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Old Yeller

By Fred Gipson

  Bud Searcy's a red-faced man with a bulging mid-

dle who liked to visit around the settlement and sit and

talk hard times and spit tobacco juice all over the place

and wait for somebody to ask `him to dinner.

  I never did have a lot of use for him and my folks

didn't, either. Mama said he was shiftless. She said that

was the reason the rest of the men left him at home to

sort of look after the womenfolks and kids while they

were gone on the cow drive. She said the men knew

that if they took Bud Searcy along, they'd never get to

Kansas before the steers were dead with old age. It

would take Searcy that long to get through visiting and

eating with everybody between Salt Licks and Abilene.

  But he did have a little white-haired granddaughter

that I sort of liked. She was eleven and different from

most girls. She would hang around and watch what boys

did, like showing how high they could climb in a tree

or how far they could throw a rock or how fast they

could swim or how good they could shoot. But she never

wanted to mix in or try to take over and boss things. She

Just went along and watched and didn't say much, and

the only thing I had against her was her eyes. They

were big solemn brown eyes and right pretty to look at;

only when she fixed them on me, it always seemed like

they looked clear through me and saw everything I was

thinking. That always made me sort of jumpy, so that

when I could, I never would look right straight at her.

  Her name was Lisbeth and she came with her grandpa

the day he visited us. They came riding up on an old

shad-bellied pony that didn't look like he'd had a fill of

corn in a coon's age. She rode behind her grandpa's

saddle, holding to his belt in the back, and her white

hair was all curly and rippling in the sun. Trotting be-

hind them was a blue-ticked she dog that I always fig-

ured was one of Bell's pups.

  Old Yeller went out to bay them as they rode up. I

noticed right off that he didn't go about it like he really

meant business. His yelling bay sounded a lot more like

he was just barking because he figured that's what we

expected him to do. And the first time I hollered at him,

telling him to dry up all that racket, he hushed. Which

surprised me, as hard-headed as he generally was.

  By the time Mama had come to the door and told

Searcy and Lisbeth to get down and come right in, Old

Yeller had started a romp with the blue-ticked bitch.

  Lisbeth slipped to the ground and stood staring at me

with those big solemn eyes while her grandpa dis-

mounted. Searcy told Mama that he believed he

wouldn't come in the house. He said that as hot as the

day was, he figured he'd like it better sitting in the dog

run. So Mama had me bring out our four cowhide bot-

tom chairs. Searcy picked the one I always liked to sit

in best. He got out a twist of tobacco and bit off a chew

big enough to bulge his cheek and went to chewing and

talking and spitting juice right where we'd all be bound

to step in it and pack it around on the bottoms of our

feet.

  First he asked Mama if we were making out all right,

and Mama said we were. Then he told her that he'd

been left to look after all the families while the men

were gone, a mighty heavy responsibility that was nearly

working him to death, but that he was glad to do it. He

said for Mama to remember that if the least little thing

went wrong, she was to get in touch with him right

away. And Mama said she would.

  Then he leaned his chair back against the cabin wall

and went to telling what all was going on around in the

settlement. He told about how dry the weather was and

how he looked for all the corn crops to fail and the set-

tlement folks to be scraping the bottoms of their meal

barrels long before next spring. He told how the cows

were going dry and the gardens were failing. He told

how Jed Simpson's boy Rosal was sitting at a turkey

roost, waiting for a shot, when a fox came right up and

tried to jump on him, and Rosal had to club it to death

with his gun butt. This sure looked like a case of hydro-

phobia to Searcy, as anybody knew that no fox in his

right mind was going to jump on a hunter.

  Which reminded him of an uncle of his that got mad-

dog bit down in the piney woods of East Texas. This

was `way back when Searcy was a little boy. As soon

as the dog bit him, the man knew he was bound to die;

so he went and got a big log chain and tied one end

around the bottom of a tree and the other end to one

of his legs. And right there he stayed till the sickness

got him and he lost his mind. He slobbered at the

mouth and moaned and screamed and ran at his wife

and children, trying to catch them and bite them. Only,

of course, the chain around his leg held him back, which

was the reason he'd chained himself to the tree in the

first place. And right there, chained to that tree, he

finally died and they buried him under the same tree.

