“I better take along that scarf you made me,” he said then.
I smiled a little. “Did you leave it in the workshop?”
“Prob’ly. It kinda got in the way when I was sandin’ last night.”
We went up the stairs together, and I packed the jam and pickles into the food basket with the rest of the things Mom had gotten ready. Frank started hugging everybody. Sam asked him to name off all the towns he’d be going through again, and Frank rolled his eyes in impatience.
“Don’t be turnin’ off no place without stoppin’ to ask somebody where you are,” Kirk told him, and Frank didn’t reply to that at all.
“Drive careful,” Katie added, and I felt the tears trying to come at me again, but I wouldn’t let them have their way.
“Stop when you need a break,” Mom said. “Stay warm.”
Dad didn’t say anything at all, just walked out to the truck with Frank and gave him a hug. Most of the rest of us went out to see him off too. Frank set Mom’s basket on the seat, hugged me one last time, and climbed in the truck. Both of us nearly forgot that silly scarf.
“Oh! Wait!” I called out and ran for the woodshop. It was on the hook just inside the door where I thought it would be. Last year’s birthday present from me to Frank. But that thought jarred me as I ran with the scarf back to the truck. His birthday was only about two weeks away. We might not be together on that day for the first time since his mother died when he was eight and I was only six.
With a sniff I ran to the open driver door of the truck and tossed the scarf around his neck. He smiled his gorgeous smile and pulled me close for one last kiss, in front of everybody.
“Drive careful,” I told him weakly, echoing Katie’s words and wondering if his truck had ever been half so far. He’d bought it after the war from Willis McNutt, and he’d been very proud to get it.
As he pulled away down the lane, I stood and watched with crazy worries circling around my head begging for notice. What if he missed a turn and didn’t even realize it? Or what if he had trouble with the truck that he couldn’t fix? He was so good with engines, I wasn’t sure what that could be, but the thought struck at me nonetheless. What if it got awfully cold, or even blizzard-like while he was driving? What if he got lost somewhere halfway?
Of course, he had Sam’s road map with him, clearly marked with route and destination. He’d memorized the names of the towns. If he had trouble, all he had to do was ask somebody. But I was still nervous about it. What must it be like to find the wording on road maps and signs practically incomprehensible? There was something extra odd about Frank that he hadn’t been able to master reading and writing despite his years of trying. He knew Scripture right and left. And he could quote just about anything else he’d ever heard too. It didn’t make much sense. I wasn’t sure I’d ever understand.
But I knew I should quit being fearful. Frank had a head on his shoulders. He was wise about so many things. And he knew what to do in cold weather. Lord knows he’d encountered enough of it on the farm. It wouldn’t do any good for me to keep on fretting about him like he was a child. My father seemed sure that Frank would be fine. He acted like this was just the thing to do, that it all made sense somehow.
I tried, but I didn’t know how to stop the worry. Already this morning I’d been imagining that Frank’s constant limp might be worse than usual. Was he already tired from the packing? Would the long trip wear on him too? And then how would he feel after days of moving furniture and dealing with Sam’s boisterous kids, all of whom loved climbing on him?
It didn’t seem fair that Sam would be riding in a train car while Frank drove all that way alone. But for Sam to leave Thelma alone on the train with six children or to expect her to squeeze them all into Frank’s truck for so many miles was just unworkable. Why couldn’t I let all this go from my mind? Frank had helped people move before—not so far away, of course. But he’d put in many a day of hard work, not only moving furniture, but haying, harvesting, and all number of other things. He was strong and he always managed fine despite the limp he’d had since a bad broken leg when he was nine. He never let it slow him down.
Most everybody else was turning to go back in where it was warm. Soon Sam and his family’d have to bundle up for the ride to the train station. I would’ve preferred that Frank take the train with them if he felt he had to go. Surely Sam could have found somebody up there that would let them borrow or barter the use of a truck. But Frank had wanted his truck with him.
Mom let me stand in the driveway for a minute in silence, but then she put her arm around my shoulders. “It might be a little hard on all of us,” she said softly, “to let Franky become his own man.”
I turned and stared at her. “He’s been his own man for a long time.”
She smiled. “You’ll understand what I mean. Eventually.” She started back for the house.
“Mom!”
She stopped and took my hand. “I know you love him, honey. But he’s got needs different from yours. All you have to do is respect him in it, and everything will work out fine.”
My heart was suddenly thundering. “Did he talk to you about something special?”
“No. But I’ve been seeing something working in him for quite a while now.”
What in the world could she mean? Now I was flustered wondering about that. What was working in him? Why hadn’t I seen it?
I knew about his willingness to help people that needed it, especially family. There was nothing new about that. So it must be about the job opportunity. Was something driving him away from here? Wasn’t he his own man already? My head hurt just thinking about it, but there was no way I could sort it all out now.
Frank
More than an hour into the trip I made my first stop, at Ashley, for gasoline. The sky had been clear, but now I was seeing the start of wintry-white clouds off to the west.
Felt strange to be away from home. I’d hardly been anywhere, especially not alone. God’s providence had planted me next to the farm where Sarah grew up, and through good times and hard times the Worthams had been shelter to my brothers and sisters and me. But God wasn’t calling me to stay under that same shelter all the time even though it might be easy to do. There was more. There had to be.
