The Carroll Farm Fight by Greg Hunt

Author:Greg Hunt
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Gale, Cengage Learning
Published: 2017-07-27T16:00:00+00:00

PART TWO

THE ADDERLY FARM RESCUE

CHAPTER EIGHT

Mel woke with a start to the sound of rustling and grunting at the edge of the cane thicket. He knew it was probably the hog that had taken up residence here, voicing his complaints about an uninvited squatter. He cautiously drew the sheath knife and stood up facing the commotion.

“Git, hog!” he called out, loud and gruff, kicking the nearby cane stalks and making as much commotion as he could. If it was one of his own pigs, that would be enough. And if it was one of the wild, mean razorbacks that roamed all through these mountains, at least he could make a fight of it with the knife. “Git, hog. Git on out of here!” Eventually the hog wandered away, grunting and snorting its offense at the injustice.

Mel settled back on the ground, lying flat on his back with his head resting on a hump of sod, enjoying the feel of the cool morning breeze, listening to the soft rustle of the cane tops, watching the feathery clouds floating past against the bright blue sky.

In spite of everything, it felt good to be alive on God’s green earth. Being buried alive and shoving the dead aside to rise again would do that for a man. So for a while he just lay there letting his senses take charge, not worrying about anything that had already happened, or what was ahead.

He was staggering with fatigue when he reached this spot last night. The moon was down before he made it here, but these were home woods and he trusted his instincts to guide him to the one place where he knew he would feel hidden and secure. From the moment he lay his head down on the soft carpet of leaves and moss in the cane thicket, to the instant when the grumbling hog woke him, he hadn’t moved a muscle or stirred awake for an instant. He wasn’t sure he had even dreamed.

Mel felt rested, at ease in his mind about his own safety, at least for now. But he was as hungry as a spring cub, and his smarting, throbbing wounds reminded him of the abuse his body had taken over the past few days.

When he sat up again, he noticed the squirrel for the first time. It lay near his feet, its head half gone, skull open and empty. It was a familiar sight, one he had found countless times lying on the back step of the cabin or on the ground nearby. Looking around in the cane thicket, he spotted the shaggy matted bundle of gray fur hunkered down on its haunches a dozen feet away.

“Hello, Smokie,” Mel said with a smile. “Glad to see you made it through all this mess.”

Smokie had been his mother’s pet cat, roaming in and out of the cabin at will, spending the evenings in her lap as she mended clothes, shelled beans, or read by the fire, earning his found by keeping the rodent population down.

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