Cruelty brought no relief, as sight did not, and yet he sometimes thought his pain might simply be the pain of his shedding, since it often seemed that he was sloughing like a snake the skins of all his seasons; his white fats and red flesh were lost in a luminous wash. Sunshine lapped at him, rose over him, and soon there were pieces of him drifting off — his head like a hat, legs like logs. Then gently he toweled his bones until they shone. They made a fair tree; they weren't so bad. Henry hadn't been prepared for anyone like Omensetter. He'd been content to believe that he would always live with usual men in a usual world; but he'd lived with himself all these years like a stranger — and with everybody else. So on these shining armatures he fancied that he shaped a fine new unstreaked clay through which life lifted eagerly like moisture warming toward its heat. There was no mistaking Omensetter's likeness; Henry was newborn in that waltzing body now; he had joined it as you join a river swimming; surely Lucy must have seen… but he didn't mind if she had. Perceptions no longer pierced his eyes — his needles returning; instead, he poured out giddily.
In this mood Henry could remember piling up a mountain in the wagon: the quilts and comforts, the toys, the tools and the utensils — tasting their metals in his mouth. Clouds were living in the river; Gilean was resting by it, the air so clear. There was every house out honest and every barn banked proper to the weather. The trees were beautiful and bare, and the tracks of the wagons glistened. On the way they'd sung Rose Aylmer. Then sometimes they counted birds. There were rings in the pools of water by the road and the air was clean as it is after rain. He thought it would be healthy for the boy to live by the river, to catch fish and keep frogs, to grow up with good excitement.
But his wife would come and jar him loose. Age had beautifully lined her jaw. Her knuckles were huge. She rattled tins and silverware in drawers.
Where have you got to now? what are you thinking?
Nothing.
Nothing? You should see your face. Nothing!
Nothing.
It's fatty. You should see your face. It's fatty.
No.
What do you go to the shop for? You can scarcely walk yet you're always off down there, and in this weather when it's hot. What do you talk about? Does Tott tell stories? Or is the Furber preaching at you, trying to fish your soul out like the last pickle? Oh, I know what's happened. You've gone to the devil. That's what's happened.
No.
It's fatty.
He would sit so quietly within the shadows behind the forge that visitors scarcely noticed he was there. It was like the effect of his illness, for after a period of pain and confusion he thought his eyes had cleared and he had watched from his bed as if from out of the world. It had been as he imagined it was like to be invisible. Your eyes were open. People looked into them but they didn't think you saw. They were less than a mirror, no more than a painting of eyes. The sickness was nothing. Many times he had struggled to say that he could hear. Being stretched to pieces was nothing. Many times he'd tried to shout I can see, I can see you — hissing instead. Fighting for breath was nothing. Burning was nothing. Locked in a shrinking boot of flesh, hour after hour he remembered Jethro Furber's prayers.
The child of Decius Clark, said Doctor Orcutt through bis beard, is very bad. A bee stung him six weeks come Tuesday on the neck. You never saw a bigger swelling.
The doctor's fingers formed an egg.
Clark used to be a potter. Quit. He's farming now — or trying to. Not much account. I won't collect.
Orcutt aimed his spit.
Let's see that finger Matthew smashed.
You're a bastard, Truxton, Watson said.
You took on so, I thought I'd see. Well, Brackett? No charge for curiosity. The nail grow back? Mat told me that he knocked it clean away — is that a fact?
Omensetter held his hand out silently.
Orcutt grinned.
Mat's took up surgery, I see. Might drive me square from business.
He turned the thumb.
A scar of great bravery, the doctor said. What do you charge?
Mat shook his head helplessly.
Well, it always happens, cut like that.
Orcutt dropped the hand. The arm fell muscleless.
A sledge ain't a very thoughtful knife. The next time you get stung like that you see me right straight off and maybe you won't grow up such a swelling.
I hit him accidental, Mat exclaimed.
All round you're mighty lucky, mister, Orcutt said.
Then he asked Hatstat how the fishing was.
Rotten, Hatstat said.
Always is, this time of year, the doctor said.
They should be up.
Ah, George, they never is, you want them to. Ain't that right, Brackett?
It isn't cool enough, said Tott.
Mat rattled through his tools.
It was stifling in the shop, and fiercely hot by the forge.
Well he's a friendly sort, Clark is, said Doctor Orcutt, spitting. Not much account. I won't collect. But friendly. His wife is taking on about the boy but Clark is calm, I will say that. He's calm. How's your infection, Henry? It all gone? Ain't you out a little early like a winter robin?
It's been weeks, Henry mumbled, backing deeply in the shop.
Home remedy — by god, it's killed an awful lot, Henry. Could have lost that arm, you know. Fix your horseshoe game permanent. Does Brackett play?
We won't let him, said Israbestis Tott.
Too bad, I'd like to see that.
Juice oozed from the doctor's mouth. He spat a running stain.
Everyone fell silent.
The child of Decius Clark is very bad, said Doctor Orcutt once again, but Decius is a friendly sort, and calm.
… Then there was Israbestis Tott entertaining him with tunes: jigs, trots, polkas — Henry thought his mind would break. Then there was Matthew Watson, who sat by his bedside with his huge hands in his lap like a pair of frogs; there were endless files of whispering women; there was Jethro Furber in the costume of a witch, threatening the divine with spells; there was Lucy, lovely as a treetop in the door's grain, Furber as a drape, Mat a lamp, Tott a shriek, Furber both frogs, Orcutt their leaps…
A hen's first egg is always female.
Orcutt burned his spit.
Mares who've seen the stallion late have colts. Scientific fact.
Luther Hawkins tested the blade of his knife with his thumb, then sighted along it and winked at the tip.
Ain't it the month, he said. The women get the odd ones.
Orcutt shook his head.
All thought a while in silence. The iron was a pale rose.
I read a Swiss professor… hell… what was his name?… Thury. That's it, Thury. He says the same Danielson — downstate — has tried it. Works with cows. Works fine. Fact.
Orcutt showed his teeth.
But I couldn't say, you move the problem on from cows to ladies.
Henry giggled against his will.
It's out of my experience, Watson said, and George Hatstat laughed like a whistling train.
Orcutt hitched about and peered at Henry through the dark.
How's Lucy these days, Henry? Bearing up?