Timecachers (32 page)

Next he tried walking away from the pair. The sheep watched him suspiciously, holding their position. Adam stopped, keeping his back to the animals, and flexed his knees slightly. He abruptly pivoted toward the sheep and sprang toward them in a flying leap. The sheep simply stepped aside, leaving Adam to land chest first in the mud and manure of the pen. The sheep looked at him and made an undulant bleating noise, sounding a lot like laughter to Adam. Jimmy stood stoically outside the pen watching, a slight smirk the only indication of his amusement.

Adam huffed as he pulled himself to his feet. “Ok, I get it; catching a sheep isn’t as easy as it sounds. How about a quick lesson?”

“You’re giving up already? I was just beginning to enjoy the show,” Jimmy laughed as he stepped into the pen. “You have to remember that sheep are herding animals. Whenever they are threatened, they will run to the others for protection. Or if there is no herd, they will run toward a wall.”

“I noticed that.” Adam tried to brush off some of the muck, succeeding only in smearing it down the front of his shirt. “I couldn’t figure a way to make it work for me though.”

Jimmy calmly walked toward the sheep, keeping his knees slightly bent, extending his arms perpendicular to the ground. “You got them a little stirred up, but I should be able to catch one with little difficulty.” He continued walking evenly toward the animals. As he approached, they began darting back and forth along the pen wall. When they ran to the left, Jimmy moved his left arm toward the wall, causing them to turn and move back to his right. He used his right arm to grab one of the sheep around the neck, and quickly brought his left hand under the animal’s front legs, capturing it with skilled ease.

“Aha!” cried Adam. “I get it now; the old wraparound maneuver! Can I try again?”

“Be my guest,” Jimmy answered, letting go of the sheep. He sniffed Adam and wrinkled his nose. “Maybe you’ll have better luck now that you smell more like one of them.”

Jimmy stood back out of the way as Adam got himself into position. He extended his arms while slowly and steadily approaching the pair of sheep, just as Jimmy had done. They slipped past him the first couple times, but on the third try, he angled just right and managed to crook his right arm around his target’s neck. The animal bleated and stomped as he tried to get control of it.

“Grab it under the front legs with your other arm, and lift. Just remember to watch out for the hooves,” Jimmy shouted over the bleating sheep.

Adam did as he was told, holding tightly and lifting the animal’s front legs from the ground. As he did, the sheep calmed and gave in to capture.

“Ho!” cried Jimmy. “Very good! You may have a future as a sheep farmer.”

Feeling confident, Adam relaxed his grip, and as he did the sheep lurched, wrenching free and knocking Adam back to the ground. He saw the sheep lurch toward him as it jumped over his body in its attempt to escape, and reflexively flattened himself against the ground and covered his face with his arms. He had avoided being struck by the animal’s hooves and wasn’t injured, but he could hear Jimmy’s muffled laughter through the caked mud now lodged in his ears. He sat up, wiped the muck from his eyes, and saw Rebecca standing akimbo next to Jimmy, hands on her hips.

“What are you doing to my sheep?” she asked him.

Jimmy doubled over from laughing so hard, tears flowing from his eyes, pointing at Adam. Rebecca, neither amused nor sympathetic, just stared at him waiting for an answer.

“Uh,” he said, feeling foolish sitting in the mud and manure of the pen. “I was catching one.”

“That’s a strange way to go about it. The sheep are now quite disturbed. If you boys are finished horsing around, the evening meal will be ready very soon. Jimmy, please show your friend where to clean up. He has gotten himself completely filthy, and I will not have that mess brought into my kitchen.” She turned without further comment and headed back to the house.

“I don’t think I made a very good impression,” said Adam.

“I wouldn’t worry about it,” said Jimmy. “She never stays mad for very long. Besides, I see you’ve made a new friend.” He pointed with his chin toward the sheep, which was now standing next to Adam nibbling on his pant leg.

“Great,” he smirked, patting the sheep on its wooly head and brushing off some of the drying mud from his clothing. “Just marvelous.”

“Come on,” said Jimmy, laughing again. “I’ll show you where to wash up.”

