bore mute testimony to her many battles +with coons. Though she ate prodigious meals, every slatted rib showed, +her paunch was lean, and knobby hip bones thrust over her back. +Outwardly, Precious Sue resembled nothing so much as an emaciated +alligator. + +For all the coon hunters of the Creeping Hills cared she could have +_been_ an alligator, as long as she continued to perform with such +consummate artistry on a coon's track. Though a casual observer might +have deduced that Precious Sue had trouble just holding herself up, she +had once disappeared for forty-eight hours. Mun finally found her under +the same tree, and holding the same coon, that she must have run up two +hours after starting. She was one of the very few hounds that had ever +forced Old Joe to seek a refuge in his magic sycamore, and no hound +could do more. + +Unfortunately, she lived under a curse. The only pup of what should have +been an abundant litter, a bad enough thing if considered by itself, +Precious Sue had been born on a wild night at the wrong time of the +moon. Therefore, she had a streak of wildness that must assert itself +whenever the moon was dark. If she were run at such times, she must +surely meet disaster. But as Precious Sue met and fell in beside them, +Harky thought only of his dream. + +"Do you think Old Joe will prowl tonight?" he asked his father. + +"What you drivin' at, Harky?" + +"I was thinking Old Joe might prowl, and come here, and Sue will run him +up that sycamore in the woodlot, and--" + +"Harky!" Mun thundered. "Heed what you say!" + +"Huh?" Harky asked bewilderedly. + +Mun shook a puzzled head. "I can't figger you, Harky. I can't figger you +a'tall. This is the dark of the moon!" + +"I forgot," Harky said humbly. + +"I reckon you ain't allus at fault for what runs on in that head of +yours." + +"Hadn't you ought to tie her up?" Harky questioned. + +"Sue can't abide ties and no coon'll come here tonight," Mun said +decisively. "Least of all, Old Joe." + +"But if he does--" Harky began. + +"Harky!" Mun thundered. "He won't!" + +"Yes, Pa." + +Long after he was supposedly in bed, Harky stood before his open window +listening to the song of the south wind. Sometimes he couldn't even +figure himself. + +There'd been last fall, when they jumped the big buck out of Garson's +slashing. Mun and Mellie Garson had taken its trail, but Harky had a +feeling about that buck. He'd felt that it would head for the +rhododendron thicket on Hoot Owl Ridge, and that in getting there it +would pass Split Rock. Harky went to sit on Split Rock. Not twenty +minutes later, the buck passed beside him. It was an easy shot. + +Old Joe would not come tonight because Mun said he wouldn't. But Harky +was unable to rid himself of a feeling that he would, and he was uneasy +when he finally went to bed. + +He slept soundly, but Harky had never been able to figure his sleep +either. Often he awakened with a feeling that something was due to +happen, and it always did. When the wild geese flew north or south, or a +thunder storm was due to break, Harky knew before he heard anything. +This night he sat up in bed with a feeling that he would hear something +very soon. + +He heard it, the muffled squawk of a hen. On a backwoods farm, at night, +a squawking hen means just one thing. Harky jumped out of bed and padded +to the door of his father's bedroom. + +"Pa." + +"What ya want?" + +"I heard a hen squawk." + +"Be right with ya." + +Harky was dressed and ready, with his shotgun in his hands, when Mun +came into the kitchen. Mun lighted a lantern, took his own shotgun from +its rack, and led the way to the chicken house. He knelt beside the +little door by which the chickens left and entered and his muffled word +ripped the air. + +"Look!" + +Harky looked. Seeming to begin and end at the little door, the biggest +coon tracks in the world were plain in the soft snow. Ten thousand +butterflies churned in his stomach. It was almost as though the whole +thing were his fault. + +He said, "Old Joe." + +Mun glanced queerly at his son, but he made no reply as he held his +lantern so it lighted the tracks. Harky trotted behind his father and +noted with miserable eyes where Sue's tracks joined Old Joe's. They came +to the flood surging over Willow Brook, and just at the edge a whole +section of ice had already caved in. + +Both sets of tracks ended there. + + + + +[Illustration] + + + + +SUE + + +After Mun and Harky entered the house, Precious Sue crawled into her +nest on the porch. The nest was an upended wooden packing case with a +door cut in front and a strip of horse blanket hanging over the door to +keep the wind out. The nest was carpeted with other strips of discarded +horse blanket. + +On cold nights, Sue shoved the dangling strip over the door aside with +her nose, went all the way in, let the horse blanket drop, and cared +little how the wind blew. Tonight, after due observance of the canine +tradition that calls for turning around three times before lying down, +she stuck her nose under the blanket, lifted it, and went to sleep with +her body inside but her head out. Her blissful sigh just before she +dozed off was her way of offering thanks for such a comfortable home. + +It was not for Sue to understand that in more ways than one the dog's +life might well be the envy of many a human. She had never wondered why +she'd been born or if life was worth living; she'd been born to hunt +coons, and every coon hunter, whether biped or quadruped, found life +eminently worth living. + +Though she often dreamed of her yesterdays, they were always pleasant +dreams, and she never fretted about her tomorrows. + +Five seconds after she went to sleep, Sue was reliving one of her +yesterdays. + +She was hot after a coon, a big old boar that was having a merry time +raiding Mun Mundee's shocked corn until Sue rudely interrupted. The coon +was a wanderer from far across the hills, and last night, with three +hounds on his trail, he had wandered unusually fast. When he finally +came to Mun's corn, he was hungry enough to throw caution to the winds. +And he knew nothing about Precious Sue. + +He did know how to react when she burst upon him suddenly. Running as +though he had nothing on his mind except the distance he might put +between Sue and himself, the coon shifted abruptly from full flight to +full stop. It was a new maneuver to Sue. She jumped clear over the coon +and rolled three times before she was able to recover. + +By the time she was ready to resume battle, the coon was making fast +tracks toward a little pond near the cornfield. With a six-foot lead on +Sue, he jumped into the pond. When Sue promptly jumped in behind him, +the coon executed a time-hallowed maneuver, sacred to all experienced +coons that are able to entice dogs into the water. He swam to and sat on +Sue's head. + +Amateur hounds, and some that were not amateurs, nearly always drowned +when the battle took this turn, but to Sue it was kindergarten stuff. +Rather than struggle to surface for a breath of air, she yielded and let +herself sink. The coon, no doubt congratulating himself on an absurdly +easy victory, let go. Sue came up beneath him, nudged him with her nose +to lift him clear of the water, clamped her jaws on his neck, and +marked another star on her private scoreboard. + +Of such heady stuff were her dreams made, and dreams sustained her +throughout the long winter, spring, and summer, when as a rule she did +not hunt. She could have hunted. There were bears, foxes, bobcats, and a +variety of other game animals in the Creeping Hills. All were beneath +the notice of a born coon hound who knew as much about coons as any +mortal creature can and who didn't want to know anything else. + +The squawking chicken brought her instantly awake. The wind was blowing +from the house toward Willow Brook, so that she could get no scent. But +she pin-pointed the sound, and she'd heard too many chickens squawk in +the night not to know exactly what they meant. Seconds later she was on +Old Joe's trail. + +She knew the scent, for she had been actively hunting for the past five +years and had run Old Joe an average of six times a year. But she saw +him in a different light from the glow in which he was bathed by Mun and +Harky Mundee. To them he was part coon and part legend. To Sue, though +he was the biggest, craftiest, and most dangerous she had ever trailed, +he was all coon and it was a point of honor to run him up a tree. + +When she came to Willow Brook, she saw the flood surging over the ice +and recognized it for the hazard it was. But except when they climbed +trees or went to earth in dens too small for her to enter, Sue had never +hesitated to follow where any coon led. She jumped in behind Old Joe, +and fate, in the form of the south wind, decided to play a prank. + +Ice over which Old Joe had passed safely a couple of seconds before +cracked beneath Sue. The snarling current broke the one big piece into +four smaller cakes and one of them, rising on end, fell to scrape the +side of Sue's head. Had it landed squarely it would have killed her. +Glancing, it left her dazed, but not so dazed that she was bereft of all +wit. + +Sue had swum too many creeks and ponds, and fought too many coons in the +water, not to know exactly how to handle herself there. Impulse bade her +surrender to the not at all unpleasant half dream in which she found +herself. Instinct made her fight on. + +Swept against unbroken ice, she hooked both front paws over it. Then she +scraped with her hind paws and, exerting an effort born of desperation, +fought her way back to the overflow surging on top of the ice. Once +there, still dazed and exhausted by the battle to save herself, she +could do nothing except keep her head above flood water that carried her +more than two miles downstream and finally cast her up on the bank. + +For an hour and a half, too weak even to stand, Sue lay where the water +had left her. Then, warned by half-heard but fully sensed rumblings and +grindings, she alternately walked and crawled a hundred yards farther +back into the forest and collapsed at the base of a giant pine. With +morning she felt better. + +Still shaky, but able to walk, she stood and remembered. Last night Old +Joe had come raiding. She had followed him to Willow Brook and lost the +trail there, thus leaving unfinished business that by everything a coon +hound knew must be finished. Sue returned to Willow Brook and sat +perplexedly down with her tail curled about her rear legs. + +During the night, while she slept, the ice had gone out as she'd been +warned by its first rumblings. She had heard nothing else, but she saw +ice cakes that weighed from a few pounds to a few tons thrown far up on +either bank. The moving ice had jammed a half mile downstream, and in +effect had created a temporary but massive dam. Harky Mundee could toss +a stone across Willow Brook's widest pool in summer, but a beaver would +think twice before trying to swim it now. + +With some idea that she had been carried downstream, Sue put her nose to +the ground and sniffed hopefully for five hundred yards upstream. It was +no use. Everything that normally had business along Willow Brook had +fled from the breaking ice. Sue had no idea as to how she would find Old +Joe's trail or even what she should do next. + +She whined lonesomely. Old Joe had eluded her again, which was no +special disgrace because there'd always be a next time. Since she could +not hunt, it would be ideal if she could return to the Mundee farm, but +she was afraid to try swimming the flood. + +Nosing about, Sue found a two-pound brown trout that had been caught and +crushed in the grinding ice and cast up on the bank. She ate the fish, +and with food her strength returned. With strength came a return of +hound philosophy. + +Since there was little point in fighting the unbeatable, and because +flooded Willow Brook held no charms, Sue wandered back into the forest. +Ordinarily she would have stayed there, eating whatever she could find +and returning to the Mundee farm after the flood subsided. But again +fate, or nature, or whatever it may be that plays with the lives of +human beings and coon hounds, saw fit to intervene. + +Sue had been born to hunt coons and she was dedicated to her birthright, +but the All-Wise Being who put the moon in the sky did so in the +interests of all romance. Sue yearned to meet a handsome boy friend. + +To conceive a notion was to execute it, and Sue began her search. She +had often hunted this area. For miles in any direction, on the far side +of Willow Brook, was wilderness. She did not know of any farmer, or even +any trapper, who might have a dog. But she had a sublime faith that if +only she kept going, she would find her heart's desire. + +Three days later, after passing up three farms that unfortunately were +staffed with lady dogs, Sue approached a fourth. It was little better +than a wilderness clearing, with a tiny barn, a couple of sheds, and a +one-room house. But Sue was not interested in the elite side of human +living, and the great black and tan hound that came roaring toward her +was handsome enough to make any girl's heart miss a beat. + +[Illustration] + +Sue waited coyly, for though to all outward appearances the huge hound +was intent only on tearing her to pieces, she knew when she was being +courted. They met, touched noses, wagged tails, and Sue became aware of +the man who appeared on the scene. + +He was a young man built on the same general proportions as a Percheron +stallion, and he hadn't had a haircut for about six months or a shave +for at least three years. But he knew a good hound when he saw one and +he had long since mastered the art of putting hounds at ease. His voice +was laden with magic when he called, + +"Here, girl. Come on, girl. Come on over." + +Because she was hungry, and saw nothing to distrust in the shaggy young +giant, but largely because the great black and tan hound paced amiably +beside her, Sue obeyed. She buried her nose in the dish of food the +young man offered her and started gobbling it up. + +So wholeheartedly did Sue give herself to satisfying her hunger that the +rope was about her neck and she was tied before she was even aware of +what had happened. + + * * * * * + +Paying not the least attention to the big bluebottle fly that buzzed her +nose, Sue stretched full-length and dozed in the sun. Trees that had +been bare when she came to Rafe Bradley's were full-leafed. Flowers +bloomed beneath them. Birds had long since ceased chirping threats to +each other and had settled down to the serious business of building +nests and raising families. + +First impressions of Rafe Bradley's farm were more than borne out by +subsequent developments. Rafe kept a good horse, but it was for riding +rather than plowing. Besides the horse, Rafe's domestic livestock +consisted of some pigs that ran wild in the woods until Rafe wanted +pork, which he collected with his rifle. + +Rafe, his horse, and his big hound had left early this morning to take +care of some important business in the woods. Since Rafe's only +important business was hunting something or other, it followed that he +was hunting now. Sue raised her head and blinked at the green border +around the clearing. + +Mun Mundee had told Harky that Sue could not abide a rope, and she +couldn't. But the rope was there, it had not been off since the day Rafe +put it there, and Sue could choose between giving herself a permanently +sore neck by fighting the rope and submitting. She did what a sensible +hound would do. + +If Rafe had not tied her, his big hound would have been sufficient +attraction to keep her around for at least a few days. After that, she +might have fallen in with life as it was lived at Rafe's and been happy +to remain. + +Rafe had tied her, and for that he could not be forgiven. Sue lived for +the day she would be free to return to Mun Mundee. With an abiding faith +that everything would turn out for the best if only she was patient, Sue +was sure that day would come. Until it did, she might as well sleep. + +The bluebottle fly, tiring of its futile efforts to annoy her, buzzed +importantly off in search of a more responsive victim. Sue opened one +bloodshot eye then closed it again. She sighed comfortably, went back to +sleep, and was shortly enjoying a happy dream about another coon hunt. + +When the sun reached its peak she rose, lapped a drink from the dish of +water Rafe had left for her, and sought the shade of her kennel. Rafe +would return with evening. She would be fed, sleep in her kennel, and +tomorrow would be another day. + +Rafe did not come with twilight. The rope trailing beside her like a +rustling worm, Sue came out of her kennel and whined. She was not +lonesome for Rafe, but she was hungry. Sue paced anxiously for as far as +the rope would let her go. + +Whippoorwills, flitting among the trees at the borders of the clearing, +began their nightly calling. She lapped another drink and resumed her +hungry pacing. Then, just before early evening became black night, the +whippoorwills stopped calling. A moment later it became apparent that +someone was coming. + +Their arrival was heralded by an unearthly clatter and rattling that +puzzled Sue until they entered the clearing. Then she saw that they were +two men in a car, a marvelous vehicle held together with hay wire and +composed of so many different parts of so many different cars that even +an expert would have had difficulty determining the original make. The +car quivered to a halt and one of the two men bellowed at the dark +house, + +"Rafe! Hey, Rafe! Whar the blazes be ya, Rafe?" + +There was a short silence. The second man broke it with a plaintive, + +"Kin ya tie that? First night in two years coons raid our ducks, Rafe +an' that hound of his gotta be chasin'!" + +"He would," the first man growled. + +The second's roving eye lighted on the kennel and then noticed Sue. +"Thar's another hound." + +"Ya don't know," the first said, "that it'll hunt coons." + +The second declared, "If it's Rafe's, it'll hunt coons. I'm goin' to git +it." + +"Keerful," the first man warned. "That Major hound'll take the arm off +anybody 'cept Rafe what tries to touch it." + +"Le's see what this'n does." + +The second man left the hybrid car and approached Sue, who waited with +appeasing eyes and gently wagging tail. When the man laid his hand on +her head, Sue licked his fingers. + +"Tame's a kitten," the man declared jubilantly. "I'll fetch her." + +He untied the rope, and the instant she was free, Sue slipped aside and +raced toward the woods. Not in the least affected by the anguished, +"Here, doggie! Come on back, doggie!" that rose behind her, she entered +the forest at exactly the same point she'd left it to meet Rafe +Bradley's hound. + +The cries faded and only the whisper of the wind kept her company as Sue +traveled on. Suddenly there was a great need that had not existed before +to put distance between herself and Rafe Bradley's clearing. Sue +traveled until near morning, then crawled gratefully beneath the thick +branches of a wind-toppled pine. She turned around and around to smooth +a bed. + +The sun was just rising when her pup was born. + + * * * * * + +Almost five months after she left it, Precious Sue came once again into +her own land. Where she had once been gaunt, she was now little more +than a skeleton. But the pup that frisked beside her, and was marked +exactly like her, was fat and healthy enough. There just hadn't been +enough food for two. + +Precious Sue fell, and the pup came prancing to leap upon her, seize her +ear, and pull backwards while it voiced playful growls. Sue got up. Head +low, staggering, she labored over a fallen sapling that the pup leaped +easily. She reached the top of the hill she was trying to climb. + +From the summit, she saw Willow Brook sparkling like a silver ribbon in +the sunshine. Just beyond were the buildings of the Mundee farm. Sue +sighed happily, almost ecstatically, and lay down a second time. + +She did not get up. + + + + +[Illustration] + + + + +HARKY GOES FISHING + + +When Mun sent him out to hoe corn, Harky knew better