Horse of a Different Color Read online

  That “we’re goin’ to need ’em” took a lot of worry off my mind, and I headed for McCook as fast as the old Maxwell would go.

  In the department store I found sturdy, brightly tinned 2½- and 5-quart pans, and 10-quart galvanized buckets that were light in weight but not flimsy, with good stout bails. Rubber stamped in purple ink on the bottom of the larger pans was a big 25¢, on the smaller ones 15¢, and on the buckets 40¢. After a little haggling the store manager agreed to give me a 25 per cent discount if I’d take two gross of pans and half a gross of buckets. Then he gave me the same discount on a dozen galvanized wash tubs we needed for storing cut meat, sausage, and hamburger in the refrigerator.

  By the time I’d picked up my shipment of spices and stale bread at the express office the old Maxwell was loaded so full there was barely room for me to squeeze in behind the wheel, and I had to drive slowly on the way home. I stopped there just long enough to unload, then took a bucket and a pan of each size up to show Effie. As I pulled to a stop in front of her office she stepped into the doorway and called, “Land sakes alive, what took you so long? These women folks haven’t let up on me for a blessed minute. What luck did you have?”

  “Pretty good,” I called back, and held up a bucket so she’d be sure to see the 40¢ mark on the bottom.

  “Jumpin’ Jehoshaphat!” she exclaimed. “Have you took leave of your senses altogether? You can’t afford that kind of stuff in place of paper and twine.”

  “Sure I can,” I said, holding up the pans with the price marks toward her. “I bought six dozen buckets and twenty-four dozen pans like these.”

  “You didn’t go and pay fifteen cents and a quarter apiece for them pans, did you?” she demanded. “Good lands, I’d ought to had better sense than to leave you go alone. Well, fetch ’em in here so’s’t I can see how bad you got stuck. I’ll swear to goodness every line on the switchboard has been buzzin’ like a bee in a bottle ever since you left.”

  When I went into the little office every light on the switchboard was blinking, a sure sign that impatient women were jiggling receivers on every line in the township, and with each blink of a light a buzzer stuttered and whined. Effie had plugged the cord of her headset into one of the line jacks and was saying irritably, “Yes, Matty, I know he’s back from McCook, but there’s nothin’ I can tell you yet. Soon as ever there is I’ll put out line calls, like I’ve been sayin’ for the past two hours.”

  She broke the connection with a yank of the cord, stripped off her headset, and told me, “A body can’t hardly hear herself think with all this racket goin’ on. Pull the switch on that battery, will you, Bud, so’s’t we can get down to business in peace.”

  The whole Beaver Township telephone system was powered by a single brine battery, so when I pulled the switch the lights on the switchboard stopped blinking and the buzzers became mute. Effie blew out her breath in a long “whissssht” and mopped the sweat off her forehead. “Well,” she said, “I hope there don’t nobody’s buildin’s catch afire while I’ve got them lines killed, but if I’d had to of listened to that hullabaloo for another five minutes it would have drove me stark starin’ crazy. Now let me have a look at them buckets and pans you bought.”

  After she’d examined each piece thoroughly and tested its weight by bouncing it on her hand, she looked up at me and said, “They’re mighty nice stuff, all right, and I wouldn’t mind havin’ a set of ’em my own self, but they’re a lot too costive to give away with sausage and lard compound and the likes of that.”

  “No, they’re not,” I told her. “I got a 25 per cent discount by taking them in gross and half-gross lots, so the buckets were only thirty cents apiece, and that’s just a cent and a half a pound on twenty pounds of shortening.”

  “What’ll it come to on stuff in the pans?” she asked.

  “Two and a quarter cents a pound in the small ones,” I said, “but less than two cents in the big ones.”

  “Lucky it wasn’t the other way abouts,” she said, looking back at the pans again. “No woman with more’n one or two cows wants to mess around settin’ milk to rise in a whole raft of little pans if she can get good big ones by just buyin’ twice as much sausage or whatever at one time—that is, if she’s buyin’ on credit—and the more of anything a woman’s got in her larder the more of it she’s bound to use. If it was me doin’ it, I wouldn’t put up shortenin’ in nothing but buckets, or wrapped in paper if somebody wanted less’n twenty pounds. And I wouldn’t put nothing but sausage in pans—that is . . . Hold your horse a minute! Didn’t you tell me you was goin’ to render out most of the fatback you didn’t make into sausage?”

