Holme blinked and shook his head. The hogs boiled past squealing and plunging and the chalky red smoke of their passage hung over the river and stained the sky with something of sunset. They had begun to veer from the bluff and to swing in a long arc upriver. The drovers all had sought shelter among the trees and Holme could see a pair of them watching the herd pass with looks of indolent speculation, leaning upon their staves and nodding in mute agreement as if there were some old injustice being righted in this spectacle of headlong bedlam.
When the last of the hogs had gone in a rapidly trebling thunder and the ochreous dust had drifted from the torn ground and there was nothing but quaking silence about him Holme climbed gingerly from his rock. Some drovers were coming from the trees and three pink shoats labored up over the rim of the hill with whimpering sounds not unlike kittens and bobbed past and upriver over the gently smoking land like creatures in a dream.
Holme walked slowly up the bluff. The sun was bright and it was a fine spring day. The drovers had begun to assemble and they seemed in no hurry to overtake the hogs. They were handing about plugs and pouches of tobacco with an indifferent conviviality.
That beats everthing I ever seen, one said.
That’s pitiful about your brother.
I don’t know what all I’m goin to tell mamma. Herded off a bluff with a parcel of hogs. I don’t know how I’m goin to tell her that.
You could tell her he was drunk.
Tell her he got shot or somethin.
You wouldn’t need to tell her he went to his reward with a herd of hogs.
He shook his head sorrowfully. Lord I just don’t know, he said. I just wisht I knowed what to tell her.
You won’t see her for a couple of months anyways, Billy. Give ye time to think some about it.
What happent? Holme said.
One of the drovers looked at him. They Lord, he said, where was you at? Did you not see them hogs?
I seen him a-settin on a rock over yander, Billy said. Vernon went right past him and he never reached to help him nor nothin.
The drovers looked at him, a bizarre collection of faces that seemed assembled from scraps and oddments, all hairyfaced and filthy and half toothless and their weathered chops lumpy with tobacco chews. One spat and squinted up at Holme.
That right, stranger? he said.
Holme ignored him. I didn’t see you comin to help, he said.
I wasn’t near him, Billy said. I couldn’t of got to him. You was right there.
I seen him a-settin on that rock.
That’s all right about him settin on some rock, who was it got them hogs started in the first place?
That’s right. How come em to do thataway?
Where was you at, stranger? When them hogs commenced runnin crazy.
I wasn’t nowheres. I was way back yander.
Behind em kindly?
He just watched Vernon go right on out over the bluff and never said diddly shit.
Somethin had to of spooked them hogs thataway.
Well ain’t he just said he come up behind em?
He never raised hand one to save him.
Stranger we don’t take too kind to people runnin off folks’ stock.
We ain’t got a whole lot of use for troublemakers hereabouts.
Vernon never bothered nobody. You can ast anybody.
Shit, Holme said. You sons of bitches are crazy.
Peace be on all you fellers, a voice sang out behind them. Two of the drovers removed their hats. Holme looked around to see what was occurring.
A parson or what looked like one was laboring over the crest of the hill and coming toward them with one hand raised in blessing, greeting, fending flies. He was dressed in a dusty frockcoat and carried a walking stick and he wore a pair of octagonal glasses on the one pane of which the late sun shone while a watery eye peered from the naked wire aperture of the other.
What’s the ruckus here? Hey? He drew up and looked from one to the other among them and looked at the ground as if he had forgotten something, taking a kerchief from his sleeve and snorting into it.
Howdy Reverend, said Billy.
Howdy. Bless all of ye’ns. They Lord what’s been thew here?
Hogs, said one of the drovers. Damndest mess of hogs you ever seen, excuse me.
Hard words don’t bother me no more than does hard ways, said the reverend. That’s what all I’m here for. What’s he done? You ain’t fixin to hang him are ye? Vengeance is mine sayeth the Lord. Don’t hold with hangin a-tall lessen it’s legal. What possessed them hogs anyways?
This here feller run em off, Billy said.
I never done it, Holme said.
The hell you never.
Here now, somebody’s lyin. You, young feller, look me in the eye and tell me you never run them hogs off.
I never run em off, Holme said.
The drovers pressed about to watch.
The preacher looked at the ground again, stuffing the kerchief back up his sleeve.
Well, Reverend?
I believe he run em off.
I told ye, Billy said.
Goddamn it, Holme said, I wasn’t nowheres …
Watch that talk in front of the preacher, boy, one of the drovers said.
But don’t hang him boys, the reverend said. Don’t do it. We’ll take him in to justice. Render unto Caesar what all’s hisn.
He shoved brother Billy’s brother Vernon off the bluff with the hogs.
Just a goddamn minute, Holme said.
There he goes again with that mouth.
Don’t hang him, boys, the preacher cried out. No good’ll ever come of it.
Everbody seen what he done, Billy said. You all seen it.
The preacher looked like a charred bird. He was peering at the ground and pounding his cane there. Ah don’t hang him, he said. Oh Lord don’t hang him. Shaking his head and muttering these things loudly over and over.
I wisht you’d hush about some hangin, Holme said.
It’s a serious thing, the preacher said. I don’t advocate it save under the strongest extremes.
Well if you’d hush about it …
Tore up with guilt. The preacher nodded sad and negative. Plumb tore up with it.
We all seen him on that rock.
How come ye to do it, son?
Holme looked about him for some sign of sanity. Shit, he said.
I believe we done mentioned it to ye oncet about that barnyard talk.
The preacher had begun to gesture inanely with his cane. Boys I believe he’s plumb eat up with the devil in him. But don’t hang him.
Ort to thow him off the bluff the way he done Vernon, Billy said.
How far down is it? the preacher was interested.
Too far to walk back.
Billy don’t know what all to tell his maw, Reverend. He just don’t have no notion how to go about tellin her. Ain’t that right Billy?
I don’t know what none of us is goin to tell Greene come upon his hogs. They must of been two hunnerd head fell off in the river.
Don’t flang him off the bluff, boys, the preacher said. I believe ye’d be better to hang him as that.
I believe we would too.
What do you say Billy? He’s your brother.
I believe I’d rest easier. I believe Vernon would of wanted it thataway.
Lessen he’s got some choice.