In a dusty valley where “fetching” is a way of life, a boy and his mare carry messages, supplies… and sometimes something much heavier. A simple errand turns into a journey neither of them will finish the same way.
My hat’s a slidin’ off my head down over my eyes and my rear cheeks are twitching with that achy draw that means it’s time for me to slide down outta Gilly’s saddle and take a stretch and wipe the sweat. So I do that. Gilly gives a snort and nods her head. The ol’ gal seems glad for me to be off her back, though I know my mare’d carry me to the end of the world, or at least to the canyon’s edge out yonder from our little valley.
Gilly’s good and mine, Pa said. The only thing I truly own save for my name and the gimp in my leg. And I guess my dented tin canteen. I own that.
Red rock dust cakes on my boots and wiggles its way into my shoes as me and Gilly saunter toward the brook. I need new ones, seein’ as how the stitchin’s wearin’ out and the bottoms are wearin’ thin. And I’ve grown so much my big toes push against the ends when I walk, but Gilly needs water and I need a stretch. And times like these is when I’m thankful for my gimp ‘cause only my left foot hurts. The right’s a little littler and a lot less feely. Mostly numb most of the time.
More and more grime and crud wiggle in. Least it’s dirt and not scorpion babies sneaking ‘round.
And I got a good deal of growin’ left to do so Ma says no use spendin’ good coin on not-done-yet feet.
I untie my canteen and finish it off to the last drop. The thin leather strap is doubled back and again and tripled up through the handles. Plenty of leather, longer than my whole body by four hands. I don’t want to lose my canteen, so I used plenty of strap.
I sorta lean on Gilly as we go. Her gray and white hide reminds me of the storm clouds that speckle then grow bigger as they get together and decide to drop the rain. She’d acted just like those storms once. As fast as gray lightning flickin’ alive the sky. But she’s got a little gimp in her and that’s why Pa said she’d make a good first for me since I do all this fetchin’ for folks. She’s a good gal, ol’ Gill, and I like leanin’ close as we go, feelin’ the muscles ripple in her shoulder and down her side. I reach and scratch behind her ear and she snorts again and sorta leans into me real gentle like, though I know she doesn’t need to lean. She’s not that gimp.
It’s just a sort of leanin’ kind of day. She’s a horse, but she’s smart about people and kinda knows when things are happy fetches or sad fetches. Like she’s hitched up to all my feels. She just knows.
I like the happy fetches. The kinds that start with “Hey, Boy. Go fetch the hen crates from farmer McMandle.” Gilly pulled a little kiddie wagon and we fetched the hen crates and delivered chickens to the neighbors. Time we got back my ears screamed with all their squawkin’ complaints. It was worse than Ma’s quiltin’ bee ladies crowdin’ in our sittin’ room on too many lazy Saturdays. Those days I always wished someone’d yell “Fetch!” But chickens were happy things anyways.
Then there was that “Hey, Boy! Go fetch Doc Banks. Jessica’s havin’ the babe!” So we ran, well Gilly ran, and I hung on till my hands ached and my fingers got all numb like my gimp foot as we fetched Doc then he took his own wagon the three miles to Jessica’s and delivered that baby nice and good. That was fun and happy. That was two years ago. That baby’s up and walkin’ ‘round and gettin’ all covered in dust and grime just like my boots.
Me and Gilly reach the brook and I secure her reins so’s they don’t dip in the creek as she drinks. Water’s low with rocks a pokin’ up through the stream and the water jigs and glides around them. I ‘magine the ripples sayin’ “Scuse me, ma’am pardon me, sir” to the pebbles as the water lazes its way south.
I fill my tin canteen, drink it all even though I catch silt and grit in my teeth, but it’s wet and that’s all that matters. I dip it into the creek and let some of the ripples worm inside. Gilly’ll keep it safe for me in her saddle until I need it again. She’s good at watchin’ over things, my Gill.
My almost-there tree’s ready for me. It’s lonely and leany and only has leaves when it good and feels like it. The roots grab to the bank and are as big ‘round as my Pa’s legs. I can’t wrap my arms around this tree like I can the spindly ones dotting in clumps here and there in the valley.
Twisted branches hang and reach clean to the other side of the brook, and when Pa taught me the way to George Washington’s, he showed me how to climb out on the lowest limb. We’d tooked off our boots and climbed out and sat on that big limb like a pew in church, only we was barefoot and stinky ‘cause it wasn’t near Saturday night bath time yet, and we let our toes play in the brook, the water saying “’Scuse me, pardon me” as it wiggled past our feet.
We did this climbing out to the pew branch and he’d teach me tree names that I couldn’t remember and flower names that I couldn’t remember—case I ever needed to pick a bouquet of sweet daisies—I think he called them daisies—for some pretty lass some day. He’d taught me about rattlers and canteens and scorpions and how to keep safe on my fetches. “Fetchin’ can earn you respect and maybe a livin’ if you barter just right.” He patted my right leg that time. He knew I’d not be cut out for millin’ or farmin’ or much heavy stuff like my brothers.
But I was good for fetchin’.
And I liked it.