than to protest or +evade. An outright refusal would instantly bring the flat of Mun's hand +against the nearest part of Harky's anatomy that happened to be in +reach. Evasion would rouse Mun's suspicions, and like as not bring a +surveillance so close that Harky would find escape impossible. + +Campaigns must be planned. When Mun said, "You go hoe the corn," Harky +answered meekly, "Yes, Pa," and he did his best to seem enthusiastic as +he shouldered the hoe and strode off toward the cornfield. + +The field was a full three hundred yards from the house, and if one were +fleet enough of foot, one might throw one's hoe down the instant one +arrived and simply start running. Harky had long ago learned the +futility of such tactics. + +Mun was winded like a bear, gifted with the speed of a greyhound, and he +knew all the hiding places Harky might be able to reach if all he had +was a three-hundred-yard start. He knew some that were even farther +away. When it came to finding his son, Harky sometimes believed, Mun had +a nose fully as keen as Precious Sue's when she was sniffing out a coon. + +Sue provided an interesting diversion of thought as Harky marched +manfully toward the cornfield. Neither she nor Old Joe had been seen +since that fateful night in February, and though of course Old Joe +seemed to be immortal, available evidence indicated that Sue had been +swept under the ice and drowned in Willow Brook. + +It could be, but Harky had a feeling about Sue. She couldn't have been +more than a couple of jumps behind when Old Joe jumped into Willow +Brook, and if one had escaped, why hadn't both? Though there was always +a possibility that the ice had held for Old Joe and broken for Sue, in +Harky's opinion, the current where the ice broke should not have been +too strong for a swimmer of Sue's talent. + +Naturally the catastrophe had not gone unchallenged. Except for +essential tasks, farm work ended the day after Sue disappeared. As Mun +explained it, a body could always get more cows or pigs, or even another +farm. But there was only one coon hound like Precious Sue. + +Mun was not unduly optimistic when he began the search, for after all +Sue had run in the dark of the moon. But the fact that Sue was doomed by +the gods did not prevent Mun's pressing the hunt with utmost vigor. Mun +and Harky traveled up Willow Brook and down, visiting every neighbor for +nine miles in one direction and eleven in the other. + +Mellie Garson hadn't seen Sue. Though Mellie had not seen her, he +recognized a genuine emergency and joined the hunt for her. So did Raw +Stanfield, Butt Johnson, Bear Pen Crawford, Pine Heglin, and Mule +Domster. After two weeks it was sadly concluded that Precious Sue had +indeed placed herself beyond hope of redemption when she took after Old +Joe in the dark of the moon. The searchers gathered in Mun Mundee's +kitchen, decided that Sue's mortal remains would come to rest an +undetermined number of miles down Willow Brook, since it was impossible +to tell where the breakup would carry her, and they drank a solemn toast +to the memory of a great coon hound. + +And Harky still had a feeling. + +He reached the cornfield, and, as though his heart were really in it, +started hoeing at the right place. The right place, naturally, was the +side nearest the house. Mun Mundee would have reason to wonder if Harky +evinced too much interest in starting near the woods. As he began the +first row, which was thirty yards long when one was not hoeing it and +thirty miles when one was, Harky mentally reviewed his caches of fishing +tackle. + +Upstream, thirty steps north, eight east, and ten south from a round +rock above the first riffle, which in turn was above the first pool +where a snapping turtle with a pockmarked shell lived, a line and three +hooks were hidden in a hollow stump. Downstream, on a straight line +between the pool where Precious Sue had jumped an almost black coon and +the white birch in which she'd bayed it, a line and two hooks were +concealed in last year's nest of a song sparrow. + +Harky worried about that cache. It had been all right two days ago +because he'd seen it, and most birds had already nested. But some would +nest a second time, and the ruins of this old nest might be summarily +appropriated for a new one. His line would disappear, too, and like as +not his hooks. Birds were not particular as long as they had something +to hold their nest together. As soon as he found another place not +likely to attract Mun's eye, perhaps he'd better move his tackle from +the nest. Good hooks and line were not so easy come by that a man could +get reckless with them. + +Leaning slightly forward, the position in which Mun thought the wielder +of a hoe would do most work, and slanting his hoe at the angle Mun +favored, Harky sighed resignedly as the blade uncovered a fat and +wriggling earthworm. He did not dare pick it up and put it in his +pocket--Harky had never seen the need of bait containers--for there were +times when Mun seemed to have as many eyes as a centipede had legs, and +an eagle's sight in all of them. If he saw Harky put anything in his +pocket--and he would see--he'd be present on the double. + +Well, there were plenty of worms to be had by probing in moist earth +near pools and sloughs. The trouble with them was that they were +accustomed to water, and they did not wriggle much when draped on a hook +and lowered into it. Garden worms, on the other hand, were so shocked by +an unfamiliar environment that they wriggled furiously and attracted +bigger fish. + +The sun grew hot on Harky's back, but his body was too young, too lithe, +and too well-conditioned, to rebel at this relatively light labor. His +soul ached. Of all the vegetables calculated to bedevil human beings, he +decided, growing corn was the worst. + +He tried to find solace by thinking of the good features of corn, and +happily alighted on the fact that it attracts coons. Also, it tasted +good when stripped milky from the stalk and either boiled or roasted. +However, the coons would come anyhow. If there was no corn, they'd still +be attracted by the apples in Mun's orchard. And if the Mundees had no +corn, neighbors who did would be glad to share with them. Meanwhile, +this patch must be hoed a few million times. + +Harky pondered a question that has bemused all great philosophers: how +can humans be so foolish? + +Working at that rhythmic speed which Mun considered ideal for hoeing +corn, missing not a single stroke, Harky went on. Discontent became +anguish, and anguish mounted to torture, but Harky knew that the wrong +move now might very well be ruinous. Like all people with great plans +and strong opposition, he must suffer before he gained his ends. But +he'd suffer only half as much if the master strategy he'd worked out did +not fail him. + +Exactly halfway across the first row, Harky turned and started back on +the second. + +It was a bold move, and Harky's heart began to flutter the instant he +made it, but the situation called for bold moves. Harky did not break +the rhythm of his hoeing or look up when he heard Mun approach, and he +managed to look convincingly astonished when Mun asked, + +"What ya up to, Harky?" + +Harky glanced up quickly. "Oh. Hello, Pa!" + +"I said," Mun repeated, "what ya up to?" + +"Why--What do ya mean, Pa?" + +"You know blasted well what I mean," Mun growled. "You didn't do but +half the first row." + +"Oh," Harky might have been a patient teacher instructing a backward +pupil. He gestured toward tall trees that, in a couple of hours, would +keep the sun from the far half of the corn patch. "The sun, Pa. It's +high and warm now, but it'll be high and hot time I get this first half +done. Then I can work in shade." + +Mun scowled, suspecting a trick and reasonably sure there was one, but +unable to fly in the face of such clear-cut logic. If he thought of it, +he conceded, he'd plan to hoe the corn that way himself. As he turned on +his heel and started walking away, he flung another warning over his +shoulder. + +"I hope ya don't aim to scoot off an' go fishin'." + +"Oh no, Pa!" + +Suddenly, because he'd have to hoe only half the corn patch, Harky's +burdens became half as heavy. It had worked, as he'd hoped it would, and +the most tangled knot in his path was now smooth string. Of course he +was not yet clear. But even Mun could not watch him constantly, and once +he was near enough the woods to duck into them, Harky would be satisfied +with a ninety-second start. + +Two hours later, having hoed his way to the edge of the woods, Harky +dropped his hoe and started running. + +When Mun Mundee would shortly be on one's trail one must ignore nothing, +and all this had been planned, too. Harky took the nearest route to +Willow Brook. + +So far so good, but strictly amateur stuff. Mun, who'd need no blueprint +to tell him where Harky had gone, would also take the shortest path to +Willow Brook. Harky put his master strategy into effect. + +Coming to a patch of mud on the downstream side of a drying slough, +Harky ran straight across it the while he headed upstream. He emerged on +a patch of new grass that held no tracks, leaped sideways to a boulder, +and hop-skipped across Willow Brook on exposed boulders. Reaching the +far side, he ran far enough into the forest to be hidden by foliage and +headed downstream. + +With the comfortable feeling of achievement that always attends a job +well done, Harky slowed to a walk. Mun, hot in pursuit and even more hot +in the head, would see the tracks leading upstream. Thereafter, for at +least a reasonable time, he would stop to think of nothing else. By the +time he did, and searched all the upstream hiding places, Harky would be +a couple of miles down. He knew of several pools that had their full +quota of fish, and that were so situated that a man could lie behind +willows, fish, and see a full quarter of a mile upstream the while he +remained unseen. + +His heart light and his soul at peace, Harky almost started to whistle. +He thought better of it. + +Mun Mundee never had mastered the printed word. But his eyes were geared +to tracks and his ears to the faintest noises. If Harky whistled, he +might find his fishing suddenly and rudely interrupted. The +softest-footed bobcat had nothing on Mun when it came to silent stalks. +More than once, when Harky thought his father was fuming at home, Mun +had risen up beside him and applied the flat of his hand where it did +the most good. + +Harky contented himself with dancing along, and he never thought of the +reckoning that must be when he returned home tonight, because in the +first place tonight was a long ways off. In the second, there were +always reckonings of one sort or another. A man just had to take care he +got his reckoning's worth. + +Harky halted and stood motionless as any boulder on Dewberry Knob. A doe +with twin fawns, and none of the three even suspecting that they were +being watched, moved delicately ahead of him. Harky frowned. + +It was a mighty puzzling thing about deer, and indeed, about all wild +creatures. Except for very young poultry, a man could tell at a glance +whether most farm animals were boys or girls, and that was that. He +could never be sure about wild ones, largely because he could never come +near enough, and there might be something in Mellie Garson's theory that +the young of all wild creatures were alike, a sort of neuter gender, +until they were six months old. Then they talked it over among +themselves and decided which were to be males and which females. Thus +they always struck a proper balance. + +It was a sensible system if Mellie were correct, though Harky was by no +means sure that he was. Neither could he be certain Mellie was wrong, +and as the doe and her babies moved out of sight, Harky wondered what +sex the two fawns would choose for themselves when they were old enough +to decide. Two does maybe, or perhaps two bucks, though it would be +better if one were a doe and the other a buck. Both were needed, and the +Creeping Hills without deer would be nearly as barren as they would +without coons. + +When the doe and her babies were far enough away so that there was no +chance of frightening them--a man never would get in rifleshot of a buck +if he scared it while it was still a fawn--Harky went on down the creek. +He stopped to watch a redheaded woodpecker rattling against a dead pine +stub. He frowned. The next job Mun had slated for him was putting new +shingles on the chicken house, and the woodpecker's rattling was +painfully similar to a pounding hammer moving at about the same speed +that Mun would expect Harky to maintain. + +Obviously finding something it did not like, the woodpecker stopped +rattling, voiced a strident cry, and flew away. It was a bad omen, and +Harky's frown deepened. He'd seen himself in the woodpecker. Just as the +bird had come to grief, so Harky was sure to meet misfortune if he tried +shingling the chicken house. + +He'd have to think his way out of that chore, too. But the shingling was +still far in the future, and the only future worth considering was +embodied in what happened between now and sundown. Troubles could be met +when they occurred. + +When Harky was opposite the pool where Precious Sue had jumped the +almost black coon, he turned at right angles. It was scarcely discreet +to go all the way and show one's self at the edge of Willow Brook, for +though Mun should have been lured upstream, he might have changed his +mind and come down. + +As soon as he could see the pool through the willows that bordered it, +Harky turned and sighted on the white birch in which Sue had finally +treed the coon. + +He was about to start toward it but remained rooted. Suddenly he heard +Precious Sue growl. Not daring to believe, but unwilling to doubt his +own ears, Harky turned back to the pool. + +He peered through the willows and saw the pup. + + + + +[Illustration] + + + + +DUCKFOOT + + +By some mischance, one of the willows bordering the pool grew at a +freakish angle. A two-pound sucker, probably coon-mauled or +osprey-dropped somewhere upstream, had washed down and anchored beneath +the misshapen tree. Its white belly was startlingly plain in the clear +water. + +When Harky came on the scene, the pup was trying to get that sucker. +Harky almost called, certain that he had finally found Precious Sue. +Then he knew his error. The pup was marked exactly like Sue, and at +first glance it seemed exactly the size of Sue. But though it was big +for its age, and was further magnified by the water in which it swam, +undoubtedly it was a puppy. + +Since wild horses couldn't have torn him away, Harky stayed where he was +and watched. + +The pup couldn't possibly have scented the fish, for the water would +kill scent. Therefore he must have seen it and known what he was looking +at. Now, despite a certain awkwardness that was to be expected in a pup, +he seemed as comfortably at home in the water as Old Joe was in Mun +Mundee's chicken house. + +He made a little circle, head cocked to one side so that he might peer +downward as he swam. For a moment he held still, paws moving just enough +to keep him from drifting in the gentle current. Then he dived. + +Smooth as a fishing loon, the pup went down headfirst and straight to +his objective. Reaching the anchored sucker, he swiped at it with a +front paw. The sucker did not move. The pup, who did not seem to know +that he was where no dog should be and trying what no dog should try, +made another attempt. Failing a second time, he tried a third. + +Wide-eyed and open-mouthed, Harky voiced the astonishment that he had +not dared express while the pup was in hearing: + +"Jinglin' all peelhaul! Sue's pup for sure!" + +There couldn't be the slightest doubt. A hound pup was one thing. A +hound pup that looked exactly like Sue, down to the last blue tick, +might leave room for argument. But there was no disputing the lineage of +a hound pup that even growled exactly like Sue. Harky had heard her do +it a hundred times, always when she was frustrated by something or +other. + +Once more his feeling had served him well. Sue had not drowned in Willow +Brook that black night when she was so hot on Old Joe's trail. However, +neither had she followed him across. As close as she'd been, she'd have +treed him sure. Even though Old Joe would have taken care to climb a +tree with one or more escape routes, Sue would have barked as soon as +she got him up. Harky and Mun, who'd lingered near the broken ice for +the better part of an hour, would have heard her bark. + +Something had happened, and though Harky did not know what it was, he +suspected that the broken ice provided the proper clue. If it had +broken under Sue, and evidently it had, perhaps she'd been hurt. Somehow +or other she'd made it across Willow Brook and the breakup had kept her +there. Trapped, unable to come home, she'd gone wandering in search of a +mate. She'd found one. + +Which one? A hound obviously, and a big one, but Harky knew every hound +this side of Willow Brook, and neither the blood nor the characteristics +of any were evident in the pup. It must have been a coon hound, for none +except coon hounds had reason to work in the water, and the pup combined +Sue's aquatic skill with some other hound's genius. A hound that could +not only dive, but apparently was capable of remaining submerged for as +long as it chose, was a marvel fully as astounding as the two-headed +calf that had been born to Mellie Garson's mule-footed cow. + +It was what one might expect from a mule-footed cow, Mun opined, and +anyway the calf lived only a few hours. The pup was not only alive, but +Harky himself was watching it. This day, he told himself, would long be +remembered in the annals of the Creeping Hills. + +The pup, finally needing air, glided up through the water as gracefully +as a trout rising to a fly. Not knowing whether he'd spook, Harky held +very still. But he could not control his imagination, and, after the pup +dived, what held him down? Fish were able to do as they pleased because, +as everyone knew, they gulped water to make themselves heavy when they +wanted to go down and spit it out to eject ballast when they wanted to +come up. Loons, grebes, and some species of ducks had mastered the same +trick. But the only animals that knew it, probably because they spent so +much time in the water that they could see for themselves what the fish +did, were beavers and muskrats. + +Harky had a sudden feeling. Far and away the greatest coon hound ever to +run the Creeping Hills, Precious Sue would never run again. If she were +alive, she'd be with the pup. But Harky's new feeling had to do with the +thought that the pup was destined to become even greater than his +mother. + +The pup growled once more. Harky rubbed his eyes, certain that he was +hearing Sue. He looked away and back again before he convinced himself +that he was watching the pup. + +Swimming so smoothly that there was scarcely a ripple in his wake, the +pup made another circle. Harky's heart pumped furiously as he realized +what was happening. + +The pup, who probably had tried to retrieve the fish a dozen times, was +not working blindly. Having learned from past mistakes, he was planning +this new attempt in a brand new way. Rather than go straight down, he +turned, swam four feet away, then turned again and dived at a forty-five +degree angle. + +This time he aimed at the willow stalk rather than the anchored fish. He +struck with his shoulder so hard that the willow's topmost leaves +rattled, but the stalk moved aside and the fish floated free. + +Floating slowly upward, the fish was within three inches of the surface +when it was seized by a swift little current and whisked away. Breaking +water exactly where the sucker should have been, the pup was bewildered. +But he remained at a loss for only a split second. + +[Illustration] + +Splashing for the first time, he churned mightily, raised his +forequarters high, looked all around, and sighted the fish. Now it was +about a dozen feet away. The pup overtook it, grasped it in his mouth, +and circled back toward shore. + +With one mighty