Chapter twenty-nine

A
dam cleaned off the majority of the muck with a washbasin and broom, at least enough to pass Rebecca’s inspection before he was permitted to enter her kitchen. Jimmy said he would show Adam how to shear a sheep after they ate, and not to worry about cleaning up too much. “You’ll get plenty dirty again this evening,” he said.

The aroma from the kitchen was exquisite, and Adam tried to make amends to Rebecca by commenting on the great smelling food.

“You should really enjoy it,” she said with a glare. “It’s mutton stew.”

Adam winced, staring dolefully at the bowl of stew Rebecca placed in front of him. His expression set Jimmy laughing once again. His laughter was infectious; Rebecca could no longer keep up her pretense of being upset and burst into laughter as well. Adam was relieved that no one was really annoyed with him, and he too joined in the laughter.

Everyone had several helpings of stew, eating and joking about Adam’s first experience with the sheep. Adam admitted that he had never eaten mutton stew before and he found it to be delicious. He remembered how good Catherine’s cooking had been, and wondered if good cooks were common among the Cherokee women.

Jimmy and Rebecca told Adam that they were very pleased to have him staying with them, since things had been so serious lately and they were glad to have such an amusing houseguest. It was a pleasant distraction. Adam said he really enjoyed their company as well, although he wasn’t sure he had the energy to be their source of amusement for too long.

“I think you will enjoy working with the wool,” said Jimmy. “It’s still exhausting work, but the sheep usually relax once the shearing begins, and once the fleece is no longer attached to a sheep it’s a lot easier to catch,” he said, starting the laughter again.

After dinner all three of them headed back to the barn, where Jimmy demonstrated the process of sheep shearing. He showed Adam the shears, which looked like a heavy-duty pair of scissors, except they were hinged at the bottom with a metal spring. Jimmy expertly used the shears to remove the fleece, leaving a much smaller looking animal and a large pile of wool. The entire process took him less than ten minutes. Jimmy grabbed the second sheep and handed the shears to Adam, showing him how to control the shears by running them close along the animal’s skin. At first, Adam was nervous that he would injure the animal, but Jimmy held on tightly and the sheep cooperated by holding still. Once Adam had the feel for handling the shears, Jimmy took them back and showed him how to trim around the animal’s legs and hindquarters so the entire fleece could be removed. Adam was embarrassed to remember his naive belief that removing the wool was a simple task. For one man to both hold and shear, and do it quickly, was a skill that would take plenty of practice to master.

Jimmy continued the lesson with the wool washing process, explaining how dirt, organic matter, and especially the lanolin—the grease secreted from the skin of the sheep—had to be removed or it would harden and ruin the wool. Rebecca demonstrated how the fleece needed to be carefully placed into a very hot water and lye soap solution and soaked several times. When the wool was clean and the lanolin removed, it could then be rinsed and set aside on a rack to dry. She explained that sometimes they used abrasion when cleaning in order to felt the wool. The felting process would turn the wool into a fabric, and was only performed when it was not going to be spun into yarn. Once the washed wool was dry, it needed to be carded, or combed, with metal-toothed brushes to separate the fibers and get it ready for spinning.

“I have to admit,” said Adam, “I never really gave much thought to all the effort that went into making cloth. Whenever I need some new clothes, I just go to the store and buy them. Much of this labor has been automated in my time, and we now have many man-made fabrics. The wool processing is still fascinating, whether it’s being done by man or machine.

“Speaking of automation, Jimmy, you said before that you purchased a cotton gin. Is processing cotton done the same way as wool? What exactly does a cotton gin do?”

“He has been hoping you would ask him about that,” said Rebecca. “Most people learn not to make that mistake twice.”

“I admit I get excited about new farming innovations. Especially my cotton gin,” Jimmy said. “I promise to not talk you into boredom.”

Despite his promise, he took a deep breath, preparing to speak for quite a while. “A big part of the cotton crop is picking it, of course, which is difficult, back-breaking work. The growers may use new immigrants to this country to do this work, but they learn quickly try to find something better to do for a living. Those who can afford it use slave labor. All of the large cotton plantations must use slave labor to be successful, since slaves don’t get a choice about the type of work they have to do.

