And the Rest of Alfie's Story

By Henry A. Buchanan

After the Easterday Adventure with The Moonshiners, Alfie was a big boy growing toward manhood. He had eaten the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil and he had become responsible for his own actions. But with Ace as his Demon, and Junior as his ever-present Gadfly, Alfie found himself in frequent trouble. Mama was his Guiding Angel, though, and Papa was the Instrument of Punishment. Uncle Seeb was the Shining Ebony Light to illuminate his path.

And LOVE for he discovered girls, and he yearned to be a Hero. His world was changing too, because Jody was now the Baby, and Willie and Cliff and Junior all went away to the War in Europe. He became the Man of the House when Papa was killed and he held in his hand Papas Watch, the Arbiter of Time and the Measuring Rod of Life.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Feb 9, 2001
• ISBN: 9780759601840

Henry A. Buchanan

Henry Alfred Buchanan was born in Georgia more than ninety years ago. He grew up on a red dirt farm near Macon and attended church at Mount Zion Baptist Church. The Lord called him to preach; he studied at Mercer University, then at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary where he earned the degree of Doctor of Theology. Doctor Buchanan loved the heroes of the Bible from his boyhood. And he takes the teachings of Jesus very seriously. He always wondered where Cain and Able got their wives, and who Cain feared would kill him. He marveled at the falling of the walls of Jericho. He wanted to find the meaning of it all. Buchanan was born to write, and he has written twenty-seven books and some newspaper and magazine articles. He did most of his work in Kentucky, but moved to Texas because that’s where the Georgia girl, Anne Ellis, lives. They married. In Texas he keeps on writing and there may be another book after Myths in the Bible. Watch for it!

Book preview

And The Rest Of Alfie’s Story

Henry A. Buchanan

Copyright © 2000 by Henry A. Buchanan

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission from the author.

ISBN: 0-75960-185-2

ISBN: 978-0-7596-0184-0 (eBook)

1stBooks-rev. 12/06/00

Contents

And The Rest Of Alfie’s Story

Chapter One: The Goat Boy

Chapter Two: A Rumble Seat Ride

Chapter Three: Winnants!

Chapter Four: Pockets Full Of Apples

Chapter Five: White Lightnin’

Chapter Six: A Visit With the Monkeys and God Knows What All

Chapter Seven: The First Possum Hunt

Chapter Eight: Dump

Chapter Nine: The Little Brass Squirrel

Chapter Ten: A Clod On The Roof

Chapter Eleven: Damyankees

Chapter Twelve: Go to the Devil For Fifty Cents?

Chapter Thirteen: I ain’t the baby no more.

Chapter Fourteen: A Sparrow Falls to Earth

Chapter Fifteen: To Shoot A Catbird

Chapter Sixteen: ACE

Chapter Seventeen: A Cure For The Croup

Chapter Eighteen: A Pocketful of Corn

Chapter Nineteen: Sally

Chapter Twenty: A Mule Trade

Chapter Twenty One: Papa’s Still

Chapter Twenty Two: The Life and Burial of Black Seeb

Chapter Twenty Three: A Greyhound Comes For Papa

Chapter Twenty Four: Papa’s Railroad Watch

About the Author

And The Rest Of Alfie’s Story

After that fateful Easter Sunday when Alfie and Junior were captured by the Moonshiners, and Papa came with his .38 calibre Smith & Wesson blazing, and Willie was shot in the foot by one of the Moonshiners who also killed Sandy in the shootout in front of the old falling down nigger shack in the Burl Green Woods, Papa and Mama both noticed that Alfie was growing.

You couldn’t say that Alfie had grown up. It was just that he was bigger than he had been before Easter. He was still littler than Junior, and that was what counted most. If you never get as big as your bigger brother because he keeps growing and staying bigger than you are, what good is it that you are getting bigger?

But it was more than just size. Alfie just wasn’t as babyish as he had been. Oh, Gran’ma still called him her Baby. But even she would sometimes call him Child instead of Baby. She would do this without even realizing that was what she was doing. It just came naturally to do it.

There are disadvantages to getting bigger though. You have to take responsibility for your own actions more, and that means that you get punished for doing wrong because now you know Right From Wrong. It’s what Mama called Reaching the Age of Accountability. There was no magic line, like reaching your seventh birthday and automatically being Accountable.

