Duster (9781310020889) Read Free

me rolled up some
cigarillos out of weeds and dried shucks, and we smoked up a mess
of them like we'd seen some of the Mex vaqueros do. The preacher
said that would make you a sure candidate for punishment, but we'd
already been punished pretty good right on the spot. It could be we
used the wrong weeds.
    I have to admit I didn't get much out of the
other preaching, but I could tell it was plenty powerful and had I
been much of a sinner at the time I might of enjoyed it more.
    Ma always enjoyed singing the hymns best,
and she'd turn to good and loud when the preacher called off a name
to be sung. When she was singing those hymns, her eyes would get
all crinkledy-like at the corners, and she looked sort of pretty. I
think the little kids noticed that, too, because I'd catch them
looking up at Ma every time when they was supposed to be
singing—even Molly who loved to sing her own self. Molly didn't
know all the words then, so she'd listen long enough to catch onto
one or two key words and then kick in real hard with them every
time they came due in the song.
    Along about midafternoon when it was getting
time for us to be leaving before they broke for dinner—so folks
wouldn't be trying to give us some of their lunches—Ma stood up and
asked the preacher if he'd say her a special prayer.
    The preacher hollered "Yes, sister," at her,
expecting her to give testimony or something probably.
    "Brother," she called out to him, "I've
listened to you preach, and I know you tell the Lord's word. I
would feel better in my heart if you would pray with us for the
safety of my eldest. He has to leave tomorrow to do a man's work,
and he will need the Lord's guidance to bring him safely home from
that cow drive. Will you do that, brother?"
    The preacher stomped his foot on MacReedy's
stoop and bobbed his head so that his beard flew. "That I will,
sister," he said. "Where is the boy?"
    Ma pointed me out, and he
hollered at me, "Stand up, boy, stand up so the Lord can spot you."
So I did, and he proceeded to pray just as loud and hard as he
could for the next ten minutes or maybe
more. It was sort of obvious from the praying that he didn't know
much about cows or the working of them, but I reckoned the Lord
did, even if His servant didn't, and He could make out the meaning
all right.
    As for me, I felt awfully funny standing
there with all those folks looking at me and that preacher talking
about me, most especially when he got to asking the Lord to forgive
me for all of my sins and named some of them that I didn't know I'd
done but couldn't argue over since I wasn't positive what they
meant.
    I was mighty relieved when it was all over
and we could head back for home. I felt sort of good about it
later, though. I hadn't guessed Ma would ever do such a thing to
embarrass me. But once it was over and I could reflect on it, it
made me feel sort of warm inside.
     

2
     
    ONE MINUTE, THERE was nothing but that
airless heat, shoving down with all the force of a straight fall
from the sun, plus the sting of sweat in my eyes and the worry
about thorns in case Mister Sam Silas's hammerheaded dun decided to
pitch again and loosen up his muscles at my expense. Then, there
was this awful crashing noise coming at me through the brush like a
mile-wide drag being hauled over every stump and dry twig between
the Frio and the Nueces.
    I couldn't see it coming yet, but what
sounded like the world's biggest longhorn was headed my way.
    I found out right away that that stubborn,
lowbred, mean dun horse might resist being ridden, but once he
heard a beef coming through the brush he was ready to go to work
right now. He busted into a run toward that noise with one big jump
that almost left me behind, even though I thought I could ride
pretty good. By the time I caught up with him and got to sitting in
a pointed-up direction again, he had tore through a couple of
clumps of thorn and had the cow—it was really a big brindle
steer—in sight.
    The dun was moving