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The Wingham Advance-Times, 1983-03-09, Page 20Page 4 -Crossroads- N1arch 9, 1983 H. GORDON GREEN Old Rob McNair had been in Canada as long as anyone could remember but his ac- cent was still so furry there were times when you could hardly understand him. "Just too hard headed to learn the language right!" our mother used to tell us. "And like all the Scotch, tight as the bark on a tree!" . Our mother was religious- ly prejudice against just about everything Scottish, including (in ascending order 1 the bagpipes, the Presbyterian Book of Praise and Scotch whisky. But every summer we did business with McNair be- cause our farm was too small for the number of cows we kept, and McNair, who had chickens instead of cows, had ten acres of hay. So every year our dad bought it from him. And every year before dad drove the mile down to McNair's place to do the necessary ° oargaining, mother would warn him against getting skinned again. "You always pay too blame much for that hay of his! And its full of daisies too!" I remember her saying this on that July morning be- fore dad and I set out in the light wagon for the annual bargaining with McNair. "Fifty dollars you paid the old skinflint last year, and cut it yourself ! And you hauled only eight loads from it. Landsakes Henry but that's over $6 a ton. Down- right ridiculous!" For 1922 it was a little ri- diculous too: "Oh he's a hard man to deal with all right," dad ad- mitted when we were bounc- ing along the road that morning. "He'll squeeze a penny till it `farts. But he's not a bad sort really." McNair's little chicken farm was up by the railroad track where the village thinned down into hawthorn and thistles, and he seemed to be waiting for us. Rumor had'it'that McNair had done something mysteriously heroic in the Boer War, and this rumor was kept alive by the flap -brimmed Boer War hat which never seemed to leave his head. But he must have been much older than most when he tangled with the Boers because he was quite gray now and his arms and face were as brown and wrinkled as an apple tree limb. We walked down to the hayfield, walked into it a ways, and dad kept parting it back like he would the fleece on a sheep to see how thick it wa and how much clover there was in it. "Considerable shorter this year, Rob. And the clover's dying out of it." "It's fifty dollars I'm askin' Henry." "Lighter than last year by a long shot, Rob." "If it's not worth fifty bucks to you Henry, just say so." "But you charged me only fifty last year and there was a lot more hay in it then. Eight loads we got last year. I doubt there'll be five loads here now, Rob!" "Dry year, Henry. Hay's short all over. But you know bloody well how it goes, Henry - the scarcer the hay the higher the price!" We came to a place where the 'hay was hardly to our knees and dad stopped here and shook his head. ''Holy Moses, Rob, but it's a thin stand you have here this year," he said. "But I suppose I could find forty for it." Old Rob was getting•red in the face. "It'll have to be fifty, Henry!" "Forty." "Fifty." "Forty-five." "We're wastin' our time Henry!" "Forty-eight then, and that's my limit!" "Fifty!" And Rob's face was so angry red now I be- gan to feel uncomfortable. Dad seemed to be getting worked up too and he kept spitting into the hay as if that would make it grow more. "All right then," he said finally. "Fifty. But it's robbery!" No question about when the fifty would be paid. No- thing signed. Not even a handshake to certify the bar- gain. And suddenly there was no more heat between them. None at all. Nor was there another word about the hay deal as we left the field. There was nothing now but gossip and laughing at each other's stories. In the orchard in front of McNair's cottage there were several hundred chicks chasing grasshoppers in the big yard, and dad stopped to look at them. "By golly Rob, but I wish we could have your luck at hatching! That's a beautiful bunch! Would you believe it, we never got a single chick this spring. Dadgum rooster seemed to be climbin' the hens all right but he never filled an egg! All he was doin' was just firin' blank cartridges, I guess... "He was probably like me," Rob said. "He keeps on tryin' but nothin' comes of it anymore." Suddenly he thought of something. "Would you like a rooster, Henry? A damned good one too!" he said head- ing for a little pen on stilts under a harvest apple tree. "Now this here Barred Rock won't waste no time firin' blank cartridges, and that I'll guarantee! Most of those chicks you be lookin' at are his, you know!" "How much?" dad said looking at the rooster face to face. "Nothing Henry! Just take him. I'm done with him." "Well I ought to at least give you meat price for him, Rob." "1 said take him. Here, chuck him into that gunny sack ..." And while he was tying up the sack and cutting a hole in the sack for the rooster's head to stick out, Rob kept looking up into the tree above us. "I don't doubt you could use a bag full of them there harvest apples again?" He found another gunny sack and shook the oatLdust out of it. "Here lad," he said to me. "Help me pick some. They're no good for pies, mind you, but there's none better for sauce, and with all them there bairns of yours - well, Henry there's nothing better to keep their bowels open, is there?" So we carted two sacks to our wagon. One with an in- dignant rooster in it and the other full of yellow apples. "You've got rhubarb enough, Henry? Yes? Well how about a mess of spare - grass? " And so with dad pro- testing that this was really too, too much, old Rob hustled over to the end of his garden and came back with a bouquet of asparagus. "You can get more when you cut the hay," he said. "It's only goin' to waste Ore. I don't eat the stuff my- self. Puts a kink in my kid- neys . . . and, by the way Henry, when you come for the hay I've got a hunk of ash in the woodshed I've been savin' for you. Straight as a die, it is. Just the thing for a man like yourself that makes his own whippletrees ..." On the way back that morning dad let the horse take his time. No use rough- ing up the rooster any more than was necessary, he told me. No use bruising the apples either. And as we turned into our lane he had a warning for me. "I reckon I'll have to tell your ma that it's fifty bucks again this year, but mind you, not a word about there only bein' five or six loads there ! " VARIETY LIVE FROM VANCOUVER David Steinberg, success- ful humorist, writer, televi- sion host, actor and film pro- ducer, is in Vancouver to host Super Variety Live, Sunday, March 13 at 7:30 p.m. on CBC Television. Live -to -tape from the North Vancouver Centennial Theatre, the show includes an hour of comedy, music and dance. The array of ta- lent presented by David Steinberg includes the now 22 -year-old Rene Simard. The former "Superkid" entertainer is joined by his 03 -year-old sister Nathalie, a young powerhouse who has recently been taking Quebec by storm. Rene and Nathalie perform the Supremes' hit, "You Can't Hurry Love". Another brother -sister act, that of accomplished young classical musicians Corey and. Katja Cerovsek dazzle the audience with their per- formance of Flight of the Bumblebee. Other guests in- clude: the rock group Trooper; dancer Jeff Hys- lop; Juno award-winning singer Shari Ulrich who per- forms her latest single; flau- tist, Paul Horn with Man- teca; children's entertainer Al Simmons and I M 4 U; and soulful blues singer Almeta Speaks. RR PalmerstQI? 343 -'?01 CG!cnn Ross. London A 454 gr. pkg. 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