Strawman by David Byron (part 1)

Plump with sweet straw, dapper in a pair of discarded overalls and a torn chambray shirt, the scarecrow stood watch over the vegetable patch. The hours spent re-stuffing and stitching the strawman had left Nicholas Grogan’s eyes strained and aching, but it didn’t matter. The old scarecrow, reborn, looked fine and new and worthy of his garden. The man scratched his head, puzzling over his handiwork. Something was still missing, but he wasn’t sure what. Oh well, he decided, it would come in time.

“Wiley, come on, boy.” Grogan called the old hound who dozed in the morning heat. The dog stood, hind legs trembling, tail wagging like a pup’s. Wiley’s still got a few years in him. Grogan bent to scratch the animal’s muzzle. He’d lost too much with Mae’s passing last spring to think further. “You and I, boy, we’ll stay together, won’t we?” The tail wagged harder.

Grogan ambled into his orchard. Bruise-purple plums hung, ripe and enticing; peaches and nectarines blushed under the sun’s gaze. Dominating the orchard was the old peach tree, the one he and Mae planted when they bought the place. It was twenty feet tall, its gnarled limbs heavy with fruit and, as Grogan studied the weighted branches, he wondered if he could do the canning this year. He didn’t know how, but he couldn’t let the crop go to waste, either. Maybe he’d barter with Ted Burnham down the road; his wife might do it in exchange for some of the harvest. Grogan spat, disgusted with himself. That would be a waste. Best do it for myself. There was no use giving something away if you didn’t have to.

He eased his old bones down to rest in the tree’s shade, and Wiley settled beside him for a snooze. Sunlight danced and dappled on his knees and he stretched his arms long above his head, relishing the feel of the rough bark against his back. A breeze rustled through the tree, dropping a fat peach into the grass.

Smiling, Grogan hefted the fruit, feeling its weight, then bit into it. Juice squirted and ran deliciously over his lips. In the distance, he heard a childish shriek of laughter and frowned, his mood broken.

Those kids better learn to leave my trees alone. He wiped juice from his mouth with the back of his hand. They had no right to steal his fruit, no right at all. Since the first ripening two weeks ago, they’d been trouble. They’d even climbed his fence once; he’d caught them in the act, and threatened to tell their parents. Damned parents stole from me when they were kids, too. Kids. You just can’t trust them. Mae had, he realized now, shielded him from most of it, somehow keeping the youngsters out of his sight. Several times, he’d suspected she’d given them some of his fruit, but he didn’t ask her, didn’t want to know, because he couldn’t be angry with Mae, even if what she did wasn’t right.

The giggling, goading voices drew nearer and slow fury oozed over him. As he stood, his hands clawed into fists.

There was scuffling at the fence, snickering whispers, and Grogan took a few steps toward the sounds. Face set, he silently waited.

He heard a boyish grunt and saw the fingers snake over the fence-top. Blond hair appeared, then a pair of squinting green eyes, which slowly widened as they focused on the old man.

One of the younger ones. Grogan grinned like a Jack-o-lantern, and the boy shrieked before disappearing with a gratifying thud.

“We’re gonna getcha, old man! We’re gonna getcha!” screeched a mocking adolescent voice before a herd of sneakers stampeded away down the sidewalk.

Grogan opened his gate, seeing red as he surveyed the peaches spattered on the ground. Their sticky nectar blotched the sidewalk like blood. In the fence, freshly carved, were initials, “J.M.”

Grogan swallowed hard, remembering. J.M. That would be Jimmy, the older kid, the one who caused so much trouble since moving into town last year. He’d heard about that one, all right. Jimmy McCobb, that’s his name. The ringleader. The kid was bad, maybe even evil. A feeling of serenity settled over Grogan. “You’re not gonna get me, kid,” he said, smiling, “because I’m gonna get you first.”

Old Nicholas Grogan went in the house to call the sheriff.

###

Peaches were piled high in baskets on the kitchen counter, and Grogan inhaled their sweet scent as he sat at the table spooning cold baked beans onto his plate. He poured a glass of milk, but it was lumpy and soured and he pushed it away.

Milk wouldn’t dare curdle if Mae were still alive. He remembered the day he’d finally understood that she was really dying. She’d just taken a sheet of gingersnaps from the oven when the pain hit her again, and she’d dropped the cookies. He bent to help her pick them up.

