Thy Rocks and Rills Page 3

  SONATA

  A short vicious thunderstorm lashed Bays Mountain on the afternoon ofJuly 3. As the storm passed, a blood-red butterflier, with a pusherpropeller in the tail and a plastic bull head on the nose, descended inthe young Sudan grass. Stonecypher dropped the saw--he had been clearingaway a beech limb the storm left in the abandoned paddock--and strolledto greet Ringmaster A. Oswell.

  "Stonecypher!" the ringmaster announced. "That storm almost caught us!"Oswell's stainless steel teeth clacked, and the breezes trailing thethunderclouds ballooned his orange silk kimono. "I never liked thesebutterfliers. They're too slow, and that swooping motion! Five hundredmiles per hour may seem fast to a man your age; but in my day, backbefore petroleum was classified as armament, we had jets! Real speed!"

  "Come on up to the house, ringmaster," Stonecypher invited. "I'll mix upsome dextrose and citric acid."

  "No, no time," the fat man panted. "Only time to see you about that bullyou sold me. The storm took a limb of your beech tree! Almost the onlyone left, I suppose. About that bull, Stonecypher, you know I was a bithesitant when I bought him, but my driver talked me into it. I'm sodisappointed I had him drafted immediately!"

  "But, what--" Stonecypher attempted to ask.

  "The young woman there in the butterflier is a much better driver andpilot," Oswell babbled. "I wouldn't have believed it of a woman! Sheweighs a good ninety-eight pounds, too! That bull--he has changedcompletely since we put him under the stands. He eats well, but he showsno spirit at all. Tomorrow is the big day, Stonecypher! I can'tdisappoint the crowd! I thought he might be sick, but the vet says not.That bull let the vet come into the cage and made absolutely no attemptto kill him!"

  "But does Fergus--"

  "Fergus's manager saw the bull! He's all for it. Fergus made anextremely poor showing on Memorial Day, and the manager thinks this oddbull would provide a real comeback! I advised against it. This heat isterrible! The storm didn't cool the air at all."

  Stonecypher maneuvered the perspiring ringmaster into the shade of thebeech. He said, "I wanta do the fair thing with you, ringmaster, so I'llgive you a guarantee, in writing if you want. If that bull's not thebravest ever fought in Highland Bullring, I give you double-money-back."

  Oswell's face wobbled in a tentative smile. He counted his stubbyfingers. "Double-money-back?"

  "Yeah. I wanta get into the business. My grandfather used to sell bulls.Then my father came along, and he wouldn't sell a one."

  "Yes. Yes, I once tried to reason with him, but--"

  "He had funny ideas," Stonecypher pressed his advantage. "I never didunderstand the old man myself. He used to lecture me on something hecalled the Man-Animal War. He said one of the worst things in the warwas the thousands of bulls that had been tortured to death."

  "Peculiar idea. Of course--"

  "He claimed bullfights slipped up on this country. Back when it wasn'tlegal, they spaded up the ground real good. There were movies, andbooks, and magazines, and foreign broadcasts, all ravin' about how braveand noble it was for a bunch of men to worry and torture a stupid animallike a bull, till he couldn't hardly hold his head up, and then run asword in 'im."

  "Naturally, you--"

  "I don't know how many times he told me a bull had more brains than ahorse, but less then a jackass. He said bullfightin' wasn't a sport,even if the bull got a man sometimes: and he had the idea the worstthing was the four or five horses, that ever' bull killed, took with'im. They had some bloodless bullfights in California, and the nutcolonies out there like it so good, first thing you know, we really hadit. It came to East Tennessee 'cause this was one of the biggestcattle-raisin' sections, before the Lakes took the grazin' land."

  "Surely, Stonecypher, you--"

  "My father always claimed if the bullfighters were near as brave as theysaid, they'd take on a really intelligent animal sometimes, like aman-eatin' tiger. He even thought a man was mentalill to fight a bull inthe first place." Stonecypher grinned. "No, you don't need to worryabout me, ringmaster. I hate to admit it, but the old man is the one whowas mentalill."

  Oswell revealed all of his steel teeth in a broad smile. "You had meworried!" he wheezed. "Now, your offer."

  "I'll go even better," Stonecypher said, "just to show how set I am ongettin' back in the business. If Moe's not brave, I got two yearlin'syou can have for free."

  "How generous! You've reassured me, Stonecypher. I have confidence, now,that the show will be a great success! I must go! You have no conceptionof the life a ringmaster leads before a fight. I won't require a writtenguarantee. I trust you, Stonecypher! See you tomorrow, I hope! I neverliked July. If the Government would only make more Lakes, it might cooloff! I hope--"

  The whir of the red butterflier's wings terminated Oswell's discourse.With a face like a gored bullkiller, Stonecypher watched theringmaster's departure. Another butterflier hovered above the mountain.This one was green and gold with the canopy pushed back and a glint oftwin lenses in the cockpit.

  Will appeared at Stonecypher's side. He spat in a long arc and said,"That's a new one, ain't it, peepin' from a butterfly? I reckon L. Dannever got kilt in that other duel like I hoped he would. You want us togit you outa this, Stonecypher?"

  "No, Will."

  "We can see you git to the Smokies. The Givernment'll never find youdown in there."

  "I'll be all right, Will. If he does kill me, take care of Catriona. Andlook after the calf records."

  "Sure thang."

  Stonecypher walked slowly toward Catriona's open-topped sunbathing tent.