Julia's Hope (22 page)

I could have gone on and on with such a fancy, but Sammy put his arm around me and asked if I didn’t want to be leaving. Emma was looking tired.

Emma was ready to go home, but she was far from admitting to being tired. “We have to make sure old Lula Bell has water,” she said. “And milk her besides.”

Of course, the kids were not nearly so anxious to leave a place with a radio
and
puppies. They’d found their way to the woodshed again, where Princess kept her litter. I could see the longing on their faces as they reluctantly set down the pups they’d been cradling and watched them tumble over one another on their way back to their mother.

But they didn’t say a word. Robert went and sat by Mr. Post’s truck, and Sarah took hold of my hand, her eyes checking to see if I’d noticed what precious little creatures the puppies were. They were good dogs, all of them looking like their golden labrador mother, but I didn’t say anything either.

It was Samuel who finally took pity on the kids and asked Emma if she wouldn’t mind bringing home a dog one of these days. I felt glad inside when she said she’d be tickled. A farm ought to have a dog, after all. But it worried me, just a little, to think of feeding it. We had a couple of weeks to consider that, though, before any of them were ready to leave their mother.

On the way home I wondered what had come over Samuel, favoring a puppy like he had, when just last night he was ready to pick up and leave. But I didn’t have to ask him. In the back of Mr. Post’s pickup, he slid his arm around me and whispered that he was going to try to live the life God gave us and not stew and fret for something else.

“Maybe we’re supposed to do this,” he whispered to me. “Maybe God looked down on Emma and sent us to her on purpose.”

I nodded, looking through the back window glass at the coiled gray braid resting just above Emma’s lacy collar. “She needs her farm, Sammy. And she’s claiming us like family.”

“But she’s got family already,” he said. “Some, at least. And they’ve got rights when she’s gone. That’s the way it needs to be. She offered me the deed this morning, but I can’t take it, honey. We’ll just be blessed doing what she wants as long as she’s living.” He kissed my cheek and was quiet several minutes.

Knowing what he was saying, I hoped Emma would live forever, but I couldn’t help but think of that solitary grave on the hill. Willard Graham. Waiting.

In my heart I knew that Emma wouldn’t do a thing to put off her date with heaven, that she’d come home to die as much as to live. Such an understanding made me feel all jumbled up inside, sad and happy all at the same time.

“I hope she’s with us a long while,” Sam finally said. “But when God calls her home, we’ll find a way someplace else. Just as good. I promise.”

I sat there with my head on his shoulder, thinking of Mr. Henley outside the church, and Hazel Sharpe, and anyone else who could think my husband capable of swindling an old lady. Understanding the choice Sam had made put a new fire in me.
How dare anyone think for one minute
that Sam Wortham has an ounce of cheat in him! Let them say
such a thing again, and I might have to set them down a notch
or two myself!

TWENTY-FOUR

Samuel

Julia had asked to see the school, so Mr. Post drove us past there before taking us home. The school was set back on a side road and almost hidden by trees, so it would have been hard to find on our own. The old building looked more like a church than a school, and it even had a steeple tower where the morning bell hung ready to ring. There was an outhouse on each side of the building and two separate wells, each with a bucket and a tin cup hanging from a post.

I could imagine boys playing ball on the patchy lawn, but there was nothing else in the schoolyard but a hitching bar. Apparently some of the students came to school on the back of a horse or mule. Robert seemed to like the looks of the place, and I was glad about that. He’d be anxious to start in the morning. But Sarah liked it too, especially the paper flowers in the windows. She whined a little that Elvira had said she couldn’t come till fall.

“Don’t let it trouble ya none, little missy,” Mr. Post told her. “They ain’t got even a month left a’ this year, anyhow. And your mama’ll need you at home that long.”

Sarah brightened up to think that she might have an important job ahead of her. But I wondered about books and things, and asked Juli what Robert would be needing.

“Mrs. Post said he could share till this year is out,” she said immediately, but didn’t tell me what we’d have to have by fall. Pencils and paper tablets for both kids, at the very least. We’d have to have money.