“You go on now, Nick. I’m fine.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes, I’m sure.” She looked at him but he couldn’t meet her eyes. “I should teach you how to make ‘snaps,” she said lightly. “Lord knows you couldn’t live without them.”

“No, I. . .” Grogan’s throat had tightened then. “You’ll keep making them for me, won’tcha, Mae?”

She patted his hand, squeezed it. “Nick, the Lord’s coming for me pretty soon now.”

“No, that’s not true. He wouldn’t take you away from me.”

She’d lifted his chin, cupped it in her hand, and made him look at her. “Nick, sometimes I think there’s just a little boy inside that big man’s body of yours. You’ve got to face it.”

And, against his will, as he watched her body slowly become shadows and hollows and heard her voice grow hesitant with pain, he’d reconciled himself to her passing.

“Oh, Mae, why’d you have to go? I need you, girl.” The beans were a cold lump in his belly.

His words echoed hollowly through the room and he bent to finish his supper, hardening his thoughts against the tears that stung his eyes.

###

Eight o’clock. Crickets sang in the hot air, heralds of a cooling night breeze that rustled through the trees. Grogan, comfortable in his easy chair, read a seed catalog, marking choices in blue ink. Abruptly, the crickets’ singing stopped, and Wiley raised his head from Grogan’s feet. The old man clicked off the reading lamp and squinted into the blackness beyond the screen door, listening.

Down the steps, down the front walk, the white fence gleamed dully in the reflected moonlight. The gate creaked as someone leaned against it. Wiley growled.

“Hush, boy,” whispered Grogan.

“Shhh–” The sound floated in on the breeze and the night became still again, allowing Grogan to hear faint scuffling noises. The boys were back. He rose and padded to the door, waiting. Wiley whimpered softly.

“You think the old man’s asleep?” The voice, a half-whisper, rode the wind.

“Sure, it’s past nine. Old farts always go to sleep before nine.”

Grogan recognized the ringleader’s voice.

Hushed giggles. There were at least three boys out there, thought Grogan, probably four or five.

“Know what I heard?” hissed Jimmy McCobb. “I heard the old man killed his wife and buried her in his garden!”

Fists clenched against flooding rage, Grogan strained to hear more of the whispers, but caught only bits and snatches over the breeze. Something about the dog. Probably the old story about Wiley’s biting kids’ fingers off, he decided.

More whispers. Now he’s telling them how I chase kids with a loaded shotgun or how I hide in closets till kids’re asleep and then jump out and kill them and take them home for my supper. He grinned in the dark. Oh yeah, he knew the rumors, all right. They used to bother Mae, but he’d always gotten a kick out of them. Encouraged them, if truth be told.

“Come on!” Jimmy’s sibilant whisper was louder now. “Let’s go around to the side. You guys watch out for that damn dog!”

The boys moved off and Grogan crossed the living room and took the rifle down from its mount over the fireplace. Wiley watched mournfully. “Just as well it don’t work anymore,” he told the dog. “I’d be mortally tempted to use it.” Grogan went to the kitchen, Wiley following. “Stay, boy,” he whispered. “If I can’t scare them away with this,” he hefted the piece, “then maybe I will teach you to bite fingers off!” He chuckled and headed for the door.

Compared to the darkness of the house, the moonlight was bright. Grogan quickly spotted a boy climbing over the fence and heading for the prize peach tree. He saw three boys already beneath it, and its chattering leaves betrayed a fourth, already high in the branches. Quietly, he moved along the walk beside the house and past the workshop. Finally, he stepped into the open and leveled the rifle, waiting. They didn’t notice him.

“There, Tom! Right there. Get the peaches offa that branch! No, there!” Jimmy squawked at the boy in the tree.

“I’m trying!” the boy whispered.

Jimmy McCobb was swearing up a storm at Tom as Grogan stepped forward. “Okay, boy,” he called. “You’ve been caught!”

“Fuck you, old man!” he called as he hightailed it for the fence. The other boys followed, and Grogan moved closer to the tree, seeing that the climber had been left behind.

“You like my peaches, boy?”

“Uh, yessir, I mean—”

Grogan aimed the rifle at him and the panicked child lost his balance. He grabbed at a branch which snapped and fell with him to the ground.

Grogan’s eyes blazed with cold fire.

“Run, Tom!” cried Jimmy from somewhere behind him.

