Furnace Mountain: or The Day President Roosevelt Came to Town Read online

  His matches weren’t where he left them, so he stumbled around in the darkness, trying to light his lamp.

  I think that’s the worst part of it all, he thought to himself as the lonely room was lit in an even glow–coming home to darkness.

  Chapter Eight

  SAM BUSIED HIMSELF with the dinner dishes. After clearing off the table, he neatly stacked the plates on the counter and wiped his hands on his pants.

  Ruth sat soundlessly in the front room, staring out the window. Her hands were folded neatly in her lap; her untidy hair stood from her head in auburn tangles. She had changed from her bedclothes, which Sam thought was an improvement, but her dress was worn and thin from too many washings. Sam had torn a hole in it the last time he’d washed it.

  At least it is clean, Sam reminded himself cheerfully. And she had eaten dinner with him, or eaten at all.

  “Mama?” he called loudly, lest she couldn’t hear him through her thoughts. “You need anything to drink?”

  “No,” she whispered. Her voice sounded like burnt leaves. “I'm all right.”

  Sam finished up in the kitchen and then went into the front room to sit with her. Even when she was quiet, he enjoyed the evenings when she would join him. It almost felt like old times, back when Daddy and Jonathan were still with them.

  Ruth had let the lamp burn out, and he refilled it and lit the wick without saying a word.

  With the warm glow of the lamp making the room more cheerful, Sam sat down on the floor and leaned up against his mother’s knees. They were bony and cold against him, and she didn’t smell like flowers the way she used to, but it was okay.

  “Mama, you know they had that town meeting tonight,” he began softly. He didn’t want to speak too loudly now, or too quickly, and risk ruining the moment. Sometimes, just when things were going well, something would happen to upset his mother and she’d have to return to her bed. And then he might not see her for days. “Remember? The meeting about Mr. Roosevelt?”

  “Hmmm?” Her eyes seemed to be focused on an something exciting going on outside in the front yard; only it was pitch black out there and she could see nothing but her own pale, narrow face.

  “Remember, I told you about my letter and how Mr. Roosevelt is coming here to visit?” Sam tried again. “I wrote him all about you and how you would like to meet him.”

  “That’s nice.” Ruth looked down at him but registered no emotion. Her face was blank, giving her a startlingly youthful appearance. “I think you must be mistaken. He’s coming all the way here? To Furnace Mountain?”

  “It’s true, Mama, because I wrote him a letter, see, for Miss Casteel’s class,” Sam spoke hurriedly now, forgetting his plan. He didn’t want to lose her attention. “And tonight they had a town meeting to talk about what we’re going to do. Miss Casteel says that we need to clean up the town and get ready for him. She said we might even fix up the depot.”

  Ruth smiled faintly. “That would be nice.”

  Sam’s heart dropped a smidge. He didn’t think she was really listening to him. “Well, tomorrow, us kids are gonna meet at the creek and talk about what we can do to help. Is it okay if I come home later?”

  “Don’t you have school tomorrow?”

  “School’s over, Mama,” Sam said sadly. “Remember? We don’t had our last day.”

  Ruth nodded and turned her head back to the window. Something flickered across her face, the faintest hint of a sigh, and then she spoke again. “Yes, I think that’s a good idea. You should help. I’ll be fine.”

  Sam let his disappointment slide away. Now, he smiled and leaned back up against her knee. It was more words than they had exchanged in weeks and he was happy.

  ***

  Robert Johnson tiptoed through the streets, keeping his head down as he walked in case he stumbled and missed the ground. He turned the corner by the tracks and moved along the back side of town. It would add more time to his journey home, but even in his intoxicated state he was alert enough to know that he couldn’t stand to walk by his old shop. There were nights when he didn’t mind much, but this was not one of them.

  Robert could still hear the dull roar of voices as people filtered out of the meeting room.

  Some kind of town meeting, he thought distantly. Nobody'd invited him. A long time ago he might have been asked, and might have even had something to add if he’d thought about it hard enough, but not now.

  “Hungry,” Robert mumbled. “Need me something to eat.”

  As Robert stumbled down the lane that ran to his home, he felt a fleeting moment of shame when he realized that he had probably stayed out past dinner.

  His Alice was a good girl and would have had something good to eat on the table. He hoped she left something out for him. No, he knew she would. She always did. Kept the house nice and clean, too, just like her Mama. He almost never had to ask her to do anything at all and when he got worked up and shouted, most of him knew he wasn't really mad at her.

  He groaned now, remembering that old Sturgill down at the store had told him. Robert didn’t know how he was going to tell Alice that there couldn’t be any more trips for provisions, at least not until they settled their bill. He had used up all of their credit and his last bit of money was gone, spent on drink. He’d used up her sewing money, too. Used it all.

  “Worthless,” Robert grunted as he stumbled over a rock. “Worthless and no good.”

  He was glad Alice’s mother couldn’t see him.

  Robert knew that they would need things. He didn’t know how his wife had been able to do it in the past, getting everything they needed. There just seemed to be so much. He’d taken it for granted back then–whatever they’d needed, whether it was food or fishing line or shoes, it would all just magically be there for him. He’d never asked.

