Gore leaned on the cornerpost of the house, turning the handle of a rake around and around in his hands, not meeting John’s eyes. Finally he put the rake down and said, “It don’t matter, Johnny. All we want’s your guns.”
“My guns!”
Perly stooped to pick a sprig of mint growing near the door. He put it in his mouth and chewed it. “With hunting season coming up, we thought a special firearms auction might be a good idea.”
“So it’s come to disarmin’ us,” John said, standing solidly before his door.
Perly threw back his dark head and laughed. “If you’re working for law and order,” he said, “you have to admit it’s not a bad idea.”
“It happens I need my gun,” John said.
“What for?” Perly said. “Town records show you haven’t taken out a hunting license for ten years.”
“A farmer needs a gun,” John said.
“Don’t suppose you’ve got an old muzzle-loader?” Perly asked, glancing through the door into the kitchen. “Those are fetching a pretty price these days.”
Gore was kicking at the mudscraper by the door. “He keeps them in the pantry, Perly,” he mumbled without looking up.
Perly raised his brows. “If you’ll excuse me...” he said to John.
John stood his ground and Perly waited to pass. Gore watched, his hand hovering near his gun. Hildie was chirping inside, happy to see the auctioneer.
Perly raised his brows. “Have you considered, John, whether you’re in a position to bar the door?” he asked. He cast a glittering eye over Mim and Ma and Hildie, then seemed about to turn away.
Finally, his face flushing deeply beneath his sunburn, John thrust his hands deep into his overall pockets and stepped slowly off the back step. He paused, then moved away toward the barn.
Perly nodded politely at John’s receding back. Then he opened the door and waited for Gore to lead the way.
But Gore stood scowling and didn’t move until Perly said pleasantly, “Well, Bob?” Then the policeman moved heavily into the kitchen and, without stopping to greet Mim or Ma, strode directly into the pantry.
Perly entered with a smile for Mim and squatted before Hildie where she stood with Mim in front of the sink. “Hi there, sweetie,” he said, holding out his arms. “Come say hello to your old friend.
Hildie smiled, but hesitated. As she headed toward Perly, Mim caught the elastic at the back of her jeans and pulled her roughly back, so that she howled in outrage.
Perly stood up. He looked down into Mim’s face with a different kind of smile. Dixie whined at the door to come in but he ignored her. “So sorry,” he murmured, but Mim was looking past him at Gore who was carrying the shotgun and the .30-’06, one in each hand, his eyes fixed and sullen on the floor in front of him.
Perly turned to him. “Did you get the ammunition?” he asked.
“God damn it, Perly,” Gore muttered and did not turn.
Perly turned back to Mim. “Where is it?” he asked.
Mim stood still, pressing Hildie’s shoulders against her thighs, her face gone white.
Perly shook his head and grinned. “Guess you just can’t please all the people all the time,” he said, and brushed Mim’s cold cheek with his fingertips.
Then, with one step, he moved into the pantry and, without searching at all, reached up and swung the red steel box of ammunition off the top shelf.
Mim watched from the kitchen, Ma from the front room, and John from the barn as Perly followed Gore down the path and the two men sprang up into the cab of the truck and drove away.
The following Thursday, under a scudding sky, heavy with rain, Perly and Gore came again.
John came out of the barn and stood in the doorway, his feet spread wide and his arms folded. “There’s nothin’,” he said.
Perly gazed cheerfully around the yard, his face darker than ever after a summer in the sun.
Gore leaned against the truck watching. “We’re takin’ cows,” he said.
“Cows!”
“Just a couple,” Perly said and winked at Mim who was standing behind the glass in the door looking out. “Figure that’s two fewer to milk. Or if you’ve got a couple that aren’t milking at the moment, we’ll settle for those.”
John glanced up at the pasture where the seven red Jerseys were bunched together under the white ash by the gate, their udders swollen, waiting for him to come and bring them in.
Perly stood with his arms folded in a graceful parody of John. His eyes reflected the rainy sky. “We’ll take two,” he said.
“The hell you will,” John muttered. Then he said, forcing the words out slowly, “Get off my land.”
John turned and headed up the path toward the back door and his family. His body seemed numb and each step was an effort. He felt he was pushing not only through his fear of the gun in Gore’s holster, but through walls of confounding anger as well.
He didn’t hear the steps behind him or the rustle of clothing. Without a sound of warning or the slightest appearance of haste, Perly slid between John and the door he was approaching.
“Did you want to consult your wife?” Perly asked. He opened the kitchen door and caught Mim tightly by the shoulder as she stepped away. He smiled down on her. She raised her eyes to his and the two were caught in the posture of young sweethearts.
John stopped.
Holding Mim by the arm, lightly now, Perly led her toward her husband.
John saw Mim, pale and unfamiliar, walking obediently toward him in the crook of the strange man’s arm, her body brushing his. Fear had blanked out all expression on her face.
Catching his breath, John turned quickly away toward the pasture and the cows, his anger and the heaviness of the humid afternoon combining to stifle him. He moved toward the path between the barn and the woodshed that led up into the pasture. Dixie darted out ahead of him and Lassie yapped along behind.
He moved up and up into his land. He could hear Gore puffing behind him, but he could only sense Perly’s silent tread. Under the ash, a flat sharp stone, as big around as a milking pail, had fallen from the wall. It grew and changed in his sight as he approached, becoming a weapon.
When he got to the barbed wire section that opened to release the cows, he stopped until Gore and Perly came up behind him and he could feel their breath swirling around his head. The stone was six feet ahead of them. He would wait until they were through the barbed wire. Perly came first, moving through as silent and effortless as a cat. Gore watched John as he went past, his small eyes cautious.
John noticed the empty holster first. Then he saw the gun. Gore wasn’t pointing it, just dangling it at his side, half hidden behind his broad thigh.
“Well,” said the auctioneer, “which of your pretty lasses will you part with?”
John stood staring down at the stone. If he bent to pick it up now, next week’s news would be that John Moore had had an accident cleaning up his guns for hunting season—never mind the fact the guns were gone.
And then the three women would be alone.
John held the fence post and looked past the men to the weathered house below to steady himself. It looked small with distance on the gray day. And in the yard, diminished too by distance, Mim stood where they had left her.
“Which ones did you say?” asked Perly.
Silently, John pointed to Moon. He leaned on the post for support as the auctioneer himself moved toward Moon, slapped her on the flank, and started her ambling easy down the field.
Gore kept watch, his feet planted wide apart, his gun tight in his hand, and his mouth half open, gasping for breath.
After that, Mudgett and Cogswell came again for a while. Mudgett led the way and Cogswell ambled after him like an enormous awkward pet. He was drinking heavily and had to be spoken to sometimes two or three times before he responded. They made two trips one week to take the entire crop of squash, and then they took the churn and separator and, finally, the rest of the cows, always a pair at a time. John and Mim worried about Hildie without the milk, but she went on thriving. They still had good vegetables, and they started eating the chickens as fast as they could, one or even two a day. “Guess they can’t take what’s already et,” Ma said.