We use Optical Character Recognition (OCR) during our scanning and processing workflow to make the content of each page searchable. You can view the automatically generated text below as well as copy and paste individual pieces of text to quote in your own work.
Text recognition is never 100% accurate. Many parts of the scanned page may not be reflected in the OCR text output, including: images, page layout, certain fonts or handwriting.
WILD PLUM THICKET
427
Everyone was surprised when word was circulated that Clacy Jo was wed to Dan Meager, right afterward. Dan was all of forty and he'd worn out two wives already. He was tighter than the skin on a fat shoat and I'll bet he has greenback in his pocket right now that would crumble like ashes if he ever took it out. When his second wife died, he had her laid out in a nightgown her sister brought her, because he wouldn't put out the cash for burying clothes, and she didn't have a stitch that was fitten. They said his first wife used to make his overalls out of blue and white striped bed ticking, because they lasted longer than the boughten ones.
He was thin as a match stick with a long hatchet face and his eyes were little and mean and they quarrelled with each other. He never laughed like anyone else, not with his face. He'd fetch a whinny that sounded like a hungry horse craving oats. Jess said the reason he never laughed with his face, he was afraid someone would think he was human and maybe ask a favor of him.
It was rumored that he never courted Clacy Jo, but just went and asked her old man for one of his girls, then picked Clacy because she was strong, and prettier than the rest. I reckon Clacy never had anything to say about it for she was not the kind of girl to go against her Pa.
THE Meager house had been built by Dan's Pa and it had two big rooms with a double chimney between, a long cook room and an ell porch. Several neighbor women were standing around the porch talking and jsvhen I asked how Clacy Jo was, they
shook their heads, sad as a bunch of rain crows on a limb. I gave them the pork sausage and went on in.
Even the Doctor from Little Cucumber didn't know what was wrong with Clacy Jo. He said she had stomach trouble but I got it in my head that maybe Harlie was calling her. Jess said I was silly and fanciful but I don't care. Knowing what I did, it seemed likely to me.
Clacy Jo looked little and puny in the middle of that big four-poster bed, though she had always been a tall girl, well filled out. Her skin was like wax now and the light had gone out behind her eyes. Her hands lay on the worn quilt and you could almost see through them. The room looked shabby and everything in it was threadbare. Even the sheets and pillow cases were made out of flour sacks. There was a bad smell about, the smell of sickness, or maybe it was the dry, sweetish scent of death.
Liz Williams was trying to coax Clacy to take a little broth, but she just shook her head and lay with her eyes closed, like she didn't want to