“Once the cotton is picked, the seeds have to be removed from the bolls, another very tedious process, and that is where the cotton gin comes in. It works by using comb-like spindles to separate out the seeds from the lint. That is the part you want to keep—the lint. The cotton lint still has to be carded, just like wool, to separate the strands of fiber for spinning.”

Jimmy directed Adam’s attention to a wooden box, about the size of a large shoebox. It had a crank on one side, and a cluster of pulleys and belts on the other. He flipped open the top, exposing a metal-fingered spool and a comb-like device. “The gin I have is a small model, which I got mostly so I could understand how it works, and to process the cotton for our own use. Even this small machine greatly reduces the amount of time it takes from picking to spinning cotton. Some of the others, as you heard Benjamin, scoff at me for purchasing such an extravagance. They do not understand the great potential I see in it. I had to have one.” He patted the machine reverently.

“Jimmy,” said Adam, “in my time you would be a geek, for sure.”

“A geek?” asked Jimmy hesitantly. “Is that some sort of vegetable?”

“Some kind of nut would be more appropriate,” said Rebecca.

“You’re pretty close to right,” Adam laughed. “A geek is what we call a person who is ‘nuts’ about new technology. Someone who is very excited by new inventions, and is compelled to own them. We’re alike in that regard, Jimmy. I’m often accused of being a geek too.”

“You two can be geeks later,” Rebecca groaned as she lifted the heavy wool fleece. “Come and help me with stacking these heavy fleeces and I’ll let you both have some of the grape dumplings I made as a special treat.”

“Grape dumplings, yum!” said Jimmy, sounding like a kid who had just been promised a piece of his favorite candy. “Lead the way, my beautiful wife.”

“That always works,” said Rebecca to Adam, “I’ve saved many visitors from the agony of sitting through hours of Jimmy’s stories with the promise of a few grape dumplings.”

They made quick work of the chores and headed off to the farmhouse, where they feasted on grape dumplings. The dumplings were made from mashed grapes mixed with cornmeal and rolled into bite-size balls. Adam had to agree with Jimmy, they were as sweet as candy and quite delicious.

By the time they finished the dumplings, the sun had set and Jimmy was charged with lighting some lanterns. Rebecca ordered him not to use “those stinking Lucifers” for which Adam was grateful. Lamps lit, they took seats in the small living area of the farmhouse while Jimmy performed the ritual of filling and packing his pipe, lighting it with a brand from the hearth instead of a Lucifer. Rebecca sat with them, tranquilly carding wool, and demonstrated to Adam how the two combs pulled the fibers into fluffy white mats.

As he puffed his pipe, Jimmy told Adam that even though he and Rebecca had adopted many of the ways of the whites, and appreciated the modern inventions that made farm life a little easier, they still tried to keep and respect many of the traditional ways of the Cherokee. He said that many of the people who lived strictly traditionally chastised them for their lifestyle, but they felt it was important to learn and utilize both the white and traditional Cherokee ways. They believed that by doing so, both cultures could someday come to understand and respect each other’s customs.

Jimmy said that one tradition they found most gratifying was storytelling. Cherokees were well-known for their fascinating and expressive stories. Often repeated, they never tired of hearing them. “The children really love hearing the stories. It is the way our history has been passed along from one generation to the next for hundreds of years. We’re looking forward to telling them all to our own children. Other tribes have a tradition of evening storytelling, but for the Cherokee, any time of day is good for a story. Evening just happens to be the best time for us farmers.” He said that this evening it was Rebecca’s turn, if he would care to listen.

“Sure I would,” said Adam. “I heard a few of the delightful Cherokee stories at Benjamin’s farm, and would love to hear another.”

“Then I know just the story,” Rebecca said, “and I have the perfect accompaniment for it.” She set aside her wool carding brushes and went to the kitchen, returning with a large bowl of fresh strawberries from the basket Adam had carried in that afternoon. They passed around the bowl and each took several of the ripe, bright red berries.