II
We had followed the two little girls homeward one afternoon, chaffing and mauling each other as we would never have done if they had not been somewhere about to see, when we returned along the Green River in the afterglow. Eventually we threw ourselves down on a knoll. While we idled there, the valley grew hushed and the stars came out.
“Say, Nat,” I demanded, “whatcher goin’ to be when you grow up?”
“A writer and a poet,” he answered without hesitation.
I pondered this. We were emerging from the period when manhood meant freedom to turn pirate or Indian fighter. If Nathan had declared his intention of becoming a locomotive engineer or a clown in a circus, I should not have hesitated to take him at his word. But a writer—a poet!
“Aw, go on!” I retorted. “Poets don’t make no money!”
“I dunno’s I wanner make money.”
I looked at him. His face—growing a bit less freckled now—was held between his hands as he lay on his chest and looked vaguely off across the smooth river where the trout were jumping. But before I could comment caustically on this he asked, “Whatter you gonna be, Billy?”
“I dunno. I’ll be a business man, I guess, and make barrels of money—as much as Mr. Gridley.”
“What kind of business?”
“Oh, I dunno. I’ll own a factory, I guess—and be president of a bank afterwards, so when I want money all I gotta do is go into my bank and help myself.”
We lay in silence for several minutes. Then I persisted:
“If you’re gonna be a writer, whatcher gonna write?”
“Oh, books and poems and things—that hurt me so much sometimes when I look at ’em.”
“Huh! That ain’t a regular business. That’s a lazy man’s job. Judge Prescott says so. His daughter, Annie, married somebody who writes poetry and the Judge has to support both of ’em. I heard him say so. Betcha your pa don’t letcher, anyhow!”
“Betcher he will! Betcher he won’t have anything to say about it—damn him!”
Nathan’s lips tightened. It was not petulancy; it was the bitterness of mistreated childhood.
“You ought not to swear about your father, Nat,” I told him, horrified.
“Why not? Is it worse to say what I think than to go around with it makin’ me mad inside?”
“No, but it’s wicked to swear about your folks. You won’t live long. The Ten Commandments says so.”
“Aw, whatter I care for the old Ten Commandments? All the Bible and the church and things is made for anyhow is to back up grown folks when they wanner work off their hell on us kids!”
“Don’t you believe there’s a God?”
“Well, somebody probably made all the stars and trees and flowers—all the pretty things. But it spoils it to think it’s the same person that dad says is so precious to his soul every week in prayer meetin’. See that evenin’ star now, Billy, hangin’ low over Haystack. Ain’t it pretty? S’pose anybody that made such a shinin’ star would be in partnership with a growed-up person who’s so tight he won’t buy his kid a pair o’ pants? Billy, whatter we got all this God-business and church-business crammed down our throats for? Why can’t we just drink it in by comin’ out to a place like this, where it’s all quiet, and watchin’ an evenin’ star?”
“But we gotta love our parents, Nat. The Bible says so!”
“Yeah—and the same Bible says we oughta be clean and peaceful and good inside. And when a feller hates anybody like I hate my father, how can he turn around and say he loves him and act like he loves him, when he don’t?”
“All the same,” I reiterated, “the Bible says we gotta, and we have!”
“Well, I’ll do it till I’m twenty-one,” assented Nathan, “’cause I can’t help myself. Then I’ll go to hell and roast, if it’s wicked—but I’ll stop lovin’ him and do as I honest please. Between the time I’m twenty-one and the time I go to hell, I’ll feel peaceful and satisfied for a while, anyhow.”
I felt my friend was damning himself irrevocably, sinning against the Holy Ghost. I had to get away from those sulphur fumes, so I went back to poetry.
“Howja know you can write poetry to make your livin’ at it? Have you tried?”
“Yeah! Lots of times. It’s a cinch!”
“You mean you’ve got some poems writ already?”
“Sure, slathers of ’em.”
“Where are they?”
“Home—locked up so Pa won’t get ’em—along with Bernie’s letters.”
“What’s your Ma think about you bein’ a poet?”
“Oh, she don’t think nothin’, only what a hard time she has with Pa and that Edith will marry money.”
“Ain’t you ever talked with her about it?”
“I see myself!”
“Thunder! Can’t you go to your Ma and talk about—things—when you wanna?”
“No! ‘Stead o’ that, I have to listen to Ma’s troubles. And if I don’t happen to agree with her, she gets to twitchin’ all over her face and goes off to rock in the dark by herself. She tells me, ‘Oh, you’re growin’ up into a small-sized edition of your father!’ Damn her, too!”
“But if you can’t talk with your Ma about things, and what you’re gonna be when you’re growed up, who can you talk ’em with?”
“Don’t talk ’em with nobody—exceptin’ you sometimes. Keep ’em to myself. That’s why I wanner marry Bernie just as quick as I can. I gotta feelin’ way down inside that she’ll listen when she’s my wife, and help.”
He spoke the word wife with difficulty.