I take off my hat, its brim worn as thin as the threads in my boots in spots, and wipe my sweat again as I sit with my back against the tree’s bumpy hide. I don’t bother checkin’ for scorps or rattles. The dirt’s taken over where the grass was last month. Only stubborn rough blades are left, but mostly, it’s bare dirt under my marker tree and nothin’ could hide here if its slithery life depended on it. I kick off my boots and pretend I’m a doin’ the toes-in-the-creek thing because I can’t stay long to enjoy.
White wispy clouds like Pa’s tobacco smoke float high in the blue. As they go, I pretend they’re playin’ tag with the gnarled branches and limbs above me. At least the sky doesn’t match Gilly.
That’d made this even a more of a leanin’ day.
I left my hat in my lap and crisscross my arms behind my head and let my brown shag dry up a bit with the breeze. Gilly’s relaxin’ and lookin’ round at the valley and her withers twitch real lazy like and her black tail flicks the flies from her hind end. She keeps that one front hoof sorta up and raised when she can. It’s the one that aches her, but she don’t complain much. We’re havin’ a peaceful sort of almost-there rest, even if this is a sad sort of fetch.
I lean my head back and let the rays dance over my face through the branches above for just a bit more. Give both our gimps a good rest. I think George Washington’s the best carpenter ‘round. Sometimes I fetch wheel spokes or chicken boxes or rockin’ chair arms. That sorta thing. But lately seems like mostly he does caskets. ‘Specially after that fever ripped through the valley last year. Me and Gilly did lots of fetchin’ out this way then when dyin’ was more commonplace than livin’. I take him the measurements and he delivers the finished boxes with his own wagon and ‘normous black horse, Eugene.
Eugene’s a good three hands higher than Gilly and a lot stronger. Eugene and George Washington match in girth and color. George Washington’s arms seem as long and sturdy as the hitchin’ post outside the mercantile. Their hides are the same color. Black as night and shiny, too. All my life I’ve never seen no other man that color in the valley. Horses. But no man.
But other folks ‘round, specially the ladies, seem scared of that color. Or maybe it’s how big he is or how he don’t say too much. Just nods and smiles real faint like. It don’t bother me none, though, and so that’s why folks send me to do most of their fetchin’ from him.
They don’t much care for his name, neither, but I can’t figure it. Teach said George Washington was a great leader. Great man. Founding father and all and he must’ve been a strong man to be a General and to have a country built on his shoulders. That’s what the Teach had said. A country on his shoulders. But some people got all messed up in their talk, fightin’ back and forth how someone that color shouldn’t have no name like George Washington. Or Abraham Lincoln, neither. But Gilly and I don’t know nobody who got that name.
I figure if you gotta have a name, may as well have one that’s as strong as you are. His momma musta known he’d grow up to be a big strong man with big strong hands and a kind heart and that’s why she gave him a grand name.
I reckon my Ma knew when I came out that I’d not fit a name like George Washington or John Adams. I kinda got a gimp in me like Gilly. Maybe that’s why Gilly and me are all connected up. We just know each other.
I wipe my hands good and hard on my britches and check my shirt pocket. Miss Lilly gave me a roll of lace this morning. I’d been out waterin’ those chatty chickens and a wonderin’ what they gossip about all day when she came up behind me. I startled. She looked awful. She’d walked the quarter mile up our lane all by herself. Wearin’ her black dress for Sunday and not standin’ up straight like usual. And I knew.
“Fetch, would you please?” And she handed it to me and I tucked it in my pocket and told her, “Yes, ma’am, I’m so sorry.” And me and Gilly took off right quick. Things like this don’t wait and give no permission for toes in the creek.
I pull the lace out and check on it. I hope my sweat didn’t get to it. I don’t think it did. It seems dry. It’s her only bit of lace left, and she’d like to have it back. It’s yellow like butter cream and dainty as lacy things should be. I don’t unroll the tiny wad, though. I want to keep it clean. It’s so tiny and frilly that I hope George Washington’s fingers don’t fray it as he uses it to measure. He’ll have to stretch it out.
That’s how this works.
I tuck the lace back into the pocket, satisfied it’s clean and tidy, set my hat on my head and tuck my too-big-feet into too-small boots—at least only the left one hurts, can’t feel the right one—and I mount Gilly and head for George Washington’s.
We pick up the pace, kicking up dust and grime behind us and feeling that sunny breeze in our faces. Almost not fair, I think as we go along. Feeling good sunshine on a sad fetch. Poor Miss Lilly. How her heart must pound with sadness. And that tiny one…
I try to not think on it much. But one can’t help it.
George Washington’s cabin is just in view. The barn’s leany and so’s his front porch. From the looks of it, you’d not know he’s the best carpenter ‘round. But he is.
I slow Gilly, let her ease up so she’ll not have such a time on the way back with her hoof. She’ll be carrying more weight—but not much more, the dainty lace isn’t that long.
