Lando (1962) Read Online Free PDF Page A

dickered at breakfast, but about that time I got awful busy making up my pack, talking to the Tinker and the like, and he began to think he'd lost me.
    Upshot of it was, I let him have that Ballard and I taken the cart, three bushels of mighty fine apples, a worn-out scythe, and a couple of freshly tanned hides. The Tinker and me turned to and tightened the iron rims and the spokes, and loaded our gear.
    It took two weeks of walking to reach the river, but by that time we had done a sight of swapping.
    The little mare was looking good. Our daily marches were not long and the load she carried most of the way was light. We babied her along on carrots, turnips, slices of watermelon, and greens from along the road, and she fattened up on it.
    We saw no sign of the three Kurbishaws, but they were never out of mind.
    All the time I kept trying to dicker the Tinker out of one of his knives. He carried a dozen in his pack, and two belted at his waist.
    A third was slung down the back of his neck under his collar. They were perfectly balanced and the steel tempered to a hardness you wouldn't believe. We both shaved with them, they were that good. In the mountains a man would trade most anything for a Tinker-made knife.
    Walking along like that, neither of us much to talk, I had time to think, and I remembered back to the Tinker asking about that gold. A man has a right to be interested in gold, but why that gold in particular? And Spanish gold, they said.
    Why was the Tinker starting to open my pack? If he had found what he wanted, would he have made sure I didn't come up to him at the Tombigbee or anywhere?
    Was it something about that gold that started the Kurbishaws after me?
    I had no gold, and never had had any. So what did I have that they might want?
    Nothing.
    Nothing, unless maybe there was something in ma's keepsake box. The first time I was alone I'd go through that stuff of ma's again. I never had really looked at it--mostly, I kept it because it was all I had of hers.
    All I had else was some worn-out clothes, some Indian blankets, and a couple of extra shirts.
    Like I've said, walking gives a man time to think, and a couple of things began to fit. Pa had never spent any of that gold that I could recall, but after Caffrey got it, some was spent. Not much right at first--he was afraid of pa coming back. And it was not long after Caffrey started to spend it that the Tinker showed up.
    Not right away ... it must have taken him some time to find out where that gold came from.
    The Tinker was not a sociable man, but he had made a point of being my friend. He had spent time with me, and I believed he was really my friend, but I now believed he had some other interest in that gold.
    That night we reached the Mississippi and the ferry. We were avoiding main-traveled roads, and the ferry we came up to was operated by a sour, evil-smelling old man who peered suspiciously at us. We dickered with him until he agreed to take us across for a bushel of apples.
    He stared at our packs as if he was trying to see right through them, but mostly he looked at Tinker's knives. Neither of us had any other kind of a weapon, except that I carried a long stick to chase off mean dogs, of which we'd met a-plenty.
    "Country's full of movers," the ferryman said. "Where mought you folks be goin'?"
    "Where folks don't ask questions," I told him.
    He threw me a mean look. "Doubtless you've reason," he said. "We git lots of 'em don't want questions asked."
    "Tinker, did you ever operate a ferry?"
    "Not that I recall."
    "I've got a feeling there's going to be a job open around here--unless somebody can swim with a knot on his head."
    The ferryman shut up, but when we made shore near a cluster of miserable-looking shacks I thought I saw him make a signal to some rough-looking men loitering on the bank.
    "Trouble," I said, low-voiced, to the Tinker.
    A bearded man with a bottle in his hand, his pants held up by a piece of rope, started toward us. Several