No, it wasn’t that simple. Not so cut and dried as that. It was just something that happened, and it was so gradual that the first thing you knew, you were Accountable. Still, there were definite events in which you became Accountable. At least that was the way it was with Alfie. And those events were discoveries of the world, a world with people in it. Some of those people didn’t seem to fit, but they were a part of it, just the same. Some of them were even a part that was slipping into the past, part of yesterday you might say, and maybe they would never be seen again. It was a wonder that Alfie experienced them. But then, Alfie’s whole life was a Wonder.

You take the Wonder of the Goat Man and the Goat Boy. You can drive from one end of this country to the other. Then you can crisscross it and just keep on driving, but you won’t see what Alfie saw that day when he and Papa were coming down the road in Colaparchee County. They had just crossed the Rattling Bridge over Tobesofkee Creek, and the Dodge was rolling along towards home when Alfie saw it and he had never seen anything like it before and the chances are good that you will never see it anywhere except right here where it took place with Alfie and Papa and The Goat Man and The Goat Boy and of course The Goats.

Chapter One: The Goat Boy

Look Papa Look! Alfie cried, pointing excitedly at the strange procession approaching at a snail’s pace and blocking automobile traffic on the narrow, rutted road. Stop and let me see, Papa!

Papa pushed the brake pedal and swung the Dodge onto the edge of the road, where it bumped to a halt opposite the spectacle that was causing all the excitement, as well as the delay, a combination of goats, humans and a wheeled vehicle. The wheeled vehicle was a home made covered wagon which creaked along on iron rimmed wheels wobbling on their axles as they came to a halt in the shade of a tree beside the road. When the wagon became motionless the wheels leaned outward at the tops of the rims, as though in this position they might more easily support the weight of their load, and resist the resumption of motion.

Four large goats were harnessed to the wagon, and as they pulled the ungainly contraption into the shade of the tree, they came to a halt and stood looking about them at the people in the passing cars. One of the goats, the largest, a male with shaggy black hair and massive curving horns, looked directly at Alfie and Papa. He moved his jaws in a chewing motion which caused his chin whiskers to wave to and fro, then presented his impressive set of horns as if to say Here are my credentials; now what do you have to say for yourself? And Alfie looked back at the big black goat; he was filled with awe and wonder, and there was a note of fear and admiration in his voice as he turned to Papa and said He’s lookin’ right at me.

In front of the goats, and leading them with a short piece of frayed rope, an old man walked on bare, dusty feet. His face was covered with an unkept beard, not so much white, though he was evidently old enough to be called a graybeard, as yellowish and brown-stained with tobacco juice. The beard reached the bib of his overalls and stood in stark contrast to the red and black plaid shirt, streaked with sweat and dust and grime. Watery blue eyes looked out from under the brim of a sweat stained black felt hat. The eyes squinted into the sun, but seeming not to distinguish the objects and persons passing by, while registering an awareness of their motion. The lips under the beard moved. Git on. Git on.

The goats stood panting in the shade of the tree. They shook their heads to dislodge the flies gathering on their faces and seeking the moisture that drained from the corners of their eyes. They switched their tails vigorously to knock the flies from their flanks, and stared with beady, inquiring eyes at Alfie, ignoring the man who stood beside them chewing a large cud of tobacco which caused his cheek to bulge outward. He spat into the dust; the spittle caught in his ragged beard and he wiped it away with the back of one hand; he gripped a heavy, twisted staff in the other.

The gnarled and twisted staff had been cut from the main stem of a small shrublike tree known among countryfolk as the devil’s walking stick. It was as tall as the man, about five feet and four inches. When the man walked, he placed the staff before him with each step, as though it were a third leg, and leaned forward in his step; now that he had stopped, he continued to lean on the staff, and he drew a dirty red handkerchief from the hip pocket of his overalls and wiped the sweat from his brow and forehead, blew his nose on the hankerchief, wadded it into a ball and pushed it back down into the pocket of his overalls.

Who is it Papa!? Alfie breathed the question while his eyes danced from the goats to the man and to the wagon and back again to Papa’s face. Papa looked on, impassively, as one does who has seen a strange thing before and is more interested in watching someone else see it for the first time.

That’s the goat man, Papa said. But you ain’t seen it all yet. Look behind the wagon.