  But he had worked back then and done good business, and Martha had taken care of them all.

  “Nobody cares about us folks,” he grunted. He’d read in the paper that people in some cities were getting help. They were getting food, money to live on, and even places to live. But they weren’t in Furnace Mountain. Nobody up in Washington or New York or even in Cincinnati knew about the people in Furnace Mountain, or cared about them.

  “Have to sell something. Gotta make some money,” Robert chanted. He could see the light of home on up the road. Almost there. “Gotta make some money and pay the debts. Buy Alice something nice.”

  But they only had a few things left that were worth anything and Martha’s pearls, the ones that he’d hoped to save for Alice, would have to be the next to go. He felt real bad about that, but then, Alice didn’t know about the pearls anyway so it wasn’t as if she could get her tail feathers up about it.

  So, the president was coming to visit their town. Robert smirked. He caught his balance on a tree stump and kept from sprawling over another rock. He could almost smell the bacon coming out the window. The president was in for a surprise when he arrived and found a whole lot of nothing. Robert had heard some of the men talking animatedly as they’d passed him in the street, something about rebuilding the depot and opening up some of the old shops. With what money, Robert didn’t know. His would certainly not be opening. It belonged to the bank. Pipe dreams, all of it.

  On unsteady legs, Robert turned and spat in the direction of town. He then lifted his leg to give it a kick, but he lost his balance and fell to the ground, landing in a puddle left by the evening’s rainstorm.

  Chapter Nine

  SCHOOL WAS OUT, but the schoolhouse was not empty. It was now being used as a temporary meeting center for those wishing to help plan the arrival of President Roosevelt. Marianne stood in front of the classroom, in her regular position, and surveyed the students that had shown up to volunteer.

  Despite the fact that they were no longer required to sit at their desks, they’d naturally gravitated to them. She watched them now as they whispered amongst one another, keeping their voices low out of habit. Marianne watched them, intrigued, for
she couldn’t remember the last time she was as excited about something.

  Only three children sat quietly and it was soon those she focused on. Sam sat at his usual desk in the front, paper and pencil in hand, staring intently at something that he had been working on for the past hour. Alice Johnson, on the other hand, was staring at her usual spot out the window. Nicholas Lewis was also staring–at Alice.

  Marianne smiled a knowing smile and turned away with a blush. She wondered if either one of them knew what she had known for years. Nicholas had been following Alice around the school yard since he was ten years old. From what Marianne could see, Alice had never noticed. She wondered what it would be like for them once Nicholas went to college.

  Frankly, she was surprised that either one of them had been able to leave their house to come down to the school. She wasn’t surprised to see Sam there; she wondered if his mother even noticed he was gone.

  Nicholas Lewis was without a doubt one of the brightest young people that Marianne had ever met. It was no secret that he had outgrown her classroom and she often found herself ordering materials from Cincinnati just to keep him interested in learning. His parents had wanted him to go to school in Four Tree but he had resisted, although he did travel to the county set three times a month for enrichment exercises.

  Not only was his young mind like a sponge, but he retained everything he learned. She enjoyed having him around because he challenged her in ways that the others didn’t. Although Marianne didn’t know him well outside of the classroom, he was always polite and gracious.

  Marianne remembered Robert’s shop from when it was still open. She’d coveted a bed he’d made, wistfully walking by the window and thinking, One day…

  Sometimes, she would pass by the store and see Alice as a young girl, playing on the hardwood floors or walking around town with her mother, eating peanuts or ice cream in a cone. Alice was a pretty little with her long blond hair and starched dresses and there wasn’t a person in town that went un-charmed by Martha Johnson.

  “Do you have ideas for us?” Nicholas Lewis asked, breaking her reverie.

  “Sorry, Nicholas,” she replied. “I was daydreaming there for a bit. Actually, I was thinking we could all take a walk through town together as a group and look at our town. See what you think needs to be done and what we can realistically accomplish.”

  “Like a field trip!” Sam cheered, his face lighting up.

  “Yes, Sam,” Marianne laughed. “Like a field trip.”

  There was no money for real field trips for the students, but she had taken them to the furnaces and to the depot on several occasions. They also frequently picnicked on the lawn, with Marianne herself preparing the cakes and sandwiches that were shared.

  “Is everyone ready?”

  ***

  Two blocks over, Homer sat at his own desk and contemplated the photograph of the depot. His own wife had taken the picture just a few months before she had died and Homer himself stood on the steps, proudly waving at the camera. She had loved her camera, one he’d bought back when he was still a railroad executive and money wasn’t an issue, and now he was glad that she had gone around town and taken her photographs. They were the only physical reminders that his town had once been something beautiful.

  They were a physical reminder that Louise had one lived.

  The depot had been an anomaly to the region–a beautiful, three-story homage to the abundance of trains that once traveled through the town and gave it purpose. Before the railroad, Furnace Mountain had been a tiny hamlet, hardly more than a general store and post office (both run from the same building). When the railroad came through, however, things changed. The Eastern Kentucky Headquarters had forever altered the town.