I see George Washington dumpin’ a fresh bucket into the trough out front. He musta clocked me comin’ round the bend and was a gettin’ ready for us. He’s always kind that way. He takes Gilly’s reins from me, she snorts at him real soft and gives him a nod. She’s only a horse, but she’s good at knowin’ the rotten folks from the good ones. He hitches her up and she drinks from the trough and rests her gimp.
I slide from her back and pull out the tiny wad. I’d like to smile at George Washington and chat about trees and millin’ and the news from up north in the valley, but it’s not a chattin’ kind of a fetch. Not today.
His big brown eyes get all glossy and he wipes his hands on his bibs before he takes the lace roll in his palm. He could hold ten of those rolls at a time in that hand of his and still have room for more. I shake that thought right out of my head. That’s a bad thought.
I follow him to his leany barn, and out front he’s got the sawhorses all set up a workin’ on some other something. Boards of all lengths lay scattered among piles of nails and handsaws and such. Scraps layin’ here and there in the dirt. Some piled neat. Some scattered in heaps. Looks like he’s a makin’ a cabinet or shelves of some sort.
That’ll have to wait now as he readies the sawhorses and moves them closer to each other ‘cause he and me already know this little bit of lace isn’t going to be near as long as his cabinet. He digs around in the board piles, and a brown mouse goes a flyin’ from his hidin’ spot deep under the pile. George Washington finds a few small planks and lays them like railroad ties across the sawhorses.
His fingers tremble a bit—I’d never seen that happen to his strong hands before. He takes the end of the buttercream frill between his thumb and finger and hands me the end. Then my hand trembles. Poor Miss Lilly. I hurt so bad for her, that I swear I feel pain even in my gimpy right foot.
I hold my end gently as he unrolls the lace. I’d wondered about his big ol’ hands and how they’d do with this small job.
They did just kindly, that’s how. That buttercream lace nearly blends perfect with the color of the boards. Slow and respectful like, he used the markin’ pencil that he always kept tucked behind his ear to mark off the boards. He and me real gentle like rolled that lace up before his tears and mine could mix and stain it all up. It’s Miss Lilly’s last bit of lace. She’d like it back.
He sees me a sniffin’ and snot startin’ and says, “Eugene could use a rub-down.” I don’t argue. I find the big, black stallion on the other side of the barn, just a hangin’ out. I hear George Washington’s hand saw whizz and zip through the boards with a sad sort of rhythm.
Back. Forth.
Back. Forth.
If only livin’ were more commonplace than dyin’.
I pat and rub and lean on Eugene and feel sick all over with grief. I startle when the hammerin’ starts, and the pounding jerks the tears right outta my eyes, but Eugene doesn’t mind. I decide to lead him over to Gilly so’s the two friends could have a visit.
It don’t take long before George Washington brings ‘round the tiny wooden box. He don’t take no effort at all liftin’ it, and Gilly doesn’t give no regardin’ to its weight as George Washington straps the thing to the back of her saddle. I’ve got plenty of room for the ride home. Eugene rubs his shoulder against Gilly’s and heads to the side of the barn, head droopin’ low. Even the grand Eugene’s sensitive enough to pick up on this sad fetch.
Eugene’s probably all hitched up to George Washington’s feels like Gilly’s hitched up to mine.
I reach my hand to shake the deal done. No coin needed. He’d only used bits of scraps for this casket. His black face, shiny with streaks of sweat and tears through the dust said enough. George Washington’s kind that way.
He unhitches my mare as I climb into her saddle. Gilly and I nod our thanks and we head north, leaving George Washington slumped on his leany front porch with his head in his massive, kind hands.
My feet hurt deep in my boots. Both my feet. And the sweat’s a comin’ a little faster, though the sun’s dipped a little lower and this shouldn’t be the case. I see my almost-there-tree and the brook and decide I’ll have to stop and drink and stretch.
I tie back Gilly’s reins so they don’t get wet while she drinks. I drink all my canteen up and give it back to her for safe keepin’. Then I rest under the tree again while she twitches and rests her own foot.
My eyes want to force shut and I’m outta breath but I manage to slide outta my boots. My right foot’s all swollen and shines brilliant red like the growing sunset where pale peach used to be. It hurts, but only barely. And for that I’m grateful.
I wonder if that little brown mouse was the only critter hidin’ in George Washington’s pile of boards.
My hat’s a slidin’ off my head and my whole being has that achy draw that means it’s time to take a long rest. My almost-there-tree supports my back with its bumpy hide. I can’t remember what kind of tree this is.
Pa would know.
The brook ripples and gurgles beside us, making its apologies to the rocks and stones on its way south. I check my pocket for Miss Lilly’s lace. I put my hand over my pocket to keep it safe. It’s her last bit and she’ll want it back.
I let my hat slide down over my face after one last glance at the sun and my trusty mare. Gilly’ll watch over the tiny casket. She’ll steady herself over me, casting a strong shade so the last part’s not so bad—she’s all hooked up to my feels, and I know she knows. Her saddle holds my canteen with the leather strap all doubled and tripled back on itself, longer than me, so there’ll be plenty to measure.
That’s my lace. That strap.
And then someone will fetch George Washington for me, and he’ll have to adjust those sawhorses all over again.
