The Tobacco Tiller Part 4

"He called Mr. Castle and Mr. Evans a pair o' softheads because they wuzn't willin' to sell at _his_ price at first askin', and when he come through the barn thar, he 'lowed the crop looked mighty pore to him. I says, 'Hain't thar somethin' the matter with your eyes, Mr. Garred? My terbaccer looks mighty _good_ to men that raises. .h.i.t: they say I ginerally always beat 'em all in growin'!'

"He never sampled none hardly, neither,--jest pertended to know what I had without hardly lookin' at hit, and when he put his hand on my _bright_ terbaccer, my _ceegar_ terbaccer, and I had some o' the purtiest a body ever seed, he 'lowed hit wuz house-burnt! Said he smelt the smoke whar we'd had fires in the barn a dryin' out the damp (and, ef you remember, Bunch, we never had no rain the fall before). And he jest offered me six cents fer my bright, and five cents fer the rest, tips, flyin's, trash, and all, him to do the gradin'. You know, Bunch, that a way I wouldn't 'a' had no bright to speak of!

"I says 'I've got some mighty fine terbaccer, Mr. Garred, and five cents is a mighty pore price, considerin'. Can't you do a leetle better fer me?' Then he ast me ef I thought he wuz born yistiddy, er the day afore, er wuz out a buyin' terbaccer fer his health, and jest ripped out the cuss words. 'Anytheng over six cents fer your terbaccer'd be an adstortionate price to pay,' he says: 'hit hain't worth no more, and I'd see h.e.l.l froze over before I'd pay you another cent!'

"Then he 'lowed ef I didn't let him have hit, what wuz I goin' to do with hit? Wuz I goin' to feed hit to my hogs, er make hit into pies fer myse'f to eat?

"Yes, sir, that's jest the way he talked, and t'other buyer, Bishop, a buyin' the year before, wuz might' night' as insultin'.

"When he wuz over at Archie Evans' terbaccer barn, he tuck out his gold watch with jewels a stickin' up like rats' eyes in the back of hit, and told the old Dutchman a croppin' with Mr. Evans, he'd give him jest three minutes to come to his price. The old Dutchman says: 'Me and your price can't agree dat queeck!' Bishop got mad and told him to go to h.e.l.l, but old Christenson, he don't git mad at n.o.body--he jest spoke up and says: 'Dat is de first time I have efer been invited to your fader's house, sir, but eef you vill come along vid me, ve vill go dere togedder!'

"Yes, sir, them buyers acts mighty quair. At them ware-houses they mix the good crops they buy all through them that hain't as good. One year I hauled the best crop I ever raised to a ware-house whar the old lady's brother wuz a workin'. He said ever' time one the men'd come to a pertic'lar extry good, bright hand, he'd say, 'Here's a hand o' Eph Doggett's terbaccer!'

"Yes, sir, and what you reckon I got fer that crop?"

"I have no idy!" averred Bunch.

"They jest give me seven cents fer hit, leavin' out two thousand pounds they didn't give but five fer--and one pound wuz jest as good as t'other. My brother-in-law said the reason the buyer done that, wuz he wuz a _evenin'_ up, a makin' up offen me, fer bigger prices he give on some other crops!"

"Thenk you'll sell your terbaccer loose, and haul hit to a ware-house, this time, er prize hit, and ship?" asked Bunch presently.

"I dunno, Bunch." Mr. Doggett pulled his beard reflectively: "I dunno hardly what to do. A feller's bound to go with his terbaccer whenever the buyer sends word fer him to haul hit, and, no matter what sort o'

weather hit is, he's got to load his waggins--his and them he's hired--and go. Ef he's got _fur_ to go, say thirty-five miles to a ware-house, like me, two o'clock in the mornin'll ketch him a startin', and I tell you, Bunch, ef the weather's dry, the terbaccer loses weight ever' mile! Ef hit's windy, the wind jest whoops and tears the leaves, and sucks the weight out scandalous: and ef a snow comes on, a body's mules b.a.l.l.s up, and they legs twists around 'tel thar's plumb danger o'

hockin' 'em.

"And when you git to the ware-house long about night, the buyer jest as apt as not, he won't weigh hit sometimes 'tel the next mornin', and by then, hit won't be no heavier layin' loose on the waggins dryin' out.

Then a feller's got to pay fer stablin' and feed o' the teams, and hotel bills fer him and his men, yes, sir!

"And shippin' a body's terbaccer is about as onsatisfactory as sellin'

hit at the barn and haulin' hit to a ware-house: yes, sir, Bunch, a body has to sell the best way they can, and has to take what they can git, fer all their hard work! Although hit's plain to be seed, somethin's wrong when a body has to sell to one man and then bag him to buy,--as I wuz a sayin'--I'm a livin' in hopes us terbaccer fellers'll sometime git prices that'll give us somethin' more'n a bare livin'."

