A Story for Eloise Read online

  “Good. Your Pa sounds like a smart man. Takes a smart man to appreciate what school can do for you. He probably wants you to learn what he did in school.”

  The boy made no response and Mike sensed an uneasiness in him regarding the entire conversation.

  “Name's Mike Maltby.”

  “Jamie Sadler. We live about halfway up the mountain on this lane.”

  The boy lapsed into silence again and after a long silence it was apparent he was wrestling with something in his mind. Finally he asked, “How far'd you get in school?”

  “Master’s degree in business administration with a minor in electrical engineering.”

  “A what?”

  Mike smiled and responded, “That means I studied two years after college and got another degree.”

  Jamie responded with awe in his voice, “I didn't know you could go further than college.”

  “You can. If you want,” Mike said and continued, “what grade you in?”

  “High School. Sophomore this year.”

  “Figured you'd be about in high school.”

  “Can someone learn to read if they are old?”

  “Sure. If they want to work at it a little. It's easier when you are young, but you can do it when you are old. He responded and continued, “but you said you could already read.”

  “I can, but my....”

  He stared at the boy, waiting, and thinking. After a few minutes of silence it occurred to him what the problem might be. What might be troubling the boy.

  Mike decided to try the head on approach. He was only passing through after all. “It's your Pa ain't it? Your Pa can't read. Can he?”

  Jamie said nothing.

  Mike continued, “So what's the problem? He can learn. Lots of people learn to read when they are older. Lots of people in this world still can't read. He ain't alone.”

  “Pa's too proud and stubborn. It'd kill him if he knew I and my sister knew he couldn't read. Ma made us promise not to tell, but it's been eating away at me. I seen you and for some reason I thought my prayers might have been answered. Don't ask me why I thought that, because I don't know. It's just that when I seen you in town I thought you might be the answer.”

  Mike responded carefully, “Look, Jamie. I'm just passing through. I'd like to help you, but I'm no teacher and I'm not the answer to anyone's prayers. I got my own problems. Your Pa will learn when he is ready. You wait and see.”

  “Ain't time for that.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Nothing. Got to go,” he said and as quickly as he stood up he was gone into the woods and out of sight.

  After he had left, Mike cleaned up his campsite and went to bed. Sleep would not come, however. He kept seeing the earnest plea in Jamie's face and sleep would not come.

  As he lay awake he realized why there was no mailbox at the end of the lane to tell him of a farm up the road. Why be interested in mail if you couldn't read it anyway. He could see how it might cause difficulties for a grown man trying to hide his inability to read from his children to have mail delivered at his farm. The kids might notice eventually that their father didn't read the mail. This way he supposed Sadler could assign his wife or the kids to retrieve the mail in town and it would probably already be read before he got to it.

  ~*~

  In the morning he did not leave. He just sat around the cold ashes of the previous night’s fire, thinking of Jamie and his illiterate father. He was struck with pity for a grown man who was so ashamed of his lack of education that he had to work so hard to hide it from his children. But he knew that showing his pity would be the worst thing anyone could do. All morning his mind returned to Jamie and his father. After noon when he started his motorcycle he turned it up the lane to the farm, instead of down to the hard road.

  He still didn't know why he was doing this, but he did know that he could not betray to anyone that he had inside information on the problem here. He had to act as if everything was new and strange to him and play the whole scene by ear. He had to pretend to know nothing about Jamie or his father until the information was revealed to him in due course.

  By the time he had set his mind back to being a total stranger without any knowledge of the area or the people, he was topping out the last rise to the Sadler farm. He could see the cabin as he crested the last of the hill up to a plateau. On his right was a field of corn with a split rail fence fronting it between the field and the road.

  Farther along the plateau, but still on the right was a barn and behind it a small shed that probably contained harness and tools. To his left and even with the cabin was a chicken coop in bad repair. He did not see a well or well house, but assumed it could be behind the cabin which was directly in front of him and sat up against the side of the mountain. Probably just a hill to these folks, he thought, but it was a mountain to him.

  The hillside, or mountain was covered with deep woods and sloped back and up from the cabin for at least a quarter of a mile, in his estimation. Since the cabin was located on the east side of the mountain he figured the mountain provided adequate shelter against the cold winter winds.

  Additionally, he noted the plateau was only that and was surrounded by hills on the north and south. Those hills or mountains, as he still thought of them, were much more distant than the one behind the cabin, but still close enough and high enough to break a strong winter wind. The plateau itself probably only took up about seven or eight acres in all and about half of that was used up by the barnyard and buildings. Two or three acres of the cornfield were relatively flat, but then it dropped out of sight over the plateau and rose again about a quarter of a mile farther on. Another field was on his left and it also dropped out of site not far past the chicken coop.

  He had expected a rather isolated place, but this was beyond even his imagination. The road that he had ridden up seemed to be the only way in or out and how it was travelled in a snowstorm or high water he could not fathom. The road was a 45-degree incline in most places and the creek that ran across it about halfway down looked like it would be out of its banks more than it was in them.

