Sunday, May 6, 2012
More About Ferris
Noticed somethin'. First, seemed like a snow drift growing across hillside mid July-- white and shiny. Frank knew from the start, but I didn't. Figured some new owner doing something-- didn't know what. Nowadays goin' over to look is trespassing. So I just sat wondering. At the kitchen table one morning-- heard his pickup howling by. Was pulling a four-horse trailer, another box trailer behind it. That's when I put it together. Trailers full with junk appliances, mixed with sheet metal and auto body parts. Wondered if he knew where he was. No electricity for miles to power that stuff if they even worked. Giant wife worked at livestock auction. Son stayed in town. Ferris stayed on his piece of prairie. Figured all his firewood was cut down from the National Forest-- no trees in sight at his place. Shiny junkpile grew. Man never slept-- always building some new crap thing, like the trailer addition. Also poached and pilfered wood and trapped on neighbors' land. Stupid of him to try to catch beavers like he did. Like he thought it was a hundred years ago-- pelts were worth $50 instead of $15. Goes to show he didn't know a damn thing about the land from the start. That among other things made him a fool.
The Goat Man
Lots of talk about Ferris lately. Not so much about his trash heap of a home. More about the livestock with no water on a tiny bit of ridgetop. Where'd he get them? Too many. No chance of keeping them alive. More to come, too. But no more feed. Around 20 horses (two of them studs), and a bunch of goats, chickens, dogs, cats, and peacocks. Amount of land he's got could barely support two animals, let alone all those. Horses grazed Ferris' land for just two weeks when it turned into a dirt pile. Needed food for them, so he let 'em loose. Heard about it first from Frank. Cut the hell out of two or three of his mares. Probably knocked them up, too, damn studs. Gonna birth some no-tail deformed things. Clay took care of the mares while Frank headed up to give Ferris a piece of his mind. Told me about this over coffee. Said first thing he noticed was the smell when he got to Ferris' dump. Refrigerators and shower stalls and television sets everywhere. Big old junk heap. Tons of goat sheds Ferris built. Lots of work, but slapdash. Just like the addition to his rusty damn trailer he lives in. Frank said smell was suffocating. Knocked on trailer door. Ferris opened it-- lots of good-for-nothing stuff in there, no furniture. Shook his hand. Told the bum to coral his horses and feed them right. Fool tried apologizing and smiling, squinting all the while-- played dumb about the roaming horses! Frank warned him he's a fool living here-- all that junk and all this wind. Ferris said he ain't afraid of no wind. Frank came back-- stunned by who he now calls the Goat Man. It stuck. Some call him Cracker-- first real cracker most anybody here seen or heard of. Ferris didn't do squat. Pulled the horses back in for a day or two-- let 'em right out again, into Colorado this time. Hoped the studs wouldn't cause as much trouble. Still cut the hell out of more horses. Brought 'em back in and starved 'em again 'til he let 'em out again. What kind of people were Ferris' folk? Sure didn't take long for this here country to go to hell.
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