Outer Dark

Four girls.

She sat, hands folded. The woman dampened cheesecloth to lay over the butter.

Oldest’n been near your age I reckon.

I’m nineteen, she said.

Yes. Oldest’n be just about your age. […] I don’t even know whether you’d say raised or not when they wasn’t but just young. The boy was near a growed man when he died.

Yes mam. I’m sorry you’ve had such troubles.

Mm-hmm. Sorry. Don’t need sorry. Not in this house. Sorry laid the hearth here. Sorry ways and sorry people and heavensent grief and heartache to make you pine for your death.

She was watching her toes.

For nineteen year.

Yes mam.

I thank ye kindly.

Shoo, the old man said. Just stay on.

Well, I best get on.

The old man took up his cane from where he had leaned it against the side of the house. Well, he said, come back when ye can stay longer.

I will, he said. He went down the steps into the yard. The hounds raised their eyes to watch him go. He half turned again at the road and lifted one hand and the old man nodded and made a little motion with his cane.

Thank ye for the water and all, Holme said.

Shoo, said the old man. I wouldn’t turn Satan away for a drink.

Then a man came out of the building on the left and crossed in front of her and as he did he tipped his hat, a brief gesture as if swatting idly at a fly. There was a trace of a smile at his mouthcorners.

Hey, she said.

Hey yourself.

She was watching him go on. You ain’t a doctor, are ye? she called after him.

He stopped and looked back. No, he said. A lawyer. I get the winners, he gets the losers. He was standing in the middle of the road, smiling a little, his hand gone to the brim of his hat again.

Well listen, she said, where’s they a doctor at?

The lawyer tucked a long forefinger into his waistcoat pocket and fished forth his watch. He snapped it open […] He won’t be in till about one-thirty, he said. It’s ten till now.

The old lady’ll fix ye a bed here in the kitchen. You ain’t no desperate outlaw, are ye? Ain’t murdered nobody?

No sir. I don’t reckon.

Don’t reckon eh? The squire smiled.

Holme wasn’t smiling. He was looking at the floor.

Get ye fattened up a little here on the old woman’s cookin you’ll be all right, the squire said. Might get some work out of ye then. You reckon?

Yessir. I ain’t scared to work.

The squire had tilted back in his chair, regarding him. I don’t believe you’re no bad feller Holme, he said. I don’t believe you’re no lucky feller neither. My daddy always claimed a man made his own luck. But that’s disputable, I reckon.