  “That’s right,” I said.

  “Then you’ll have cracklin’s till you can’t rest, won’t you?”

  “I suppose I will,” I said, “but they’ll make awfully good hog feed.”

  “Hog feed! Fiddlesticks!” she sputtered. “Why don’t you use your head a bit before you go to throwin’ stuff out to the hogs? Don’t you know that almost everybody likes to make a batch of cracklin’ bread once in a while? And some folks salt cracklin’s and nibble on ’em of an evenin’ like they was peanuts—don’t let me forget to say somethin’ about that when I make the line calls—and it’s a cinch that everybody’ll want all the free pans and buckets they can get. If I was you I’d sell one of them big pans heapin’ full o’ cracklin’s for fifty cents, or a bucketful for a dollar. And, you know, there’s lots of German folks hereabouts, and they make sausage out of critters’ heads and insides. Why don’t you sell the whole works from a hog or a heifer—liver, lights, head, heart, and kidneys—bucket and all for a dollar. Elsewise you’ll have to give that kind of stuff away or throw it out.”

  “How about pigs’ feet and ham hocks?” I asked. “Would you put those in pans or buckets?”

  “I’d wrap ’em in paper,” she told me. “You can get a nickel apiece for pigs’ feet and a dime for hocks, anyways, and you couldn’t get a penny more if you was to put ’em in a thirty-cent bucket. It’s women folks that buys the meat, and if you aim to make any money doin’ business with ’em you’ll have to learn to use your head.”

  “I’ve never had much experience doing business with women,” I said, “and it’s a little late for me to start learning to use my head. What I need is you for a partner.”

  “Hmmfff!” she jeered. “And I need a partner that’s a’ready up to his neck in debt like I need a broken leg.” Then she turned serious again and told me, “I was only joshin’ you, Bud, and didn’t aim to poke you on the hurt place. You don’t need a partner no more’n a cat needs two tails, but I’ll tell you what I’ll do; I’ll put out line calls and take phone orders for you, and you can keep Guy and me in fresh meat if you have a mind to. Is that a deal?”

  “You bet your boots it’s a deal,” I told her, kissed a finger, and touched it to the end of her nose.

  “Well then,” she said as she picked up her headset, “switch that battery back on and get out of here. I’ll put out line calls right away, and give you a ring as soon as ever I get all the orders in. What time on Sunday should I tell the folks they can come for their stuff?”

  “Oh, it doesn’t matter,” I said. “I’ll be around the place all day and all evening.”

  “Don’t be a fool!” she told me. “If we don’t stop ’em right at the start, some of these women folks will devil you to death—comin’ by any time from sunup till midnight for a pound of spareribs or a bone for the dog. That Eyetalian bein’ scared of his own shadow the way he is, how do you reckon you’d get away to do any trading? I’m goin’ to tell the folks that the only hours you’ll be open for meat business are from six to eight on weekday evenin’s, and ten to one o’clock on Sundays. That way they’ll have a chance to come after supper, and them that goes to church can stop by on their way home. It’ll save time for all hands, and you won’t sell a nickel’s worth less than you would the other way. Now get out of here.”

  Most of the heif
ers I’d bought were to be delivered when the sellers came to haul hogs on Saturday, but I’d arranged to have four delivered that afternoon. As soon as they arrived we picked out the fattest one and butchered her right away. Actually, Nick did most of the work. He was an expert at it and, as always, the sight and smell of slaughtering nauseated me. After the job was finished he stayed to scrub down the slaughterhouse while I went to start supper. The telephone was ringing wildly, and when I picked up the receiver Effie’s voice came over the wire irritably, “Where in the name of common sense have you been for the past hour? I was just about to send Guy over to find out if that Eyetalian had cut your throat, or if the both of you was froze to death in the icebox.”

  “I’ve been out to the slaughterhouse,” I said. “We had to do some butchering so we’d be ready for Sunday’s business.”