leap, Harky landed in knee-deep water. He hadn't dared +move while the pup was in the shallows near the bank, for there was too +much chance that it might slip around him, run into the brush, and +escape. But not even a pup as talented as this one could swim fifteen +feet and get away. + +The water rose to Harky's thighs, then to his belt. Watching him, but +not dropping the sucker, the pup made a downstream circle designed to +carry him around Harky and into the willows. His eyes were calculating, +his manner the calm and detached air of one who knows exactly what he's +doing. + +[Illustration] + +Water lapped Harky's armpits, and he knew that he was going to win but +not by a comfortable margin. With another foot or so of lead, or a +second more, the pup would get away. + +When a yard and a half separated them, Harky flung himself forward, +enfolded the pup with both arms, and clasped it to his chest. Being +caught, the pup dropped his fish. Sinuous as a snake and swift as a +hummingbird, he brought his head around, scored Harky's arm with +needle-sharp puppy teeth, and blood seeped out of the scratches. + +"Ouch!" Harky gritted. "Leetle devil!" + +Holding the pup with his right arm, he clamped his left hand around its +neck so the pup could not turn and bite again. The pup whined. When +Harky petted him gently, his whine changed to a warning growl. Harky +pondered the entire situation. + +Here was the proper place to teach manners, but the pup was not without +justice on his side. He had located the fish and worked hard to get it. +Therefore he should have it. Now in quiet water, the fish was bobbing +against Harky's chest. He let go of the pup's neck, grabbed at the fish, +and the pup bit him again before he was able to grasp it. + +"Cut it out!" Harky ejaculated. "I'm just trying to help you!" + +Now that the fish was in Harky's hand, the pup forgot all about biting. +He extended his muzzle, licked his chops, and wriggled. When Harky held +the fish near enough, the pup bit off a chunk of tail and swallowed it +whole. Three bites later, the fish was eaten. + +"You ain't just hungry," Harky commented. "You're starved." + +The pup sighed, snuggled against Harky's chest, and then turned to look +him full in the face. Harky looked back. The pup was Sue all over again +except for his eyes. Hers were gentle. His could be, but they could also +be proud and fierce. Harky thought of Mun. + +"I think you'd as soon be friends," Harky said, "but something tells me +nobody will ever take a switch to you. Whoever thinks you need a hiding +had best use a club." + +Oddly as though he wanted to shake hands, the pup raised a forepaw to +Harky's left palm. Harky's heart skipped a beat. He gulped, wondering if +he felt what he thought he did and not daring immediately to feel again. +Then he did and almost threw the pup back into the pool. + +"If I hadn't felt it!" he gasped, "I couldn't no ways believe it!" + +No lightning flashed in the blue sky and no thunder pealed. Bright day +did not turn to black night. Harky felt the paw again, then steeled +himself to look. He gulped, but because no supernatural forces descended +upon him, he first felt and then looked at the pup's other three paws. + +There was no shade of doubt. Each of the pup's toes was joined to the +next by a webbing of skin. Sue had given birth to a duck-footed hound! + +Suddenly it occurred to Harky that he was still waist-deep in Willow +Brook, and that nothing special was to be gained by staying there. +Carrying the pup, who seemed satisfied to be carried now that he was no +longer so hungry, Harky waded back to the bank. His awe mounted. Since +he was born with a duck's feet, no wonder Sue's pup could swim like a +duck. Dripping water, Harky climbed the bank. + +"What are we going to do with you, Duckfoot?" he asked. + +Duckfoot answered that question by wriggling, rolling sidewise, and +jumping to the ground. Harky sighed with relief. If the pup was allied +with witches--and how else could duck feet on a dog be explained?--now +was the time for him to disappear in a flash of flame and a cloud of +smoke and return to the infernal regions from which he had emerged. + +He did nothing except sit down, blink solemnly at Harky, and wag his +tail. Harky had a fleeting thought that almost frightened him all over +again. Duckfoot had certainly been touched by sinister forces that no +man ever saw. + +Man sometimes heard them when they shrieked on the midnight wind or +moaned among the forest trees, and decidedly they were better left +alone. But suppose, just suppose, that Duckfoot was more hound than +spirit? What if the good, as embodied in the hound, was powerful enough +to overcome the bad, which was surely represented in webbed feet on a +dog? If Duckfoot gave his allegiance to any man ... + +Harky trembled when he considered such possibilities. Old Joe himself, +who'd been running the Creeping Hills for all of time, could not run +away from a duck-footed hound! + +In sudden near panic Harky swooped, caught Duckfoot, clutched him +tightly, and raced up Willow Brook. He needed experienced counsel. Mun, +who knew far more than he about such matters, was the man to advise him. + +It never occurred to Harky that deserved punishment awaited his return. +And it never occurred to Mun, who knew the ways of his son, that Harky +would even think of coming home until he had enjoyed his full day. The +hiding wouldn't be any harder. + +Mun's first fleeting thought was that Harky had gone insane. Then he +noticed the pup in Harky's arms and came incredulously forward. + +"What the blazes?" + +"Look!" + +Harky put Duckfoot down. The pup gave Mun a sober and very critical +inspection, then came forward to sniff his shoes. + +"Sue's pup!" Mun ejaculated. + +Harky looked curiously at his father. He'd never thought much about Mun +except that, when it came to running away from trifling farm tasks to +engage in worthwhile pursuits, he was a mighty hard man to fool. All he +knew at the moment was that, for the first time since that dreadful +night when Sue disappeared, Mun looked happy. + +Harky fidgeted. He'd like it well enough if Mun always looked happy, but +he dared not assume the fearful responsibility of pronouncing judgment +on Duckfoot. Nor was it for him to bring a hound that was only part +hound into the household. Not even if the hound part was all Precious +Sue. Harky steeled himself, caught up Duckfoot, and extended his paw. + +"Look!" + +For a moment Mun did not speak. Then he discovered his voice. + +"Goshamighty! Whar'd ye git that pup?" + +"In the pool by the shale bank he was, trying to get a sucker from +beneath that crookety willow--" + +Mun listened attentively, and when Harky finished he cleared his throat. +But he did not speak for a full forty-five seconds. + +"I got it figgered now," he said seriously. "When Sue run off that +night, she missed Old Joe, but now I know how come she didn't drown. A +duck pulled her out of the water." + +"A duck?" Harky questioned. + +"Not jest a barnyard duck," Mun said, "an' not jest a wild duck neither. +It was some big ol' duck, mebbe bigger'n Sue herself, what's been +settin' back in the woods for no man knows how many years, jest waitin' +to put a spell on Sue." + +"What'll we do, Pa?" Harky asked worriedly. + +"Watch Duckfoot," Mun declared. "Watch him close an' shoot him the +minute we find he's puttin' spells on us. Mebbe he won't. He's anyhow +half Sue an' mebbe that'll keep the half that ain't down. Leave him go, +Harky." + +Harky put Duckfoot down. Just at that moment the single forlorn duck +that shared the chicken house with Mun's chickens, chose to stroll past. +Duckfoot leaped ecstatically at it, overtook it, bore it down in a +flurry of threshing wings, and looked very pleased with himself. + +"Sue done that," Mun declared. "She knows what she's fetched on us, an' +she's tryin' to make up. But we still got to have a care. Jest as Sue +was under a spell in the dark of the moon, Duckfoot is bewitched by +ducks." + +"What about the duck?" Harky asked practically. + +"Take it behind the barn an' pick it," Mun directed. "We'll have it for +supper. 'Twas sort of a piddlin' duck anyhows." + +[Illustration] + + + + +[Illustration] + + + + +THE SUMMER OF OLD JOE + + +Downstream from the Mundee farm, approximately three miles away as the +water flows, Willow Brook formed two channels. The main stream, a series +of conventional pools and ripples, went sedately about the business of +every creek and pursued its way to a river that in turn emptied into the +sea. The secondary channel, as though weary of doing the same thing in +the same way all the time, stole off to go exploring by itself. + +In high water this channel dutifully accepted its share of the spring +freshet. But even then it never became too big for its banks; there was +plenty of room for surplus water in a swamp through which it dawdled. + +In low water, the entrance to the channel was a bare seepage that +struggled painfully around rocks and was so unimpressive that few human +residents of the Creeping Hills ever bothered to go farther. Only Mun +and Harky Mundee and Mellie Garson knew that some of the best fishing in +Willow Brook was down this channel. + +Old Joe knew it, and on this September night he was heading toward one +of his favorite pools. + +Though the days remained pleasantly warm, the heat of summer was past +and the nights were cool without being cold. A light frost draped +shriveled grasses, and a first-quarter moon that shone palely upon them +made it appear as though someone had been very careless with a large +quantity of silver flakes. It was exactly the sort of night Old Joe +favored above all others. + +He was very well satisfied with himself and his accomplishments as he +pursued a leisurely way from a cave in a ledge of rocks where he'd lain +up all day. In the summer now ending he'd added new luster to his +already shining name and enjoyed himself thoroughly while doing it. +Living, seldom a vexing matter for a hunter of his talents, had been +ridiculously simple. + +Weatherwise, with exactly the right balance of rain and sun, and no +prolonged spells of excessive heat, conditions could not have been more +ideal. Besides plenty of wild fruit in the woods, gardens bore a bumper +crop and Old Joe helped himself whenever he felt like it, which was at +least every other night. In addition, Pine Heglin had decided that it +would be a wonderful idea if he raised some guinea fowl, and Old Joe had +indeed found it wonderful. + +In the first place, Pine Heglin had ideas, which is laudable enough if +they are good ideas. Most of Pine's were not, but he never convinced +himself of that. Pine had an idea that a mongrel was far more effective +on coons than any hound can ever be, and his current pride and joy was a +big dog of many breeds that Pine considered a canine genius. Actually, +the dog hadn't sense enough to get up if he were sitting on a sand burr. + +In the second place, most of the thirty guinea fowl that Pine acquired +ran true to type and headed for the woods the instant they were +released. Though they set up a hideous squawking whenever Old Joe +raided their roost, the noise never disconcerted him in the smallest +degree. Pine's dog, who couldn't have found a skunk in a packing box, +was even less bothersome, and Pine was too stubborn to call in some +neighbor who had a good hound. + +Old Joe, who'd run ahead of all but two of the coon hounds along Willow +Brook, and who feared none of them, happily raided every garden except +Mun Mundee's and Mellie Garson's. He kept away from them because there +was a new hound--Duckfoot at Mun's and Morning Glory at +Mellie's--roaming each farm. Old Joe wasn't especially afraid of them +either. But he had not had an opportunity to find out what they could +do, and he hadn't lived to his present size and age by taking foolish +chances. + +He hadn't the least doubt that in the course of time both Duckfoot and +Morning Glory would be on his trail. Old Joe intended to pick the time +and place. Future actions in regard to both hounds would be based upon +what he found out then. + +In spite of the rich living the farms provided whenever he saw fit to +take it, Old Joe was far too much the gourmet to spurn the delicacies of +the woods and waters. The only reason he did not raid farms every night +was that sometimes he felt like eating fresh-water mussels, sometimes he +craved fish, sometimes he preferred frogs, and sometimes he yearned for +crawfish. Tonight he was in a mood for crawfish. + +Coming in sight of Willow Brook's adventurous channel, the big coon +halted and stood perfectly still. His was the rapt air of a poetic soul +so overcome by the wonders of the night that he must savor them, and +perhaps that did account in part for Old Joe's attitude. More important, +he'd long ago learned never to cross his bridges until he'd found what +was on them, and Old Joe wanted to determine what else might be prowling +the channel before he became too interested in hunting crawfish. Finding +nothing to warrant concern, he moved nearer the water's edge. + +He knew every inch of this channel. The trickle that fed it in low water +remained a trickle for a bit more than a hundred yards. Then there were +three deep pools separated by gentle ripples. The channel snaked through +the forest, pursued a devious route, dozed through a swamp, and rejoined +Willow Brook proper three-quarters of a mile from where the pair +separated. + +The pools and ripples were the proper places to catch fish, the swamp +yielded frogs and mussels, and the pool beside which Old Joe halted was +the best in the entire channel for crawfish. Old Joe advanced to the +edge of the pool, but he did not at once start fishing. + +The ambitious first-quarter moon slanted a beam downward in such a +fashion that it glanced in a dazzling manner from something directly in +front of Old Joe's nose. Spellbound, he stared for a full two minutes. + +He yearned to reach out and grasp whatever this might be, and it was +half a mussel shell that had been shucked here by a muskrat and fallen +white side up. But though he might safely have retrieved this treasure, +Old Joe sighed, circled two yards around it, and waded into the pool. +Trappers who know all about a coon's inclination to put a paw on +anything shiny often bait their traps with nothing else. + +Once in the pool, Old Joe went about his fishing with a businesslike +precision born of vast experience. Crawfish, whose only means of offense +are the pincerlike claws attached to their front end, back away from +danger, and this bit of natural history was basic to Old Joe's hunting +lore. He slid one front paw beneath each side of a small stone and was +ready. There were crawfish under every stone in this pool. Whichever paw +Old Joe wriggled, a crawfish would be sure to back into the other. + +Before he had a chance to stir either paw, he withdrew both and sat up +sputtering. Another coon was coming. As though it were not outrageous +enough for a coon or anything else to trespass on a pool that Old Joe +had marked for his private fishing, the stranger paid not the slightest +attention to his warning growl. + +Obviously the intruder needed a lesson in manners and Old Joe would be +delighted to teach it. When the strange coon came near enough, he +discovered the reason for its lack of courtesy. It was a mere baby, a +little spring-born male, and it hadn't learned manners. But it would. +Old Joe launched his charge. + +The trespasser stopped, squalled in terror, and with Old Joe in hot +pursuit, turned to race full speed back in the direction from which he +had come. Seventy-five yards from where he started, Old Joe rounded a +tussock and stopped so suddenly that his chin almost scraped a furrow +in the sand. + +Just in front of him, her bristled fur making her appear twice her usual +size, was the same mate whose den tree he'd sought out when he left the +great sycamore in February. Old Joe was instantly transformed from an +avenger bent on punishment to a husband bent on appeasement. Experience +had taught him how to cope with every situation except that which must +arise when he chased his own son, whom he did not recognize, and came +face to face with his mate, whom he definitely did. + +Old Joe had time for one amiable chitter. Then, in the same motion, she +was upon and all over him. Her teeth slashed places that Old Joe hadn't +previously known were vulnerable while her four paws, that seemed +suddenly to have become forty, raked. For a moment he cowered. Then, +since she was obviously in no mood to listen even if he had known how to +explain that it was all a mistake, he turned in inglorious flight. + +She chased him a hundred yards and turned back. Old Joe kept running. He +reached the other channel, swam Willow Brook, climbed the opposite bank, +and finally slowed to a fast walk. He hadn't seen his mate since they'd +left her den tree to go their separate ways, and he hadn't had a single +thought for either his wife or his two sons and three daughters. + +He had one now, a very profound one. They could have the pool where +crawfish abounded and, for that matter, both channels of Willow Brook at +least for this night. Having met his match, Old Joe hadn't the least +desire to meet her again. + +He put another half mile between them before he considered himself +reasonably safe. With the feeling that he was finally secure, came a +realization that his dignity had been sadly ruffled. He was also hungry, +but broken pride could be mended and hunger satisfied with one of Pine +Heglin's few remaining guinea hens. + +No longer threatened, Old Joe became his usual arrogant self. Despite +Pine's exalted opinion of his big dog, Old Joe knew the creature for the +idiot it was. The guinea hens, though wild, were stupid enough to seek +the same roost every night, and they roosted in a grove of small pines. +Old Joe, who'd taken his last guinea hen six nights ago, went straight +to the grove. + +He had no way of knowing that sometimes the gods smile on those who +refuse to court favor. + +Five days ago, just after Old Joe's last visit, Pine Heglin's cherished +mongrel had gone strolling past a limpid pond on Pine's farm. He'd +looked into the water, seen his own reflection, decided that he was +being challenged by a big and rather ugly dog, and promptly jumped in to +give battle. The reflection disappeared as soon as he was in the water, +but reflections were too complex for one of his mental capacity. All he +knew was that he had seen another dog. He was sure that it must be +lurking in the pond, and though he never got many ideas, he stuck by +those he did get. Presently, still looking determinedly for the other +dog, he sank and did not come up. + +Though Pine could have borrowed any hound that any of his neighbors +owned, he remained loyal to his conviction that mongrels are superior. +He dickered with Sad Hawkins, an itinerant peddler who'd sell or swap +anything at any time, and in exchange for six chickens and a shoat Pine +got another mongrel. + +It was a smaller dog than his former prize, but so tightly packed and +heavily muscled that it weighed nearly as much. With a generous portion +of pit bull among his assorted ancestors, the dog feared nothing. He +differed from Pine's former mongrel insofar as he had some sense. + +Knowing as well as Old Joe where his guinea hens roosted, and aware of +the fact that they were being raided, Pine left this dog in the grove +with them. Thus came Old Joe's second shock of the night. + +The dog, who wouldn't waste time barking or growling if he could fight, +achieved complete surprise and attacked before Old Joe even knew he was +about. Since he couldn't run, he had to fight. + +[Illustration] + +The weight was nearly even, with the dog having perhaps a five-pound +advantage. In addition, before he came into the possession of Sad +Hawkins, he'd made the rounds of behind-the-barn dog-fights and he had +never lost one. He could win over most coons. + +The dog was a slugger. But Old Joe was a scientific boxer who knew +better than to stand toe-to-toe and trade punches. He yielded to the +dog's