"Hi, Emma. I swear you get prettier every day. How you ever fell for an
old he-coon like Joe is something I'll never understand." He shifted the
fiddle to his other shoulder. Pete stood in the doorway, and seemed to
be waiting.
"Play something, Yancey," Emma pleaded. "Play some music for us."
"Sure. What do you want to hear?"
"Anything."
Yancey Garrow took his fiddle out of its case, tucked it under his chin,
and drew the bow across it a couple of times. He began a lively
rendition of "Yankee Doodle." Her face flushed with pleasure, Barbara
emerged from her room.
"Long while since I've danced with a girl as pretty as you are!" Pete
Domley declared. "Come on, Bobby."
He whirled her around the room while Yancey increased the tempo of his
music. Grinning, Joe took Emma in his arms. A shadow darkened the door
and Fellers Compton was there.
"Stretch my ears and call me a jackass!" he breathed. "You people get
the best ideas of anybody in Missouri!"
He had a wrapped parcel in his hands and he put it down on the table.
"Caroline put up too much strawberry preserves and she hopes to unload
some of it on you, now that you're going away. Keep playing, Yancey.
I'll be back."
While Joe danced with Barbara and Pete Domley with Emma, Yancey played
"Oh, Susannah," and then another of Foster's songs. Putting his fiddle
aside for a second, Yancey dipped himself a drink of water. Barbara's
and Emma's eyes were glistening, for the air was tense and expectant.
This was the way most parties started. Yancey put the gourd dipper
beside the bucket of water just as old Tom Abend drove up with his wife,
his three youngest children, his two married daughters, their husbands,
and their children.
"Fellers said we might come over here to see what's goin' on," he
greeted.
"Right good idea," Joe said.
Tom continued, "One of my boys shot a buck last week, and we made jerky.
Lot more'n we can use so I brought some for you to take along."
"Thanks, Tom."
Joe saw Tom's amiable wife and daughters chatting with Emma. In addition
to jerky, meant to go along with the departing wagon, they had brought
four pies, several pounds of butter, some fresh venison, and two
lanterns. Yancey swung into the plaintive melody of "Ben Bolt" and Joe
found himself dancing with one of Tom Abend's daughters while her
husband danced with Emma.
The neighbors came on horse- and muleback, in wagons and carts, and on
foot, with those who lived nearest arriving first. All bore gifts, and
all explained that they simply had too much at home. The Towers would
really be doing them a favor to take some of it off their hands. In
addition, all brought whatever had been ready for a hoedown in the
making. They overflowed the house and spilled out into the yard, but
somebody had stretched a rope between the house and the barn and hung
lighted lanterns on it. Tonight there would be no thought of saving
lantern oil. Tonight was for fun.
Yancey played until he was tired, and then Les Tenney spelled him. While
not as expert a fiddler as Yancey, Les knew a great many tunes,
variations on those tunes, and when he could think of nothing else he
improvised his own music. Joe saw Barbara dancing with Marcia Geragty,
but only for a second. Grinning, two of Tom Abend's big sons separated
the girls and danced them away. Dancing with eight-year-old Celia
Trevelyan, Tad was having a wonderful time and even the babies danced
with each other.
Inside the house, the table groaned under its weight of food and a huge
pot of coffee, and those who were hungry could help themselves to as
much as they wanted any time they wanted it. But nobody lingered inside
for very long. Old Tom Abend tapped Joe on the shoulder.
"My sons-in-law got a coon treed behind the barn. They want you to come
help shake it out."
"Sounds like fun."
"It will be."
Joe followed old Tom out of the light cast by the hanging lanterns and
into the dark shadows cast by the barn. Tom's two husky sons-in-law
stood beside the barrel of whisky that they had set up on blocks of wood
and tapped. The crowd around the barrel increased as more men slipped
away from the dance, and cups rattled as they were filled and passed
around. Old Tom said clearly.
"We'll drink to the Tower family and Oregon!"
"All right!" they chorused. "To all the Towers and Oregon!"
Joe stepped back into the shadows, raised the cup to his lips, and
managed, unseen, to spill it onto the grass. But he felt as though he
had drunk all of it. His feet were light and airy, and his head seemed
clearer than it had ever been before. He laughed unrestrainedly, and
rejoined the party just in time to choose Emma as his partner for a
square dance which Lance Trevelyan was calling;
"Alamen left and you git around,
Hand over hand like a merry-go-round."
As the dance gathered tempo, all the younger children were put to sleep
in either the beds or in whichever wagon was not already crowded with
sleeping youngsters. Joe danced on, and at intervals cups again rattled
behind the barn while the barrel became lighter.
Because it seemed to him that the dance had just started, Joe was amazed
when the sun rose.