  “Homer,” he could still remember his father declaring, “big things are coming to Furnace Mountain. You’ll want to get in on the ground level.”

  And so he had.

  By the age of twenty-five, he was married, respected, and one of the most important men in the area. They’d built a beautiful home, his wife hosted parties that everyone who was anyone in the county wanted to attend, and they could afford to take trips on the line to places like Chicago and Boston.

  At that time, Furnace Mountain had just been incorporated and was a main stop on the line. The Kiwanis Club opened a chapter and Homer was president. Henry Lewis, with his family money, moved to town and started the Furnace Mountain Tribune. Shortly thereafter, his son Nicholas was born.

  Passenger rail service was at its height; trains stopped in town five times a day. The depot had been built to recognize this. It boasted two complete stories with a community room full of stained glass windows on the top. A wraparound porch that extended onto the platform was always full of onlookers as they waited in rocking chairs and on benches to watch the passengers come and go. It was the largest depot in a seven-county radius and everyone had been proud of it.

  Today, it was a decrepit mess. He could see it from his window and it was surely an eyesore. The porch had collapsed and the glass from the windows was missing. Some had simply fallen out from the rotting wood while others were broken by anger or disillusionment. Homer was sure even more were stolen for someone’s own home–something Homer had a difficult time faulting. Times were bad, indeed, and at least those were being used.

  “Louella, any word on the glass?”

  His secretary’s noncommittal response did little to boost his confidence.

  It was the glass that worried him now. Lumber would be difficult enough, but they were working on that. The labor would have to be free and he hoped that people could live up to their word, but the glass was expensive.

  At one time, Homer had earned a healthy income. When the headquarters closed and the company had left, however, they’d taken the money and his job. Oh, he’d been offered another position but it was in Nashville. Louise was already sick at that point and he was afraid of moving her. What money they didn’t need to settle their debts had been lost to her care. At the end, he would have paid anything to make her comfortable.

  “What about shutters?” he hollered again.

  “Maybe,” came Louella’s dubious response.

  Homer thought that perhaps they could get away with using shutters on the top story of the building, but they would definitely need glass for the first level and that was, he quickly counted in the picture, at least six windows.

  “Got any money, Lou?” he joked.

  That didn’t warrant a response at all.

  There was another meeting tonight and Homer didn’t want to be the one to rain on anyone’s parade. However, the subject would need to be brought up eventually. So would the topic of tools. Hammers and saws–those weren’t the problem. Nails might be, though. People didn’t want to give things up for free anymore and he couldn’t blame them.

  “It’s the little thing, the little things,” he muttered to himself.

  “What?”

  “Nothing, Lou,” Homer sighed.

  Louella entered his office and interrupted his thoughts. She was a no–nonsense woman in her mid-sixties and she had seen the town go through many changes over the course of her lifetime. She insisted that this depression was a passing phase. “It will pass, too, just like the others,” she was fond of saying when Homer was feeling the weight of the world. “You’ll see. It will pass. The only thing different this time are the people.”

  “It’s the people that worry me,” Homer would say in response.

  “I’m going to go ahead and leave for the day, Homer,” she stated. Her voice always reminded him of his childhood school teacher and he felt the urge to sit to attention anytime she walked into the room. “If I’m going to go to the church and get the lemonade and sandwiches started then I’ll need the time.”

  “Go ahead Lou,” Homer smiled. “I appreciate your hard work.”

  With a tight smile, she turned and walked out, closing the door smartly behind her. He knew that the ladies at the church had been getti
ng things ready all afternoon, but that wouldn’t have mattered to her. In Louella’s mind, nothing began until she got there.

  ***

  Alice rested on the sagging steps of her porch, Nicholas at her side. In his hands, he held a stack of papers. He rifled through them with enthusiasm, hardly paying attention to her.

  “There’s just so much to fill out,” he stated when he at last set the stack down between them. “It’s going to take me all weekend.

  “So have you decided then?”

  Nicholas nodded. “Boston, I think. I’ve been reading about it, you know, and it sounds exciting. So much history. Big, of course, but it’s right on the ocean. We went there once, you know? On vacation to Virginia Beach. I could even go out on a boat maybe. You know, when I’m not studying. Dad says that I might not even have to work but only part time. I had no idea that he and Mom had been saving for so long…”

  Nicholas continued to talk about his college admittance with little notice or regard to Alice, who was not quite sharing his enthusiasm.

  Oh, for Pete’s sake, she thought to herself. Must you really do this now? She’d been in the middle of going through her mother’s scrap fabrics, looking for things she might be able to use, and now the front room was a mess. She needed to get it cleared away before her father returned.

  If he returned tonight. More and more, he’d been staying in town with a friend or up in the hunting cabin on the mountain.

  She was proud of Nicholas, of course, for being accepted and the entire idea of going away to a school in the north and taking a train was probably exhilarating for some, but she was also wise enough to know that this would be their last summer together. Oh, of course he would come back during his breaks and would probably even return for the entire summer once his classes ended in the spring, but she knew that it would be different. He would be different. She, however, would not.