rushes even while he inflicted as much punishment of his own as +possible. However, the battle might have been in doubt had it not been +for one unforseen circumstance. + +Hard-pressed by a determined and fearless enemy, Old Joe reached deep +into his bag of tricks. He knew the terrain, and some fifteen feet away +was a steep little knoll. It was elemental battle tactics that whatever +might be in possession of any height had an advantage over whatever +might attack it. At the first breathing spell, Old Joe scurried to the +knoll, climbed it, and waited. + +He was more than mildly astonished when the dog did not rush +immediately. But the dog hadn't had a keen sense of smell to begin with. +The numerous fights in which he'd engaged wherein his hold on a +vanquished enemy was broken with a liberal application of ammonia, had +ruined the little he did have. The dog was now unable to smell a dish +of limburger cheese on the upwind side if it was more than three feet +away, and he could not renew the battle simply because he couldn't find +his enemy. + +Never one to question good fortune, Old Joe turned and ran as soon as he +could safely do so. First he put distance between himself and Pine +Heglin's remaining guinea hens, that were standing on the roost +screeching at the tops of their voices. Next he made a resolution to +leave Pine's remaining guinea hens alone, at least for as long as this +dog was guarding them. + +Hard on the heels of that came anger. One needn't apologize for running +away from one's angry mate. To be vanquished by a dog, and not even a +coon hound, was an entirely different matter. Old Joe needed revenge, +and just as this necessity mounted to its apex, he happened to be +passing the Mundee farm. + +Ordinarily he'd never have done such a thing. He knew nothing about +Duckfoot, and a cornfield, with the nearest safe tree a long run away, +was a poor place to start testing any unknown hound. Old Joe was too +angry to rationalize, and too hungry to go farther. He turned aside, +ripped a shock of corn apart, and was in the act of selecting a choice +ear when Duckfoot came running. + +In other circumstances, Old Joe would have stopped to think. Duckfoot, +who would have the physical proportions of his father, had almost +attained them. But he was still very much the puppy and he could have +been defeated in battle. + +Old Joe had had enough fighting for one night. He reached Willow Brook +three jumps ahead of Duckfoot, jumped in, ran the riffles and swam the +pools for a quarter of a mile, emerged in a little runlet, ran up it, +and climbed an oak whose upper branches were laced with wild grapevines. +The vines offered a safe aerial passage to any of three adjoining trees. +Finding him now was a test for any good hound. + +A half hour later, Old Joe was aroused by Duckfoot's thunderous tree +bark. The big coon crossed the grapevine to a black cherry, climbed down +it, jumped to the top of an immense boulder, ran a hundred yards to a +swamp, crossed it, and came to rest in a ledge of rocks. This time +Duckfoot needed only nineteen minutes. + +Old Joe sighed and went on. The night was nearly spent, he needed +safety, and the only safe place was his big sycamore. After the most +disgusting night of his life, he reached and climbed it. He hoped that +if he managed to get this far, Duckfoot would drown in the slough. But +in an hour and sixteen minutes Duckfoot was announcing to the world at +large that Old Joe had gone up in his favorite sycamore. + +Old Joe sighed again. Then he curled up, but even as he dozed off, he +was aware of one thing. + +Duckfoot was a hound to reckon with. + +[Illustration] + + + + +[Illustration] + + + + +MISS CATHBY + + +His books strapped together with a discarded bridle rein, and dangling +over his shoulder, Harky Mundee placed one reluctant foot after the +other as he strode down the dirt road. + +The events that culminated in this dreadful situation--returning to Miss +Cathby's school at the Crossroads--had for the past three days been +building up like a thunderstorm, and on the whole, it would have been +easier to halt the storm. Every autumn, just after the harvest, Mun +acquired firm ideas concerning the value of higher education for Harky. +But never before had Mun resorted to such foul tricks or taken such +unfair advantage. + +Coming to where Tumbling Run foamed beneath a wooden bridge and hurled +itself toward Willow Brook, Harky halted and rested both elbows on the +bridge railing. He looked glumly into the icy water, along which coons +of high and low degree prowled every night, and he wished mightily that +he were a coon. + +Though even coons had their troubles, Harky had never known of a single +one that had been forced to hoe corn, milk cows, feed pigs, pitch hay, +dig potatoes, or do any of the other unspeakable tasks that were forever +falling to the lot of human beings. But even farm chores were not +entirely unbearable. In a final agony of desperation, his cause already +lost, Harky had even pointed out to Mun that the fence needed mending +and hadn't he better cut the posts? + +"Blast it!" Mun roared. "Stop this minute tryin' to make a fool of me, +Harky! You know's well as I do that the cows ain't goin' to be out to +pasture more'n 'nother three weeks! You need some book lore!" + +Harky rubbed the heel of his right shoe against the shin of his left +leg and wished again that he were a coon, even a treed coon. Being +hound-cornered was surely preferable to becoming the hapless victim of +Miss Ophelia Cathby. + +Grasping the very end of the bridle rein, Harky whirled the books around +his head. But exactly on the point of releasing the strap and reveling +in the satisfying distance the books would fly, Harky brought them to a +stop and slung them back over his shoulder. + +He sighed. Free to walk the two miles to the Crossroads, with Mun not +even in attendance, Harky was anything except free to throw his books +away and explore Tumbling Run. When he ran away from farm tasks, which +he did at every opportunity, the worst he could expect was the flat of +Mun's hand. + +But if he did not show up at school this morning, and for as many +mornings hereafter as Mun thought necessary, he would never see his +shotgun again. Harky lived again the inhuman scene wherein he had been +subjected to torture more intense than any mortal should ever endure. +Mun took the shotgun, locked it in his tool case, pocketed the key and +addressed Harky: + +"Thar! Now jest peg on to school, an' I aim to see Miss Cathby an' find +out if ya did! Hingein' on what she tells me, ya kin have the shotgun +back!" + +Harky permitted himself a second doleful sigh. A man could take a hiding +even if it were laid on with a hickory gad. But a man might better lose +life itself rather than the only gun he had or could hope to get, at +least in the foreseeable future. Mun was a man of his word. Harky saw +himself in a fiendish trap from which there was no faint hope of escape. + +He glanced at the sun, and from the length of the shadows it was casting +deduced that it still lacked forty-five minutes of nine o'clock, the +hour at which Miss Cathby called her classes to order. If he stuck to +the road, forty-five minutes was at least thirty-eight more than he +needed to cover the less than a mile remaining between himself and the +Crossroads. But there were excellent reasons why he could not stick to +the road. + +Raw Stanfield, Butt Johnson, Bear Pen Crawford, and Mule Domster all +lived upstream from the Mundee farm. Mellie Garson and Pine Heglin lived +down. Harky had not hesitated to walk openly past Mellie's farm, for +though Mellie had been an enthusiastic sire, he had begat only +daughters. They were all pretty enough to be snatched up the moment they +came of marriageable age, and the four oldest were happily married. But +girls of all ages were forever gadding about doing silly things that +interested girls only. Though they probably would think it a modern +miracle, Mellie's eight youngest would not consider it necessary to rub +salt in Harky's already-raw wounds simply because he was going to +school. + +Pine Heglin had specialized in sons, of which he had seven. The six +eldest were carbon copies of their father. It was said along Willow +Brook that if one cared to give Pine or any of his six elder sons a good +laugh in January, one had only to tell them a good joke the preceding +April. + +The youngest Heglin, named Loring and called Dib, had been born on +Halloween and showed it. Every witch who walked must have touched Dib +Heglin, and among other questionable gifts they'd bestowed a tongue with +a hornet's sting. + +Dib was three months older than Harky. He did not go to school. He found +endless amusement in the fact that Harky did go. Harky had no wish to +meet Dib. + +A quarter of a mile on the upstream side of the Heglin farm, Harky +started into the woods and stopped worrying. Dib was a not-unskilled +woodsman. But he'd never studied in the stark school from which Harky +had graduated with honors; anyone able to hide from Mun Mundee could +elude fifty Dib Heglins. + +A sour chuckle escaped Harky. Dib, who knew how to add two and two, +would know that the Mundees' harvest was ended. Nobody would have to +tell him that this was the logical day for Mun to expose Harky to some +more of Miss Cathby's education. No doubt he'd got up a half hour early +just so he could wait for Harky and insult him when he appeared. + +Presently, as it always did, the magic of the forest overwhelmed less +desirable influences. Miss Cathby and her school, while not far enough +away to let Harky forget he'd better be there on time, needn't be faced +for the immediate present. Harky found himself wondering. + +Duckfoot had grown like a weed in the corn patch, and to the casual +observer he was not greatly different from other gangling hound puppies. +But a careful scrutiny revealed him as a dog of diverse talents. There +was the incident of the root cellar. + +Because it would not keep long in warm weather, meat was at a premium +along Willow Brook during the summer months. When somebody butchered, it +was both practical and practice to share with his neighbors. + +Mule Domster butchered a hog, and to the Mundees he brought a ham and a +loin. Mun stored both in the root cellar, that was closed by a latch. +The latch was lifted by a string dangling down the door. While Duckfoot, +who to all appearances was interested only in scratching a flea behind +his ear, sat sleepily near, Mun removed the ham. + +Shortly afterward, returning for the loin and finding an empty space +where it had been, Mun went roaring to the house for his rifle. Since no +farmer of the Creeping Hills would think of robbing his neighbor's root +cellar, obviously an unprincipled and hungry stranger had come up Willow +Brook. Finding no tracks, Mun further declared that he was a cunning +stranger. + +Harky had a feeling. It was based on the fact that Duckfoot, who +normally ate like a horse except that he did not chew his food nearly as +much, was not at all hungry when his meal was put before him. It meant +nothing, asserted Mun, for he had flushed an early flight of teal from +Willow Brook and Duckfoot was perturbed by the ducks. Harky watched the +root cellar. + +Evening shadows were merging into black night when Duckfoot padded to +the door, reared, pulled the latch string with his teeth, and entered. +Since Mun was sure to take a dim view of such goings on, Harky never +betrayed the thief. All he did was break the latch and replace it with +an exterior latch that was not string-operated. + +That happened shortly before Duckfoot disappeared for a whole week. To +be expected, said Mun, for wild ducks were passing daily now and +doubtless Duckfoot had gone in search of his father. But Harky had +another feeling. + +He'd been with Duckfoot along Willow Brook, or near one of the ponds, +when wild ducks flushed. Far from betraying his duck blood, Duckfoot had +given them not the slightest attention. Could it be, thought Harky, that +a coon, maybe Old Joe himself, had come raiding? Had Duckfoot trailed +him, treed him, and stayed at the tree until he was just too tired and +hungry to stay longer? + +Mun scoffed at such notions. He pointed out that Duckfoot was still a +puppy who, as far as anyone knew, had never been on a coon's trail. So +what could he know about running coons, especially Old Joe? Harky was +indulging in another pipe dream even to think that a puppy, any puppy, +would tree a coon and stay at the tree for a week. Precious Sue herself +wouldn't have stayed that long. + +Harky knew only that Duckfoot was lean as a blackberry cane when he +finally came home and that he kept looking off into the forest. If he +hadn't treed a coon, he certainly acted as though he had. + +In sudden panic Harky realized that he had a scant four minutes left. He +began to run, and he burst into Miss Cathby's school just as the last +bell was tolling laggards to their desks. + +The school was a one-room affair flanked by a woodshed half as big as +the school proper. Inside were the regulation potbellied stove, six rows +of five desks each, a desk for Miss Cathby, and a plain wooden bench +upon which the various classes seated themselves when called to recite. +Behind Miss Cathby's desk was the blackboard. If it was not the ultimate +in educational facilities, it was a vast improvement over the no school +at all that had been at the Crossroads until three years ago. + +When Harky ran in, his fellow pupils were seated. + +The first grade, consisting of the younger daughters of Mellie Garson +and Raw Stanfield, and the youngest sons of Butt Johnson and Mule +Domster, was the largest. Thereafter the grades decreased numerically +but with an increasing feminine contingent. Boys old enough to help out +at home could hardly be expected to waste time in school. Melinda and +Mary Garson were the fifth grade, Harky the sixth, and Mildred and +Minnie Garson the seventh and eighth. + +Miss Cathby smiled pleasantly when Harky came in. + +"Good morning, Harold," she greeted. + +"Good morning, ma'am," Harky mumbled. + +"Is your father's harvest in, Harold?" + +"Yes, ma'am." + +Harky, who knew his name was Harold but wished Miss Cathby didn't know, +squirmed and longed to drop through the floor. With the only other male +who even approached his age being Mule Domster's ten-year-old son, he +was indeed surrounded. + +Miss Cathby, who knew several things not written in textbooks, +understood and let him alone. Harky fixed his eyes on the back of +twelve-year-old Melinda Garson's slender neck. He calculated the exact +spot where a spitball would have the ultimate effect, then decided that +it wasn't worth his while to throw one. + +The first grade was called for recitation. Solacing himself with the +thought that Mun's enthusiasm for booklore seldom endured more than +three weeks, Harky escaped in a dream. He had his shotgun, Duckfoot was +hot on a coon's trail, and presently they heard his tree bark. Mun and +Harky made their way to the tree. + +"Harky," said Mun, "git your light beam on that coon." + +Harky made ready to shine the treed coon. The words were repeated and he +came rudely awake to discover that Miss Cathby was speaking. + +"Harold," she said, "are you dreaming so soon?" + +"Yes, ma'am," Harky said meekly. + +"Well come down here. The sixth grade is called to recite." + +Harky rose and shuffled unhappily to the recitation bench. He slumped +down, head bent, shoulders hunched, fists in pockets. Never again, he +thought, would he have any part in caging a coon. Not even to train +Duckfoot. He knew now what cages are like. + +"Have you been keeping up with your studies?" Miss Cathby asked. + +"Yes, ma'am," said Harky. + +"Which books have you been using?" queried Miss Cathby. + +"Same ones I used last year," Harky mumbled. + +Miss Cathby frowned prettily. Harky's last year's books were for the +fifth grade; Harky had started in the fourth solely because he'd been +too old to begin in the first. Miss Cathby's frown deepened. + +She knew that, with the best of luck, Harky would be under her influence +for a maximum four weeks. But Miss Cathby's fragile body harbored a will +of granite. If she combined guile with persistence, four weeks were +enough to turn this youngster from the heathenish ways of his ancestors +and show him at least a glimmer of the one true light. + +"Very well," she said pleasantly. "We'll review your last year's +arithmetic. If a farmer harvests thirty tons of hay, sells two thirds +and feeds the remainder, how much will he feed?" + +Harky shuffled nervous feet and stared past her at the blackboard. "I +never could figger that one, Miss Cathby." + +Miss Cathby said, "It isn't difficult." + +"Parts ain't," Harky admitted. "But parts are. He'll sell twenty tons, +always reckoning he can find somebody to buy. The rest just shrivels me +up." + +Miss Cathby sighed. As soon as she proved to her own satisfaction that +these backwoods boys were not morons, they proved her wrong. Anyone able +correctly to deduce two thirds of thirty should be able to subtract +twenty from thirty. A firm adherent of the idea that sugar entices flies +where vinegar will not, Miss Cathby applied the sugar. + +"Come, Harold," she coaxed. "If you have thirty potatoes and give twenty +away, how many will you have left?" + +"Ten," Harky said promptly. "But we was talking about tons of hay, not +potatoes, and that ain't what crosses me up." + +"What is it that you do not understand?" Miss Cathby pursued. + +"What kind of critter a remainder is and how much hay does it eat?" + +The fifth, seventh, and eighth grades, as represented by the sisters +Garson, filled the room with giggles. Miss Cathby rapped for order and +evolved a cunning plan to win Harky's interest and favor by discussing +something he did know. + +"Do you have a good raccoon hound for the coming season, Harold?" + +Miss Cathby composed herself to listen while Harky launched an +enthusiastic, and minutely detailed, description of the misadventures of +Precious Sue and the wiles of Old Joe. He needed eighteen minutes to +reach the thrilling climax, the discovery of Duckfoot and, + +"His Pa's a duck," he said seriously. + +"A duck!" Miss Cathby gasped. + +"Not just a barnyard duck and not just a wild duck," Harky explained +patiently. "It was some big old duck, maybe older'n Old Joe himself, +that's been setting back in the woods just hoping Sue would come along." + +Miss Cathby's eyes glowed with a true crusader's zeal. In all the time +Harky had spent in school and all the time he would spend there, she +could not hope to impart more than the rudiments of an education. But +here was a heaven-sent opportunity to strike at the very roots of the +ignorance and superstition that barred his march toward a more +enlightened life. Miss Cathby saw past the boy to the father who would +be. Strike Harky's chains and he would voluntarily free his children. + +"That's impossible, Harold," she began. + +Warming to her subject, she sketched the Garden of Eden, traced the +history of mankind, disposed of witches and witch hunters in a few +hundred well-chosen words, explained the laws of genetics, and finished +with conclusive proof that a coon hound cannot mate with a duck. + +Harky listened, not without interest. When it came to telling stories, +he conceded, Miss Cathby was even better than Mun and almost as good as +Mellie Garson. Nor was she shooting wholly in the dark; Harky himself +did not believe that Duckfoot had been sired by a duck. But there was +something wanting. + +For a moment he could not define the lack. Then, happily, he thought of +another of Pine Heglin's ideas. If apples were stored so they could not +roll, Pine decided, there would be fewer bruised apples. Forthwith he +constructed some latticeworks of willow withes, arranged them as +shelves, and stored his apples on them. But Pine had forgotten that +some apples are big and some small. The small ones fell through the +lattices and the big ones became jammed in them. All were bruised, and +rotted quickly, with the result that Pine had no apples at all. + +Miss Cathby's