Raintree County (34 page)

—John, my boy, the Perfessor said, holding out his hand and adopting his rhetorical manner, at this affecting moment I find myself inarticulate. What can I say, my boy, that shall convey to you my deep and genuine fondness and admiration? Let me only say that I expect great things of you. Don't let the world nail you on the cross of respectability. You and I are alike in only a few ways, but those are fundamental. We both love life and beauty. If a series of misadventures have made me a cynic, that need not happen to you, my boy. You have a beautiful girl who loves you and whom you love. By all means, my boy, marry her, love her, beget broods of happy cherubim, go on, my boy, to greater and better things, and in the years that are to come let your mind sometimes revert, not without a feeling of affection, to that amiable miscreant, your misguided but perhaps not wholly misguiding mentor. Your hand, my boy. A scrap of verse may not be unfitting at this moment, if I can lay my tongue to one. Well, perhaps this will do.

The Perfessor winked and, arms gesticulating in his best classroom manner, recited,

—O, may your pathway ever gleam

With sincere love and joy supreme.

May Him whose eye is felt for miles,

Bless you with Nellie's brightest smiles

And all that fairest love can dream:

Such is the wish of your friend, Jerusalem Webster Stiles.

The train was drawing abreast, a lantern swinging from the cowcatcher. The Perfessor climbed the bank. With brittle agility, black coattails flapping, he leaped upon the rear of the ultimate car. Johnny heard a high voice crackling above the sullen rumble of the train:

—Ave atque vale!

—Good-by, Professor! Johnny called, waving.

He saw a long, thin arm shaken obscurely against the dull sky. Then the Perfessor was gone in the grayness of the just beginning day.

Johnny's eyes were blurred with tears. It was because a beautiful, mournful dawn was breaking in the sky, it was because he felt that there had just been a great departure in his life, it was because in this parting he knew that he had not only said good-by to the departing one but to a portion of himself as well. An era of his life was ending. He had discovered that the earth of Raintree County was not only full of beauty but of peril, and that its Hesperian fruits were guarded by dragons breathing fire. All this he had learned in part from the gifted but erring creature who had just gone down the track to eastward, but he knew that he had always suspected it himself.

When he finally got back to the Home Place and in bed, beneath his shut eyes the day just passed sprang to life again. Dreaming, he relived it in bizarre distortions. This dream, like many of his dreams, disturbed him with strange, savage encounters and adventures. And yet his dreaming self passed through the dream's protean, erotic landscapes somehow always in the best Johnny Shawnessy tradition, pursuing an eternal quest for beauty and the good. This night, more vividly than usual (and his dreams were always vivid) the remorseless comedy of life streamed on; and just before awakening, he dreamed perhaps the most delicious, if frustrating, dream that he had ever dreamed.

He was, it seemed, coming into Freehaven along the oldest pathway of his childhood. Down the road, he saw the redbrick structure of the Court House in a clearing stubbled with stumps. It was some vision of early times in Indiana when the founders of Raintree County imposed their austere dream of freedom on the forest earth. Riding in the wagon with T. D., Ellen, and the other children, he felt as if the scene had been conceived and colored by his own verbal magic, he the budding bard of Raintree County, who like William Shakespeare would write the epic dramas of his people. For him, lusty dialogues in the manner of the elder poets, bards of deathless dramas!

Everyone was waiting for a certain important personage to arrive so that the program might begin. The sky darkened. Over the roofs
of Freehaven shot a fiery streak, perhaps the burning stick of a rocket, descending till it became a train pulling into the station. Someone sprang lightly down, turning a somersault in the air, black coattails stiff out behind, eyes compounded by brilliant lenses, black hair slicked flat to a reptile skull.

PROFESSOR JERUSALEM WEBSTER STILES

bowing gracefully to crowd, twirling malacca cane,

—Greetings, one and all, from foreign parts. As I was about to say before I was so rudely interrupted by the Protestant Reformation, I trust you all perceive the object that I hold in my hand.

THE REVEREND MRS. GRAY

blushing, speaking with grave and sweet decorum,

—Your majesty, as representative of the ladies of Raintree County, I wish to tender you a cordial token of our gratitude for your ardent efforts in our behalf.

