Free Home from the Hill by William Humphrey Page A

do’.”
    The story never varied a word, so Theron chanted it in his mind, and sometimes out loud:
    â€œSo he oiled up his gun and he put on his stalking boots and—”
    â€œSo he oil up his gun an he put on his stawkin boots an he go for his ole Chauncey.” (Chauncey had been Old Chauncey even as a young man, for it was a title he had earned early, a certificate of reliability, such as is given a dog or a cunning old fox or a long-run locomotive, people speaking of Old Queen or Old Red or Old Ninety-seven. He was very proud of his title, a haughty old man and the only Negro Theron ever knew who did not mister white men. Oh, he mistered some, those who in his estimation were not men at all, the ones who were not hunters; and none dared take exception to being called by their given names by “that nigger of the Captain’s.”) “Well, all this bout them trappers was unbeknownst to yo’s truly. Cap’m say we goin huntin so I desume we goin after squirrels. So I never paid no mind till we’s done down in the woods. Then I take notice he carrying that ole Winchester thutty-thutty you see before you in that cabinet right dis minute. Now as you very well know, that ain’t for squirrels. Oh-oh, says I to myself. Well, but whutever it is, ain’t I with the one man that can git me out of there again? Yes. But let me tell you, boy, when you git way off down in there even Cap’m Wade Hunnicutt look like jes barely enough to bring you out again. An jes you try to keep step with that man. Lord, I druther pick wet cotton. Well, we come up on the first track. I look at them clove-footed prints an I say to myself, ‘Now, Chauncey,’ (jes to make sure it was me I was talkin to) ‘Chauncey, ain’t no cows strayed off down in this part of the world, is it?’ To look at them tracks you would swear it was the devil hisself. Well, when it come to me whut it really was, then I wush it was the devil. I jes plopped right down. ‘O.K., Chauncey,’ say Cap’m, ‘you can choose yo pick—come along with me, else wait on me here.’ Well, Lord, I reckon I druther come up on a wile boar an him with me than have the boar come up on me by my lonesome. So off we go again. Well, we follow them tracks till about the middle of the afternoon. We standin on the edge of a little clearin, when all-a-sudden Cap’m whisper to me, ‘Chauncey, let’s see how fast you can shinny up that tree.’ You may think I stayed to be tole twice, but you got another think comin. But when I git up an look down again, there he is, the one man that can git me out of here, still down on the groun. Now we huntin upwind, so on comes the boar unsuspectin, an fore long you can hear him. Snortin an puffin an gruntin an crashin along, sound like he’s big as a steam locomotive. ’Twas a long, still, hot summer’s day an you could smell that pig a-comin: smelt like burnt flesh an feathers. An hit’d been a long dry spell that summer, so when he come into the clearin he was red, solid red, all over, cause he couldn’ find hisself no mud to waller in an he was covered with tiny drops of blood coming outa ever’ pore stead of sweat, an so it was gnats an flies buzzin all over him an he was half crazy they was aggravatin him so. Oh, I tell you, he looks plumb sweet up there on the wall to whut he looked that day. His tushes don’t sparkle nothin now to whut they did then, cause then he hone em fresh ever’ day gainst a rock an file em to a nice point an strop em gainst a tree. Well, he come into the clearin an he sniff an he look an he stop. ‘Ugh?’ he go, as if to say, ‘Whut is this come traipsin on my claim?’ Cap’m stand there lookin him over an never bat a eyelash. Pig comes on an I prayin, ‘Lord, won’t he never raise his gun an shoot that thing!’ Now Pig sees Man. ‘Uuuuuuuugh!’ he go, an he paw up