Before Grogan could turn, hands thumped his back, throwing him forward. Quickly regaining his feet, he whirled, leveling the rifle. Jimmy McCobb grinned at him, and Grogan saw Satan in the boy’s smile.

“Can’tcha spare a few peaches, mister?” The kid’s voice was syrupy with insolence.

“You’re trespassing, boy, and you’re gonna get on outta here right now.”

Languidly, Jimmy looked toward the fence, watching as the younger boys scrabbled over it to safety. “Yeah, sure, you’re gonna shoot a buncha little kids? You’re gonna tell the cops some little kids took your precious peaches, so you shot them dead?”

“Sheriff’ll be here in a minute, boy. Called them before I came out,” Grogan lied. “Guess I’ll be telling them how you pushed me over.” He looked at the broken branch, then at Jimmy, and smiled grimly. “Guess maybe I could tell them you threatened me with the limb you broke off. They’d believe that, now, wouldn’t they?”

Faint surprise passed over Jimmy’s face and Grogan’s grin broadened. “Guess you’ve been in trouble with the law before, boy?” he asked amiably.

“You’re gonna be sorry, mister.” The McCobb boy turned, ran, and hitched himself over the front gate with feline grace.

###

The sun was high when Ed Laker finally showed up and now, after five minutes of talk, Grogan knew he’d be of no help.

“Well, Mr. Grogan,” the sheriff was saying, “I’ll go over to the cafe and talk with Mrs. McCobb. Maybe she can locate the boy.”

“Might have helped if you’d got here a little sooner,” grumbled Grogan. “You should’ve come yesterday, when I first phoned.”

“I’m sorry. Had a busy day yesterday. Wouldn’t have helped, though, because those boys were long gone when you called.” Laker removed his hat and wiped the sweat from his forehead with a white handkerchief. “I’ll get in touch with Ted Burnham and tell him Tom’s been running around pulling pranks after dark — that ought to take care of the young ones. Burnham will spread word among the other parents. And, as soon as I find Jimmy, I’ll send him over here to apologize and patch up the damage he did.”

“Will that be this afternoon? I don’t like my property looking like this.” Grogan pointed at the fence.

“Maybe, but I wouldn’t count on it. That boy’s famous for running off every time he’s in trouble.” Laker replaced his hat, pulled the brim down to shade his eyes. “Why, he was gone most of October last year after he put that dead opossum through the church window.”

Grogan spat. “Little yellow-belly. Does something and then can’t even take his medicine.”

“Yeah, well, I’ll talk to his mother, see what she says.” Laker paused, chewing his lower lip. “You know, Mr. Grogan, you can’t get kids to behave by riling up at them. You yell, they just get worse.”

“I’ll keep it in mind,” mumbled the old man. His frost colored eyes bored into Laker’s back as the sheriff walked to his car and knew that the law wouldn’t be of any help at all. He turned and went indoors to get his wallet and hat.

###

He returned from the feed store later with enough barbed wire to run the circumference of his property, and after he garaged the old pick-up, he went around to the workshop to fetch the wheelbarrow and tools.

Then he saw the scarecrow.

Its head, nearly torn from the body, hung like an empty balloon. Straw bulged from the neck and oozed from the knife-blade rips in the denim and chambray. Grogan felt a shimmer of fear, then fury replaced it, and he strode into the garden. His cornstalks near the scarecrow were broken and ragged, his tomatoes spattered the ground, red as fresh blood. His stomach churned as he undid the straw man from its pole and gently carried it into the workshop.

Shaking his head, he laid the mutilated scarecrow on the workbench. No use telling the sheriff. Pursing his lips, he picked up his tools, put them in the wheelbarrow and took them outside.

Several times, as he worked away the afternoon, he heard jeering voices and thumping footsteps as the boys flew by, but they didn’t bother him, and by suppertime, the fence around his yard was equipped with a single strand of barbed wire, strung inside and just below the top of the fence-planks, exactly where prying fingers would grab.

Later, Grogan phoned Ed Laker, telling him nothing but finding out that Jimmy McCobb hadn’t been seen. Finally, disgusted and tired, he got ready for bed, checked each door and window to be sure it was locked and, at last, he carried his arthritic old hound into the bedroom and placed him on the bed. They began to snore within seconds of one another.

###

After two hours of weeding and hoeing, the day became too hot for yard work. Grogan was sitting in the kitchen studying Mae’s canning cookbook when he heard the sounds. He grinned, happy he’d remembered to lock his truck in the garage so the boy wouldn’t know he was home.