PERFESSOR

with malacca cane expertly flipping Mrs. Gray's back skirts up and gravely reading an inscription embroidered across her bloomers,

—When this you see, remember me,

And all our fun at Old Pedee.

Madame, I accept this festive offering in the spirit in which it is tendered. Henceforth it shall occupy a prominent place in my home as a reminder to me of happy days spent in the old Pedee Academy. And now, folks, time for our geography lesson.

He touched his pointer to a phrenological chart hanging on a tree; and as he did so, the chart, changing slowly, became a varnished study of the human anatomy and then a map of Raintree County.

PERFESSOR

in best classroom manner,

—Beware, my boy, the Peak of Penis!

Beware, beware the Mount of Venus,

The Wandering Isles of Genitalia!

Beware the Roman Saturnalia

And all the Paphian Penetralia.

GIRLS

naked, dancing with maenad fury, venereal mounds adorned by the ripe tobacco leaf,

—Some do it chew and some it smoke,

Whilst some it up their nose do poke!

JOHNNY

declining proffered cigars,

—Sorry. No, thanks. You see, my pa—— Besides, they tell me it's against the law.

GARWOOD JONES

bulky and sleek in new suit, handsome blue eyes smiling, exhaling odor of lotion, holding whiskey bottle,

—Pure yellow corn that comes by the cup! Come on, fellers, drink up, drink up!

PERFESSOR

through megaphone,

—Ladies and gentlemen, yes-sir-ee, we're ready to start the huskin' bee! Workin' fast on the middle row is young John Shawnessy. Go, boy, go!

He husked his way down a corn row growing through the court house yard past a series of exnibits while the crowd cheered him on. Nearing the finish line, he was surrounded by girls in costumes of the corn, swaying with cernuous motion.

CORN MAIDENS

—Shakamak! Husky lover! Shawny, shockheaded boy! Reder of riddles!

VOICE

husky and rehearsed, from within a shrine of pillars, walled with stalks of the ripe corn,

—With yellow and unloosened hair,

Clothed in a garment white and fair,

Inside a green and guarded keep,

A lovely lady lies asleep.

No key can turn the twisted lock;

Yet love comes in and tears her smock.

He burst through a wall of laughing girls into the shrine where an ear of corn tall as a maiden grew from a treebroad stalk. He tore the green husk down, laying bare the yellow tresses, ripe redtipped breasts, round white belly of

NELL GAITHER

entangled in green cornstalks, looking back at him with wistful eyes, in low voice, musical, receding,

—Let's do the next
liber
together, Johnny.
Oft was I weary when I toiled with . . .

He was lying on the bank of the Shawmucky, where he and a great many other young men had been hunting for the fabulous white creature lost in country waters and reported in a famous article of the
Free Enquirer.

WILLIE SHAKESPEARE

sharpfaced stripling in overalls, straw hat, shirt open at neck, chewing a grass-stem, writing on coarsegrained paper,

—William Shakespeare, his hand and pen.

He will be great—but God knows when.

JOHNNY SHAWNESSY

—Say, Bill, if it's not being too personal, what's the lowdown on your affair with Ann Hathaway? According to the records, she was twenty-six and you were eighteen when the marriage took place, and the first child was born just six months after——

WILLIE

—By cock, John, you're sharp at your sums. Alackalas and welladay, 'twas midsummer madness with too little method that tumbled poor Will in the hay.

As you like it—and what doth it skill—

Ann Hathaway—and also a Will.

Everyone knows poor Will was to blame

For taming the shrew—and for shrewing the dame.

GARWOOD JONES

lying on back, hands under head, blowing smoke rings,

—Ain't Nature grand?

WILLIE

peering through rushes, pointing at a girl standing naked in green sedge across the river,

—Ain't God good to Indiana—fellers, ain't He, ain't He though?

PERFESSOR

—By the way, Bill, do you think John's been in there?

WILLIE

—Don't be banal, boy.

PERFESSOR

standing up, baseball bat in hand,

—It's about time I instructed the local primates in an ingenious game. Now, folks, I trust you all perceive . . .