  Bud Searcy sure hoped that we wouldn't have an

outbreak of hydrophobia in Salt Licks and all die be-

fore the men got back from Kansas.

  Then he talked awhile about a panther that had

caught and killed one of Joe Anson's colts and how the

Anson boys had put their dogs on the trail. They ran the

panther into the cave and Jeff Anson followed in where

the dogs had more sense than to go and got pretty

badly panther-mauled for his trouble; but he did get the

panther.

  Searcy talked till dinnertime, said not a word all

through dinner, and then went back to talking as quick

as he'd swallowed down the last bite.

  He told how some strange varmint that wasn't a coyote,

possum, skunk, or coon had recently started robbing

the settlement blind. Or maybe it was even somebody.

Nobody could tell for sure. All they knew was that

they were losing meat out of their smokehouses, eggs

out of their hens' nests, and sometimes even whole pans

of cornbread that the womenfolks had set out to cool.

Ike Fuller had been barbecuing some meat over an

open pit and left it for a minute to go get a drink of

water and came back to find that a three- or four-pound

chunk of beef ribs had disappeared like it had gone up

in smoke.

  Salt Licks folks were getting pretty riled about it,

Searcy said, and guessed it would go hard with what-

ever or whoever was doing the raiding if they ever

learned what it was.

  Listening to this, I got an uneasy feeling. The feeling

got worse a minute later when Lisbeth motioned me to

follow her off down to the spring.

  We walked clear down there, with Old Yeller and

the blue-tick dog following with us, before she finally

looked up at me and said, "It's him."

  "What do you mean?" I said.

  "I mean it's your big yeller dog," she said. "I saw

him."

  "Do what?" I asked.

  "Steal that bait of ribs," she said. "I saw him get a

bunch of eggs, too. From one of our nests."

  I stopped then and looked straight at her and she

looked straight back at me and I couldn't stand it and

had to look down.

  "But I'm not going to tell," she said.

  I didn't believe her. "I bet you do," I said.

  "No, I won't she said, shaking her head.  Wouldn't,

even before I knew he was your dog."

  `Why?"

  "Because Miss Prissy is going to have pups."

  "Miss Prissy?"

  "That's the name of my dog, and she's going to have

pups and your dog will be their papa, and I wouldn't

want their papa to get shot."

  I stared at her again, and again I had to look down.

I wanted to thank her, but I didn't know the right

words. So I fished around in my pocket and brought out

an Indian arrowhead that I'd found the day before

and gave that to her.

  She took it and stared at it for a little bit, with her

eyes shining, then shoved it deep into a long pocket she

had sewn to her dress.

  "I won't never, never tell," she said, then whirled and

tore out for the house, running as fast as she could.

  I went down and sat by the spring awhile. It seemed

like I liked Bud Searcy a lot better than I ever had

before, even if he did talk too much and spit tobacco

juice all over the place. But I was still bothered. If

Lisbeth had caught Old Yeller stealing stuff at the

settlements, then somebody else might, too. And if they

did, they were sure liable to shoot him. A family might

put up with one of its own dogs stealing from them if

he was a good dog. But for a dog that left home to

steal from  everybody else - well, I didn't see much

chance for him if he ever got caught.

  After Bud Searcy had eaten a hearty supper and

talked awhile longer, he finally rode off home, with

Lisbeth riding behind him. I went then and gathered

the eggs and held three back. I called Old Yeller off

from the house and broke the eggs on a flat rock, right

under his nose and tried to get him to eat them. But he

wouldn't. He acted like he'd never heard tell that eggs

were fit to eat. All he'd do was stand there and wiggle

his tail and try to lick me in the face.

  It made me mad. "You thievin' rascal," I said. "I ought

to get a club and break your back-in fourteen differ-

ent places."

  But I didn't really mean it, and I didn't say it loud

and ugly. I knew that if I did, he'd fall over and start

yelling like he was dying. And there I'd b~in a fight

with Little Arliss again.

  "When they shoot you, I'm going to laugh," I told

him.

  But I knew that I wouldn't.

Chapter Seven

I DID considerable thinking on what Lisbeth Searcy had

told me about Old Yeller and finally went and told

Mama.

  "Why, that old rogue!" she said. "We'll have to try to

figure some way to keep him from prowling. Every-

body in the settlement will be mad at us if we don't."