There was an adolescent squeal of pain followed by a spate of obscenities. Jimmy McCobb had returned. Grogan fetched his broken rifle, then waited, listening, as shoes thumped against wood planks. He peered through a crack between the curtains, and saw Jimmy climb carefully over the fence. Quietly, Grogan went out the back door, Wiley at his heels. “Stay close, boy,” whispered the old man.

The youth was heading for the trees when Grogan stepped out of the shadows of the house.

“Hold it, McCobb!”

Jimmy turned and Grogan raised the rifle, taking aim.

“Old man, you’re crazy. Gonna shoot me, huh!” he sneered.

“Just defending myself and my property. Who’s to say you aren’t about to do to me what you done to my scarecrow?”

Jimmy gave Grogan a big foolish grin. “Ah, now, mister, I didn’t do nothing to your stinking scarecrow.”

“You’re a coward, boy. Can’t even admit what you done. Now, you get off my property; otherwise, I’m gonna have to shoot you.” Grogan leveled the gun.

“Hell, old man, everybody knows that gun don’t shoot nothing but bullshit.”

“Watch your mouth.” Grogan shifted the rifle in his hands, but kept it trained on the boy. “What everybody knows about me would fit on the head of a pin . . . Wiley!”

The dog growled, and Jimmy’s eyes turned toward the animal. He looked back to Grogan, standing his ground.

“Now, boy, you better start running for that fence.”

Wiley snarled. The fur along his back rose in a menacing ridge and Jimmy took a step backwards. “You’ll be sorry, Grogan. I’m gonna burn your house down, burn your precious trees down,” he glanced at the hound, “and I’m gonna burn you and that damned dog, too!”

“Sheriff will be right interested to hear that. Now, move! Wiley, siccum!”

With unexpected agility, Wiley leapt at Jimmy, and Grogan laughed as the youth ran for the fence with the dog barking wildly at his heels. “You’re lucky, boy,” he called. “A few years back, Wiley’d have had your throat torn out already!”

Jimmy jumped onto the fence; as he hurled himself over, Grogan heard something rip. He walked to the fence. “It’s okay, Wiley,” he told the barking dog. “Quiet down, now.” He scrutinized the pale blue cloth that fluttered on the barbed wire and saw a damp red stain. “Huh! Looks like we drew blood, fella. Maybe we scared him off for good.”

###

Twilight came as Grogan put down the needle and thread on the workbench. The scarecrow was nearly repaired now; all he had to do was stuff fresh straw into its head and put in the final stitches.

Outside, Wiley barked and the man stood still, listening. Probably just a cat. He went back to work. Suddenly, a gunshot cracked the air and Wiley yelped, high and thin.

Grogan ran into the yard. “Wiley! Wiley! Where are you?

The dog whimpered in the darkness, and Grogan moved toward the sound until he saw the animal lying in a shaft of moonlight flowing between the branches of two plum trees. He ran and knelt beside his old hound.

Blood pumped from a black wound in the dog’s flank and flowed over his belly. “Wiley!” whispered Nick Grogan. The dog cried softly as the old man pulled his bandana from his trousers and held it against the animal’s side to staunch the flow. Quickly, blood soaked the handkerchief, staining it a darker red.

From behind the fence came a shriek of laughter, but Grogan paid no attention. “Wiley, Wiley, boy, it’ll be alright,” he whispered. He held the dog’s head up, cupping its muzzle. “Wiley, you’ll be all right.” But the dog moaned and its muscles twitched, the clear brown eyes staring into his own. They widened and stared toward heaven. Beneath Grogan’s hand, Wiley’s heart stuttered and ceased to beat. He was gone. Like Mae.

“Wiley, no!” cried Grogan. Then he heard the mocking laughter again. He looked up, saw the fence plank that was pushed askew, and swallowed his anger. “Not now,” he muttered to himself. He scooped the dog gently into his arms, stood and walked slowly toward the house. He looked down at Wiley’s still body, holding him close, and then turned toward the fence. “Murderer!” he cried. “Killer.”

###

Guided by moonlight, Grogan buried Wiley in Mae’s rose garden and placed a chunk of shiny black obsidian from the garden’s border over the grave as a marker. The rest of the night was sleepless and long as Nicholas Grogan reflected on the past and the future.

(To read part 2, click here)