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Chapter 6

Chapter 6

Summary

Jake Spoon's return means most to Newt, who remembers him as his dead mother Maggie's kindest visitor and privately suspects Jake is his father. Jake, a former Ranger and lifelong gambler, eats Augustus's fried meat with fastidious slowness and unfolds two things. First, Montana: he has been north past the Yellowstone and seen grass and water beyond anything in Texas, empty of cattlemen, and he proposes they gather free cattle and drive them up to get rich before anyone else. Second, his trouble: in Fort Smith, Arkansas, he fired a borrowed buffalo rifle at a drunk mule skinner, missed, and killed the town dentist across the street — a man who happened to be the mayor and the brother of the sheriff, July Johnson. Call, who has quietly pressed Dish into well-digging, sees where the talk is heading and leaves. Behind him Augustus tells Jake plainly that one of them is probably Newt's father.

Analysis

Jake is installed as charm without spine — the novel's moral thermometer. Two engines start here: Montana as promise, July Johnson as pursuit. Augustus says aloud that one of them is probably Newt's father, planting the book's quietest and longest-running plot in a room Call walks out of.

Plates

The name Jake Spoon strikes Newt on the back porch, and the boy goes still while the rest of the outfit talks on around him.
00 The name Jake Spoon strikes Newt on the back porch, and the boy goes still while the rest of the outfit talks on around him.
The little pile of things Newt's mother Maggie left behind — beads, combs, a scrapbook, cutout magazine pictures, and one scratchy photograph of a grandfather in Alabama, with no Mr Dobbs anywhere in it.
01 The little pile of things Newt's mother Maggie left behind — beads, combs, a scrapbook, cutout magazine pictures, and one scratchy photograph of a grandfather in Alabama, with no Mr Dobbs anywhere in it.
Deets and Jake Spoon riding in across the flats toward the house, the pacing bay kicking up little puffs of dust in the wagon yard.
02 Deets and Jake Spoon riding in across the flats toward the house, the pacing bay kicking up little puffs of dust in the wagon yard.
Jake swings down off the gant bay at the back porch and he and Call shake hands, looking one another over, with Pea Eye waiting his turn.
03 Jake swings down off the gant bay at the back porch and he and Call shake hands, looking one another over, with Pea Eye waiting his turn.
"Are you little Newt? Why you're plumb growed" — Jake turns from the handshakes and finds the boy, who can hardly speak.
04 "Are you little Newt? Why you're plumb growed" — Jake turns from the handshakes and finds the boy, who can hardly speak.
Deets leads the two horses off toward the roofless barn to give the gant bay a good feed, his quilt trousers snagged and trailing cotton ticking.
05 Deets leads the two horses off toward the roofless barn to give the gant bay a good feed, his quilt trousers snagged and trailing cotton ticking.
Call looks Dish Boggett eye to eye until the top hand swallows his pride and goes off to dig the well with Pea Eye and Newt.
06 Call looks Dish Boggett eye to eye until the top hand swallows his pride and goes off to dig the well with Pea Eye and Newt.
Jake picks fastidiously at Augustus's fried meat and tells them about Montana — grass and water past the Yellowstone, free cattle, a fortune for whoever gets there first — and Call comes back in and straddles a chair to hear it.
07 Jake picks fastidiously at Augustus's fried meat and tells them about Montana — grass and water past the Yellowstone, free cattle, a fortune for whoever gets there first — and Call comes back in and straddles a chair to hear it.
"Kilt a dentist" — Jake, picking his teeth with a whittled match, admits the buffalo rifle went through the saloon plank and across the wide street into the mayor, whose brother is the sheriff.
08 "Kilt a dentist" — Jake, picking his teeth with a whittled match, admits the buffalo rifle went through the saloon plank and across the wide street into the mayor, whose brother is the sheriff.
Call puts on his hat, picks up his rifle and walks out, leaving Augustus to tell Jake that one of them is more than likely Newt's father.
09 Call puts on his hat, picks up his rifle and walks out, leaving Augustus to tell Jake that one of them is more than likely Newt's father.