Morning Glory by Lavyrle Spencer

The boy pointed at the structure that looked like a tobacco-drying shed.
    “There what?”
    “That’s where the pig mash is.” He led the way into a building crammed with everything from soup to nuts, only this time, usable stuff. Obviously Dinsmore had done more than collect junk. Barterer? Horse trader? The paint cans in here were full. The rolls of barbed wire, new. Furniture, tools, saddles, a newspaper press, egg crates, pulley belts, canepoles, the fender of a Model-A, a dress form, a barrel full of pistons, Easter baskets, a boiler, cowbells, moonshine jugs, bedsprings... and who knew what else was buried in the close-packed building.
    Donald Wade pointed to a gunnysack sitting on the dirt floor with a rusty coffee can beside it. “Two.” He held up three fingers and had to fold one down manually.
    “Two?”
    “Mama, she mixes two with the milk.”
    Will hunkered beside Donald Wade, opened the sack and smiled as the boy continued to hold down the finger. “You wanna scoop ‘em for me?”
    Donald Wade nodded so hard his hair flopped. He filled the can but couldn’t manage to pull it from the deep sack. Will reached in to help. The mash fell into the milk with a sharp, grainy smell. When the second scoop was dumped, Donald Wade found a piece of lath in a corner.
    “You stir with this.”
    Will began stirring. Donald Wade stood with his hands inside the bib of his overalls, watching. At length he volunteered, “I can stir good.”
    Will grinned secretly. “You can?”
    Donald Wade made his hair flop again.
    “Well, good thing, ‘cause I was needin’ a rest.”
    Even with both hands knotted hard around the lath, Donald Wade needed help from Will. The man’s smile broke free as the boy clamped his teeth over his bottom lip and maneuvered the stick with flimsy arms. Will’s arms fit nice around the small shoulders as he knelt behind the boy and the two of them together mixed the mash.
    “You help your mama do this every day?”
    “Prett-near. She gets tired. Mostly I pick eggs.”
    “Where?”
    “Everywhere.”
    “Everywhere?”
    “Around the yard. I know where the chickens like it best. I c’n show you.”
    “They give many eggs?”
    Donald Wade shrugged.
    “She sell ‘em?”
    “Yup.”
    “In town?”
    “Down on the road. She just leaves ‘em there and people leave the money in a can. She don’t like goin’ to town.”
    “How come?”
    Donald Wade shrugged again.
    “She got any friends?”
    “Just my pa. But he died.”
    “Yeah, I know. And I’m sure sorry about that, Donald Wade.”
    “Know what Baby Thomas did once?”
    “What?”
    “He ate a worm.”
    Until that moment Will hadn’t realized that to a four-year-old the eating of a worm was more important than the death of a father. He chuckled and ruffled the boy’s hair. It felt as soft as it looked.
    I could get to like this one a lot, he thought.
    With the hogs fed, they stopped to rinse the bucket at the pump. Beneath it was a wide mudhole with not even a board thrown across it to keep the mud from splattering.
    Naturally, Donald Wade got his boots coated. When they returned to the house his mother scolded, “You git, child, and scrape them soles before you come in here!”
    Will put in, “It’s my fault, ma’am. I took him down by the pump.”
    “You did? Oh, well...” Immediately she hid her pique, then glanced across the property. When she spoke, her voice held a quiet despondency. “Things are a real fright around here, I know. But I guess you can see that for yourself.”
    Will sealed his lips, tugged his hat brim clear down to his eyebrows, slipped his hands flat inside his backside pockets and scanned the property expressionlessly. Eleanor peeked at him from the corner of her eye. Her heart beat out a warning. He’ll run now. He’ll sure as shootin’ run after getting an eyeful of the place in broad daylight.
    But again he saw the possibilities. And nothing on the good green earth could make him turn his