lecture was like that, Harky decided. She would find an +exact niche for Old Joe, Duckfoot, Mun, everything in the world, and +she'd never stop to think that few things really belonged in exact +niches. Her ideas just didn't have room to grow in. Mun's did. + +"Can you prove to me, Harold, that there is any such creature as this +witch duck?" Miss Cathby finished. + +"No ma'am," said Harky, and he forebore to mention that neither could +she prove there wasn't. + +By some miracle, the endless day ended. The new books that Miss Cathby +gave him strapped in the bridle rein and slung over his shoulder, Harky +walked straight up the road. He had a feeling that was justified when he +saw Dib Heglin waiting. + +"Ya been to see Miss Cathby?" Dib squawked in a voice that would have +maddened a sheep. "Did Miss Cathby give ya a bathby?" + +Harky shifted the bridle rein from his right hand to his left. +Effecting a gait that was supposedly a caricature of Miss Cathby's +feminine walk, and was remarkably similar to the waddle of a fat goose, +Dib came toward him. + +"Ya been to see--?" he began. + +They were near enough. Harky's right fist flicked out. + +"Ya-ooo!" Dib shrieked. + +Harky danced happily on. No day was wholly wasted if it left Dib Heglin +nursing a bloody nose. + +[Illustration] + + + + +[Illustration] + + + + +MELINDA + + +Mellie Garson sat on an overturned pickle keg sourly contemplating the +inequity of fate. If he was no better than the next man, he told +himself, neither was he worse. So why should some be rewarded with a +free buggy ride while others received a kick from the mules pulling the +buggy? + +Mellie shifted his right foot, his newest reason for eating bitter +bread, and glared at the crutches without which he was helpless. It was +indeed a bitter blow, but it seemed to Mellie as he sat there that his +entire life had been one blow after another. + +Though he was the father of children, the very fact that there was no +son among them was a desperate situation. How did one hand a coon hound, +not to mention the mass of coon lore that Mellie had acquired during his +sixty-seven years on earth, down to a girl child? + +The lusty wail of a baby floated out of the house. Mellie shuddered, and +only by exercising a heroic effort could he refrain from putting his +hands over his ears. It was not that he didn't love his daughters and do +for them as a proper father should. But did his thirteenth child, now +yelling away in her crib, have to be a girl, too? + +Mellie ran down the list of his offspring: Marilyn, Maxine, Martha, +Minerva, Margaret, Mildred, Minnie, Melinda, Mary, Maud, Marcy, +Marcella, and finally, Michelle. There'd been some hope they'd run out +of Ms, but he'd hoped that clear back when Mary arrived and now hope was +dead. He couldn't have thought of Michelle. But his daughters could and +that, he supposed, was no more than he deserved for exposing them to +Miss Cathby's school. + +Mellie often wondered if he'd been born in the wrong time of the moon. +Maybe he'd even been born in a caul, but he'd never know whence came +his talent for fathering girls, because by the time he started wondering +his parents had gone to their eternal reward and it was too late to ask +them. + +He sighed. Thirteen girl children were thirteen facts of life that +nobody could change. There were rare intervals, when they didn't all +start talking at once, that it was even pleasant to have them around. +But how explain the rest of his misfortunes? + +Mellie retraced the chain of events that had culminated in this stark +tragedy. + +Morning Glory, his pup out of Raw Stanfield's Queenie by Butt Johnson's +Thunder, showed every indication of becoming a rare coon hound indeed. +Though Mellie would have been satisfied had she inherited the talent of +either parent, there were reasons to believe that she combined the best +of both. + +However, Glory must have some education and tonight, this matchless +autumn night, Raw Stanfield with Queenie and Butt Johnson with Thunder +were meeting at Mun Mundee's house. Had they planned a coon hunt, and +that only, Mellie would have contented himself with just being +heart-broken. But Mun and Harky Mundee were going along with Duckfoot +and Mellie had been invited to bring Glory. So-- + +Yesterday he'd been mule-kicked! + +Mellie groaned his misery. Glory and Duckfoot had an opportunity to +learn their trade under masters such as Queenie and Thunder. Now Glory +couldn't go, and what had Mellie ever done to merit such catastrophe? + +No doubt Duckfoot would be there, and thinking of Duckfoot, Mellie +wondered why a little of the Mundee luck couldn't rub off on Mellie +Garson. It had been a terrible blow to lose Precious Sue. But to stumble +on Sue's pup, even if he was half duck, and to find that he probably +would be as good as Sue ever was. How come the Mundees were so favored? + +Mellie glanced bitterly around as a mule-drawn wagon came from behind +the barn. Morning Glory wagged contentedly behind it and four of +Mellie's daughters comprised the crew that was bringing in another load +of corn. Mellie fixed his eyes on Melinda. + +Twelve years old, limber as a willow withe and pretty as a week-old +colt, she was driving the self-same mules that had kicked Mellie right +out of a coon hunt. Furthermore, she was driving them more skillfully +than her father ever had. Mellie permitted himself a troubled frown. + +Certain Melinda would be a boy, and a firm exponent of starting the +worthwhile things of life as early as possible, Mellie had even dickered +for a hound pup so the two babies might grow up together. Somebody had +crossed him up, or sneaked up on him, but Melinda should have been a +boy. + +She could throw a rock straighter than Harky Mundee; catch bass when +Mellie himself couldn't lure them; handle in perfect safety mules that +could kick flies off each other's ears and were anxious to kick anything +else; she could do everything most boys could and do it better. If more +was needed, Glory adored her with a passion few hounds bestow on any +human. + +Melinda backed the wagon into the barn, and as her three sisters started +to unload the corn, she unhitched the mules and drove them to their +stable. A fiendish plan formed in Mellie's brain. Girls were about as +welcome on a coon hunt as bees at a sewing circle, but why should Mellie +do all the suffering? Melinda came out of the stable and floated toward +the house. Mellie came to a decision and called, + +"Melinda." + +She danced to him on feet that never seemed to touch the ground. "Yes, +Pa?" + +"Raw Stanfield an' Butt Johnson'll be at Mun Mundee's come evenin'. +They're goin' to take Duckfoot on a coon hunt. How'd you like to go with +Glory?" + +"Pa! You mean it?" + +"Sure I mean it, honey." + +She stooped and kissed him, and suddenly Mellie felt sorry for +unfortunate fathers who do not have at least thirteen daughters. + + * * * * * + +Making himself as small as possible, Harky Mundee kept his fingers +crossed and hoped Mun had forgotten he was alive. Everything had worked +out so much better than he'd dared hope that surely there must be some +mistake. + +After eleven days at Miss Cathby's school, he was ready and unwilling to +begin the twelfth when he happened to glance toward the pasture. He +himself, after helping milk them at half past five, had turned the cows +out. But though he'd turned all six out, only five remained. Old +Brindle, Mun's ornery cow, had decided to take herself for a walk. It +was nothing that could be ignored. Old Brindle was fast as a deer and if +she decided she'd had enough of human society, she'd be as hard to +catch. + +"You'd best help me get her," Mun said. + +"Yes, Pa." + +They'd scarcely left the house, when, apparently having decided that the +free life is for those who want it, Old Brindle jumped back into the +pasture she'd just jumped out of. But instead of turning on Harky and +roaring for him to be off to school, Mun said nothing at all. + +It had been easy as that, which is why Harky worried. Though it was hard +even to imagine Mun's having thoughts to spare for Miss Cathby and her +school with a coon hunt coming up, dismal experience had taught Harky +that it was easier to forecast the next skip of a sand flea than to +anticipate Mun. + +Until he knew exactly how the wind was blowing, Harky thought, silence +was not only golden but silver, gold and diamonds. If Mun was thinking +about sending him back to school, to school he would go. If he was not, +an incautious word might start him thinking. + +Harky watched furtively as Mun put on his coon-hunting pants, boots, +and curled the brim of his coon-hunting hat. Then he went to the tool +box for his coon-hunting axe. + +"Harky!" he roared. "What's your shotgun doin' in my toolbox?" + +"Why," Harky hoped he appeared innocent, "is it in there, Pa?" + +"Git it out!" + +Harky drew his first easy breath since Old Brindle's escape. If Mun had +forgotten why he'd confiscated Harky's shotgun, he'd forgotten about +school. The ordeal was over, at least for this year, and Harky was free +to concentrate on important matters. For the immediate future, the only +matter of importance consisted of wishing it was night so they could go +coon hunting. + +Evening finally arrived, and, with Queenie and Thunder at their +respective heels, Raw Stanfield and Butt Johnson arrived with it. The +older hounds sneered in their own fashion at Duckfoot, who +enthusiastically sneered right back, and curled up on the porch. + +None of the men, as yet, knew that Mellie was sending his daughter to +substitute for him. When Queenie, Thunder, and Duckfoot set up a +desultory baying, all thought that Mellie would join them shortly. To +do so he would follow prescribed etiquette of the Creeping Hills, which +involved opening the door and walking in. + +When Mellie did not enter, but someone knocked, the four hunters first +looked astounded. Then they looked at each other. It was Harky who +decided that one way to find out who was knocking would be to go open +the door. His astounded bellow made Queenie cringe and sent Thunder +slinking from the porch. + +"What in tunket do you want?" + +"Hello, Harold," Melinda trilled. + +She was dressed in the boy's trousers she always wore except when she +went to school, a boy's shirt which immediately gave the lie to the +theory that girls can't wear boys' clothing and look like girls, and a +denim jacket. Her feet were encased in an old pair of shoes, and a boy's +hat was pushed back on her saucy black curls. Without a second glance +for Harky, she walked past him into the kitchen. + +"Pa's been mule-kicked and can't come," she announced. "I brought +Glory." + +"Right kind of ya," said Mun. "We'll take good care of her an' see that +she gits back." + +[Illustration] + +"Oh, I'll take her back myself," Melinda said. "Pa will expect it." + +"Nice of ya to offer," said Mun. "But Harky an' me, we sort of batch it +here. The house ain't rightly fixed fer a girl to stay in an' we may be +gone all night." + +"Don't you worry about that, Mr. Mundee," Melinda reassured him. "I'm +going hunting with you." + +Harky gagged. Melinda turned to face him. + +"You sound as though you've been eating green apples, Harold," she said +sweetly. "Have you?" + +"Why'n'choo go home?" + +"Harky!" Mun roared, but not very loudly, "mind your tongue!" + +"Thank you, Mr. Mundee," Melinda said, with the barest hint of a sob in +her young voice. "You do want me along, don't you?" + +"Well uh--" Mun stammered and appealed to Raw Stanfield. "We do want her +along, don't we?" + +"Well uh--" Raw aped Mun and looked at Butt Johnson. + +Butt stuttered, "Why--why--why--" and fixed his gaze on Harky. + +"There!" Melinda said triumphantly. "The other three want me! Now what +do you say?" + +"Hope ya fall in the mud!" + +"Harold!" Melinda wrinkled her distinctly fetching nose. "How terrible!" + +"Hope ya fall in the mud, an' I'll stomp on your head if ya do!" Harky +said. + +"Harky!" This time Mun voiced a full-throated roar. "Mind your tongue!" + +"Le's get coon huntin'," Raw Stanfield choked. "Le's do anything long's +we git out of here!" + +[Illustration] + + + + +[Illustration] + + + + +OLD JOE UP + + +Raw Stanfield with the lantern, Butt Johnson with a torch for shining +treed coons and a .22 rifle for plinking them out of the trees, Mun with +his coon-hunting axe, Melinda with serene self-assurance, and Harky with +a miserable feeling that it couldn't be very long now before the whole +world went to pot, they set off through the night. + +Misery was Harky's only feeling. If he had another, he told himself +sourly, he wouldn't dare put stock in it. When girls horned in on coon +hunts anything could happen and it probably would. + +Harky comforted himself with thoughts of what can happen on coon hunts. +He had a soul-satisfying vision of a cold, wet, mud-spattered, and +hungry Melinda wandering through the night pleading for Harky to come to +her succor. Harky heard, but he let her wander until the last possible +second. Then, just as she was about to sink into mud from which she +would never rise had it not been for valiant Harky, he lifted her to her +feet, took her home, and scuffed scornful feet on Mellie Garson's +threshold. + +"There!" he heard himself saying. "Let that teach you that girls ought +never horn in on coon hunts!" + +Harky breathed a doleful sigh. Delightful as this mental image was, in +no way did it erase the fact that a girl had horned in on a coon hunt. +Harky sought solace by tearing his thoughts away from Melinda and +fastening them on something pleasant. He considered the four hounds. + +Queenie was a slow and methodical worker who'd never been known to lose +a trail she started. Of course they did not get every coon Queenie +started; some went to earth in rock-bound burrows and some escaped by +devious means. Queenie, who tongued on a trail, was one of the few +hounds who'd followed Old Joe to his magic sycamore. + +Glory, as yet untried, might and might not adopt her mother's hunting +style. Duckfoot--neither Harky nor anyone else had any reason to believe +that he'd already tracked Old Joe to his sycamore--was another unknown +quantity insofar as his own special way of hunting was concerned. But +Harky had no doubt that, after adequate training, Duckfoot would shine, +and Glory would do well enough. + +Thunder, next to Precious Sue the best coon hound ever to run the +Creeping Hills, couldn't be doubted. Big, long-legged, and powerful, +Thunder was another hound who'd distinguished himself by tracking Old +Joe to the big sycamore. A silent trailer but a tree barker who did +credit to his name, Thunder was so fast that he often caught coons on +the ground. With six years of hunting experience behind him, he was +probably the best of the four hounds on this current hunt. + +They were, Harky thought, a pack fit to run in any company. With Thunder +to run ahead and jump the coon, Queenie to work out the trail at her own +pace and at regular intervals to announce the direction Thunder had +gone, and quality pups like Duckfoot and Glory, any coon they struck +tonight, with the probable exception of Old Joe, would find his +stretched pelt on the barn door tomorrow. Maybe even Old Joe would have +a hard time with this pack. + +Thinking of coons, Harky was pleasantly diverted for a few minutes more. + +Creatures of the season, coons availed themselves of the most of the +best of whatever was handy. When they emerged from their dens at +winter's end, they liked to fill empty stomachs with buds and tender +grass and flower shoots. As the season advanced, coons conformed. They +never spurned vegetation if it was to their liking, but as soon as the +spring freshet subsided, they did a great deal of fishing and frog, +crawfish, and mussel hunting. When gardens started to bear, the coons +varied their diet with green vegetables. As they ripened, both wild and +domestic fruits received the attention of properly brought up coons. +They were always ready to raid poultry. + +At this time of year, with frogs already gone into hibernation, fish +inclined to linger in deep pools where even Old Joe couldn't catch them, +the crawfish and mussel crop well picked over, and vegetation withered, +coons concentrated on fields of shocked corn, such fruit as might cling +to branches, and beech and oak groves, where they foraged for fallen +beechnuts and acorns. + +It was to a beech grove that Raw Stanfield led them. + +The black thunderheads that had been surging through Harky's brain +changed suddenly to a sky of dazzling blue. Rubber boots were not +unknown among coon hunters of the Creeping Hills, but except by a few +eccentrics, they were unused. A man trying to make time to a +tree-barking hound did not care to be slowed by boots. + +Harky licked his lips. God tempered the wind to the shorn lamb, but ice +water felt like ice water even to a coon hunter and the grove toward +which Raw headed was on the far side of Willow Brook. The water was +autumn-low with plenty of exposed stones, but jumping them by daylight +and jumping them under lantern light were different matters. Harky +wasn't sure that even he could cross at night without getting wet. + +It looked as though ladies' night at coon hunts would terminate abruptly +and soon. Harky hoped so, and it would be a nice touch indeed if +Melinda scraped her shins when she fell in. + +Willow Brook glinted in the light as Raw Stanfield held his lantern high +to see whether they were approaching a pool or riffle. It was a riffle +that purled lazily, and coldly, around exposed stones. Harky grinned in +the darkness. It _looked_ easy, but there was a trick to it. + +Once you started jumping there was no turning back and the stones were +unevenly spaced. You had to adjust your jumps accordingly, so that it +took a really experienced stone jumper to cross in reasonably dry +condition. + +Contemplating the joys of watching Melinda come reasonably near +drowning, Harky made a shocking discovery. + +Thunder, Queenie, and Glory still trailed at the heels of the hunters, +but Duckfoot was no longer present. Harky gulped, then used the thumb of +his left hand to trace a circle on the palm of his right. Less than half +a shake ago, Duckfoot had pushed his cold nose into that dangling palm +and the circle Harky made there would certainly close him in and bring +him back from wherever he had gone. At any rate, it should. + +It didn't. Chills never born of the frosty night chased each other up +and down Harky's spine. Mun claimed Duckfoot was half duck, Miss Cathby +said that couldn't be, and Harky wavered between the two. He looked +again, but only three hounds waded into the riffle to join the hunters +gathering on the other side. Harky jumped. + +If he had his mind on his work, he'd have crossed in perfect safety. But +just as he made ready to strike a humpbacked boulder with the sole of +his left foot, he miscalculated and struck with the heel. That broke his +stride to such an extent that the next jump was six inches short, and +instead of landing on a flat-topped rock where he could have balanced, +he came down in ten inches of ice water. + +Only vast experience as a rock jumper prevented an allover bath; Harky +threw himself forward to support his upper body on the flat rock. Then, +since it was impossible to get his feet any wetter than they were, he +waded the remaining distance. + +"Really, Harold," said Melinda, who was dry as a shingle under the July +sun, "you did that rather clumsily." + +Harky made a mental note. It was easy to work the pith out of an +elderberry stick. Small stones were plentiful. One of the latter, +placed in the mouth and blown through the former, was never forgotten by +anyone with whom it collided. The next time Harky attended Miss Cathby's +school, Melinda was in for an unforgettable experience. + +For the moment, since he could do nothing else about her, he could +imagine she wasn't along. Harky turned his back on Melinda and addressed +Mun: + +"Duckfoot's gone." + +"Danged if he ain't," said Mun, who noticed for the first time that they +had only three of the four hounds with which they'd started. "When'd you +note it?" + +"Other side of the brook," Harky said in a hushed voice. "One minute his +nose was in my hand, the next it wasn't. Do you figure he took wings and +flew off?" + +"It could," Mun began, but his about-to-be-expressed opinion that such a +premise was wholly reasonable was interrupted by Melinda's, "Nonsense!" + +Harky blazed, forgetting his sensible plan to ignore her. "Watta you +know about it?" + +"Now don't lose your temper, Harold," Melinda chided. "It's silly to +suppose Duckfoot's half duck." + +Harky drew his arm back. "Silly, huh? I've a good mind to--" + +"Harky!" Mun roared. "Men don't hit wimmen!" + +"Why don't they?" Harky growled. + +"You're being childish, Harold," Melinda said sweetly. "Duckfoot's +simply gone off somewhere. Perhaps he got tired and went home." + +Harky tried to speak and succeeded only in choking. If it was insult to +assert that Duckfoot could not be half duck, it was heresy even to imply +that he left a hunt and went home because he was tired. Harky recovered +his breath. + +"Duckfoot didn't go home!" he screamed. + +"Really, Harold," Melinda said, "it isn't necessary to make so much +noise." + +Harky was saved by the bell-like tones of a suddenly-tonguing hound. + +"Queenie's got one," Raw Stanfield said. + +"That's Glory tonguing," Melinda corrected. "She's pitched just a shade +higher than Queenie." + +"Now, Miss," Raw stuffed his tobacco into a corner of his mouth, "I know +my own hound." + +"There she is," Melinda said. + +A second hound, almost exactly like the first but with subtle +differences that were apparent when both tongued at the same time, began +to sing. Raw Stanfield promptly swallowed his chew. Butt Johnson and Mun +were momentarily too shocked to move. + +Harky gasped. There was witchery present that had nothing to do with +Duckfoot. Raw didn't know his own hound when he heard it, but Melinda +did. Then Harky put the entire affair in its proper perspective. What +else could you expect when you brought a girl on a coon hunt? Raw was +just so shook up that he might be pardoned for failing to recognize +Queenie even if he saw her. + +"Le's git huntin'," Raw muttered. + +[Illustration] + +Guiding himself by the blended voices of Queenie and Glory rising into +the night air, and seeming to hover at treetop level for a moment before +they faded, Harky began to run. The cold air whipped his face. The night +whispered of all the marvels that have been since the beginning of time +and will be until the end. For a moment, he even forgot Melinda. + +This, he thought, was what coon hunting really meant. Listening to the +hounds and trying to keep pace; knowing that somewhere far ahead, swift +and silent-running Thunder was also on the coon's trail; drawing mental +pictures of the coon and his scurry to be away; Thunder bursting upon +and surprising the coon, who'd be listening to the tonguing hounds; the +chorus as all hounds gathered at the tree. Harky laughed out loud. + +Now he knew what a running deer knew, he told himself, and almost +instantly the swiftest deer seemed unbearably slow. He was the wind +itself, and he exulted in the notion that the other plodding humans, +who would surely be running, would just as surely be far behind. They +hadn't had his experience in running away from Mun. + +[Illustration] + +Glory and Queenie, who seemed to run at the same pace even as they +tongued in almost the same pitch, drew farther ahead but remained well +within hearing. Harky frowned thoughtfully as he sped through the night. +The way that coon was running, and the way the dogs became quiet at +intervals, as though they'd been thrown off the scent, he had a feeling +that they were on Old Joe himself. + +When he climbed a knoll and was able to hear nothing, he no longer +doubted. Queenie and Glory were casting for the trail, and Old Joe was +the only coon that could keep Queenie puzzled this long. Harky halted. + +"Old Joe sure enough," he said out loud. + +"Don't you think," Melinda asked calmly, "that we should go directly to +his big sycamore?" + +Harky jumped like a shot-stung fox. He blinked, not daring to believe +she'd kept pace with him but unable to discredit his own eyes. Suddenly +he felt far more the plodding turtle than the speeding deer, but he +extricated himself as neatly as Old Joe foiled a second-rate hound. + +"If I hadn't slowed down on accounta you," he said belligerently, "I'd +of been at Old Joe's tree by now." + +Melinda said meekly, "I know you were running slowly, Harold, but you +needn't have. I could have gone much faster." + +Harky gulped and felt his way. Melinda, he decided, must have brought +her rabbit's foot with her and probably she'd rolled in a whole field of +four-leaf clovers. Beyond any doubt, she'd also observed the phases of +the moon and conducted herself accordingly. + +"What do you know about Old Joe's sycamore?" he asked. + +"What everyone knows," she said casually. "Old Joe runs to it every time +he's hard pressed by hounds." + +"He's probably lost a thousand hounds and two thousand hunters at that +tree," Harky said. + +"Pooh!" Melinda scoffed. "There haven't been a thousand hounds and two +thousand hunters in the Creeping Hills during the past hundred years!" + +"Old Joe's been prowling that long," Harky declared. + +"Rubbish!" said Melinda. "He's just a big raccoon who's smart enough to +climb a tree that can't be felled or climbed. Even my own father +believes he's been here forever, but you should know better. You've been +taught by Miss Cathby." + +Harky sneered, "Miss Cathby don't know nothin' about nothin'." + +"Harold!" Melinda was properly shocked. "Don't you dare talk that way +about Miss Cathby!" + +"Ha!" Harky crowed. "I'll--" + +The battle that might have resulted from this impact of Miss Cathby's +education with the lore and legend of the Creeping Hills was forestalled +when two hounds began to bay at Old Joe's sycamore. They were Thunder +and Duckfoot. + + + + +[Illustration] + + + + +THE FALL OF MUN + + +Old Joe left his daytime den, a burrow beneath a humpbacked boulder, +half an hour after nightfall. He paused for a moment in the exit he'd +chosen--one of three leading from the den--to twitch his whiskers and +wriggle his nose. As usual, he wanted to determine what was in the wind +before going down it. There was nothing, or at least nothing that called +for more than ordinary caution. Old Joe chittered contentedly to +himself. + +Except for the one bad night, when everything went wrong and he'd +finally been chased up his big sycamore by Duckfoot, he had enjoyed a +successful season indeed. Corn had been plentiful, crawfish and mussels +abundant, poultry careless, and enemies few. Some of those that had +threatened would have been considerably better off if they hadn't. + +Notable among them was Pine Heglin's fighting dog. Smarting from that +unexpected encounter, when he'd returned to steal one of Pine's guinea +hens and been so desperately pressed, Old Joe had chosen his time and +gone back to Pine's house one night. The dog rushed. Old Joe scooted +away. After a pathetically short chase, the dog bayed him. + +The dog, however, lacked a full appreciation of the properties of bees, +and Old Joe had let himself be cornered on one of Pine's beehives. The +dog closed, the hive tipped over, and while Old Joe scurried happily +onward, the dog received a short but intensive education in the folly of +tipping beehives. Bees did not bother Old Joe. Even in summer his fur +was long enough to protect him, and whenever he felt like it, which was +whenever he wanted some honey, he raided beehives. + +Now, with a blanket of fat beneath his glossy fur, he was all ready for +the wintry blasts that would send him to bed in his big sycamore. +Between now and that uncertain period when bitter winds blew, there was +considerable living to be done. + +On this particular night the first order of living involved something to +eat, and Old Joe was in a mood for beechnuts. They were so tiny that +Melinda Garson might have held fifty in the palm of her hand and still +lacked a handful. But they were delicious, and along with acorns they +spread a bountiful autumn table because they existed by the billion. +When frost opened the pods and wind rattled the branches of beech trees, +the sound of beechnuts pattering into dry leaves was not unlike the +sound of a violent rain. + +Having chosen his menu for the night, Old Joe had only to decide which +of many beech groves offered the easiest pickings with the greatest +advantage to himself. He finally selected the one bordering Willow Brook +and just opposite Mun Mundee's farm. + +There were various reasons for his choice. First, the grove was in a +sheltered area, which meant that its pods ripened later than those that +were exposed to first frosts and heavy winds. Therefore it would not be +so thoroughly picked over, and would still be dropping nuts in +abundance. Second, this grove always produced a lush crop. + +But Old Joe's most compelling reason for his choice was that the grove +was infested with squirrels, who had been frantically gathering the +beechnuts ever since they began to drop, and storing them in hollow +logs, stumps, crevices, and any other place available. It was no part of +Old Joe's plan to scrape in the leaves and gather his dinner nut by nut +when a little investigation was certain to uncover a cache that might +contain from half a pint to a couple of quarts of beechnuts, already +gathered by some industrious squirrel. + +His campaign mapped, Old Joe proceeded to execute it. + +The autumn night posed its usual charms, but hunger took precedence over +esthetic inclinations. Old Joe did not linger to watch starlight +glinting on a pond, investigate fox fire in a swamp, or even to retrieve +a nine-inch trout, wounded in combat with some bigger fish, that was +feebly wriggling in the shallows. The trout was a delicacy, but so were +beechnuts. Let lesser coons settle for less than they wanted. + +Coming to a long pool, Old Joe plunged in and swam its length. +Thereafter he kept to Willow Brook. He'd seen no evidence of hunters and +had no reason to suppose that any were abroad tonight. Though keeping to +the water was an amateur's trick--one any good coon hound could decipher +without difficulty--leaving this break in his scent was one of Old Joe's +numerous forms of insurance. If a hound should get on him, Old Joe would +at least have time to plan some really intricate strategy. + +Dripping wet, but not even slightly chilled, and with every sense and +nerve brought wonderfully alive by his journey through ice water, Old +Joe climbed the bank into the beech grove. He paused to reconnoiter. + +The grove, composed entirely of massive beech trees, bordered Willow +Brook for about a quarter of a mile and gave way to spindly aspens on +either side. The best beechnut hunting lay in the most sheltered area +near Willow Brook, but there were other considerations. + +There had still been no evidence of hunters. Old Joe, however, could not +afford to ignore the possibility that some might venture forth. He knew +perfectly well that the instant he left Willow Brook he had started +laying a hot trail that any mediocre hound could follow. While mediocre +hounds were no cause for concern, they were as scarce in the Creeping +Hills as apples on a beech tree. + +Old Joe must plan accordingly, and his immediate plans centered about a +lazy slough that lay a short distance back in the beeches and had its +source in a lazy runlet that trickled down an upheaval of massive rocks. +He made his way toward that slough. + +The grove already had an ample quota of beechnut harvesters of high and +low degree. Old Joe circled a snuffling black bear that squatted on its +rump, raked dead leaves with both front paws and gusty abandon, and bent +its head to lick up beechnuts along with shredded leaves, dirt, and +anything else that happened to be in the way. Farther on was a buck with +massive antlers, then a whole herd of deer. A family of skunks had come +to share the bounty, and a little coon that hadn't yet learned the +proper technique of harvesting beechnuts made up in enthusiasm what he +lacked in skill. + +Old Joe bothered none. The bear and the deer were too big, the skunks +too pungent, and he couldn't be bothered with callow little coons. +Anyhow, there was plenty for all. Old Joe came to the slough and sat up +to turn his pointed nose to each of the four winds. Detecting nothing +that might interrupt his dinner, he fell to hunting. + +Towering high over the slough, touching branches across it as though +they were shaking hands, the beech twigs rattled dryly as the wind shook +them and beechnuts pattered in the leaves or made tiny splashes in the +slough. Old Joe, with no disdain for the many nuts he might have +gathered but a hearty contempt for the work involved in gathering them, +went directly to a moss-grown stump. + +He sniffed it. Then he nibbled it. Finally, half sitting and half +crouching, he felt all around it with both front paws. The moss was soft +and the stump rotting, but nowhere was there a crack or crevice in which +a provident squirrel, anticipating the winter to come, might have +concealed any beechnuts. + +In no way disheartened, Old Joe went from the stump to a gray-backed +boulder and explored that. Again he failed. On his third try, fortune +smiled. + +At the very edge of the slough, possibly because its deep roots were +imbedded in constantly-wet earth, a great beech had been partially +toppled by a high wind that screamed through the grove. One massive root +lay on top of the ground and snaked along it for three feet before +probing downward again. + +Beneath this root Old Joe found the hidden treasure trove of what must +have been the most industrious squirrel in the Creeping Hills. At least +a gallon of beechnuts were packed in so tightly that it was necessary to +pry the first ones loose. Old Joe settled himself to partaking of the +squirrel's hoard. + +Opportunity, which knocked often but rarely in such lavish measure, had +better be welcomed instantly and swiftly or there was some danger that +the squirrel might yet partake of some of the nuts. But though Old Joe +was industrious, it just wasn't his night. + +He'd eaten about a fifth of the squirrel's cache when the bear he'd +previously circled raced to the slough, splashed across it, and with a +great rattling of stones and rustling of leaves ran up the hill and +disappeared in the night. + +Old Joe came instantly to attention. The bear, a big one, was +frightened. Big bears did not easily take fright, therefore something +was now in the beech grove that had not been present when Old Joe +arrived. + +A moment later, Duckfoot rushed him. Keener scented than any of the +other three hounds, Duckfoot had been the first to discover that a coon +was indeed in the beech grove and he acted accordingly. + +Old Joe rolled down the bank into the slough and started swimming. On +such dismal occasions his mind was automatically made up, so that there +was no need to linger and determine a proper course of action. He swam +fast, but at the same time he exercised discretion. A terrified young +coon would have splashed and rippled the water, and thus marked his path +of flight for any hound that was not blind. With everything except his +eyes and the very tip of his nose submerged, Old Joe swam silently. + +It had been a case of mutual recognition and Old Joe never deluded +himself. With Duckfoot again on his trail, the only safe tree was his +big sycamore. Emerging at the head of the slough, Old Joe ran up the +trickle that fed it, scrambled down the far side of the upended rocks, +raced through a swamp, and took the shortest possible route back to +Willow Brook. He'd just reached and jumped into the brook when any +lingering plans he might have had for foiling Duckfoot were put firmly +behind him. + +Back where the hunters were gathered, Glory and Queenie began to sing. +Though he'd never been run by Glory, Queenie was the slower and noisier +half of a formidable team, and Thunder would be along presently. There +was no time to waste. Swimming the pools and running the riffles, and +knowing that neither these nor any other tactics would baffle Thunder +and Duckfoot for very long, Old Joe sacrificed strategy for haste. +Panting like a winded dog, he sprang into the slough at the base of his +sycamore, swam it, and climbed. + +He tumbled into his den, sighed gratefully, and waited for whatever came +next. + +It was Duckfoot and Thunder. Running neck and neck, the inexperienced +puppy and the tested veteran reached the sycamore at exactly the same +second and wakened the night with their voices. + +Old Joe stirred uneasily. Though this was not the first time he had +been trailed to his magic sycamore, never before had he been so hotly +pursued. He was on the point of leaving his den, climbing farther up the +sycamore and escaping through his tunnel, but Old Joe restrained +himself. He'd always been safe here and he was too smart to panic. +Besides, if the worst came to the worst, he could still use the tunnel. + +Thunder and Duckfoot, blessed with voices that would have awakened Rip +Van Winkle, were presently joined by Queenie and Glory. Old Joe +scratched his left ear with his right hind paw, a sure sign of +nervousness. On various occasions one hound had trailed him to the +sycamore, a few times there'd been two, but never before had there been +four hounds at the sycamore's base. + +Again Old Joe was tempted to resort to his tunnel. Again he refrained +and waited for the hunters. + +Harky and Melinda came. Old Joe wriggled his black nose. Harky, usually +the first to arrive at any tree when a coon was up, he knew well. His +acquaintance with Melinda was only casual. He heard the pair talking. + +"When he wants to get out," Harky avowed seriously, "some say he climbs +out on a limb and drops back into the slough. On t'other hand, some say +he grows wings and takes off like a bird." + +"How silly!" Melinda exclaimed. + +"Yeah?" Harky asked truculently. "Watta you know about it?" + +Melinda declared scornfully, "Enough not to believe such nonsense! He +has a den somewhere in that sycamore and he's in it right now! The only +reason nobody ever found it is because everyone's been too lazy to +climb!" + +"And how you gonna climb?" Harky demanded. + +"Just cut one of these smaller trees, brace it against the crotch of the +sycamore, and shinny up it," Melinda asserted. + +Harky said nothing because this purely revolutionary scheme left him +speechless. + +Old Joe's uneasiness mounted. Though he understood no part of the +conversation, he had no doubt that a new force had invaded coon hunts. +The men who'd always come to his magic sycamore had been happy just to +get there, proud of hounds able to track Old Joe so far, and amenable to +the idea that neither hounds nor humans could further cope with a coon +that was part witch. + +Old Joe didn't know what she was, but Melinda was definitely not a man. +The rest of the hunters arrived, but before they could begin their +ritual that had to do with the invincibility of Old Joe, Melinda threw +her bombshell. + +"I was telling Harold," she said brightly, "that Old Joe has a den +somewhere in this big sycamore. Why don't we fell a smaller tree, brace +it against the sycamore, and shinny up to find out?" + +"By gum!" Mun said. + +As soon as the three men recovered from this flagrant violation of +everything right and proper, Old Joe heard the sound of an axe. A tree +was toppled, trimmed, and leaned against the sycamore. + +"Let me go up, Pa," Harky said. + +Mun asserted, "If anybody's goin' to have fust look at Old Joe's den, +it'll be me." + +Mun and Old Joe started to climb. + +"Thar he scampers!" yelled Raw Stanfield. + +Old Joe continued to scamper, paying no attention whatever to the fact +that, while excitement reigned, Mun fell out of the sycamore. Old Joe +climbed out on the limb and tumbled into his tunnel. + +Duckfoot, who'd noted the obvious escape route but was just a split +second too late, tumbled in behind him. Both the tunnel and Old Joe, +however, were low-built. Duckfoot, considerably