Trailing behind the wagon were three more goats, smaller than the ones up front. At first glance it might have appeared that they were pushing the wagon in concert with the four larger goats pulling it. Instead, they were simply tied to it, and with lowered heads they plodded along when it moved, but when it came to a standstill, they also stopped, raised their heads, brought their ears forward and took in the scene with a show of both curiosity and intelligence. A boy walked behind the three goats.

The boy was taller than Alfie, but thin and undernourished. His pinched face was set in a blank, resigned expression. He seemed not so much to look at the people passing by in cars, as to look through them, as if they were not there, or at least as if they had no real substance, no bearing upon him, called for no response from him. He also was barefooted, and he wore overalls and a shirt, but no hat. When the wagon had come to a halt the boy had walked past the trailing goats to the tailgate, and just before he reached it, two small baby goats appeared, pushing their tiny, eager faces through the opening in the tarpaulin that covered the vehicle. They looked expectantly at the boy, as if they considered him their foster mother, and he took them, one in each arm, hugging them to his cheeks, which they licked eagerly, nuzzling hungrily at his neck.

The goat boy? Alfie turned questioningly toward Papa, but he did not wait for Papa’s reply. The baby goats were nibbling at the goat boy’s ears and nose, and the boy turned his face one way and then the other,squinting his eyes and wrinkling his face into a wry smile which exaggerated his thin sharp features; he staggered back from the wagon with his twin burden.

Papa, Alfie said, Can I go an’ talk with the goat boy? But what Alfie meant was that he wanted to touch the baby goats snuggling in the goat boy’s arms. The goat boy was standing beside the wagon now and the canvas covering, tattered and and weathered, flapped each time the passing cars stirred the breeze. Inside the wagon was a pile of old quilts and dirty blankets, bedding for the goat man and the goat boy, and the baby goats.

Old clothing was piled in among the quilts and blankets and the corner of a dirty pillow stuck out from under the pile. Cooking utensils, pots and pans and a skillet, hung from straps attached to the posts holding up the canvas covering. A washtub, a tin bucket, and what appeared to be a feedpan for the goats, hung in similar fashion on the outside of the rickety vehicle. Some of the cars passing by moved slowly because the children in them wanted to see the goat man and his entourage, the goats, wagon and the goat boy, but others moved more swiftly because their drivers were impatient with the delay caused by the slow moving relic of the past, and these stirred the air so that the canvas flapped and billowed and moved about, and this movement allowed a momentary peek at the disheveled interior of the covered vehicle piled with bedding and clothing and the bare necessities of life on the road. But Alfie’s eyes were on the baby goats which the goat boy held in his arms, and Alfie said to Papa Can I go an’ talk with the goat boy?

Papa said, You go an’ talk with the goat boy, Son. Then Papa walked over to the goat man and Papa and the goat man talked about the weather because that was what they had in common, as does the whole race of men on Earth, for whether they live in great cities of steel and concrete and glass, or lead a nomadic existence on dusty raods, or dig their sustenance from the soil, all men are subject to the weather, and so weather is the subject of conversation wherever men meet. And Papa said to the goat man, Hot, ain’t it!

Then the goat man took out the wadded red handkerchief and pushed back the black felt hat with the greasy hat band; he wiped the sweat from his brow and spat tobacco juice into the dust where it kicked up a little puff of dust, then rolled into a little dust ball. Dry too, the goat man said. Never seed it so hot n’ dry at the same time an’ I’ve traveled the whole state of Georgy and parts of Tennysee goin’ on seven year now an’ I never seed it hotter nor drier. Not at the same time.

Papa was on the verge of remarking that hot weather and dry weather usually go together in the parts of the world with which he was acquainted, but the goat man blinked his watery blue eyes at Alfie and said That yore boy? and when Papa affirmed that Alfie was his, the goat man said My boy, he’s back there with the goats.

Alfie went to the rear of the wagon where the goat boy stood holding the baby goats in his arms. Alfie stopped and looked into the goat boy’s face for a moment and smiled and the goat boy hugged the baby goats and smiled back at Alfie, a thin, wispy smile, and Alfie said Can I touch ‘em? Is it all right if I pet ‘em?

