The old man smiled behind his rough hand and said, “De ma’s name is Melia, son.”
Uncle Isaac drew nearer to hear, and Uncle Bill told how Melia had been the apple of his eye since the day she was born. He planned to have her raise the finest litters ever born on this plantation. But Melia was a headstrong person. She had a mind of her own.
Uncle Isaac chuckled and murmured, “Dat’s de Gawd’s truth!”
Jack, the boar heading the herd, would take a prize anywhere. He had tremendous size, yet he was so well-bred that in spite of his bulk his skin was smooth, his hair soft and fine. He had every mark of a perfect Poland-China.
Uncle Isaac agreed emphatically. “Yes, e sho’ is. Sho’! Sho’!”
But when Melia grew up she would have nothing to do with Jack. She didn’t like him. Uncle Bill tried to encourage her to do her duty, but Jack wasn’t to her taste, and that’s all there was to it. No amount of coaxing could make her change.
Last spring Uncle Bill made up his mind Melia would have to be killed. He hated to do it. The very thought cut at his heart-strings. But there was no use to keep Melia unless she had children. He’d have killed her then, but she was too large to be killed in hot weather. Her ham couldn’t be cured properly, and so she was left to be made into meat this winter.
Uncle Isaac broke out laughing. Lord, Bill was a doleful soul when he fixed on Melia’s death. Uncle Bill nodded:
“It’s de Gawd’s truth! I pure had to go off an’ pray, I was so fretted over Melia! My prayers was answered, too. Dey sho’ was!” He said soon after his sorrowful decision, he went to the pasture one morning and found a strange sight: the pasture fence had been broken down, and a low-down, ornery, red razor-back hog was inside. He was dirty and lean and ugly. His red hair was stiff and coarse and caked up with mud. He was a sneaky, no-mannered beast. But Melia liked him.
Before many moons Melia had a fine litter of pigs. Red pigs, that took their color from the father Melia chose for them, a scrubby, ugly no-account hog that came from God knows where.