Free The Run for the Elbertas by James Still

Lark opened the poke holding a Wilburn and a Henry Back.“You take the Wilburn,” I told him, for it was the largest. “I choose the Henry Back because it pops when I bite it.”
    Lark wrapped the damp seeds in a bit of paper torn from the poke. I got up, raising the saddle-bag. The grackles flew lazily off the rails, settling into a linn beside the road, their dark wings brushing the leaves like shadows.
    â€œIt’s nigh on to six miles to the forks,” I said.
    Lark asked to carry the saddle-bag a ways, so I might rest. I told him, “This load would break your bones down.” I let him carry my brogans though. He tied the strings into a bow and hung them about his neck.
    We walked on, stepping among hardened clumps of mud and wheel-brightened rocks. Cow bells clanked in a redbud thicket on the hills, and a calf bellowed. A bird hissed in a persimmon tree. I couldn’t see it, but Lark glimpsed its flicking tail feathers.
    â€œA cherrybird’s nigh tame as a pet crow,” Lark said. “Once I found one setting her some eggs and she never flew away. She was that trusting.”
    Lark was tiring now. He stumped his sore big toe twice, crying a mite.
    â€œYou’ll have to stop dragging yore feet or put on shoes,” I said.
    â€œMy feet would get raw as a beef if’n I wore shoes all the way till dark,” Lark complained. “My brogans is full o’ pinchers. If’n I had me a drap o’ water on my toe, hit would feel a sight better.”
    Farther on we found a spring drip. Lark held his foot under the cool stream. He wanted to scramble up the bank to find where the water seeped from the ground. “Thar might be a spring lizard sticking hits head out o’ the mud,” he said. I wouldn’t give in to it, so we went on, the sun-ball in our faces, and the road curving beyond sight.
    â€œI’ve heared tell they do quare things at the fork school,” Lark said, “yit I’ve forgot what it was they done.”
    â€œThey’ve got a big bell hung square up on some poles,” Isaid, “and they ring it before they get up o’ mornings and when they eat. They got a little sheep bell to ring in the schoolhouse before and betwixt books. Dee Finley tuck a month’s schooling there, and he told me a passel. Dee says it’s a sight on earth the washing and scrubbing and sweeping they do. Says they might’ nigh take the hide off o’ floors a-washing them so much.”
    â€œI bet hit’s the truth,” Lark said.
    â€œI’ve heard Mommy say it’s not healthy keeping dust breshed in the air, and a-damping floors every day,” I said. “And Dee says they’ve got a passel o’ cows in a barn. They take and wet a broom and scrub every cow before they milk. Dee reckons they’ll soon be breshing them cows’ teeth.”
    â€œI bet hit’s the truth,” Lark said.
    â€œAll that messing around don’t hurt them cows none. They get so much milk everybody has a God’s plenty.”
    The sun-ball dropped behind the beech woods on the ridge. It grew cooler. We rested again in a horsemint patch, Lark spitting on his big toe, easing the pain. Lark said, “I ought ne’er thought to be a scholar.”
    â€œThey never was a puore scholar amongst all our folks,” I recalled. “Never a one went all the way through the books and come out yon side. I’ve got a notion doing it.”
    â€œHit’d take a right smart spell,” Lark said.
    We were ready to go on when a sound of hoofs came up the valley. They were far off and dull. We waited, resting this bit longer. A bright-faced nag rounded the creek curve, lifting hoofs carefully along the wheel tracks. Cain Griggs was in the saddle, riding with his feet out of the stirrups, for his legs were too long to fit. He halted beside us, looking down where we sat. We stood up, shifting our feet.
    â€œI reckon yore