Papa inserted two fingers and his thumb into his shirt pocket, took out the little booklet of cigarette papers and cupped one of them in his hand. He opened the top of the sack of Bull Durham and poured the tobacco into the thin, cupped paper, licked its edges, rolled it into a cylinder and put it between his lips. Drawing the string on the Bull Durham sack, he returned it to his pocket and took out a match, which he struck on his thumb nail, lit the cigarette, drawing and puffing out little clouds of smoke. Squinting his eyes all the while to keep the smoke out of them. He shook the flame from the match and threw it onto the ground near the spot where the goat man’s tobacco juice spittle had rolled into a dust ball. The extinguished match sent up a tiny curling wisp of smoke and died.

There was not much for Papa and the goat man to talk about, just the weather, but the act of spitting into the dust, and the ceremony of rolling and lighting the cigarette, the glance toward the two boys, Alfie and the goat boy and the baby goats, these were the instruments of their communication, the sacraments by which a tenuous, fragile and momentary communion came into being and existed between Papa and the goat man when the goat man halted his procession in the shade of the tree beside the road, and Alfie, approaching the goat boy cradling the baby goats in his arms, asked the goat boy Is is all right for me to pet ‘em?

The cicadas in the tree above them throbbed out their deafening love song. July flies, Papa said. "Biggest crop of

July flies I ever seen." He drew on the cigarette and emitted a puff of smoke.

The goat man nodded, gulped and spat into the dust at his feet. Jar flies we call ‘em where I come from, he said, but he did not say where he came from.

Sure, you can pet ‘em, the goat boy said, turning so that one of the baby goats was extended toward Alfie. Then Alfie stroked the baby goat which opened its mouth and tried to suck Alfie’s fingers but Alfie was afraid, and the goat boy said Don’t be skeered. He ain’t gonna eat you.

Alfie laughed, feeling a happiness about the baby goats and a closeness to the goat boy; he looked again at the covered goat wagon and its pitiful contents all piled and jumbled together, and at the baby goats nestled in the goat boy’s arms, and he said to the goat boy Don’t you have no Mama?

The goat boy’s face became empty again and his eyes were vacant and he looked down at the baby goats cradled in his arms and he shuffled his bare feet in the dust, stirring the dust with his toes. He drew a deep breath and expelled it and said Naw, my Mama died. Ain’t nobody but me an’ Pa…An’ the goats.

Then Alfie wished he had not asked the goat boy about his Mama because he saw it made him sad and lonely; he thought about Mama with her big brown eyes looking into his face; he thought about Gran’ ma making teacakes. Then he said Who cooks things for you?

Me an’ Pa cooks for ourselves, the goat boy said. Mostly we drink goat milk. An’ sometimes Pa buys us sardines an’ sody crackers… when he gits money for the pitchers.

The goat boy was uneasy talking about himself and the way he lived, and he shifted his feet in the dust and looked down at the baby goats in his arms. One of the baby goats stretched its neck and extended its face and licked out its tongue, scraping it across Alfie’s cheek. It was rough and it tickled and Alfie squealed with joy, and the goat boy said You wanta hold ‘im for a while?

Alfie danced with happiness and reached for the baby goat, but at that moment Papa called to Alfie and said that they had better be going. Alfie’s arms dropped to his sides, the goat boy clutched the baby goat which continued to look expectantly toward Alfie. The goat man stared sourly at Papa and said Ain’t you even gonna buy a pitcher?

A pitcher? Papa said, looking perplexed. Then the goat man rummaged through the jumbled contents of the wagon and came out with a photograph showing the goat wagon with the four large goats hitched in front and the three smaller ones tied on behind, and the two baby goats looking out between the flaps and the goat man standing at the head of the procession and leaning on his gnarled and twisted staff, and the goat boy bringing up the rear, looking sad and lost. When the goat man held up the photograph, which was not very well done, but it had all the essentials in it, Papa said Oh, that’s what you meant.

The goat man said Dontcha wanta buy one?

Papa held the photograph at arms length to look at it because he had not yet accepted the necessity of wearing glasses. How much? Papa said.

The goat man said A dime, and Papa fished in his pocket until he found a dime and he gave it to the goat man. He gave the picture to Alfie and said Here Son. You can take this home to your Mama and show her what you seen today. At Papa’s mention of Mama the goat boy dropped his eyes and looked down at his feet, and Alfie swallowed hard but didn’t say anything.

