At the last turn of the old logging road
There stood the strangest kind of a house,
Chinked in the ledge where the creek tumbled down
From old Buck Mountain Pond. 'Twas like to fall
With a good sharp gust of wind, and yet it stood
So many years that now as I look back
I feel the old house was not built with hands,
That it had grown like fungus of the woods
Out of some living spore cast there by chance,—
It was so much a part of the wild loneliness.
Grey roof, wet rafters, weatherbeaten sides,
Rocks in the dooryard, only wild flowers growing
Around the doorstep,—sweet fern, and that vine
The children eat because it tastes like spice;
And like the nesting partridge, it was hid
By its own colors, for you could not see
A house at first, but only rocks and trees.
But then a door would open, and things stir
That looked like tattered bark blown by the wind,
And just a wisp of smoke would tell you soon
That human folk were there, and kindled fires.

Ben Hewitt and his wife lived there alone,
They always kept a savage hunting dog
That lay upon the floor and growled and growled
Until you wondered if he was a dog

And not some mountain goblin summoned there
Who voiced suspicion at your human blood.
They had an only son, who went to war
When old Ben volunteered in 'sixty-one.
We knew that he was killed at Fredericksburg
Before his father's eyes, and after that
We thought Ben Hewitt's mind was not just right,
For he had queer ideas of common things
And he would sit and talk to you like this
About the lightning, in a thunderstorm:

“I know what lightning's made of—don't tell me;
I saw a ball burst right here in the yard,
And it was full of shingle nails and things,
And tin, and bolts, and Lord knows what a mess.”

He used to gather healing herbs and say:
“You're foolish if you don't take hemlock sweats
For fever and for all your shaking chills,
And steep and drink a little hemlock tea;
And if you're troubled some with darting pains,
There's lung-weed over in the pasture lot,
And Slippery Elm. These durn fool doctors go
And give you devil's pills; I cured a cancer once
With nothing more than plain green plantain leaves.”

Or he would talk on politics he'd read
In last year's almanac, and gravely say:
“There ar'n't no statesmen now; they talk and talk—
And sit around and don't do anything.”

Now somehow it got out around the town
That Old Ben was a miser, and had kept
His pension money in a bag there in the house
For ten years running. So one stormy night
Some roughs came there and gagged and tied his wife
And trussed her in the corner like a sack,
And opened the stove door and told old Ben
That they would burn his feet unless he showed
Where all his money was. They burned and cursed
And left him well nigh dead; he never walked
For a whole year; but not a word he said.

One time he told me why he let those men
Torture his flesh for money all the night.
He had few savings—just a scanty hoard;
But for long years he had a sacred place
He kept his money. He was fond of me,
And bade me look behind the stairway door
And bring what hung there over to his side.

It was a faded coat of Union Blue,
With corporal's straps all tarnished with the years.—
“It's Sonny's coat; he died at Fredericksburg.
And all these years I've kept my money there
In his coat pocket—out of lonesomeness;
For every time I went to get a coin,
I'd think of him when first he crept to me
And, catching at my boots, pulled himself up
And called out ‘Dada.’ He had yellow hair
And bright blue eyes. His laugh was like the song
The creek makes underneath that jutting rock.
I built the house up here because I heard
The sound one day when I bent there to drink.
He grew up to my eyes, and when the war
Took me, he wouldn't let me go alone,
And went and volunteered, and we were off
To fight the Rebs to make the black men free.

“We fought together, and one night we lay
Crouched down at Fredericksburg behind some sod,
And he was tired with the long delay
And fretted to be fighting. Some one said,
‘I dare you to get up and wave your hat.’
He was a boy, remember,—young and rash.
He stood straight up; the waiting riflemen,
Those Tennessee men, drew a bead on him
And he fell down and never made a moan.

“It's mostly tatters now, the pocket tore
A dozen times; I always mended it.
I couldn't let those robbers lay their hands
On Sonny's coat. I'll have it laid at last
Inside my coffin, when I come to die.”

When goodbyes came, I left him sitting there
Thinking of Sonny by the dying fire:
A bent old man with faded, rheumy eyes—
Across his knees a coat of Union Blue.