As the year-long winter resumes its assault, we arrive at our new homestead near Little Pigeon Creek in the Indiana wilderness. Without unloading our belongings, Father races against an impending storm to make a scant shelter, tucked up against a thicket of bare-limbed trees. It’s called a half-faced camp—fourteen foot sides, framed with stout poles, and covered on three sides with smaller poles and brush. At the open end, we build a fire for cooking. The embers provide warmth, and the fire’s glow keeps hungry animals at bay.
A lull in the storm gives Father time to hunt, but fierce winds and snow trap us in our shabby lean-to before he can cure enough game to last until spring. A few days later, our fire dies out from want of kindling, and we hang animal skins across the open face—our only defense against the elements.
Sally and I huddle under animal pelts on a mattress of dried leaves and twigs piled at the foot of our parents’ crude bed. Our teeth clatter, and our tears are dried up from a bone-aching cold that has sucked moisture out of everything. A hungry panther’s scream keeps us awake late into the night. If it doesn’t get us first, we’re sure to become supper for a bear or pack of ravenous wolves.
Sally drapes her arm over me and whispers, “Snug up closer. We’ll be warmer.”
I burrow against her. “Should’ve drowned in that stupid crick. Would’ve been over an’ done with.”
“Shh ….” Her voice is nearly lost in the howling storm. “Try dreamin’ ‘bout Kentucky.”
“If we see morning, Father will insist God’s Mercy has saved us from our own foolishness.”
Sally giggles. “Mother will argue we’re in the hands of Providence.”
Near my eighth birthday in early February, tiny patches of bare ground checker the snow in front of the half-faced camp. I peer between the animal pelts hanging over our entry and spot a small flock of turkeys mingling among the trees, scratching about for acorns or frozen bugs. Father is out setting traps. He left his muzzleloader behind, propped just inside the opening. He’s been teaching me to shoot and keeps hounding me about becoming a man. Tells me it’s time to put aside childish ways, just as Mother’s Bible says.
A voice inside my head telling me it’s wrong to kill. “Mother, would Father be angry if I shot a turkey?”
She nods and says in a low voice, “He’d be proud.”
My hands tremble as I fumble with the ramrod, trying to pack powder, waddling, and shot down the gun’s barrel. I draw a deep breath and raise the stock to my shoulder, taking aim. Tiny beads of sweat line my brow, and the muzzleloader weighs heavy in my clammy hands. My conscience twinges again, but I quell it once more and whisper, “… put aside childish ways.”
The charge explodes, pummeling my ears, and my eyes slam shut. When I open them, the turkey is flailing and making an ungodly noise. “I’ve murdered it,” I whimper.
I collapse to my knees, sobbing.
Mother tries to console me.
Tears roll down my cheeks. “Father can be proud of me if he wants, but I hate myself for what I’ve done. Never again will I pull a trigger on anything as large as a turkey.”
Spring’s arrival finds Father building a permanent shelter from logs he harvests out of the dense forest. He says it’s going to be at least two times bigger than the half-faced camp. I do my best to help, but never enough to please him. He no longer teaches me to shoot, instead he puts an axe in my hands and gives me long hours of practice felling trees. To help Mother and Sally, I keep the fire going and trek a mile each way down to the creek whenever the water pails are empty.
If Father’s in a good mood, or if he’s out tromping through the woods, Mother recites stories to Sally and me from the Bible and Aesop’s Fables, books we spirited away from Kentucky without Father’s knowledge. The passages are ones that were read to her as a child, which she committed to memory. As Mother recites, Sally and I follow along in the books. In this way we build on the meager skills we gained at the ABC schools back home. Mother encourages me to practice writing as well.
Warmer temperatures allow us to plant corn and vegetables among the tree stumps left from cutting timber for logs. By late summer the new cabin is up, and our first crop is ready for harvest. I begin regular trips on horseback to the grist mill a couple miles away. Often, waiting for my turn to grind our corn into flour takes hours. My idle time is filled reading books I’ve borrowed from neighbors.
One afternoon, I return from the mill to find Father back home from gathering the pigs we’d left behind at the Gollahers’ in Kentucky. That was one of Father’s few sound choices. The unruly animals would have slowed us down, preventing our arrival in time to build even the sparsest winter shelter. Survival would have been impossible. Of course, if storms had set upon us along the way, we all might have died before reaching our destination, anyway.
I grin broadly and bring the old mare to a halt. The Sparrows, relatives of ours who lived near Knob Creek, are unpacking their belongings and moving into the half-faced camp we’ve recently abandoned.
Dennis Hanks, a cousin, is ten years my elder, lean, and only a scant taller. He calls out, “Haloo, Abraham.”
“Cousin Dennis,” I holler back as I jump down and dash toward him, forgetting the sacks of flour draped over the horse’s neck.
Father scowls. “Mind yer manners, boy. Give due respect to yer elders, first.” He points to Aunt Betsey and Uncle Thomas. They raised Mother from the time she was a girl, and now watch over Dennis because his mother died, and he’s a Hanks bastard.
I straighten. “Good day, Uncle Thomas, Aunt Betsey. Have you quit Kentucky, also?”
“Good day, Abraham,” says Aunt Betsey who bears a resemblance to Mother. She smiles at Father. “Your Nancy’s workin’ to make a fine gentleman outta this one.”
“Time’d be better spent makin’ him useful, rather than wastin’ it on readin’,” Father grumbles. “Gittin’ too smart for his britches. Always got his nose stuck in some book. Startin’ to soun’ like one too.”
Dennis breaks in. “Abraham, help me unload.”
As we rush off, Dennis mutters in my ear, “Yer ol’ man’s still mean as a polecat.”
“No difference ‘tween him and those slave traders back in Kentucky, except I don’t reckon they yoke or beat their own sons.”
That evening at supper when Mother sets a kettle on the table, I examine the sparse offering of potatoes, and scowl. A quick glance toward the fireplace dashes my hopes that another pot of vittles is simmering away. That would be quite a trick, since we just have the one pot that’s already on the table. The only other thing coming from that hearth tonight is a touch of warmth. Of course, any heat from the fire makes a quick escape through the doorway that’s still in want of a door.
Father calls for us to bow our heads and offers a blessing for the food.
“These is mighty scant blessings,” I mutter.
Father glares at me and pounds his fist on the table.
Mother shouts, “Thomas!”
He looks at her, and she stares him down.
We eat the potatoes and go to bed without a word spoken among us.
Next morning, I ask Mother where Father is off to.
“Huntin’ with Dennis,” she replies, adding she can’t understand why he always waits for our stomachs to ache with hunger before he hunts.
I mumble low enough she can’t hear, “Maybe now he has a son who’ll make him proud.”
After a couple days, Father and Dennis lumber home carrying a single, scrawny deer.