  “Well, I hope to goodness you done a plenty of it,” she told me proudly. “I’ve got orders enough here to choke a billy goat. Nelly Moss wants a bucket of that shortenin’ and a big pan of sausage and five pounds of beefsteak and . . . ”

  “Hold it, Effie!” I broke in. “All I need to know right now is how much sausage and shortening to get ready. Will you add up the totals and call me back? I’ll bring you up some pork chops after supper and pick up the separate orders then.”

  I barely had the fire started when she called back, “Well, here’s your totals,” she told me, “but land knows how long they’ll be good for. There’s still orders comin’ in faster’n I can write ’em down. Let’s see, it’s eleven big pans of sausage and six little ones, and eighteen buckets of shortenin’.”

  “Whewww,” I whistled, “that’ll be a hundred and forty pounds of sausage and three hundred and sixty of shortening.”

  “I told you what would happen if you put the stuff into free milk pans and buckets, didn’t I?” she gloated. “There’s more calls comin’ in, so I got to ring off now, but listen Bud, when you come up for the orders bring a little liver for my cat, will you? She’s crazy about it.”

  As soon as we’d eaten supper Nick and I rounded up our three biggests hogs and had driven them to the slaughterhouse when he stepped in front of me and said, “I take now.”

  With my squeamish stomach I was glad enough to have him take over the slaughtering. The pork he’d butchered that morning was thoroughly chilled, so I cut half a dozen thick loin chops, wrapped a pound of liver, packed them in one of the buckets, and drove up to the telephone office.

  It was hard to tell whether Effie was more pleased with the bucket, the chops, the liver for her cat, or the orders she’d taken. “I’m a’ready up to my neck in orders,” she told me, “and there’s more still dribblin’ in. Besides, there’s forty things I’ve got to find out from you. First off, can folks outside the township have charge accounts if they’ve been doing livestock business with you? It seems like the news has leaked out and they’re callin’ in from all over.”

  “Anybody with good credit can have a charge account if he’ll agree to settle up by Thanksgiving,” I told her.

  “Well then,” she told me happily, “I’ve got orders for eighty pounds more sausage and five buckets of shortening, along with four hundred and fifty-one pounds of other stuff.”

  I was too astonished to speak for a moment, but as soon as I’d collected my wits I asked, “For heaven’s sake, Effie, did you blackmail people into giving you orders? I didn’t think there was this much meat business in Decatur County.”

  “You didn’t do much thinkin’ then,” she told me smugly. “Farmers won’t do their own butcherin’, leastways in summer, if they can buy meat on credit for fifteen cents a pound with free buckets and pans throwed in. But how you’re goin’ to make a profit on it—the price hogs have gone to—is more than I can figure out. Accordin’ to the six o’clock broadcast, top grade hogs brought eleven-fifty at Kansas City this morning.”

  I reminded her that I’d bought my hogs before the market went up, and told her I’d come out all right on my prices if she kept on getting me shortening orders the way she’d started out. Then I hurried home and got back to work. By the time Nick had finished dressing the three hogs and scrubbed down the slaughterhouse, I’d broken down the pork carcasses from the refrigerator, ready for cutting into chops and cutlets, sidemeat slabs, spareribs, and scraps for making sausage.

  It was past ten o’clock before we’d scrubbed the cutting room and gone to bed, but we were up, had eaten breakfast, and were back at work by four the next morning. In doing it we established a pattern that we seldom broke, for the hours from four to seven were the coolest of the day. Meat could safely be kept out of the refrigerator longer, remained firmer during the processing, and the work went faster.

  The band saw with its semiautomatic carriage made cutting steaks, chops, and cutlets a simple matter, and the closer to the time of sale they were cut the fresher they would appear. As we broke down the carcasses of the hogs slaughtered the day before we hung the hams, shoulders, loins, and sidemeat slabs back in the refrigerator. Then Nick diced fatback for rendering while I boned leftovers for sausage. Boning a neck is rather tricky business for an inexpert butcher, but I soon discovered that it required little skill if I first cut it into inch-thick slices with the saw.

