“You have a lot of daughters-in-law, Gramp. They'll all want a few bits.”
Gramp gave in and went away muttering something about prime cut glass.
The Rodgers' place was one of those dilapidated farms on once good land, running to weed with wild breeds of hens and dogs and rusting farm tools. The house was white brick, but a wing had sagged, and a fire had destroyed the best part of it. The Rodgers still acted as if they owned slaves and productive acres, but it was only a matter of time before the bank kicked them off the family acres. Mrs. Rodgers was wide, fat and very charming. She smelled of peppermint and sage, and had fat hands full of rings from which some of the stones were missing. She took Mama in to see the milk glass, chattering away close to Mama's face, patting herself on the checks and making gestures against her chest.
“Lord love yo', we don't get much quality any more out here. Seems the nature of people isn't what it once was. Yo' just come in here and I'll show you what we have … we wouldn't sell it, only Sam. he wants to move into town to be near his club, and where can you find an old house like this to keep treasures in? Watch yo' step, that board is loose.”
Sam Rodgers was a short man with a beak nose and a rubber-band mustache. He dressed like an English squire: leggings, shooting jacket and a tweed hat. Like his farm, he was shabby, and trying to give the impression that he found poverty on lean acres amusing. He saw the hawk on my wrist and came over to me.
“We used to have our own hawks years ago. Mine if I have him ferret out a rat in the barn for me?”
It wasn't polite to say no, so Mr. Rodgers set the hawk on his wrist and went into the barn. Gramp lit a cigar and shook his head. “They never had any hawks. You don't borrow a hawk, and no self-respecting hawk would hunt for a stranger.”
I said, “Ben likes hunting rats.”
There was a curse from the barn, a clatter of feet, a howl of pain. The hawk came flying through the huge door, closely followed by Mr. Rodgers holding his nose and waving a pitchfork.
The hawk settled on my wrist and Mr. Rodgers showed his badly clawed nose and shouted: “I'll wring the neck of that buzzard! I'll nail his tail feathers to a barn door! Give me that varmint.”
Gramp stepped between us. “Mr. Rodgers, a hawk is a gentleman. If you borrow him to hunt rats, you insult his breeding. I hear you distill a bit of 'shine from time to time. I'll stand treat to a pint.”
The men went off arm in arm, and I looked at Ben. He shifted on his scaly feet, and his co.d eyes viewed me with great contempt. The hawk could not forgive me for having lent him to a stranger. The whole afternoon seemed wasted. Mama found that Mrs. Rodgers' glass was not worth much, Gramp said that the 'shine wasn't much better, and we all felt happy to leave the run-down farm and its once grand people settling in their decay.
The next morning we started north. In the back, the glass, packed in straw and crated, rested on our luggage. In front, the three of us cheerfully looked forward to getting home. We crossed the bay to Cape May, and we tried to get through to the house by phone. One of the maids answered and said the family had gone to the summer place in Pittsfield, up in Massachusetts. Gramp frowned and shook his head. “We'll never make it. The car is wearing out.”
“Let's try,” said Mama. “She can't let us down.”
“Sari, a machine has no soul. You can't appeal to its emotions.”
“Maybe if we lightened the load?”
Gramp nodded, “Well ship the glass and most of the luggage express to Pittsfield. Maybe we'll make it.”
So we got rid of most of our luggage. Then we went back to the local hotel to get Mama. The hotel clerk said she had gone to pick dogwood blossoms down by the crick (the natives never say creek, only crick).
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