farther from the ground, +had to crawl where Old Joe ran. + +The big coon ran out of the tunnel and into the swamp with a safe enough +lead. But the next morning's sun was two hours high before he managed to +shake Duckfoot from his trail. + +[Illustration] + + + + +[Illustration] + + + + +IMPASSE + + +Harky Mundee shoved his fork deeply into the hay. He twisted the tines +to gather the biggest possible load; as long as a man had to pitch fool +hay he might as well do so in as few forkfuls as possible and get the +misery over with. Then he tumbled his load down the shute into the cow +stable and leaned on his fork to indulge in some sadly-needed +self-criticism. + +Mun sat in the house with a broken leg and that was a bad thing, though +on the whole it was easier to endure than Mun's ruptured temper. +However, Mun's temper was an abstract affair that might erupt at any +moment, while a broken leg was distinctly concrete. Harky told himself +that anything so indisputably tangible should never beset Mun. + +Still, hadn't it been wrought by providence? If Mun had not tried to +climb Old Joe's sycamore, he wouldn't have fallen. If he had not fallen, +he wouldn't have a broken leg. He should not have such a thing, but he +had it, and by all the rules of logic Harky should have achieved the +ultimate ideal. + +With his leg splinted and bound, Mun's current living space was +restricted to the chair upon which he sat all day long and the cot upon +which he lay all night long. Harky had been prudent enough to remove +from the sweep of his father's arms all sticks of fire wood, dishes, +hatchets, knives, and anything else Mun might throw. Let Mun roar as he +might (and did, whenever Harky was in the house), roaring broke no +bones. For the first time since he could remember, Harky had no need to +outwit his father in order to do as he pleased. + +Of course there were some tasks one did not avoid. Livestock was +incapable of caring for itself, and Harky was too close to the earth to +let any living creature suffer for lack of attention. It was far better +to butcher it, an idea Harky had played with, but no matter how long the +winter might be, two people couldn't eat six cows, four pigs, and +sixty-nine chickens. There'd always be the horses left anyway. + +Grimacing as he did so, Harky pitched another forkful of hay down the +chute. Livestock should really be taught to eat coon meat so a man, with +complete freedom of conscience, might spend all his time hunting coons. +Maybe, if cows ate something besides hay, they wouldn't be such fools. + +Harky thought suddenly of the last time he'd attended Miss Cathby's +school, and shuddered. + +One of Miss Cathby's unswerving goals embraced assailing the minds of +her students with literature other than that which their fathers might +exchange behind the barn, and to that end there was a daily reading. +Most of it was not unendurable; all Harky had to do was think about +coons and look as though he were paying attention. On this particular +day, however, he had been unable to think about coons and was forced to +listen while Miss Cathby read a poem all about new-mown hay on a bright +June day. + +Harky shuddered again and pitched furiously until he had all the cows +could eat. He jammed his fork into the hay and scrambled down the ladder +to the barn floor. + +Formal education could mean the ruin of a man if he didn't watch out. +Miss Cathby had enthused about the poem and its author, but in the first +place, hay was not harvested in June. It wasn't even ripe until July, +and whoever wrote so touchingly of new-mown hay had never stood under a +furnace-hot sun and pitched any. + +Duckfoot, who had been waiting in the chaff on the barn floor, sidled up +to Harky. Harky let his dangling hand caress the big dog's ears, and he +tried to do some thinking about Duckfoot. But thoughts of hay just +naturally started him to thinking about corn, and the Mundee corn was +still in the field where it had been shocked. + +Therein lay a major point of friction between Mun, who demanded that it +be brought in, and Harky, who wouldn't bring it. He'd long had his own +sensible ideas concerning the proper way to run a farm, and bringing in +shocked corn did not come under the category of sense. + +There were arguments pro and con, and pro was summed up by the fact +that if it was not properly harvested, there'd be neither corn for +winter feeding of pigs and chickens nor husks for bedding. This +argument, Harky admitted, was not without a certain validity. But +opposed to it was such an overwhelming weight of evidence that any value +it might possess was puny indeed. + +Though unattended corn could not suffer as neglected animals would, +Harky would endure untold agony if he first had to haul it to the barn +and then husk it. If pigs and chickens had nothing to eat they could +always be eaten, thus solving the twin problems of caring for them and +satisfying one's own appetite. Corn in the shock lured coons, but not +even Old Joe could break into a corn crib. + +The corn would stay in the shock. + +It was, or should have been, a cause for leaping in the air, clicking +one's heels together, and whooping with joy. Unafflicted by any such +desire, Harky stirred nervously and wondered at himself. There was no +special age at which a man started slipping, and if he found no delight +in ignoring tasks Mun ordered him to do, he was already far gone. + +Suddenly it occurred to Harky that there had been no particular pleasure +since that night, a week ago, when they had Old Joe up and Mun fell out +of the sycamore. Harky hadn't even wanted to go coon hunting, and then +he knew. + +Knowing, he trembled. Coon hunters of the Creeping Hills had flourished +since the first hunter brought the first hound because they did things +properly, and the proper doing was inseparably bound to a proper respect +for the art they pursued. There just hadn't been any trouble. + +Until the first time a girl horned in. + +Raw Stanfield and Butt Johnson had helped carry Mun home. Then, +understanding the fearful consequences of Melinda's heresy, they'd +summoned Queenie and Thunder to heel and hadn't been seen since. + +Shaken from the tips of his toes to the ends of his shaggy hair, Harky +needed another fifteen minutes before he could muster strength to start +milking. Melinda had put a hex on all of them that night she stood +beneath Old Joe's sycamore, with Old Joe up, and declared so loftily +that the sycamore was not a magic tree but merely one that hunters were +too lazy to chop or climb, and that Old Joe was nothing more than a big, +wise, and rather interesting coon. + +That accounted for the broken leg of Mun, the aloofness of Raw Stanfield +and Butt Johnson, and the unhappiness of Harky. He sat down to milk, but +he was still so jarred by the dreadful tidings he'd just imparted to +himself that when Old Brindle kicked the pail over Harky didn't even +threaten her with a club. Affairs were already in a state so hopeless +that nothing Old Brindle did could complicate them further. Not even if +she kicked Harky's brains out. + +He finished the milking and the other chores and latched the barn door. +Duckfoot trailed behind him as he walked toward the house, but Harky did +not have even his usual friendly pat for the hound's head when they came +to the porch. Duckfoot, who'd shed most of his puppyish ways, crawled +disconsolately into his sleeping box. + +Gloom remained Harky's companion. Fifty-one years ago, or approximately +at the beginning of time, his great-grandfather had settled this very +farm. There'd been Mundees on it since, and hounds of the lineage of +Precious Sue, and all of them had hunted Old Joe. Now the spell was +broken because a mere girl, who had been taught by Miss Cathby, who +didn't know anything about anything, had considered it right to trifle +with spells. + +Harky recalled the night Melinda had brought Glory to the coon hunt. He +had, he remembered, hoped Melinda would fall in the mud and had promised +to stamp on her head if she did. He could not help thinking that that +had been a flash of purest insight, and that all would now be favorable +if Melinda had fallen in the mud and had her head stamped on. + +Harky turned the door knob and made his decision as he did so. The new +and radical, as represented by Melinda and Miss Cathby, must go. The old +and steadfast, as embodied in the immortality of Old Joe and the +probability that Duckfoot's father was really a duck, must be restored +to the pedestal from which it had toppled. But Harky needed Mun's +advice, and he was so intent on the problem at hand that he only half +heard his father's greeting. + +"So ya finally come back, eh? Of all the blasted, lazy, pokey, +turtle-brained warts on the face of creation, I jest dunno of a one wust +than you!" + +Harky said, "Yes, Pa." + +Startled, but too much under the influence of his own momentum to stop +suddenly, Mun demanded, "Didja git the corn in?" + +"No, Pa." + +The fires in Mun's brain died. Harky, who should have been sassing him +back, was meekly turning the other cheek. Despite Mun's frequently and +violently expressed opinions concerning the all-around worthlessness of +his offspring, Harky was his son and the sole hope of the coon-hunting +branch of the clan Mundee. + +"Ya sick, Harky?" Mun asked suspiciously. + +"No, Pa." + +"Then what is chawin' on ya?" + +"Tell me again when my great-grandpappy come here," Harky requested. + +Mun said, "Nigh onto fifty-two years past." + +"That's a heap o' time, ain't it?" Harky asked. + +"A smart heap o' time," Mun declared proudly. "Not many famblys knows as +much about themselfs as us Mundees." + +"You sure," Harky went on, "that Sue come to no good end on account she +run in the dark o' the moon?" + +Mun shrugged. "What else?" + +"And Duckfoot's pappy was a duck?" + +Mun looked puzzled. "Think I'd lie, Harky?" + +"No, Pa," Harky said hastily. "Just tell me again that all us Mundees +been on the trail of Old Joe." + +"How kin ya ponder?" Mun asked. "My grandpappy told my pappy, who told +me, who told you, that Old Joe's been hunted by every Mundee." + +"What do you think of Old Joe's big sycamore?" Harky questioned. + +"It's a witch tree," Mun said seriously. "I ain't rightly been able to +figger if'n Old Joe takes wings an' flies off it or if'n he does jump in +the slough. But I'm sure that if'n Old Joe gits in his witch tree naught +can harm him." + +"Ha!" Harky exclaimed. "Now we know!" + +"Know what?" Again Mun was puzzled. + +"All," Harky declared. "Mellie Garson gets mule-kicked; Melinda brings +Glory to horn in on our hunt; we get Old Joe up in his sycamore; Melinda +says it ain't no witch tree and Old Joe's naught but a big coon; you +believe her and try to climb; you bust your leg; Raw and Butt don't want +no more part of us--and," Harky wailed, "I can't even take pleasure on +account you can't make me fetch the corn in!" + +"By gum!" Mun said, "you got it!" + +"Sure I got it," Harky asserted. "Why'd you let Melinda horn in on our +coon hunt, Pa?" + +"I don't rightly know," Mun admitted. "I wa'n't of no mind to have her, +an' I know Raw'n Butt wa'n't. But she was of a mind to go, an' gol ding +it, when a woman's of a mind to do somethin', they do it!" + +"I would of stomped on her head if she'd fell in the mud," Harky assured +his father. + +"I know," Mun meditated, "an' it wa'n't a poor notion. But, gol ding it, +men just don't mistreat wimmen." + +"I still don't know why," said Harky. + +"Nor I," Mun admitted. "They jest don't an' that's all. Your ma, she +didn't weigh mor'n half what I do, but she's the only mortal critter +ever made me take to the woods." + +"Are women ornery all the time?" Harky questioned. + +"'Bout half," Mun said. "Rest o' the time, well, they're wimmen." + +"What else do you know about 'em, Pa?" + +"Durn little," Mun confessed. "What ya drivin' at anyhow, Harky?" + +"Melinda put a spell on us," Harky said. "But it ain't all her doing. +Miss Cathby showed her how." + +"I never thought of that," said Mun. "Never ag'in do I make ya go to +school, Harky." + +"Good," Harky said. "But I got to get that spell off." + +"How do ya aim to go about it?" Mun questioned. + +"I'll ask Melinda to fetch Glory on another coon hunt," Harky declared. +"We'll run Old Joe up his sycamore again. Then I'll climb the tree and +make her climb with me. She'll eat mud when she finds out there ain't no +den." + +"Harky!" Mun said joyously. "Your great-grandpappy would be right proud +of the way you talk!" + + + + +[Illustration] + + + + +HARKY'S PLOT + + +Mellie Garson, still immobilized by the mule kick, was aware of the +stain that afflicted his immortal soul. But he was not completely +repentant. Nothing could be worse than another day on the pickle keg. + +Listlessly Mellie caught up a handful of pebbles and shied them one by +one at a knothole in the woodshed wall. He shook his head and uttered a +despairing moan. Tossing pebbles at the knothole was the only game he'd +invented to beguile the passing hours, and at first it had been +interesting because he made a bull's-eye only about one time in twenty. +Now it seemed that every pebble he tossed sailed through the knothole as +naturally as a trout swims up riffles. + +Mellie contemplated scooping up more pebbles for more sharpshooting, but +where was the fun when he just couldn't miss? Glumly he reviewed the sin +for which he must one day answer. + +He should not, he told himself, ever have sent Melinda to take Glory on +the coon hunt. But how was he to know they'd get Old Joe up in his magic +sycamore? Could he possibly have had forewarning of the fact that +Melinda would not only question the witchery of Old Joe and his magic +tree, but infect the minds of her male companions with her own +skepticism? Could anyone guess that the hallowed traditions of the +Creeping Hills coon hunters would topple simply because a girl took part +in a coon hunt? + +Mellie shook his head sadly. Melinda, not exactly a woman, was not +exactly a girl either. She was, Mellie told himself, old enough to cast +the monkey wrench that usually lands in the gears whenever women intrude +on affairs that by every law of God and nature belong exclusively to +men. + +The wreckage had been fearful indeed; Mun Mundee laid up with a broken +leg; Raw Stanfield and Butt Johnson afraid to show their faces on the +lower reaches of Willow Brook; Harky Mundee mad as a trapped mink; and +Melinda explaining blithely that hunting raccoons was indeed good sport. + +Mellie buried his face in his hands and shook with anguish. He was not, +he told himself honestly, as ashamed as he should be because he had +thrown such a destructive bomb among the Creeping Hills coon hunters. +But that a Garson, even a female Garson, should refer to the art of coon +hunting as mere "good sport" shook the very foundations of everything in +which Mellie had faith. + +Glory, who had been dozing in the sun, rose and prowled restlessly over +to snuffle at the woodpile. Mellie regarded her with an experienced eye. + +Melinda might lack a true appreciation of coon hunting, but she'd +certainly given him a thorough rundown on Glory. A slow starter and slow +hunter, Melinda had said, and she tongued on the trail. But she was +steady as a church and true as a homing pigeon. She was every bit as +good as Queenie, and with a little experience she'd be better. A year +from now, any coon Glory got on would be treed or run to earth. + +Mellie had a sudden, uncomfortable feeling that he himself could not +have found out so much about Glory in just one hunt. Or if he had, he'd +be inclined to doubt until Glory proved herself. But he'd accepted +Melinda's evaluation without the slightest question, and now as he +looked at Glory he knew a rising uneasiness. + +A good thing was never to be taken for granted, and there was much that +could happen to any hunting hound; Mellie had only to remember Precious +Sue. Though he fervently hoped she wouldn't, Glory might go the same +way, and where would he find another coon hound of equal quality? There +was only one source. + +However, there was a great deal involved. It was blasphemy even to think +in terms of ordinary coon dogs when Glory was simultaneously in mind. +There were only two hounds on Willow Brook worthy of her, Thunder and +Duckfoot. Things being as they were, even if all else were equal, it was +unlikely that Butt Johnson would bring either his hound or himself +within nine miles of the Garsons, or anything that belonged to the +Garsons. + +About to catch up another handful of pebbles, Mellie grimaced and +refrained. He did not know how many pebbles he'd flicked from the +upended pickle keg through the knothole and into the woodshed, but +offhand he guessed there were at least four bushels, and he didn't even +want to think about another one. Nor had he much of anything else to +occupy his thoughts. His daughters, with a minimum of fuss and a maximum +of efficiency, had all the farm tasks well in hand. + +Mellie resumed his study of Glory, who had lain down in the sun but was +not sleeping, and wondered if he should keep her tied up. She might go +wandering, and there was no assurance that she'd be as lucky as Precious +Sue. As everyone knew, the woods were just filled with all sorts of +witches, and many of them were all bad. + +Glumly Mellie pondered the probability that she'd break loose and go +wandering even if he tied her (would anything ever go right for him?) +when Glory sat up, tilted her head, and voiced a warning wail. A moment +later, Harky Mundee appeared. + +Mellie sat still, doing his best to conceal his amazement, for he'd have +been no more completely astounded if Old Joe himself had appeared with +the ghost of Precious Sue in hot pursuit. Obviously Harky was not +seeking a fight, for he carried no fighting tools. But he certainly was +not coming in peace; after Mellie's foul trick, the Mundees would never +make peace with the Garsons. On the point of demanding that Harky state +his business and be on his way, Harky forestalled him with: + +"I come to ask can Melinda fetch Glory on another coon hunt tonight?" + +For a moment Mellie felt as though he'd again been mule-kicked, this +time squarely between the eyes. He blinked and recovered. + +"I thought," he heard himself saying, "that you come to ask kin Melinda +fetch Glory on another coon hunt tonight?" + +"I did," Harky asserted. + +A sudden suspicion pricked Mellie's mind. Boys were boys and girls were +girls, and all things considered it was a very pleasing arrangement, and +there was no harm whatever in a bit of smooching. But how come Harky +Mundee, otherwise so very sensible, thought he could successfully blend +that with a coon hunt? Or did he? + +"You got notions 'bout that girl child of mine?" he demanded. + +"You bet!" Harky assured him. + +"Well, I don't know as I have any real objections. Melinda's a mite +young, but you're a mite young yourself to be huntin' a wife." + +"Wife!" Harky gasped. "You think I been moonstruck?" + +"You talk like you been," Mellie growled. "A man has to be 'fore he'll +let himself in for all what can happen when he _asks_ a woman to go coon +huntin'. Who ya aim to take along outside o' Melinda an' Glory?" + +"Me an' Duckfoot," Harky stated. + +"But you ain't got no ideas 'bout Melinda?" Mellie pursued. + +"You're darn' whistlin' right I got ideas!" Harky said. "I've had 'em +ever since the night everything got smashed to bits!" + +"I know," Mellie said gloomily. + +"I can't even take no pleasure on account Pa can't make me fetch the +corn in and husk it," Harky continued. + +"I know," said Mellie, and he shrugged helplessly. "Many's the time I +been tempted to leave mine out, but with fourteen wimmen folk, a body's +got less chanst than you stand with your Pa." + +"Could be you're right," Harky said reflectively. "I guess there's times +when a man like you just can't help himself, and that's why you sent +Melinda on the coon hunt." + +"I could of helped myself," Mellie corrected. "I could of told Melinda +to stay home an' she'd of stayed. But I didn't an' she didn't." + +"Why'd you send her?" Harky asked. + +"Pure hellishness," said