  By eight o’clock we had the hog carcasses processed except for sawing chops and cutlets. But Effie had taken orders for so much shortening and sausage that we’d have to kill another beef and two more big hogs before we could fill the expected railroad order. We’d driven two enormous sows into the slaughterhouse chute when Nick again stepped in front of me and said, “I take now.” There was a certain finality in his voice, as much as to say, “This is my end of the business. You stay out of it.” From that time on I never went into the slaughterhouse except to show it to visitors when it wasn’t in use, and I always found it scrubbed spotlessly clean.

  I returned to the cutting room, put on my white coat and apron, and had started breaking down a beef forequarter when the McCook taxi clattered into the yard. Although I hadn’t expected him so early, I knew it would be Mr. Donovan, so went out to meet him. He was cordial and friendly, but seemed embarrassed at having come to make the inspection. His only purpose, he told me, was to make sure the premises were clean enough and the refrigeration sufficient that there would be no danger of ptomaine. I told him I was glad he’d come, then led the way to the cutting room door and flung it open. For a moment or two he stood looking into the room with his mouth half open. Then he said, almost reverently, “Glory be . . . ”

  The inspection took no more than ten minutes, with Mr. Donovan exclaiming over almost everything I showed him. When we’d finished the round he told me, “I’m that sorry, lad! I should have told you right at the outset that you didn’t need a fancy layout the likes of this. It’s a shame you’ve gone to so much expense, and for only a four-months’ business. Tell me, what ever will you do with it when the job is finished and done with? You can’t move a refrigerator like that one, or a slaughterhouse that’s cemented tight to the ground.”

  There was no reason for telling him that the whole setup had cost only a shade more than a thousand dollars, or that it looked as though the farmer business would considerably exceed the railroad contract, so I said, “If my luck holds out until Thanksgiving the way it’s been running for the past month, I have an idea the setup will have paid for itself so I’m not going to worry about it.”

  After the inspection Mr. Donovan asked if I’d mind driving him to Danbury, Nebraska, ten miles down Beaver Valley and beyond the railroad washout. On the way he told me that the equipment and commissary train had arrived, and that the work train would bring the construction crew Sunday forenoon. He said the camp would be mobile, always at railhead as the track was reconstructed westward, and it was there that I would make my deliveries. As we neared Danbury I could see that the shipping pens were crowded with horses and mules. A dozen carloads of grading and track-laying equipment were lined up on the siding, and beyond them stood t
hree kitchen and bakery cars.

  At one of the kitchens Mr. Donovan introduced me to the chief steward, an enormous, good natured Irishman named Tim. When I asked if he could give me his meat order for the first three meals he told me, “Surest thing you know! The lads’ll get here with their bellies as empty as their pockets, and for a couple o’ days they’ll eat a pound or more of meat at a meal. I’ll be needing two hundred pound o’ pork chops for Sunday dinner, the same o’ beefsteak for supper, and for Monday’s breakfast you’d best to make it a hundred and fifty pounds of pork chops and fifty o’ sausage. Fetch it Sunday mornin’ and bring a hundred pounds of lard for the bakers.”

  I was worried by the proportion of pork to beef, and by Tim’s ordering chops and lard. But before I could say anything Mr. Donovan explained that the contract called for cutlets rather than chops, and shortening instead of lard, Then he said that my sausage was the tastiest he’d ever eaten, and suggested that Tim increase his order to a hundred pounds. Breathing more easily, I thanked Mr. Donovan for his kindness and Tim for his order, then got away as soon as I could.

  23

  My Boyhood Sweetheart

  NICK and I were by no means expert meat cutters, but I’d used a band saw a good deal while working as a carpenter during the war, and the piece of equipment made by the old German machinist was a lifesaver for us. While Nick finished his slaughtering and scrubbing that Friday forenoon I broke down and processed the first beef carcass, going at it more like a sawyer than a meat cutter. I first sawed out what ordinarily would be the rib roasts, the thick shoulder clods and rolls, the loins, rumps, and rounds, then hung them back in the refrigerator to be sliced into steak. The brisket and lower half of the ribs I sawed into three-inch strips, cut the best portions into short-rib chunks, and boned the rest of the leftovers for stew meat, hamburger, and sausage scraps.