A Little More Than Kin
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Dartmouth College Dartmouth Digital Commons Open Dartmouth: Peer-reviewed articles by Dartmouth faculty Faculty Work 1982 A Little More than Kin Ernest Hebert Dartmouth College, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.dartmouth.edu/facoa Part of the Fiction Commons Dartmouth Digital Commons Citation Hebert, Ernest, "A Little More than Kin" (1982). Open Dartmouth: Peer-reviewed articles by Dartmouth faculty. 3956. https://digitalcommons.dartmouth.edu/facoa/3956 This Book is brought to you for free and open access by the Faculty Work at Dartmouth Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Open Dartmouth: Peer-reviewed articles by Dartmouth faculty by an authorized administrator of Dartmouth Digital Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. A Little More Than Kin also by ernest hebert The Darby Chronicles The Dogs of March A Little More Than Kin Whisper My Name The Passion of Estelle Jordan Live Free or Die Spoonwood Howard Elman’s Farewell Fiction Mad Boys The Old American Never Back Down I Love U Nonfiction New Hampshire Patterns with Jon Gilbert Fox A Little More Than Kin Ernest Hebert university press of new england Hanover and London University Press of New England www.upne.com © 1982 Ernest Hebert All rights reserved Manufactured in the United States of America First published by University Press of New England in 1993, together with The Passion of Estelle Jordan, under the title The Kinship. A Little More Than Kin was first published in 1982 by The Viking Press. For permission to reproduce any of the material in this book, contact Permissions, University Press of New England, One Court Street, Suite 250, Lebanon NH 03766; or visit www.upne.com Paperback isbn: 978-1-61168-623-4 Ebook isbn: 978-1-61168-624-1 Library of Congress Control Number: 2014940310 5 4 3 2 1 Contents Ollie and Willow 1 The Sign 6 The Charm 23 Mrs. Clapp 34 Donald’s Junkyard 46 Niagara Falls Park 56 Grant Us Peace 63 A Deal 76 St. Pete’s 82 The Scarecrow 87 A Night 97 A Day 115 Hadly and Kay 139 Winter 150 The Appointment 184 The Charcoal Burners 196 Where Willow Went 202 Statues 210 Estelle 220 God chose those whom the world considers absurd to shame the wise; he singled out the weak of this world to shame the strong. He chose the world's lowborn and despised, those who count for nothing, to reduce to nothing those who were something; so that mankind can do no boasting before God. The FirstLetter of Paul to the Corinthians> ly 27-29 e Darby Chronicles e Dogs of March A Little More an Kin Whisper My Name e Passion of Estelle Jordan Live Free or Die Spoonwood Howard Elman’s Farewell Guide to the Darby Chronicles <erniehebert.com> N Runs more or less INTERSTATE E Parallel to the W Connecticut 91 River on the S Vermont Side Original site of Cooty’s Cabin Site of former Abare’s Folly Basketville sign Mountain and Jordan shacks Great Meadow Village New Hampshire Vermont DARBY DEPOT Rte. 12 to Keene Site of PLC Project Ike’s Cutter Place Auction Barn Trust Lands Elman Place Grace Pond Dorne Place River Connecticut CENTER DARBY McCurtin Hillary Farm Place Town Trust Lands Hall RIVER DARBY Downed Elm Turner Primeval Forest Tree House Sandbank Jordan Place Latour’s Spoonwood Cabin UPPER DARBY Trust Lands Trust Lands Salmon Ledges Estate and 1-Mile where Birch Cooty’s was born Cabin OlJted WifloSw Old Man Dorne gathered the phlegm in his throat and spat it into a handkerchief, and that was how the storekeeper knew he was getting ready to launch into a speech. "The Jordans are no kin of mine, no kin of yours, no kin of God almighty himself," he said. "They ain't even a family exactly, not like you and I think of as a family, anyway. Just a collection of like-minded individuais, like communists or par- ticipants in modern art. Course the blood bond is there, right from the line of Cain, if you don't mind me speaking a little in a religious vein here. Not that I have anything personal against the Jordans, except maybe against Willow, who upset my missus over the matter of some petunias. I don't bear him any malice, however, not as Harold Flagg would. How that man could hold a grudge, God rest his soul. God rest ali our souls. I wouldn't admit this in front of a bunch of strangers, but Tm getting a little atheistic in my old age. A man gets more impressed