  "Somebody'll shoot him," I said.

  "Try tying him," she said.

  So I tried tying him. But we didn't have any bailing

wire in those days, and he could chew through any-

thing else before you could turn your back. I tried him

with rope and then with big thick rawhide string that

I cut from a cowhide hanging across the top rail of the

yard fence. It was the same thing in both cases. By

the time we could get off to bed, he'd done chewed

them in two and was gone.

  "Let's try the corncrib," Mama said on the third

night.

  Which was a good idea that might have worked if

it hadn't been for Little Arliss.

  I took Old Yeller out and put him in the corncrib and

the second that he heard the door shut on him, he set

up a yelling and a howling that brought Little

on the run. Mama and I both tried to explain to him

why we needed to shut the dog up, but Little Arliss

was too mad to listen. You can't explain things very

well to somebody who is screaming his head off and

chunking you with rocks as fast as he can pick them

up. So that didn't work, either.

  "Well, it looks like we're stumped," Mama said.

  I thought for a minute and said, "No, Mama. I be-

lieve we've got one other chance. That's to shut him up

in the same room with me and Little Arliss every night."

  "But he'll sleep in the bed with you boys," Mama

said, `and the first thing you know, you'll both be

scratching fleas and having mange and breaking out

with ringworms."

  "No, I'll put him a cowhide on the floor and make

him sleep there, I said.

  So Mama agreed and I spread a cowhide on the

floor beside our bed and we shut Old Yeller in and didn't

have a bit more trouble.

  Of course, Old Yeller didn't sleep on the cowhide.

And once, a good while later, I did break out with a

little ringworm under my left arm. But I rubbed it with

turpentine, lust like Mama always did, and it soon

went away. And after that, when we fed Old Yeller

cornmeal mush or fresh meat, he ate it and did well on

it and never one time bothered our chicken nests.

  About that time, too, the varmints got to pestering

us so much that a lot of times Old Yeller and I were

kept busy nearly all night long.

  It was the coons, mainly. The corn was ripening into

roasting ears now, and the coons would come at night

and strip the shucks back with their little hands, and

gnaw the milky kernels off the cob. Also, the water-

melons were beginning to turn red inside and the

skunks would come and open up little round holes in

the rinds and reach in with their forefeet and drag out

the juicy insides to eat. Sometimes the coyotes would

come and eat watermelons, too; and now and then a

deer would jump into the field and eat corn, melons,

and peas.

  So Old Yeller and I took to sleeping in the corn patch

every night. We slept on the cowhide that Yeller never

would sleep on at the house. That is, we did when we

got to sleep. Most of the night, we'd be up fighting

coons. We slept out in the middle of the patch, where

Yeller could scent a coon clear to the fence on every

side. We'd lie there on the cowhide and look up at the

stars and listen to the warm night breeze rustling the

corn blades. Sometimes I'd wonder what the stars were

and what kept them hanging up there so high and

bright and if Papa, `way off up yonder in Kansas, could

see the same stars I could see.

  I was getting mighty lonesome to see Papa. With the

help of Old Yeller, I was taking care of things all right;

but I was sure beginning to wish that he'd come back

home.

  Then I'd think awhile about the time when I'd get

big enough to go off on a cow drive myself, riding my

own horse, and see all the big new country of plains

and creeks and rivers and mountains and timber and

new towns and Indian camps. Then, finally, just about

the time I started drifting off to sleep, I'd hear Old

Yeller rise to his feet and go padding off through the

corn. A minute later, his yelling bay would lift from

some part of the corn patch, and I'd hear the fighting

squawl of some coon caught stealing corn. Then I'd

Jump to my feet and go running through the corn,

shouting encouragement to Old Yeller.

  "Git him, Yeller," I'd holler. "Tear him up!"

  And that's what Old Yeller would be trying to do;

but a boar coon isn't an easy thing to tear up. For one

thing, he'll fight you from sundown till sunup. He's not

big for size, but the longer you fight him, the bigger he

seems to get. He fights you with all four feet and every

tooth in his head and enough courage for an animal five

times his size.

