“Top-grade,” Caleb said.
Wisps of steam rose off his father’s cup of coffee, and it brought to mind the last march under the colors of the enemy, when the flatlands had yielded to a punishing cold front. The boys put in charge of him were his age, rowdy and prone to thieving from farmers and townsfolk when they could get away with it. They’d stolen overcoats to fend off the weather, but when the sun reemerged one day, they chose to cast them aside, yet saw no reason to leave them in the woods where they’d be of no use. A skinny lieutenant mentioned how often Caleb had whined of being too far from the fire, and the rest decided he would be the best choice to inherit the excess coats, which they packed onto his shoulders until the weight buckled his knees. The heat was so great as the day wore on that the sweat collected in small puddles at the cuffs of his sleeves and pants.
He grew damp behind the ears just thinking about it and was happy when the memory passed. It was then he saw the two men leaving the barn. One was remarkably large, with an unmistakable current of muscle at his shoulders, his body broad enough to dwarf the other man.
“Are you going to explain that?” he asked his father.
The two were brothers, he said, giving him some assistance with a peanut farm he was setting up down below the hill. “If you want I can show you the progress.”
“A peanut farm. You?”
“Is that so difficult to believe?”
“You could barely be made to help Mother with the roses she put in. Said she only had them because Mrs. Foster did and there was no pride in spending your life matching wits with others lost in vapid hobbies. If I recall correctly.”
“You do,” his father said, taking a sip of his coffee. “But this is different.”
“Always different when you do it, isn’t it?” Caleb said, thinking of how his father’s short-lived foray into making moonshine was deemed to be unrivaled compared with other enthusiasts, as his eye for quality whiskey was unmatched; or then there was his spontaneous wish to construct a cabinet, a process he thought valid only until he realized he hadn’t the slightest skills, at which point the entire field of cabinetmaking suddenly became trivial, so unworthy of time that he shook his head when passing the woodworkers in town for years after.
Caleb spat over the railing and commented that the men had been with his father the day before, when he arrived.
Yes, his father said, their names were Prentiss and Landry, and he explained how they’d come to the woods. They were staying in the barn for now.
“You have Mr. Morton’s Negroes in your keep, then.”
“I wouldn’t call that a fair interpretation. They’ve elected to stay here.”
“Yes, well, I suppose having Negroes is different when you do it, too.”
His father sipped his coffee, swallowed hard.
“I feel that you’re being stubborn for no reason at all. And it’s a bit much this early in the morning.”
It wasn’t the first time his father had made a claim about his stubbornness, and such words had lost their power over time. In this instance, with his mood lightened by his return home, he chose to ignore them. The birdsong was picking up a rhythm, and he recognized the same tunes he’d heard since childhood.
“I told them they could do what they wished today,” his father said, “as I aimed to spend some time with you.”
“Actually, I was meaning to ask if I might borrow Ridley. I’m thinking of heading to town.”
“Already bored with us, then.”
“Now you sound like Mother. There’s just other folks to see. I’ll be back before nightfall. We can finish off that hen together.”
“You’re grown now,” George said. “You’ll do as you will.”
Caleb stood before him, motionless.
“You don’t need my permission to ride Ridley. If you want the saddle it should be beside the feed bag.”
Caleb left his father at the porch and retrieved Ridley from the stable. So little had changed with the donkey—the twitching rabbit’s ears, the mane spiked like a jagged mountain range which took to his hand but still shivered at the touch—that the reunion felt diminished by the animal’s familiarity. To the donkey, it seemed, Caleb had not been gone at all. There was little ceremony to the brushing and haltering, and afterward he led Ridley out of the stable and past the house, waving goodbye to his mother and catching another glimpse of his father as he finished his coffee on the porch.
“Tell August I say hello,” his father called. “And when you get back I’d like to hear what really happened to that face of yours. About that horseplay.”