The bat in the Perfessor's hand had shrunk into a starter's pistol. In the Court House Square, hundreds of people crowded to the starting line.

OFFICIAL STARTER

tall black hat, pistol in air,

—After several delays, folks, we're ready to start this here dash. Emulate Adam, folks. He set sich a blisterin' early pace that he started—and dern near finished—the race. (Struggling with pistol) This doggone shootin' ar'n ain't wuth a dang. I cain't seem exactly to git the——

PISTOL

—BANG!

Everyone was running in the Court House Square. Children and dogs ran under the wheels of carriages. Old men ran, waving crutches and shouting hymen. Grandams ran, holding up petticoats and making bony legs blur with speed. Girls in summer dresses ran, emitting high squeaks of excitement, backs gracefully erect, necks and shoulders held with fashionable stiffness, parasols maintained primly over heads.

FLASH PERKINS

running a shade ahead of Johnny, white teeth clenched in an insolent grin,

—Five times runnin' I won that dash—Perkins, Orville—better known as Flash!

SOUTHERN BELLE

shaking her shoulders and twisting her hips,

—Come on, honey, the weather's fine down below the mixin' and the dazin' line.

GIRLS

flinging ecstatic flowers,

—Goddess, give of your gracious bounty, to the fastest runner in Raintree County!

Running, his feet were all daubed with mud. He seemed unable to stay up with the other contestants. He was ashamed to see that he was running unclothed like the ancient contenders in the Olympic games. Beside him in the fastgathering murk of the Square was his mother, Ellen Shawnessy. Her white feet glimmered beside him, as she tried to lead him along some darkening path at the end of which was a face of stone or perhaps the mythical Raintree. But he had failed her somehow. He had committed an unpardonable crime. He had done and said pagan, fleshly things and he had known desires that were of the flesh only. For this, he dared not look at her.

ELLEN SHAWNESSY

her face a pale stain in the darkness,

—A great man is a man who does good for other people. What's this I hear, Johnny, about you and——

A crowd came by yelling the lustful shout of the mob. At first, Johnny thought that they had come for him, but then he saw that they were full cry in pursuit of a buggy in which a man and woman rode naked.

PERFESSOR

lashing horses, chanting in thin sardonic voice above the sullen fury of the mob,

—Woodman, spare that tree!

For my head am bendin' low!

My country, 'tis of thee!

Goddammit, Dobbin, go!

The whole grostesquely comic vision swept past into darkness, and then with a tidal rhythm came flowing back again from darkness. Now the mob bore aloft the body of the Perfessor tied on
crossed rails, dripping hot tar, bestuck with feathers. The lean, terrible body began to change form, flapped vast birdwings, tore loose from its rotting cross, began to rise slowly over the river.

PERFESSOR

beating his condor wings,

—To John Wickliff Shawnessy, life's eternal young American,
ave atque vale.
Awk. Awk. Shawkamawk.

Green be the grass above thee,

Friend of my better days.

None knew thee but to love thee.

But whiskey never pays.

It was night along the river. Beams of lantern light accused the darkness. He remembered now why he was here. He had stolen a famous statue by a young American sculptor and had hidden it in his favorite nook beside the river. No doubt the whole County knew of it and was coming to chastise him. In deep grass he tugged at the antique stone and slowly unearthed the marble breasts and back and buttocks of the Venus found in Melos. Pulled loose, it seemed to come alive in his hands, a mature young woman. He strove against her warmfleshed nudity, impeded by a white oarblade, broken, which she held between them. Her green eyes watched him, pensively calm. Her hands played with the planed wood, tracing with featherlight fingertips a legend carven in an antique language. Their slight touch on the oar gave him a remote pleasure, but suddenly the visual pain of beholding their delicate caress became the anguish of his own body, betrayed into spasms of desire. Smiling, the young woman leaned her mouth to his, grazed his lips lightly. The very fury with which he seized her drove her from him. Beneath his hands her twisting waist was barky and rough, her hair was a branch of oak-leaves. And she was gone beside the dark river in which he swam and stumbled through mucky pools and webs of waterweeds. Shocks of corn in near-by fields were flooded with the gray waters. . . .