  On top of that, he's fighting inside a thick hide that

fills a dog's mouth like a wad of loose sacking. The dog

has a hard time ever really biting him. He just squirms

and twists around inside that hide and won't quit fight-

ing even after the dog's got enough and is ready to

throw the fight to him. Plenty of times, Papa and I had

seen a boar coon whip Bell, run him off, then turn on

us and chase us clear out of a cornfield.

  It was easy for me to go running through the dark

cornfields, yelling for Old Yeller to tear up a thieving

coon, but it wasn't easy for Old Yeller to do it. He'd

be yelling and the coon would be squawling and they'd

go wallowing and clawing and threshing through the

corn, popping the stalks as they broke them off, making

such an uproar in the night that it sounded like murder.

But, generally, when the fight was all over, the coon

went one way and Old Yeller the other, both of them

pretty well satisfied to call it quits.

  We didn't get much sleep of a night while all this

was going on, but we had us a good time and saved

the corn from the coons.

  The only real bad part of it was the skunks. What

with all the racket we made coon fighting, the skunks

didn't come often. But when one did come, we were in

a mess.

  Old Yeller could handle a skunk easy enough. All he

had to do was rush in, grab it by the head and give it a

good shaking. That would break the skunk's neck, but

it wouldn't end the trouble. Because not even a hoot

owl can kill a skunk without getting sprayed with his

scent. And

he could hardly stand it. He'd snort and drool and

slobber and vomit. He'd roll and wallow in the dirt and

go dragging his body through tall weeds, trying to get

the scent off; but he couldn't. Then finally, he'd give

up and come lie down on the cowhide with me. And of

course he'd smell so bad that I couldn't stand him and

have to go off and try to sleep somewhere else. Then

he'd follow me and get his feelings hurt because I

wouldn't let him sleep with me.

  Papa always said that breathing skunk scent was the

best way in the world to cure a head cold. But this was

summertime, when Old Yeller and I didn't have head

colds. We would just as soon that the skunks stayed out

of the watermelons and let us alone.

  Working there, night after night, guarding our pre-

cious bread corn from the varmints, I came to see what

I would have been up against if I'd had it to do without

the help of Old Yeller. By myself, I'd have been run

to death and still probably wouldn't have saved the

corn. Also, look at all the fun I would have missed if

I'd been alone, and how lonesome I would have been. I

had to admit Papa had been right when he'd told me

how bad I needed a dog.

  I saw that even more clearly when the spotted heifer

had her first calf.

  Our milk cows were all old-time longhorn cattle and

didn't give a lot of milk. It was real hard to find one

that would give much more than her call could take.

What we generally had to do was milk five or six cows

to get enough milk for just the family.

  But we had one crumpled-horn cow named Rose that

gave a lot of milk, only she was getting old, and Mama

kept hoping that each of her heifer calves would turn

Out to be as good a milker as Rose. Mama had tried two

or three, but none of them proved to be any good. And

then along came this spotted one that was just raw-

boned and ugly enough to make a good milk cow. She

had the bag for it, too, and Mama was certain this time

that she'd get a milk cow to replace Rose.

  The only trouble was, this heifer Spot, as we called

her, had been snaky wild from the day she was born.

Try to drive her with the other cattle, and she'd run

off and hide. Hem her up in a corner and try to get

your hands on her, and she'd turn on you and make

fight. Mama had been trying all along to get Spot

gentled before she had her first calf, but it was no use.

Spot didn't want to be friends with anybody. We knew

she was going to give us a pile of trouble when we set

out to milk her.

  I failed to find Spot with the rest of our milk cows

one evening, and when I went to drive them up the

next day, she was still gone.

  "It's time for her to calve," Mama said, "and I'll bet

she's got one.

  So the next morning I went further back in the hills

and searched all over. I finally came across her, holed

up in a dense thicket of bee myrtle close to a little seep

spring. I got one brief glimpse of a wobbly, long-legged

calf before Spot snorted and took after me. She ran me

clear to the top of the next high ridge before she turned

back.

  I made another try. I got to the edge of the thicket

and picked me up some rocks. I went to hollering and

chunking into the brush, trying to scare her and the

calf out. I got her out, all right, but she wasn't scared.

She came straight for me with her horns lowered, bawl-

ing her threats as she came. I had to turn tail a second

time, and again she chased me clear to the top of that

ridge.