by the evidence and less by the arguments, older he gets. You could get mad at Willow Jordan, but you / 2 A Little More Than Kin couldn't hate him. It's hard to hate an idiot. It's something that takes practice, and I never had the time. "As I say, Willow Jordan is an idiot, but his father Ollie is another matter. There is something brooding and figurative about the man. A mind like his is dangerous to society, dan- gerous to itself, but there's an admirability about it too. That's why I think Flagg hated him so. Flagg was a big law-and-order man, and he was a smart man, but he didn't have much admi rability. So, you see, he had double grounds to hate Ollie Jordan: philosophy and jealousy. It's not generally known, but Flagg's the one that got Ollie and his kin run off from that piece of land they were living on. Tm for private property and ali that but they were on that land so long they had a claim to it. "The land is owned by some feller from down-country. He rents out space for the Basketville sign that you can see from the Interstate across the river in Vermont—God bless that state and its crippled deer herd. He also rented to the Jordans, Nobody else would want to live up there, on that lonely road that the town don't—won't—plow. The Jordans arrived there maybe twelve, fifteen years ago, and through it ali Flagg built up this animosity against Ollie Jordan. Flagg gave him credit, you know. Wanted the man to owe him something, so that when he took back from him, he could take back everything and call it interest. He bided his time. A man with a grudge don't like swift retribution. Then about in March, Flagg got the planning board to write the feller from down-country and tell him he couldn't rent his land no more, and Flagg called him up, ali sweet, you know, and said hush, hush. The next week Flagg died of a heart attack but the wheels were set in motion. Last month the Jordans were evicted. Now I don't say that Flagg knew he was going to die, but I say each man has certain, er, call 'em cognitions, when his time is near, even if he don't see them for what they are, and he tries to put his house in order, or bring down somebody else's house, if he's the kind. "Course nobody really likes the Jordans. But I don't go with those who say they don't belong in Darby. I say every town has 3 Ollie and Willow its Jordans and moreover needs its Jordans so the people can take their mind off their troubles. Give a man somebody lower than himself to compare himself to, and Til show you a man with a strong belief in his own being. Even Willow, TH admit, was put here for some purpose. Your average Congregational minister will tell you that, of course, but I mean to say I know the purpose: somebody to wear the fun hat. Every man needs somebody to laugh at that he ain't related to, and there's no one on this earth more distant a relative to you and me than Willow Jordan. On the whole, TH argue the town's poorer without the Jordans. Vm not saying I was happy to see Ollie and his idiot son this morning. Vm speaking theoretical here. Anyway, as Professor Blue would say, 'It's purely academic,' because I don't imagine they'11 stay. When Ollie Jordan sees what's been done to his land, he'll run like any other lonely heart fleeing the scene of his hurt..." A call on the storekeeper's CB from Mrs. McCurtin inter- rupted Old Man Dorne. The cops were headed for the Jordan place, she said. Heard it on the scanner. No confirmation. A code 9. Unfamiliar to her. Therefore, must be something considerable. She signed off temporarily to listen some more to the scanner. The old-timers in the store fell silent, waiting for more news. Mrs. McCurtin was the town repórter, that is, the town gossip, but she lacked tenure, just as the storekeeper did. Old Man Dorne had explained the situation. The former longtime town gossip, Arlene Flagg, the old-maid sister of Harold Flagg, had committed an unpardonable act: She had mocked the town with her own secret. After her brother died sud- denly, she sold the store through the Stout Realty people and then left town without telling anyone where she went. Some- one said she had run off with Lancelot Early, the milk salesman from Walpole, but no one in Darby was sure. The fact was no one knew where Arlene was or why she'd done what she'd done because there was no one in Darby with the sources that Arlene herself had.