David Crockett_ The Lion of the West - Michael Wallis [39]
Jean Finley—a loquacious and willful woman—was in no way bashful. She praised Crockett’s rosy red cheeks and told him she had just the sweetheart for him—the eldest of her three daughters, who only used her middle name, Polly. “In the evening I was introduced to her daughter, and I must confess, I was plaguy well pleased with her from the word go. She had a good countenance, and was very pretty, and I was full bent on making up an acquaintance with her.”11
As soon as the fiddlers showed up and dancing commenced, David asked Polly to join him in a reel, a lively dance that originated in the Scottish highlands. The young woman graciously took his calloused hand, and after they finished the dance, she and David found seats together and visited. “I found her very interesting; while I was setting by her, making as good a use of my time as I could, her mother came to us, and very jocularly called me her son-in-law.” Puzzled by this comment, Crockett decided the woman was joking. Nonetheless, he paid as much attention to the mother as to the pretty daughter for the rest of the evening. Even at his young age, Crockett had learned the importance of winning over the mother if he wanted to land the daughter. “I went on the old saying, of salting the cow to catch the calf. I soon became so pleased with this little girl, that I began to think the Dutch girl had told me the truth, when she said there was still good fish in the sea.”12
The frolic lasted until almost sunrise, and when David finally parted from Polly, he “found my mind had become much better reconciled than it had been for a long time.” He went home and made a bargain with the Canaday son who had been his teacher. Crockett promised him six months of work for a “low-priced horse” needed right away so he could properly court Miss Polly Finley. When he mounted his horse—the first one he had ever owned—and rode to the Finley home, David met Polly’s father, Billy, whom he found very affable. Jean Finley was just as talkative as ever.13
The feisty mother bombarded the young man with all sorts of questions to find out if he was the right man for her daughter. Crockett soon discovered that the “old Irish woman” did not like what she heard. Despite the gushing reception he received from Polly’s mother at the reaping where they first met, she was not in favor of a Crockett union with her daughter. Probably Crockett’s financial standing in the community had a lot to do with Jean’s attitude toward him.
Later, when Polly returned home from a meeting escorted by another attentive young man, David began to think “I was barking up the wrong tree again,” but he was determined to make his stand.14 The sun had long disappeared behind the mountains, and when darkness closed in, Polly suggested that, because David had a lengthy ride home ahead of him, he stay for supper and spend the night at the Finley home. “Her mother was deeply enlisted for my rival, and I had to fight against her influence as well as his,” Crockett related. “But the girl was the prize I was fighting for; and as she welcomed me, I was determined to lay siege to her.” His persistence worked and he simply outlasted the other suitor that night. In disgust, the other young man gritted his teeth and skulked off as Crockett shot him hard looks “as fierce as a wildcat.”15
About two weeks after this confrontation, Crockett was out on a wolf hunt with several of his friends and their pack of hounds. They hunted in an area that was new and unfamiliar and Crockett somehow became separated from the others. Not only did he find himself alone, but nightfall was fast approaching, and storm clouds brewed in the darkening sky. Crockett had wandered at least six or seven miles when suddenly he caught a flash of movement in the trees and saw “a little woman streaking it along through the woods like all wrath.”16 Crockett gave chase. “For I was determined I wouldn’t lose sight of her that night anymore. I run on till she saw me, and she stopped.