  I tried it one more time, then went back to the house

and got Old Yeller. I didn't know if he knew anything

about driving cattle or not, but I was willing to bet that

he could keep her from chasing me.

  And he did. ~I went up to the edge of the thicket and

started hollering and chunking rocks into it. Here came

the heifer, madder than ever, it looked like. I yelled at

Old Yeller. "Get her, Yeller," I hollered And Yeller got

her. He pulled the neatest trick I ever saw a dog pull

on a cow brute.

  Only I didn't see it the first time. I was getting away

from there too fast. I'd stumbled and fallen to my knees

when I turned to run from Spot's charge, and she was

too close behind for me to be looking back and watch-

ing what Old Yeller was doing. I just heard the scared

bawl she let out and the crashing of the brush as Old

Yeller rolled her into it.

  I ran a piece further, then looked back. The heifer

was scrambling to her feet in a cloud of dust and look-

ing like she didn't know any more about what had

happened than I did. Then she caught sight of old

Yeller. She snorted, stuck her tail in the air and made

for him. Yeller ran like he was scared to death, then cut

back around a thicket. A second later, he was coming

in behind Spot.

  Without making a sound, he ran up beside her, made

his leap and set his teeth in her nose.

  I guess it was the weight of him that did it. I saw

him do it lots of times later, but never did quite under-

stand how. Anyway, he just set his teeth in her nose,

doubled himself up in a tight ball, and swung on. That

turned the charging heifer a flip. Her heels went

straight up in the air over her head. She landed flat of

her back with all four feet sticking up. She hit the

ground so hard that it sounded like she ought to bust

wide open.

  I guess she felt that way about it, too. Anyhow, after

taking that second fall, she didn't have much fight left

in her. She just scrambled to her feet and went trotting

back into the thicket, lowing to her calf.

  I followed her, with Old Yeller beside me, and we

drove her out and across the hills to the cow lot. Not

one time did she turn on us again. She did try to run

off a couple of times, but all I had to do was send Old

Yeller in to head her. And the second she caught sight

of him, she couldn't turn fast enough to get headed

back in the right direction.

  It was the same when we got her into the cowpen.

Her bag was all in a strut with milk that the calf couldn't

hold. Mama said we needed to get that milk Out. She

came with a bucket and I took it, knowing I had me a

big kicking fight on my hands if I ever hoped to get any

milk.

  The kicking fight started. The first time I touched

Spot's bag, she reached Out with a flying hind foot, aim-

ing to kick my head off and coming close to doing it.

Then she wheeled On me and put me on top of the

rail fence as quick as a squirrel could have made it.

  Mama shook her head. "I was hoping she wouldn't

be that way," she said. "I always hate to have to tie up

a heifer to break her for milking. But I guess there's no

other way with this one."

  I thought of all the trouble it would be, having to

tie up that Spot heifer, head and feet, twice a day, every

day, for maybe a month or more. I looked at Old Yeller,

standing just outside the pen.

  "Yeller," I said, "you come in here."

  Yeller came bounding through the rails.

  Mama said: "Why, son, you can't teach a heifer to

stand with a dog in the pen. Especially one with a

young calf. She'll be fighting at him all the time, think-

ing he's a wolf or something trying to get her calf."

  I laughed. "Maybe it won't work," I said, but I bet

you one thing. She won't be fighting Old Yeller."

  She didn't, either. She lowered her horns and rolled

her eyes as I brought Old Yeller up to her.

  "Now, Yeller," I said, `you stand here and watch

her."

  Old Yeller seemed to know just what I wanted. He

walked right up to where he could almost touch his

nose to hers and stood there, wagging his stub tail. And

she didn't charge him or run from him. All she did was

stand there and sort of tremble. I went back and milked

out her strutted bag and she didn't offer to kick me one

time, just flinched and drew up a little when I first

touched her.

  "Well, that does beat all," Mama marveled. "Why, at

that rate, we'll have her broke to milk in a week's time."

  Mama was right. Within three days after we started,

I could drive Spot into the pen, go right up and milk

her, and all she'd do was stand there and stare at Old

Yeller. By the end of the second week, she was stand-

ing and belching and chewing her cud the gentlest

cow I ever milked.

  After all that, I guess you can see why I nearly died

when a man rode up one day and claimed Old Yeller.