Snopes: The Hamlet, The Town, The Mansion

“You must have been desperate,” he said quietly. He meant no insult. He was not even thinking of Varner’s daughter’s shame or of his daughter at all. He meant the land, the Old Frenchman place. He had never for one moment believed that it had no value. He might have believed this if anyone else had owned it. But the very fact that Varner had ever come into possession of it and still kept it, apparently making no effort to sell it or do anything else with it, was proof enough for him. He declined to believe that Varner ever had been or ever would be stuck with anything; that if he acquired it, he got it cheaper than anyone else could have, and if he kept it, it was too valuable to sell. In the case of the Old Frenchman place he could not see why this was so, but the fact that Varner had bought it and still had it was sufficient. So when Varner finally did let it go, Ratliff believed it was because Varner had at last got the price for which he had been holding it for twenty years, or at least some sufficient price, whether it was in money or not. And when he considered who Varner had relinquished possession to, he believed that the price had been necessity and not cash.

Varner knew that Ratliff was thinking it. He sat the old horse and looked down at Ratliff, the little hard eyeeneath their bushy rust-colored brows glinting at the man who was a good deal nearer his son in spirit and intellect and physical appearance too than any of his own get. “So you think pure liver aint going to choke that cat,” he said.

“Maybe with that ere little piece of knotted-up string in it?” Ratliff said.

“What little piece of knotted-up string?”

“I dont know,” Ratliff said.

“Hah,” Varner said. “You going my way?”

“I reckon not,” Ratliff said. “I’m going to mosey down to the store.” Unless maybe he even feels he can set around it too again now, he thought.

“So am I,” Varner said. “I got that damn trial this morning. That damn Jack Houston and that What’s-his-name. Mink. About that durned confounded scrub yearling.”

“You mean Houston sued him?” Ratliff said. “Houston?”

“No no. Houston just kept the yearling up. He kept it up all last summer and Snopes let him pasture and feed it all winter, and it run in Houston’s pasture all this spring and summer too. Then last week for some reason he decided to go and get it. I reckon he figured to beef it. So he went to Houston’s with a rope. He was in Houston’s pasture, trying to catch it, when Houston come up and stopped him. He finally had to draw his pistol, he claims. He says Snopes looked at the pistol and said, ‘That’s what you’ll need. Because you know I aint got one.’ And Houston said all right, they would lay the pistol on a fence post and back off one post apiece on each side and count three and run for it.”

“Why didn’t they?” Ratliff said.

“Hah,” Varner said shortly. “Come on. I want to get it over with. I got some business to tend to.”

“You go on,” Ratliff said. “I’ll mosey on slow. I aint got no yearling calf nor trial neither today.”