"What about the Equity Society that feller was a speakin' on here last summer, a helpin' prices?" observed Bunch.

"The Equity?" repeated Mr. Doggett. "Mr. Archie Evans--he's one o' them Equity men. He kept that Equity speaker a week when he wuz in the neighborhood a speakin'. Bedded him in one them gold-papered rooms, and fed his hoss oats three times a day. He said, ef a cause wuz good and jest, he wuz the man to holp in the h'istin' uv hit! I asked Mr. Evans what the Equity wuz, and he said hit wuz a society with the objict to git profitable prices fer thengs raised on the farm, garden and orchid.

He says he j'ined hit mainly because he saw hit had got so sober fellers that put in ever' lick o' time they possible could a workin', couldn't make enough to keep their famblys in anything that wuz any kin to comfort. Yes, sir!

"Mr. Evans, he says. .h.i.t's the theng fer us terbaccer man to jine hit,--ever' livin' soul of us, tenants and landowners, and jest hold our terbaccer as. .h.i.t says, ontel we git feefteen cents: quit a raisin' hit one year, and we'd come out on top.

"Them manufacturers used to give us somethin' like a livin' price, afore they all j'ined together in one buyin' comp'ny and put the price down jest as low as they wanted to, and they'd have to give us a livin' price agin, yes, sir, to git us to raise hit.

"Mr. Evans, he says, hit hain't no use to try to git the Gover'ment to holp us out, by a takin' the rev'nue offen the terbaccer so we could stem hit and twist hit and sell hit that away to anybody, jest as we pleased. He says ever' time the terbaccer raisers has tried to git a law takin' the tax off, them beeg manufacterer fellers has sot down on hit so hard, hit jest died ez quick ez me er you would, ef a elephant wuz to mistake us fer a cheer and set down on us! Yes, sir!

"He says we've jest got to lay to them manufacterers by a holdin' our terbaccer, and cuttin' out the raisin' o' hit: says them fellers of us that's not a j'inin' the Equity, is jest a stavin' off the good day fer all of us. Mr. Sam Nolan and Mr. d.i.c.k Leslie over here, they say thar hain't no good in the Equity, but Mr. Evans, he says the reason they talk that a way is: the buyin' Comp'ny, thenkin' 'em beeg fellers, and influency, give 'em prices away up yonder on their terbaccer, so's they'd talk agin the Equity! Yes, sir!

"The comp'ny could easy do that, Bunch, and not feel hit. Jest thenk o'

a gittin' a dollar and a half a pound fer terbaccer! Hain't that what _Black Jack_ sells at, Joey?

"And all them fellers does to the terbaccer is jest to sweeten hit a leetle, and put a leetle liquish in hit, and maybe a leetle opium, so as to set the cravin' fer more on a feller that uses. .h.i.t!

"And talkin' about hard work, us fellers up here in the Blue Gra.s.s ortn't to complain nigh as much as we do about havin' to be in the terbaccer from one year's end to t'other, and jest gittin' a gnat's livin' outen hit! Now down yonder in the Green River country, the Dark Terbaccer country, whar they don't raise _nothin'_ but terbaccer (no leetle corn patches to fall back on fer stock feed and bread, like we've got) hit's wuss off with them fellers than with us. Hit's work all the time reg'lar, and in the cuttin' and housin' time, hit's work day and night too, come Sunday, come Monday! Fer they're jest bound to save hit, hit bein' their whole livin'!

"I've worked in the terbaccer from daylight to dark and hit rainin' hard all day, wormin' and a suckerin', and expect to ag'in: I've worked on Sunday considerable--planted on Sunday in a settin' season, and cut in a press,--skeer o' frost er somethin', on Sundays, and _some nights_, but my cousin, Columbus Skeens, down thar, he says Sunday is week day to him, and the moon is the sun, all August and September nigh about.

"And Columbus' women folks, they have to git out in the fields considerable, too.

"And yit Bunch, on account o' the dark terbaccer not brengin' as much as our'n, they're wuss off than we are. One feller can't raise more'n four acres o' terbaccer, ginerally, and he has to halve hit with the land-owner, so ef he raises a thousand pounds to the acre, and gits seven cents, he don't git but a hunderd and forty dollers fer his year's work in terbaccer. Yes, sir!

"And 'tain't been so long sence the buyers, when they all j'ined together in one buyin' Comp'ny, pinched them fellers down thar in the Black Patch down to _three_ cents, when their sellin' time come.

Somethin's wrong, Bunch.