  The cabin was small, but looked snug and well kept up to him. It had a long, roofed porch across the front of it with windows on each side. Apparently there was a window for the living room and kitchen combined, he guessed and one for a bedroom toward the front of the cabin, on the chicken coop side. Probably a bedroom in the back, too, he thought, or maybe two if the cabin is deep enough. The cabin is just that, he mused, a cabin, mud chink and all. Wood shingled roof with nary a board painted anywhere. This is really back woods living, and he began to wonder, if he did talk this Sadler into keeping him around, where he would even sleep. A barn could get a might cool this time of year. Well, he thought, I'll cross that bridge when I get there, if I get there.

  Mike was close to the cabin now and was planning on heading right up to the front door when he caught some movement off to his right. He turned to look and saw that a man was out in the cornfield walking between the rows. The man was obviously picking corn by hand. That makes sense, he thought. After all, it is October and it is time to get the crops in from the field. He stopped the bike, climbed off, turned, and headed toward the field, trying to calculate just which row the man was in so that he could intercept him.

  The man, who he took to be Sadler, was walking towards the cabin and Mike walked out to meet him. The man was concentrating on his work and did not see him approach until he was about 30 feet away. The man looked up with a start and stopped dead in his tracks. Obviously, he was surprised to see someone walking down the same row of corn he was in and Mike could see why. He was willing to bet Sadler rarely got a visitor way up here and when he did it was probably bad news.

  “Howdy,” Mike said amiably. “Name's Mike Maltby and would you be Mr. Sadler?”

  “Might be. Why?” the man responded very cautiously.

  Mike continued just as amiably as before, “I'm just pass'n through. Head'n my way south
and was hoping to find some work over the winter.”

  “Ain't got no money for no hired hands,” the man said flatly and decisively.

  “I know what you mean. I got no money either, but I don't want no pay, just a place to hole up for the winter. I can do 'bout anything you need doing and I'd admire to have some place out of the cold to wait out the winter.”

  “Ain't winter yet,” the man responded, still cautious. “You got time to get on down south a piece before it gets really cold.”

  “Yep. I could do that if I had me money to live when I got there and gas money to get there, but I got only what I'm carrying and no money. I'm afraid I ain't got the gas to get clear of these mountains before it gets really cold. I don't take to no charity so I ain't about to ask no folk for help at any of them there shelters.” He was doing his best to talk hill folk, but it was a foreign tongue to him.

  At the last, the man said, “pride, now, I understand that. Men don't take no charity. Men work and take care of their own. The day a man can’t take care of his own without handouts then that's the day he isn't a man no more.”

  “Yep, guess that’s pretty much it,” Mike replied.

  “Got no place for anyone to sleep. All the rooms is took. There’s a room above the back of the cabin in a loft, but it ain’t fit to use right now, all junked up.

  Mike figured the man just didn’t want a stranger that close to his family and didn’t blame him so he said, “a barn or shed would be okay.” Mike wasn’t over-joyed though, he knew how cold a barn or shed could be. Then again, it wasn't quite winter yet and blankets together with his sleeping bag would do in place of a fire, for a while.

  “Well…you know anything about farming?”

  “To be honest, Mr. Sadler I never done a lot of farming. My folk raised some horses from time to time, so I know about animals and the like, but I never done much fieldwork. You show me what to do though and I'll do it. Hard work don't bother me none at all. I can do a lot of lifting and carrying. Split'n wood and stacking it, well, that’s just second nature to me, too,” he said earnestly, if not completely truthfully. He had chopped some wood, but only for a fireplace, and then only when no one else could be found to do it. Hard work to Mike was a 10-hour day on the telephone.

  “The fare ain't real good around here. Don't got much food in the winter months. I do some hunting occasionally.”

  “I'm a fair hand with a rifle or shotgun,” Mike said and continued, “might be I could give you a hand there, but I don't know the area and I couldn't get too far away as I might get lost. Though I traipsed around some rough country and if I was careful I could get far enough out to find some game I expect.” He was less than a fair hand, he knew, but he was selling an image, not a reality.

  Selling images rather than reality had always been his specialty. Besides, even if he had been a good shot he wouldn't have told this man. He knew that as soon as you told a “ridge runner” you were a good shot then he would put you to the test and make a liar out of you. Most of these hill folk could knock the wings off of a fly at 400 yards.

  “Well, so long as you know.”

  Mike took that to mean he was hired or at least, on trial, so he said, “here let me give you a hand, Mr. Sadler. Plenty of daylight left to get some work done in.” And he went to picking corn.

  “Name's Jake.”

  “Okay, Jake and I'm Mike. You pick 'em all and sort 'em out later?”

  “Yep,” Jake said, as he again started picking corn.

  After about 30 minutes of picking, Mike had decided that he might not stay alive around here long enough to teach Jake anything. He was having to really move to keep up with Jake and he had probably been at this since 5:00 a.m. Still, Mike picked as fast as he could. He figured he was on trial and he wanted to make sure that Jake knew he wasn't afraid to work. Although he was already feeling the protests of muscles he had not only not used lately, but never used. Getting up in the morning would probably be his biggest accomplishment.

  While he was picking he noticed two kids come up the gravel road from school. The boy, whom he recognized as Jamie, headed for the two men in the field as soon as he topped the rise.