Mellie. "I was mule-kicked an' couldn't go coon +huntin' so I figgered I'd ruin it for everybody else." + +"You sure enough did," Harky told him. "Pa's got a busted leg, Raw and +Butt are staying near enough the woods so they can duck into 'em, and us +coon hunters are just going to sink right where we are without we do +something." + +"What ya aim to do, Harky?" + +"I got to take Melinda out and I'll bring her back. We have to run Old +Joe up his big sycamore and I got to show Melinda that there ain't any +den there for him to hide in." + +"It's a right big order," Mellie said. + +"But the only chance any of us got," Harky pointed out. "That Miss +Cathby, she come into the hills and tried to teach that Old Joe ain't +nothing but a big old coon. The rest, she says, is a lot of +foolishness, too. If we don't put a finish to that sort of thing once +and for all, even us men will be sitting around gathering our lore out +of books 'stead of coon hunts." + +Mellie shuddered at a prospect so horrible. There was a brief silence, +and Harky asked, "Can Melinda fetch Glory tonight?" + +Mellie said seriously, "Maybe you ain't been moonstruck in one way, but +you sure have been in another. You ever try tellin' a woman what to do?" + +"No," Harky conceded, "but I'd like to." + +"Me too," Mellie said sadly, "but I know better. Melinda kin go if she +wants to, an' I kind of think she will on account she likes coon +huntin'. But--" + +"But what?" Harky asked. + +"But nothin'," Mellie said. + +About to fill Harky's understanding ear with his recent mental turmoil, +and how that was responsible for his decision to keep Glory tied, Mellie +wisely said nothing. Somehow or other he'd got just what he wanted +anyhow, and Glory would be running with Duckfoot. Only fools meddled +with affairs that were already perfect. + +"Good enough," said Harky. "I'll wait 'til Melinda comes." + +In due course, another day at Miss Cathby's school behind them, Melinda +and Mary danced into the yard. Mary, who not only thought Harky a +roughneck but said so loudly, frequently, and publicly, stuck her tongue +out at him and ran into the house. Melinda, met and accompanied by an +ecstatic Glory, came to where her father and Harky waited. + +"You must have your corn in, Harold," she said sweetly. + +"How come you ask that?" Harky demanded. + +"If you didn't, you'd never be wasting daylight hours just talking." + +"Corn ain't in and it ain't gonna be," Harky stated. "It ain't none of +your mix if 'tis or not. What I come to ask is, will you bring Glory and +come hunting tonight?" + +"Can I, Pa?" Melinda breathed. + +"If you've a mind to," Mellie said. + +"Oh, Pa!" + +She kissed him, assured Harky that she would be there with Glory at +nightfall, and ran into the house. Mellie turned glowing eyes on Harky. + +"You do git yourself a wife come two-three years, don't cuss your girl +children. Didja see her kiss me?" + +"Fagh!" said Harky. + + * * * * * + +Duckfoot, sitting on the Mundee porch, was hopefully sniffing the pork +chops Harky was frying inside. Knowing that in the fullness of time he +would be gnawing the bones, Duckfoot licked his pendulous jowls in happy +anticipation and blew through his nose. + +If he thought of himself at all, which he seldom did, it was never to +wonder what he was or why he had been created. He was a hound, he had +been created to hunt coons, and that's all Duckfoot had to know. + +He could not possibly understand that he was a canine genius, and he +wouldn't have cared if he had. The blood of Precious Sue mingled with +that of Rafe Bradley's huge hound in Duckfoot, and he had inherited the +best of both plus something more. He was born with a sense of smell and +an ability to stick to a trail that is rare in even the best of +experienced hounds. + +The extra something consisted of a talent to out-think and outguess the +quarry he was running. He'd been a mere pup the night Old Joe came +raiding, but he'd experienced little difficulty in tracking Old Joe to +his magic sycamore and he'd learned since. + +The second time they ran Old Joe, Duckfoot had paced the renowned +Thunder and arrived at the sycamore with his far more experienced +hunting companion. He'd known perfectly well that Old Joe was in the +den, for he could smell him there. + +With a coon up, and for as long as the coon remained up, Duckfoot was +satisfied to run true to form and bay the tree. Sooner or later his +master would hear him tonguing and arrive to take charge. But Duckfoot +had no intention of letting any coon, treed or not, get the upper hand +and he called on his inborn hunting sense to make sure they never did. + +Even Thunder considered his whole duty discharged if he either caught +his coon on the ground or treed him and bayed the tree. Duckfoot went +beyond that to a complete grasp of any given situation. He had known +even as he supported Thunder's voice with his own that Old Joe might try +to escape and that the one logical escape route was farther up the +sycamore and into the tunnel. + +The instant Old Joe left his den, Duckfoot raced for the ledge. Only the +cramped tunnel prevented his overtaking Old Joe, and there'd been a +long, hard chase after the big coon emerged into the swamp. Old Joe had +finally escaped by entering a beaver pond, diving, evicting the rightful +tenants from their domed house, and waiting it out. + +It was a maneuver that Duckfoot had yet to learn; all he was sure of was +that beaver appeared but the coon disappeared. Duckfoot, however, had +learned exactly what to do should Old Joe again enter his den in the +sycamore and be forced out of it. Rather than go to the tunnel's +entrance, he'd go to its mouth and wait for his quarry to come out. + +Thus Old Joe entered a wrong phase of his own special moon. If he treed +in the sycamore and stayed there, his den would surely be discovered. If +he left, Duckfoot would catch him at the swamp. + +Two seconds before his supper was ready, Duckfoot winded Old Joe. + +The old raider was down in the corn, making ready to rip a shock apart +and help himself to the ears, when Duckfoot rushed. With a coon +scented, he forgot even the prospect of pork chop bones. + +The trail led to Willow Brook. Ranging upstream, Duckfoot found where +the big coon had emerged on the far bank and tried to lose his scent in +a slough. Duckfoot solved that one. Running like a greyhound when he was +on scent and working methodically when he was not, he went on. + +Presently, far behind, he heard Glory begin to tongue. Duckfoot set +himself to working out another twist in Old Joe's trail. + +Beyond any doubt, it would lead to the magic sycamore. + +[Illustration] + + + + +[Illustration] + + + + +AUTUMN NIGHT + + +Old Joe scrambled up his magic sycamore and tumbled into his den. Five +and a half minutes later Duckfoot arrived to waken the night with his +roaring. Old Joe crouched nervously in the leaf-filled den, knowing that +at last he had been careless. There were various reasons for his lapse +in good judgment, of which the night itself was most important. It was +mild autumn, just such a night as sometimes lingered through +mid-December and sometimes changed in a few hours to cold winter that +brought snow and left Willow Brook ice-locked for another season. + +When he started out Old Joe had an uneasy feeling that this was to be, +and that tonight would be his last to prowl the Creeping Hills until the +February thaw. Uncertainty as to just how far he might venture from a +safe den contributed to his carelessness, and he raided Mun Mundee's +because his was the only corn left standing in the shock. + +So doing he had scarcely a thought for Duckfoot. He chittered anxiously +as he lay in the den and listened to the big hound roar. + +The magic sycamore was a witch tree no longer; its spell had been broken +the last time Old Joe treed in it and Mun tried to climb. The big coon +did not know that Mun had fallen and broken a leg in falling; he'd have +felt more cheerful if he had been aware of an occurrence so delightful. +He was certain that he could now be chased out of this den and equally +sure that Duckfoot knew his avenue of escape. + +But even though Old Joe felt his mistake, he did not feel that it was +necessarily a fatal one. + +He decided to remain where he was and await developments. If the hunters +flushed him from his den, he'd try to escape through his tunnel. Should +Duckfoot be waiting there, Old Joe's only choice would be to try +fighting off the hound until he was in the tunnel. Then he could run +away. + +Anything else that might arise, he'd deal with when the time came. + +Glory arrived to add her shrill voice to Duckfoot's bass roars, and then +Harky and Melinda came. Old Joe climbed the mouth of his den and poised +there; if it was necessary to run up the sycamore and drop into his +tunnel, every split second would be precious. + +He saw the glow of the lantern. He heard the measured blows of an axe +followed by the sound of a smaller tree toppling. The big coon waited +until it was trimmed and propped against the sycamore, then he could +wait no longer. + +He left his den fast, scampered up the sycamore, and climbed out on the +limb that overhung the tunnel's entrance. Old Joe continued to move +fast. Though he was ready to fight if Duckfoot were waiting for him--and +the big coon fully expected that he was--the coons that lived longest +were those that ran away when they could avoid fights. It would be +distinctly to his advantage if he reached the tunnel ahead of Duckfoot. + +Meeting no hound when he dropped into the tunnel, Old Joe sighed +thankfully and scooted onwards. Again he chose the branch that led into +the swamp, for there were various courses open now. If Duckfoot was +waiting for him when he emerged into the swamp, he could always go back +and through the tunnel's other branch. + +Duckfoot was not waiting. A little relieved because there was no pursuit +and a little worried for the same reason, Old Joe cut a winding trail +into the swamp and circled back toward Willow Brook. + +He plunged in, and climbed out when he came to another swamp. It was the +one he'd sought in February, when he voluntarily left his magic sycamore +and stopped to steal a chicken from Mun Mundee on the way. Old Joe went +unerringly to the same huge hollow oak. + +There was still no hound on his trail and now he thought there'd be +none. The finger of providence had crooked at the right moment, and Old +Joe would run another autumn. + +As he entered the hollow oak, he turned his sensitive nose away from the +freezing wind that swept down. His premonition had been correct; winter +would soon rule the Creeping Hills. + +High in the great oak, Old Joe's sleeping mate awakened to growl. She +surged forward and nipped his nose. Old Joe backed hastily away and +chittered pleadingly. The next time he advanced, she let him come. + +This winter they'd share the same den tree. + + * * * * * + +Harky Mundee, who knew that a hound should not be heavily fed just +before a hunt, still thought it unwise and unfair if they were allowed +to run on a completely empty stomach. He chose a pork chop bone and some +scraps of meat for Duckfoot's supper and took them out on the porch. +Nobody had to tell him what had happened. + +Duckfoot, who was always fed as soon as Mun and Harky finished eating, +appreciated his suppers. Nothing except the scent of a coon could force +him to be absent when his meal was ready, and the only place he might +have scented a coon was down in the shocked corn. + +Harky took Duckfoot's supper back into the house. Mun looked up +inquiringly. + +"He's off on a coon," Harky explained. "One must of come raiding in our +corn and he winded it." + +"He must of," Mun agreed. "Could it be by any chanst Old Joe, Harky?" +Mun pleaded. + +Harky said sadly, "I can't tell, Pa." + +"Ain't you got a feelin'?" Mun persisted. + +"I ain't had any kind of feeling I can count on since the night Melinda +horned in on our coon hunt." + +Mun sighed unhappily. "Goshamighty. Wish I'd of turn't her back that +night." + +"Wish you had," Harky agreed. "We wouldn't be in this fix now." + +"If it's jest a common coon, Duckfoot'll soon have it up," Mun said. +"You can git him an' still have the night to prowl for Old Joe." + +Harky said, "I'll go out for a listen." + +Harky went out on the porch and strained to hear in the deepening night. +His hopes rose. Duckfoot, a silent trailer, would come silently on any +ordinary coon that might be raiding the shocked corn and he'd almost +surely tree it within hearing of the house. He would not get Old Joe up +so easily. Harky rejoined Mun. + +"I can't hear anything." + +Mun said, "It could be Old Joe, then." + +"It could be," Harky agreed. "Gol ding it! Are women late for +everything? Even coon hunts?" + +"Most times," said Mun, "'cept when they're early." + +Harky laid out Mun's coon-hunting axe, filled the lantern, stuck the +flashlight in his pocket, and put the .22 in easy reach. He stifled an +urge to go out on the porch for another listen. This night the whole +future of coon hunting in the Creeping Hills was at stake, but such +confidence as Harky had possessed was fast waning. Taking a girl on a +coon hunt had brought about this whole mess. Where was his assurance +that taking the same girl on a second hunt would not result in an even +more hopeless tangle? + +What had seemed sheer inspiration, and a positive way to retrieve +shattered legend by proving to Melinda that she was wrong and the coon +hunters right, no longer seemed such a good idea. When Melinda did not +come, Harky began to hope she wouldn't. Just as there seemed reason to +think this hope might be realized, Melinda arrived. + +She was dressed in the same costume she'd worn for the previous hunt, +except that she wore two shirts instead of just one. Both together, +however, did nothing to conceal the fact that no masculine coon hunter +was bundled beneath them; Harky thought sourly that even if Melinda +wore her father's bearskin coat she'd still look like a girl. + +"Where you been?" he demanded. + +"Why I came at nightfall, Harold," she answered. "I'm not late." + +"Y'are too!" + +Said Melinda, "You're so unreasonable, Harold. Isn't he, Mr. Mundee?" + +"I figger--Yeah," said Mun. + +Harky favored his traitorous father with a bitter glance. He put on his +coat, and with the flashlight secure in a pocket he took the .22 and the +coon-hunting axe in one hand and the lantern in the other. + +"Duckfoot's gone," he said accusingly. "A coon come raiding our corn and +he run off on it." + +"It isn't my fault," Melinda pointed out. "Let's go find him." + +"Where's Glory?" + +"Outside, of course. Harold, if we take Glory down to your shocked corn, +she'll pick up the same scent Duckfoot's already on. That way we'll find +him easily, don't you think?" + +Harky expressed what he thought in a ferocious scowl, his feelings in no +way improved because Melinda had suggested the very thing he intended +to do anyhow. + +"C'mon," he said. + +"Let me carry something." + +"I got it, soon's I light the lantern." + +Glory rose to meet them when they went out on the porch. Harky paused +just long enough to listen, and went on. Now he was fairly certain that +Duckfoot was again on Old Joe, for an ordinary coon would have been up, +within hearing, before this. Without a backward glance, Harky moved +toward the shocked corn. + +Glory trotted away and began to tongue as she found scent. She ran +directly to Willow Brook, was silent as she cast for the trail, and +resumed tonguing when she found it. Harky determined her direction. + +"They're on Old Joe again," Melinda pronounced. "We'll save time by +going directly to his big sycamore." + +Disdaining to answer, for he had been on the point of dazzling Melinda +with this very suggestion, Harky started to run. He no longer deluded +himself that he was the rushing wind, or even a racing deer, for the +last time he'd entertained such notions Melinda had accused him of +running slowly. But he knew a direct route to Old Joe's witch tree and a +blackberry thicket on the way. + +He crashed through it, holding the .22 and the axe across his chest and +a little in front to divert the whipping canes, and he grunted with +satisfaction when he heard Melinda gasp. Harky steered a course to +Willow Brook. + +There was a log there, a fallen pine that spanned a shallow pool, and it +made an adequate bridge except during flood time. Harky held the lantern +high, jumped on the log, and at once began a wild effort to keep his +footing. + +The night had turned colder. Running, he hadn't noticed the lower +temperature or thought the log would be ice coated. His luck held. Harky +danced to the far bank, jumped off the log, and continued running. + +Duckfoot was tonguing at Old Joe's magic sycamore. Presently Glory +joined him. Harky wondered. Duckfoot, who had been roaring constantly +and furiously, suddenly began to yap like a puppy, and Glory trilled her +tree bark. It seemed that even hounds were bewitched when girls horned +in on coon hunts, but they had Old Joe up once again. + +Reaching the sycamore, Harky discovered the two hounds alternately +barking up the tree and cavorting around each other, with far more +emphasis on the latter. A sudden suspicion entered Harky's mind. It was +a good thing Duckfoot had run ahead of Glory or neither would have +reached Old Joe's witch tree. + +Harky felled a smaller tree. The lesser branches he sliced off at the +trunk, the larger ones he stubbed to serve as hand- and foot-holds. With +some effort, he leaned his ladder tree against the sycamore and turned +to Melinda. The time for explaining was here. + +"Can you shinny up behind me?" he demanded. + +"Y--, yes, Harold." + +There was something in her voice that had not been there before, a +quaver that did not belong. Harky held the lantern high and turned +toward her. Melinda's hat was missing, her dark hair plastered wetly +against her head. Her clothes were soaking wet, her lips were blue with +cold and her teeth chattered. Scratches left by the blackberry canes +streaked her young cheeks. + +"What in tunket happened to you?" Harky demanded. + +"I fell in when we crossed the log," Melinda apologized. "I'm sorry." + +"You can't climb when you're shiverin' that way," Harky said crossly. +"You might fall and I don't want to carry you out of here. I'll warm +you." + +He unbuttoned her wet jacket, slipped it off her trembling shoulders, +and at the same time opened his own coat. He drew her very near and +buttoned his coat around the pair of them. A sudden electric shock +coursed through him and all at once he was very pleasantly warm. + +Harky put both arms around her and looked down at her upturned face. A +stray star beam lighted it gently. Presently Melinda said, + +"I'm warm now, Harold." + +"Not warm enough," said Harky, who was astounded to discover that there +was something more pleasant than looking for coons' dens. "I'll warm you +some more. And call me Harky, huh?" + +"Aren't we going to climb to Old Joe's den?" she asked shyly. + +"Best not tonight," said Harky, who wouldn't have considered abandoning +what he was doing for a dozen Old Joes. "We have to get you warm. Will +you come coon hunting with me again, Melinda?" + +"I'm afraid not, Harky," she said in a troubled voice. + +"Why?" + +"I simply cannot go anywhere too often with any boy who lets his +father's corn stand in the shock when it should be brought in and +husked." + +"I'll bring it in," Harky promised recklessly. "I won't do a lick of +hunting until it's all in and husked! How about a kiss, Melinda?" + +"Oh, Harky!" + +"Please!" + +"M-mmm!" + +It occurred to Harky, but only very vaguely, that Miss Cathby's foothold +in the Creeping Hills was too solid ever to dislodge. But let what may +happen. In years to come, Old Joe would still prowl on Willow Brook, +hounds of Precious Sue's lineage would trail him, and Mundees would +follow the hounds. Nothing could stop any part of it. + +Harky had a feeling. + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The Duck-footed Hound, by James Arthur Kjelgaard + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 41723 *** |