"Hit's jest as bad, I've heerd in some the Counties up naixt the Ohio River, too. Columbus, he keeps a sayin' ef thengs don't git no better, somethin's a goin' to happen down thar!"

"Thar's already been thengs a happenin'," remarked Gran'dad, taking a sudden interest in the conversation, "that is, in some parts o' the State. I wuz a readin' yisterday about people a bein' turned back home with waggin loads o' terbaccer the buyin' Comp'ny'd sneaked around and bought,--terbaccer that was pooled in the Equity, and they had no right to sell. And more than that, some barns o' pooled terbaccer, the buyin'

Company has persuaded some pore fellers with more emptiness in their stomicks than brains in their heads, to sell to hit, has been burned down, by what the papers calls 'night riders.'"

"A heap a body sees in the papers hain't so, though," put in Mr.

Doggett. "That's the failin' o' human critters--they believe most anything they see in print!"

For an instant the silence in the stripping house was unbroken, except for the soft swish of the tobacco leaves.

Then Gran'dad, who was evidently not pleased with his son's comment on the failings of a newspaper reader, spoke again.

"How does. .h.i.t happen, Ephriam, that Castle and Brock always git the highest market price on the Louisville breaks, when they ship theirn and yourn? Brock and Castle both says Brock's terbaccer sold yourn last spreng."

The red in Mr. Doggett's face deepened as Gran'dad flung out this taunt.

Mr. Brock, at one time, before a spirit of moving, and losing, took possession of him, had been a land-owner: he furnished his own teams altogether in making his crop, and, contrary to usual custom, required no advancement of money before the sale. In addition, he was not troubled with humility.

For these reasons, probably, he was held in greater respect than Mr.

Doggett, by their landlord. Then, too, Mr. Doggett was a good servant, and perhaps Mr. Castle felt that it was not the part of wisdom to allow an idea of his worth to get into his head, lest with this idea, an aspiration to seek another master might also come. At any rate, his long-continued and undue praise of Brock's tobacco, and unjust disparagement of Doggett's, had set a thorn of dislike in the heart of the latter gentleman toward his former son-in-law.

"I've seed a heap worse terbaccer," Mr. Doggett informed his hearers, when, after a moment of silence, his cheeks had paled to their normal color; "but Mr. Brock's terbaccer wuz mighty sorry last year,--the meanest crop he ever raised. We had a beeg frost in the spreng before he raised that crop and hit ketched Brock. Reub, he went away that Sunday mornin' to stay 'tel next day, and he told his pap afore he started, ef hit got any colder afore night, to be _sh.o.r.e_ to kiver the beds over with hempherds er straw er somethin'. Mr. Brock, he's mighty se'f deceited, n.o.body can't tell him nothin'; he 'lowed the frost wuzn't comin', but old Jack showed him, yes, sir. And he had to put in his crop with mixed-up late plants, all the kind them that didn't know hit all, wuz able to spare him.

"And then he put too much Paris green on his terbaccer, which some men will do, ef they hain't no more in love with work than Mr. Brock; besides he hauled some o' his'n in, in sech a rush, and drug and beat hit about ontel hit looked like hit had been lapped around a tree, and part of his wuz sh.o.r.e house-burnt. Them September rains done fer him, yes, sir. But mine wuz ever' stalk Stand-up Burley, and nigh about as good as ever I raised, ef I do say hit myse'f.

"The reason he got sech a price wuz the way he packed his hogsheads. You know the inspector, he takes a jobber, and fishes out one hand down about the middle o' the hogshead, and thar's whar Brock packs his brightest terbaccer; although he denies. .h.i.t, yes, sir.

"Mr. Lindsay, he holped Brock strip last year, and pack, too. Mr.

Lindsay, he's got a good sleight at strippin' terbaccer: I've never seed him put a leaf out o' place, even when I've been a carryin' fourteen grades. He jest can't be beat in a strippin'-house. I'd back him ag'in anybody you might breng, I don't keer who: but, as I wuz a sayin', Mr.

Lindsay, he told me, that's the way Brock packed his hogsheads.

"And Mr. Brock, he nestes his too, when he sells. .h.i.t loose. He nested hit one year,--put all the bad in the middle o' his seven piles o'

bulked down--and Mr. Castle sold hit to a buyer, and agreed to let the buyer prize hit in hogsheads at the barn, yes, sir. And afore the man come, Brock had to rebulk the whole theng to keep from bein' ketcht up with, yes, sir. I don't never nest none."

"Tain't no penitentiary refence, Pap, to sorter put your best wher'

hit'll be saw first," remarked Jim Doggett, a tall man of twenty-eight.

"Ephriam bein' possessed frum experience of information o' what hit takes to const.i.tute a penitentiary offence," gibed Gran'dad.