Papa and Alfie got into the Dodge, Alfie clutching the picture in his hands and looking back at the goat boy and the two baby goats in the goat boy’s arms. The baby goats watched Alfie, their soft bright eyes following his every movement, and they turned their faces back to the goat boy’s face, still inquiring, and they moved their legs and necks in an attempt to gain a more comfortable position while snuggling even closer to him.

In the Dodge Alfie sat still, staring ahead through the windshield. A cloud of dust rolled up behind the Dodge as it gained speed. Alfie turned to look back but he could not see the goat boy and the goats because of the cloud of dust.

Papa’s head was thrown far back as he drove and his arms were extended full length as he gripped the steering wheel. Sunlight danced on the thin reddish blond hair that crowned the top of his head, and it glistened on the curling reddish gold hairs on his extended forearms. The Dodge rumbled across the bridge over Tobesofkee Creek. the floor boards clapping against the supports as the tires rolled over them. Papa glanced down at Alfie and he said, You got the picture for your Mama to see, Son?

Alfie was still and quiet. He gripped the edges of the picture, and they curled under his fingers. He moved his head up and down to indicate to Papa that he had the picture to show to Mama as evidence of what he had seen. He blinked back a tear, and he was not certain whether the tear was for the baby goats which he wanted to hold in his own arms and did not get to hold them because it was time to go. Or if he was sad because of the goat boy whose vacant grey eyes were lonely and lost in the pinched thin face bent over the baby goats in his arms.

Then Alfie’s chin trembled slightly, and he had to work his lips for a moment to get them to be still so that he could speak. And he said Papa, the goat boy don’t have no Mama.

Chapter Two: A Rumble Seat Ride

Alfie was growing, but Willie had grown up. Willie had become big enough to drive. And Willie had his own car. With a Rumble Seat.

Papa didn’t give Willie the car. Willie bought it. With the money he earned at the feed mill. He didn’t get any money for the work he did at the dairy. Nor for plowing corn and pitching hay. That was his family responsibility. He got paid when he went out to work. Then he brought part of his pay home to the family. To Papa. Or to Mama. And with what was left he bought the car.

It was a Model A. And it had a rumble seat. There is nothing in the experience of a growing boy to compare with a rumble seat ride.

There are not many things a boy would not do for a ride in the rumble seat. He will even wash behind his ears if that is made a condition of the rumble seat ride.

Wash behind your ears, Alfie. Lord! Just look at the dirt behind your ears! Mama was straightening her own skirt and powdering her nose. I don’t want your Uncle Babe to see dirt behind your ears. He’ll think…

Alfie did not wait to hear what Uncle Babe would think if he saw dirt behind Alfie’s ears. He ran to the back porch where he dashed cold water from the well bucket into the enamel wash pan, then splattered it onto his face, even rubbing a dab of it behind his ears. The screen door slammed behind him with a loud bang and he did not hear what Mama said Uncle Babe would think of dirt behind Alfie’s ears.

Junior ran onto the porch and dipped his hand into the wash basin. With his hand he wet his heavy locks of hair, pasting the hair to his scalp. I’m gonna ride in the rumble seat. Junior’s announcement was made with a great deal of pride. We’re goin’ to Uncle Babe’s in Willie’s Model A. I heard Willie say it and I’m gonna ride in the rumble seat.

Alfie looked up. Water dropped from his face. He squinched his eyes to squeeze the water out of them. I am too. I’m gonna ride in the rumble seat too. I’ll ast Willie. I know Willie’ll let me ride in the rumble seat.

Hah! You better ast Mama. ‘Cause Papa ain’t goin’ an’ Willie’s gonna drive his A Model, but you better ast Mama if you wanta ride in the rumble seat…with me.

Sitting with Junior was not for Alfie like being given the seat of honor, although it was preferable to being squeezed between Willie and Mama on the seat up front. What was a privilege was to ride in the rumble seat of Willie’s 1929 A Model. And it was not even necessary to refer to that vehicle as a Ford. To say A Model told it all for nobody except Henry Ford had even thought of building an A Model which was a considerable advance over the T Model.

And to say Rumble Seat told that Willie’s A Model was a very special body style of the A Model Ford, one with an outside seat where more conventional and less sporty models merely had a luggage compartment in the rear.

Mama consented to the seating arrangement because she wanted to talk with Willie about matters she considered too advanced for Alfie’s ears. Alfie never knew for sure what those concerns of Mama’s were but he guessed from the expression on Willie’s face . Willie could