“C’mon, Huck,” I said, heading down the porch steps. “Let’s go.”
“Where ya goin’?” Henry stood up and called after me.
“Nowhere,” I yelled, not looking back.
“Can I come?”
I kept going, pretending not to hear, but outside the gate, Huck found something on the ground. It was a green handkerchief. He sniffed at it and pranced around it, getting all excited. The handkerchief was the same color as Aunt Millie’s dress. She’d probably dropped it on her way up the trail. I didn’t want to go back to give it to her because that would just give Henry James another chance to pester me about taking him along.
“We’ll git it later, boy,” I said. “C’mon.”
I kept walking, but Huck didn’t follow. Instead, he sniffed some more and began heading in the opposite direction back up toward the house. He sniffed the ground and walked like he was following that invisible thread again, just like he had done the day before with Grandma’s bookmark. I didn’t want to, but I turned and picked up the handkerchief and followed Huck back into the yard. As I did, I watched him walk in the exact same path Aunt Millie had.
Henry was sitting in the rocking chair again, this time pushing his feet against the porch floor, moving himself back and forth. When he saw Huck and me coming back, he stopped the chair and wiped his hands across his face. Had he been crying? What did he have to cry about? But then I remembered why Henry James was here. I was so busy being mad at him for ruining my summer that I had almost forgotten that his mama and daddy had just dumped him here without even telling him when they’d be back. That had to be crummy!
I felt a twinge in my stomach. The same kind of twinge I felt last year when I let one of the boys at school get in trouble for tying the girls’ jump rope in knots when I had been the one to do it. I just thought it would be funny to see all those prissy girls crying because they couldn’t twirl and jump and sing their stupid, silly songs, but it wasn’t all that funny when I heard that Harry Hickox got in trouble from his daddy for having to stay after school all week.
I sighed.
But I pushed back at that feeling in my stomach. It wasn’t my fault that Henry had been left at Honey Island for the summer. It wasn’t my fault that his mama and daddy were more worried about saving other people’s souls than taking care of their own son. And what was I supposed to do about it anyway? And just when I felt that twinge in my stomach sinking away, I noticed the hopeful look on Henry’s face. The one that told me he hoped I had changed my mind about taking him with me, and that bad feeling in my stomach bobbed to the surface again.
So, I looked away from Henry and kept watching Huck until he finally followed the invisible path up the porch steps. He stopped at the screen door and scratched at the porch floor right outside the door.
I let him scratch a bit until finally Grandma yelled, “Elsie Mae, come git that dog of yers!”
She didn’t know I was standing right there watching Huck try to dig a hole in the porch floor. Henry James watched too, but neither of us did anything, and Huck kept scratching.
“Elsie Mae!” Grandma yelled again.
I looked at Henry, and then I did something I knew I shouldn’t do, but just had to. I had to see if Huck would do the same thing to Aunt Millie that he had done to Henry James, so I reached for the handle on the screen door and opened it, letting Huck inside. I knew what he’d most likely do, and I knew Grandma would be beyond addled when he did it. Even more, I knew Aunt Millie would be outraged, but I had to see if what I thought was going to happen really did happen.
Once inside the house, Huck kept following the invisible line that I knew would lead right to his prize—Aunt Millie.
“Elsie Mae,” Grandma said through the pins she held between her teeth. “What’re ya lettin’ Huck in here fer?”
I didn’t answer Grandma, but only stood silently in the doorway watching Huck get more and more excited with every sniff until he was right up next to Aunt Millie. And that’s when it happened. He jumped right up on top of her, knocking her clear off the bench she sat on.
“Help!” Millie screamed. “Help!”
Huck sniffed her. Huck slobbered on her. Huck attacked her like she was one of Grandma’s huckleberry pies. All while Millie squealed like a hog.
“Elsie Mae, git on over here and git this animal offa her,” Grandma wailed, spitting out the pins she held in her mouth and tossing Aunt Millie’s dress onto the table so she could help her.
“He’s killin’ me! He’s killin’ me!” Millie whined, fighting off Huck’s slobbery tongue.
I let go of the screen door that I was still holding and ran in after Huck. I grabbed the extra skin around his neck that I now almost thought of as a handle and pulled him across the floor toward the door.
“What in tarnation made ya let that beast in here, child?” Aunt Millie exclaimed as she sat up on the floor.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“Elsie Mae,” Grandma said, reaching down to help Aunt Millie to her feet, “git that dog outta here, and ya better find a way to keep ’im from scarin’ people half to death or we’re gonna have to git rid of ’im.”
“Yes, ma’am,” I said, pulling Huck out on the porch again. “We won’t bother ya again. We’re goin’ out in Uncle Owen’s boat anyway.”
Henry James, who had been watching the whole scene unfold, used my misery as his opportunity.
“Aunt Sarah?” he called through the screen. “Is it all right if I go out in the boat with Elsie Mae and Huck?”
I glared at him, but he knew he had weaseled his way into coming along. He knew Grandma would say yes, and he knew if she did, I couldn’t say no, especially after what had just happened with Aunt Millie.
“That’d be jus’ fine,” Grandma said. “Might be best if y’all stick together from now on. What with the hog bandits runnin’ ’round and that dog of Elsie’s actin’ all wild lately.”
“Thanks!” Henry called as he jumped off the porch without even using the steps.
Oh great! Now Grandma thought Henry and I should stick together. That meant I was probably not just stuck with Henry for the afternoon. I was probably stuck with him for the rest of the summer, or at least until we found those hog bandits, which was what I intended to do.
But now, not only did I have to figure out how to find the hog bandits before Uncle Lone or anyone else did, I had to do it with Henry James and his hallelujahs tagging along with me everywhere I went.