No Small Victory

Copyright © 2010 by Connie Brummel Crook
EPub edition copyright © August 2011
Published in Canada by Fitzhenry & Whiteside,
195 Allstate Parkway, Markham, Ontario L3R 4T8

Published in the United States by Fitzhenry & Whiteside,
311 Washington Street, Brighton, Massachusetts 02135

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Fitzhenry & Whiteside acknowledges with thanks the Canada Council for the Arts, and the Ontario Arts Council for their support of our publishing program. We acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Canada Book Fund (CBF) for our publishing activities.

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Crook, Connie Brummel
No small victory / Connie Brummel Crook.

For ages 8-12.

ISBN 978-1-55455-169-9
eISBN 978-1-55455-977-0
I. Title.

PS8555.R6113N6 2010 jC813'.54 C2010-900232-6

U.S. Publisher Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Crook, Connie Brummel.
No small victory / Connie Brummel Crook.
[160 ] p. : cm.
ISBN: 978-1-55455-169-9 (pbk.)
eISBN: 978-1-55455-977-0
1. Courage – Juvenile fiction. 2. Teenage boys – Juvenile fiction. I. Title.
[Fic] dc22 PZ7.C766Ns 2010

Cover and interior design by Erik Mohr
Cover image: iStockphoto.com/Imagine Golf (Farm), iStockphoto.com/VegaBlue (Girl)

With fondest memories to my friends,
Madeleine Davidson Kempt and Archie Davidson
and in memory of Muriel Humphries Bowman

Acknowledgements

My many thanks to the following:

My grandson, Ryan Floyd, for composing the poem to match the original chant, Here Come the Kids from Bug Town.

Eileen Balfour, of Peterborough, for expert advice from her own experience in raising chicken flocks past and present.

Patti Gordon, for showing me her lovely farm home, originally the setting for this book.

Brenda Mancini, Administrative Assistant at P.C.V.S., for details about Dr. H.R.H. Kenner, Principal at Peterborough Collegiate and Vocational School (1908–1943).

John Chesney B.A., outdoorsman and teacher for 35 years, who described visits of a student's pet crow to his classroom at Grove Public School in Peterborough.

Grietje R. McBride, B.Sc., teacher for 33 years, for very helpful detailed editorial suggestions in the beginning chapters of the text.

Robert C. McBride, B.Sc., M.Ed., a teacher, librarian, principal, and consultant in Gifted Education for 32 years, and now editor of the national magazine, The Loyalist Gazette. His enthusiasm, as one of my students many years ago and now as a reader of my books and this text in particular, has been most helpful. He has always been and still is a great source of encouragement.

Robert Bruce of Belleville, a retired O.P.P. officer who mapped the route for the journey from Massassaga to Lang at that time.

Dr. & Mrs. J. Sheppard, Peterborough neighbours, who visited an elderly doctor, to inquire regarding the medications used in the 1930s and before. Thanks especially to Liz who tabulated those notes for me.

Ann Featherstone, of Featherstone Editing Services, whose suggestions for cutting/adding to my story made all the difference in making it marketable, and

Christie Harkin, Editor of Children's Books, and Sharon Fitzhenry, Publisher of Fitzhenry & Whiteside, for their support and encouragement.

ONE:
BONNIE AND HER SHADOW

Bonnie awoke suddenly to strange sounds below her tiny bedroom. Jumping up, she crept out into the small hallway. She started down the steep pine stairs, still in her pyjamas. It was dark, but through the window in the front door below, she could see figures moving about the yard. She could hear her father's voice. Something was going on.

“Those two are hard-working beasts, but they're not used to long shifts. So I told Elvin not to push them. I'll be needing them to plant crops at the new place.”

New place? Bonnie didn't know anything about a new place. Her heart sank. She loved it here in the Massassaga community, surrounded by stately maple trees and gentle fields of peas and tomatoes. But Father's crops had failed this year, and there was something called a
debt.
Her mother and father talked about it every night after supper—even while she was at the table.

She crept down the remaining stairs and opened the front door. Shadow would come. Beautiful, sleek, and black, he had a diamond-shaped white spot under his chin and another on the tip of his tail. Every night she would sneak out of bed to let him in. Then she'd smuggle him under her quilt and fall asleep to the sound of his contented purring.

“Shadow…” she whispered. “Shadow…come here!”

Something moved under the lilac bush. Good, there he was. He'd come toward the door in a moment, maybe once things quieted down a bit.

“Good thing Elvin left here with time enough to get your wagon through Belleville this morning before too many other wagons and cars were moving about.” It was Grandpa O'Carr, her mum's father. What was he doing here in the middle of the night?

“Hopefully, with a full-day's head start, we'll get our farm supplies to the new place just after we get through with the rest. And I was careful not to overload the wagon.”

“I hope the daytime traffic didn't spook the horses too much,” said Grandpa. “Those motor cars would startle the steadiest horse.”

“They're the way of the future. Soon there won't be a horse left on any farm,” said Dad.

“You and your new-fangled machinery,” grumbled Grandpa. “You think you can push a button and get all your farming done before noon!”

“By George, a bit of good machinery would help. But I can't afford it.”

“Humph. You'll never get machinery shipped that far north, anyway!”

“It's not that far!” Dad protested. “We'll have a beautiful brick home with a small orchard and a garden…and the rent is very reasonable.”

“That may be, but in those parts! The land will be hard to till; it's full of hills and rocks—like the ones you've got in your head for picking that place.”

Bonnie could hear low mumbling and shuffling coming from the kitchen. Uncle Adam and Uncle Marsh emerged, lugging a huge box. So Dad's brothers were here, too. It was practically a family reunion! And they had put her to bed to sleep through it all.

Bonnie stepped out and crouched behind the cedar bush till her uncles had passed by. Then the moon shone out from behind a cloud. Now she could see her way around to look for Shadow. She whispered in a low voice, “Shadow! C'mon, Shadow!”

The September night was cool but she didn't care if she caught a cold. Was this really going to be her last night at home? She must find Shadow. They would need to stick together. Would that new place be as bad as Grandpa O'Carr said?

Bonnie and her Shadow. Dad had thought of both names. Beatrice was Bonnie's real name, and Mum wanted to call her Bea. “She'll be my little helper,” she'd said. “Busy as a bee, just like her mother.” But Dad had won out. At first sight of the baby in the cradle, he'd declared she was a bonnie lass, and so all the Browns called her Bonnie. Soon everyone did.

“You know, there's no call to be moving out of your home—lock, stock, and barrel—in the middle of the night.” Grandpa's voice boomed out over the dooryard as men carried the dining-room table to Uncle Adam's cattle truck. Bonnie could hear the cows shuffling and mooing. Was the good furniture going to be packed right next to the cows? She hoped they had a partition between them. “I bought those things when you married my daughter and I still have the receipts. By law, they belong to me. It's a real shame that you're losing your farm because you can't meet those mortgage payments, but I'll see you don't lose anything else. They'll not get their hands on your beds and tables. They're mine.”

“Are you sure?” Dad sounded worried. “What about the tax collectors?”

“My taxes are paid, so the same holds true,” said Grandpa. “I won't let anyone take away your furniture.”

“Well, I'm glad someone's doing well.”

“It's not your fault, son. It's this miserable Depression. And it can't last forever.”