  “Howdy, Pa. Need some more help?” Jamie said warily, looking at Mike, but saying nothing to him or giving any indication of recognizing him.

  “Got no homework, boy?” Jake asked flatly.

  “Sure, Pa. You're right. I'll get to it. See you at supper,” he said, obviously trying hard to hide his disappointment that his father's first greeting had not been what he had expected.

  It was obvious to Mike that Jamie had wanted his father to say “howdy” back and to take the time to ask how school went or thank him for his offer to help and then gently remind him that school work needed to be done first. But he got the impression that there wasn't much of that around here. Jake was a gruff sort of guy. Not intentionally, Mike figured, but because he had so much to do to keep the mouths fed around here. He surmised that Jake didn't have much time for small talk or to think about hurt feelings. Mike had been there also.

  That’s another important part of education that Jake had missed, he thought. That type of education could be more important than reading. Especially, when you had a boy wanting so much to be a man and you didn't take the time to help him. Too much of that could break a young boy's spirit and a broken spirit might never heal. Mike's education on that subject had been a little late in coming, too.

  Such were his thoughts as he hit the end of the row he was on and watched Jamie enter the front door of the cabin without the vigor and spunk normally associated with a young boy just home from school.

  He and Jake continued to pick corn as fast as each could and each seemed to be trying to outdo the other. Finally, when he was about to slack the pace or drop in his tracks, he heard a bell from the house.

  Jake said, “that means it's about supper time. Janice, that's my wife, she rings that bell about a half hour before eat'n time so I can get finished up and cleaned up.” He stopped and looked toward the west which was mostly mountainside and continued, “be dark soon any ways. Gets that way in these mountains early. That's the trouble with farming right up against a mountain. Looks like the sun is down a half hour before it is. Best get this load of corn up to the crib. While we are there I'll show you around and you can stake you out a corner of the barn to sleep in.”

  After hauling the load of corn up to the crib where it could be quickly unloaded in the morning, Jake showed him the barn and Mike selected an out-of-the-way corner covered with fresh straw.

  “I'll have the wife rustle you up some more blankets after supper. Gets mighty cold up here in these foothills this time of year. The straw will help keep you warm though. Sleeping with the animals don't bother you none does it?” Jake finished questioningly.

  “I was raised with horses. Many a time I slept out with the horses when I was a kid. Get used to the smell,” Mike ended with a chuckle which brought the first hint of a smile to Jake's face that he had seen. Images, he said to himself, people buy images, not reality.

  “Well, you get settled, then come on in the house for supper. You can wash up inside. I rigged a pipe into the house from a spring up yonder,” he said pointing up the slope. “We ain't got much, but we got running water, even if it is cold,” he finished, with obvious pride in his voice.

  ~*~

  Mike took his time arranging the few things he had packed along with him figuring Jake would want to have a little time to explain his presence without him being around. Hill folk didn't trust easy and Jake was hill folk through and through.

  “Mike, this is my wife, Janice, and the two young’ens there is Jamie and Eloise,” he said, as Mike entered the front door of the cabin.”

  “Howdy,” Mike said simply.

  “Nice to meet you,” Janice said casually as she pointed toward the front of the house and to his left and continued, “you can wash up for supper in yonder.”

  “Thank you, ma'am,” he sa
id as he headed for the corner room, which turned out to be a fairly well equipped indoor bathroom not a front bedroom. He looked around in the bathroom and was amazed at what Jake had done with it. There actually was running water, although none hot, but for this cabin in the woods with no electricity it was quite an accomplishment. He figured the water pressure, such as it was, came from the water being fed down a narrow pipe from a spring high up on the slope.

  There was a toilet in the room, too, but just how it flushed and where it went he was not certain. Didn't matter anyway, since he would be using the old outhouse out by the barn. Quite ingenious though, he thought. Jake may not have much formal education, but he sure had to have some brains to figure out this arrangement. He also wondered at how, with a little ingenuity, life could be made better even for a dirt-poor family. That concept was also foreign to him. He had so long been rich, he could not relate to being poor.

  By the time he had finished washing up, dinner was on the table and the kids were lining up to take their places. Jamie indicated that Mike could sit next to him. Mike knew Jamie already, but couldn't let on. This boy has real grit, he thought, if his father would just recognize him a little more and show him a thing or two, he could turn out to be a real man.

  During supper Jake said to Janice, “Janice, you need to dig up a couple of extra blankets for Mike. Gets mighty cold out in that barn, even this time of year.”

  “Sure, Jake, I got some real heavy ones that'll do just fine,” she said, but her look betrayed the fact that she was about as fond of the idea of Mike sleeping in that cold barn as he was.

  However, Mike knew that in this part of the country the men folk did the master minding around the house. That, of course, is not strictly true, he thought. The women really did the planning and thinking, but were quiet about it. The women had their ways of getting their thinking adopted and their plans implemented without making a fuss over it and without making their husbands mad. For right now though, he figured Janice would go along with Jake. Probably, she was putting him on trial, too and she wasn't going to make a fuss over him unless he earned the right to be fussed over.

  “What grade you in, Jamie?” Mike asked nonchalantly.