I felt unsettled, letting myself think about what was coming and all the things we’d need. New shoes for both kids, but especially Sarah, who pulled hers off every chance she got because they were starting to pinch her toes. And coats, good heavy ones, to keep the kids warm on the walk to school. We’d had coats for them last winter, but had left them behind, not having room to carry something that had come to be too small anyway.

Julia had told me when we left Harrisburg that we had the whole summer to watch God provide for us before fall. At the time, I thought she was just trying to brighten me up a little. But she’d really believed it, and we’d seen a lot provided, there was no doubt about that. But there comes a time when God expects a man to find his way, set his hands to some work, and make an honest buck.

I had to look for a job. Had to, no matter how much needed to be done on Emma’s farm. But I knew it might take a miracle to find a job. Two men from Emma’s church had been south of here somewhere working in a mine, but they’d lost their jobs. Everybody was laying off, and nobody was hiring.

I was still thinking such thoughts when we got home. I was anxious to get to work again on that fence, thinking that the sooner it was finished, the sooner I could hunt for something with pay involved. But Emma didn’t favor working on the Sabbath, just like I’d figured, and it seemed best to respect that, at least as far as she could see me.

So I took the kids to the barn to see the kittens I’d discovered that morning. And despite my worries, I was glad we were here and glad I was a father, when I saw my kids’ smiling faces down in the hay, getting so completely involved in the wonder of life. I’d thought the mother might not like us hanging around so close, but she didn’t seem to mind the kids at all. She just lay there, receiving a nursing kitten and Sarah’s gently petting hand equally well.

While they were still in the loft, I set to work on Emma’s chair. I’d drawn out what I wanted to do, but I hadn’t figured out how I’d manage the problem of mounting the chair over the wheel axle and have it stable without being clumsy as an old cart. I decided I’d get to that after I had the chair part made.

I was using a design of simple slats, like Rita McPiery’s porch swing, only smaller. I found some boards I thought I could use once they were cut to size. But I didn’t want to do any cutting right now. The kids would hear that and come to see what I was up to, and I wasn’t ready for explanations yet. So I went hunting for nails of a size to do the job right. It wasn’t easy to find any less than eight penny, but when I did, I pulled them carefully out of the boards and stored them in an old chipped cup I’d found in the straw.

Mrs. Post had sent us home with leftovers, and Julia wanted to return the favor and have the Posts over sometime. I pulled nails, thinking how that might seem to them, to come over here and eat yard greens and whatever else we might have around. They’d given us coffee, good and black, and it had tasted better than candy to me. What would they think of us, digging up the blue-flowered chicory for Julia to grind and roast and pour into their cups?

Maybe the Hammonds would understand such things. Maybe they did it themselves. But Posts and Hammonds seemed a world apart. One appearing to be well off and the other maybe as poor as we were. Considering that, I didn’t feel so bad toward George Hammond. I even said a prayer for him before going back up to the house that night.

Mr. Post and his grown son, Martin, came just after breakfast the next morning, ready to help me with the fence. They acted as if it were nothing at all for them to be so willing to help.

“That’s the way people do things around here,” Barrett said. “At least they used to. And they still should. If folks’ll help raise a barn, they oughta be willin’ to help with anything else when there’s a need. And Emma gettin’ her cows back is worth it to me.”

That comment took me by surprise. Did everybody know that Hammond still had some of her cows? And that she’d never been paid for any of them?

“Got me some good cattle off the bull Emma give me,” Post explained. “Figured I owed her one brung home. The one I promised is third generation. Come from real good stock. She’ll be good for you, no lie.”

Maybe Post didn’t know about Hammond. His was generosity repaying generosity. I could picture Emma giving away a bull; it was just the kind of thing she’d do.

Post gave me an inquiring look and then nodded his head, as if he’d decided on something important. “For an hour or two of labor,” he suddenly said. “I’d be willing to stick her in with old Beau and get her bred, if that’s what you want.”

“Bred?” How would we manage it? A cow giving birth! Julia would be thrilled, but I felt weak in the knees. “For a couple of hours labor?” I had to ask, still stunned by the man’s offer.

