The Auctioneer

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And then all along the bottom like a border, it says “First Ad. First Ad. First Ad. First Ad.’ ”

John took the paper from her and read it again. “Which houses? Ward’s maybe and who else’s?” he said.

“A pond?” Mim said. “And a hill for skiing?”

That night, after Ma and Hildie were asleep, John and Mim lay on separate edges of their mattress. A full moon over the pond threw a bright ell of light down the wall and across the floor. The dim blue light outlined the underwear folded in piles on a new shelf, and the jeans and shirts hanging on hooks along one wall. Mim’s face and hands and arms, a flat bright pink with calamine, glowed in the half light.

“We got ourselves, John,” she said. “And the truck and money in the jar still. All the smart ones are gettin’ out.”

“Where do you think the likes of us could go? Ain’t like we had relatives.”

“Maine, maybe? Canada?”

“How do you make out we could live without the land?

“Get jobs. Lots of people never had no land.”

“Anyplace but here we’d be outsiders.

“I could work with flowers or cook. You’re a good farmer. You’re real good with stock. You know how to run the snowplow and the grader.”

John snorted. “So does every jackass farmer’s kid in Maine,” he said. “You don’t see the jobs in Harlowe goin’ to some poor slob’s just showed up from nowhere without a penny in his pocket. Without the land, we’re nothin’. Tramps. Gypsies. They’d think we was runnin’ scared. They d guess in a minute we was runnin from the law.” The thought gave John a certain sardonic pleasure. “Not far off the mark either,” he said.

“There’s the city,” Mim said. “I bet they’re not so close with jobs in the city. Can’t be where everyone’s strangers.”

“What do we know about the city?” John asked. “And they’d see right off we wasn’t onto their way of livin. Pick our pocket, hit us over the head, stick a knife in our back. You want to bring up Hildie in the city?”

“But how will we live here?” Mim cried. “He’s got in mind to turn all Harlowe to his ends.”

“The land, Mim,” John said, reaching to touch her in spite of the ivy. “The land is all we got. And what would it do to Ma to tear her loose of it?”

“Not all your talk can change things, John. What can we do but go?” Mim sat up and her voice rose over John’s head. “They give you choices, John—your blessed land or... and her voice fell to a whisper. “Think what happened to Tuckers boy. And them with so much more than us.”

“Mim, Mim,” John said, pulling her down under the covers. “Things is things. But they can’t take your flesh and blood. And they can’t take the land, because we’re on it.”

“Words, John,” Mim said. “That’s not stoppin’ them. What is it they been doin’ all this summer and fall?”

“This is still America, Mim. They can’t. There’s limits.

“John, think. All the land that’s city now was farms one time. And somehow they made the farmers go.”

“But, Mim,” he said. “Jimmy Ward just up and left and so did Oakes. Fanny says there’s others. They’re willin’ to oblige. But ain’t nobody can sell the land out from under us. We got a deed up to Hampton says they can’t.”

“Agnes counts her children all night long,” Mim said. “And she’s on the side that’s supposed to be safe. And even Fanny’s askin’ after Hildie.”

John held Mim. The house banged and creaked and clattered as if it were full of secret footsteps. The November wind outside blew over the pond and the pasture and the stand of heavy white pine. It pulled at the shingles of the empty barn and rattled the loose sash, searching out the couple who lay in each other’s arms listening to the warm breath of the child on the floor beside them.

8

“I’m goin’ too,” Mim said.

“I’ll tell you just how it is,” John argued.

“You won’t. You’re set to stick to the land. You’ll hold back the worst.”

“It’s no day for Ma to be outside. Listen to the wind.

Ma listened silently, to her thoughts or to the wind wasn’t clear.