Manly Wade Wellman - John the Balladeer 05 by The Voice of the Mountain (v1.1) Read Free Book Online Page A

about it. I walked toward where the cry
rose, walked even before it died out, and kept on a-walking.
                 I
scrambled up a slope under more trees and more. I came to where the trees
thinned. The way along got easier, and I kept my feet to it. Once again I
rested and supped enough water to wet my mouth inside. At last I got to the top
of a ridge.
                 Beyond
the ridge, the trees were just brush for quite a stretch, and above them and on past them I saw what purely had to be Cry Mountain .
     

4
                 All
right, gentlemen, you all wonder me what did Cry Mountain look like, and how came me to know it was Cry Mountain ?
                 From
off where I stood up to look, it sort of flew up against the sky. It was tall,
tall, and it was bare, bare, and it was steep, steep, steep. It was shaped like
a bucket turned upside down. The naked rock it was made of had a tan-gray
color, and looked so straight up and down that you'd reckon a mountain boomer
squirrel would have its job cut out for it to climb up. High at the top, which
figured to be flat, grew trees, thick and green. And on the tan-gray side of Cry
Mountain a-facing me ran a crooked line up, like some Z’s one on top of the
other. That line looked green, too, a dark green, and if trees hung on there, a
man might hang on to the trees to help him mount up.
                 Cry Mountain , naked and steep, stood so high above other
heights right and left, they looked like brushy knolls. It stood where it was
and, if I'd had aught of a doubt, it named itself to me with its cry, Awoooooo . . .
                 I
headed for it.
                 The
trees were thinned out as I went down a long slope, and there was some coarse
grass that whispered against my boots. A spotted snake went whipping away as I
came. I didn’t see what kind it was, but I jumped about a foot. My idea of
nothing to do is mess round with snakes. The sun was a-getting high in a blue
sky without a cloud in it, and I judged it to be maybe half past ten when I started that approach march toward Cry Mountain . I kept on my way, but I stopped maybe each
twenty minutes or so, just to squat down and breathe a few breaths. By noon I came to a clear little branch of sweet
water and I took me more of a blow there. I didn’t eat the lunch Tombs had
fixed for me, but I did drink from the branch and filled up my canteen again
and washed my face and neck and ears. I felt as good and fresh as I could hope
when I headed along through little belts of trees, toward Cry Mountain off there.
                 It
was an hours-long walk again, with all the time the steep bare mountain
a-coming closer and closer, till it took up a big bunch of the country ahead. I
got to where I could make out the way the rock of it was, steep and mostly
smooth and a little bitty bit shiny in the sun. It didn’t call to me now, maybe
it just waited. There was no sound except a little puff of wind, a-rustling the
grass and the leaves of trees here and there.
                 It
was still a right good walk to the foot of Cry Mountain . Trees thinned out into brush and tussocky
grass, and the sun got hot and bright. By the time I stopped again, the sun
said maybe five o’clock and Cry Mountain shut off all things in sight ahead, and
rose up above me near about straight.
                 But
I came no closer. I’d been on the march all day, and there wouldn’t be enough
light for me to get all the way up. I camped, under some pines and oaks.
                 To
do that thing, I raked up leaves and pine straw into a heap to lie down on.
Then I pulled together dry twigs of pine for kindling, and broke up fallen
branches of oak for longer burning. All that wood I stacked together to be
used. My canteen shook like as if it needed to be filled full again, so I made
a little scout at the foot of the mountain. Sure enough, I found a