“I could use me some help in the field,” he told me. “Fact is, I’ll need a lot a’ help all season. Wayne Horne moved all the way to Missouri, and my boy here’s done got him another plot a’ ground, plus a pair a’ twins to keep him busy. I hired me a couple a’ boys that used to work the Scranton mine, but I’m needin’ another hand.”

I just stood there, surely looking dumb, trying to keep from falling over or bawling in front of the man. Another answered prayer, that a job would just walk up to me this way, without me even having to hunt for it. Why would God do such a thing? Why would he care?

“You mean you’re offering me work, just like that?”

Barrett gave me a nod. “I’ll swap you fencin’ for roofin’. Then you give me a hand awhile, and I’ll see you get yer cow and calf. After that, if I like the way you work, I’ll call on you time and again, for cash.”

I reached my hand to Mr. Post. “Thank you,” I managed to say. “You’ll like my work. I’ll make sure you do.”

He smiled a wide and toothy smile. “That’s what I figured. We ready to get started?”

The Posts worked fast. And Barrett talked the whole time.

“I hear they’re gonna close Lake Creek 4,” he told me. “Won’t be no workin’ mines in the whole state ’fore long! Dad blum shame! Used to set records, we did, for coal ’round here. My cousin Edmund at the New Orient says Illinois’s got more coal than all the rest of the world put together. Don’t know ’bout that, you know, but one sure thing is the world ain’t buyin’ much of it right now.”

I wondered about Dewey, who’d said he was considering applying for work at the Paulton mine. What would he do now?

“They say there’s a bank closin’ down in Marion,” Post went on. “I been keepin’ my eye on ours. Can’t trust it to be there forever. You get any money, hang onto it. Pays to keep your cash hid in days like these.”

He stopped and looked at me, silent for several moments for emphasis. “Don’t know how things was where you come from,” he said. “I hear some places is fine. But ’round here, a lot of folks is sinkin’ on account of the mines. Affects ever’body one way or another.”

I looked to the yard, where I could see Juli planting potatoes. She seemed to be hopping about, rejoicing in things just the way we had them. Did she really understand how bad things were? Barrett said the whole area was affected. Bad times were everywhere.

The worrying made me so tense that I forgot how happy I’d been just moments before when offered a job.
How can
Post afford to be hiring men? He must be even better off than he
looks. But will it last?

“Take a look next time you’re in there at that Dearing store,” Post went on, not realizing the effect he was having on me. “Prices is gone way up. And they say I might not get thirty-five cents a bushel for my wheat this year. Could be some kinda winter.”

I set an old post down hard in my fresh-dug hole and wiped the sweat off my forehead. “Get much snow around here?”

“Oh, Lordy!” Post proclaimed. “Snow! I seen it to my belt and more. ’Course, that ain’t every year. Now’s the time to think on them things, though. Got wood cut?”

“Not much.”

“There’s time. You can always do that when you ain’t got nothin’ else to do. Emma still got that nice little kerosene heater in the sittin’ room?”

“No. I haven’t seen a kerosene heater.”

“Prob’ly gave it away when she moved. That’s Emma for you. Heart a’ gold.”

I’d thought plenty about wood for the cookstove and the fireplace, but it hadn’t occurred to me that we might need more heat than that.

“You’re gonna need that outhouse shored up,” Post said, changing the subject. “It’s leanin’.”

“I’ll get to that after the fencing.”

“Always somethin’ to do, ain’t there?” He laughed and looked over at his son, who’d been working the whole time without saying a word. “Martin’s got to fix his brand-new porch! Brother-in-law come and hit smack into the corner of it with his Chevrolet coupe! Ain’t that the richest! And him thinkin’ he’s a dandy one too!”

Martin didn’t look too pleased with the mention of it. I told him I’d help him if he needed it, since he was helping me. He nodded his appreciation before walking to his father’s truck for a barrel of nails.

“That’s a good boy,” Barrett told me.

“I can tell.”

“Hang it all if his wife ain’t got him goin’ to church, though.”

Julia had sent Robert to school that morning with his lunch wrapped in newspaper, so I was a little surprised to see him walking home before noon.

“Teacher sent us home,” he told me after climbing up on our board fence. “Said she had a toothache.” He watched us for awhile, apparently waiting for the Posts to get out of earshot.