I checked the tie-downs on the canvas tarp covering the back of my truck. If it started snowin’, I didn’t want damage to the cedar chest and other things I was bringing along. I paid for my gas and took off for the highway again. The sky was cloudy overhead by the time I come to Nashville, Illinois, where I turned on the road going north. I knew from the look of the clouds that there was a storm threatening. Hopefully it would hold off till I got to Sam’s house and not snow back home at all, or Sarah would worry worse than she already was.
I was hungry by the time I got to Carlyle. A little road ran off from the main road toward a lake, and it seemed like the perfect place to stop despite the cold. I couldn’t drive close to the water, but I parked where I could see it. The whole lake was mostly froze and kept going far enough to make your eyes feel like they’d had exercise. That was the kind of water I liked. Big enough to make you think about the bigness of the earth and how vast God must be to make stuff like this.
“Lord God, you put things together pretty when you made this world,” I said into the wind. “A man can see that, even in winter. I want you to know I’m thankful for this trip. Use it some way. An’ use me.”
I almost forgot I’d come to eat. Mrs. Wortham’s food basket was waiting, but just as I was about to reach for it, a redbird come flying out from the bare trees to one side of the truck. A cardinal. Male. All alone, just like me.
“What are you doin’ out here?” I asked him. “You got a girl waitin’ someplace while you’re off gallivantin’ the countryside?”
The bird chirped and flew off. I helped myself to the sandwiches and three of Mrs. Wortham’s cookies. But when the wind picked up I decided I’d better move along.
It started to snow, gentle at first, as I was headed back to the main road. Past Donnellson it picked up and started getting slick. I stopped and put on the tire chains. The next town on my memorized route would be Hillsboro, but I wasn’t sure exactly how far I had to go to get there. So I coaxed the truck along slow for a while, not wanting to just sit by the roadside and wait. That was the only time I considered that driving so far alone might not a’ been the best idea, but the notion didn’t stick in me long. Would’ve been ignorant to stay home just because it might snow, or some other such worry. I pulled into the next café I saw for a cup of coffee and a chance to warm up awhile.
The place smelled like bacon even though it was the middle of the day. With checkered tablecloths and a radio playing “Don’t Fence Me In,” the café seemed ready for a crowd, but it was almost empty. The waitress reminded me a little of Sarah Jean, with her long brown hair pulled back. She brought me my coffee and sat at the end of a long counter. There wasn’t but one other customer in the place, an elderly fellow bent over a newspaper. What might today’s paper be saying? More about the reconstruction in Europe? Or the Communist threat, or studies of the new drug called penicillin?
Sometimes it annoyed me awful that I couldn’t read about such things for myself. And with that trouble plus my limp and folks otherwise thinkin’ me peculiar, nobody seemed to believe I could manage on my own. Everybody expected me to settle as close as I could to Mr. Wortham and work with him like I’d been doin’ since I was a kid, so I wouldn’t fall flat on my face someplace else.
I downed my coffee in a hurry, trying to clear my head a’ thoughts like that. The radio started playing “Accentuate the Positive,” and I decided to move on. No use waiting on the weather. The snow wasn’t deep yet, and roads were passable, even with the drifts. Gettin’ to the next town’d be relief because I’d have more than half the trip behind me.
I went through Pawnee and straight north. Not another soul was on that road. Barren snow-covered fields run along both sides of the road, and in some places it was hard to tell where road stopped and field started.
Six miles like that, and I seen a dark shape off in the ditch. A four-door coupe up against the fence line. I slowed down, knowing the road must be slick. The car’d hit a fence post. A big fellow was in the driver seat. I couldn’t see nobody else, and I hoped the man wasn’t hurt ’cause I didn’t know where nothin’ was up here to get help. Maybe all he’d need was a ride to the next town. I pulled up close and stopped. And then I heard crying. A child. And someone else was moving now in the front seat, their head bowed and bloody. This wasn’t gonna be so simple as I’d hoped.
Lord, have mercy.
Sarah
Our house seemed strangely empty now. Mom and Katie and I were cleaning up after Sam’s wild and messy bunch. Dad had taken them to the train on his way to work, and I tried not to let it bother me that the sky had gradually filled with clouds. About mid-morning, we heard a ruckus. Something had our chickens frantic. Mom and I grabbed our coats and ran outside to see what the matter was, expecting to scare off a fox. But it was no fox this time. Something big had bent down part of the fence and broken one of the chicken-house windows. One hen was gone and one was wounded.
Whatever it was left a flurry of feathers and a mottle of blood behind. Strange for something to be out hunting in the broad daylight like this. I propped the fence as best I could without Dad there to fix it, and fetched a board to nail over the window. Katie came from the house to find out what was keeping us and see if she could help.
“We’ll have to be watchful for the chickens after dark,” Mom said. “Whatever did this is liable to come back.”
“What do you think it was?” Katie asked.
“Stray dog. Too big to get through the chickens’ door. It was desperate to try breaking through the window. If you see it, keep your distance, all right?”
Mom was calm when she said it, but we took her seriously. We were used to foxes coming around so that wasn’t much cause for alarm. But this dog was a lot bigger than a fox. We found evidence of that before we went inside. One huge paw print in what was left of last week’s snow. I set my gloved hand down beside the track, and my hand was only a little bigger. That was one big dog.
Dad was supposed to be back by supper, and Mom said we should wait on evening chores until he got home. I usually pitched in, or even did the evening chores myself on days Dad was working in town. Kate’d help too, when she wasn’t working at the five-and-dime. But it’d be dark by chore time, and Mom didn’t seem to want us out after dark. We didn’t argue. We just went back inside to our work, and the house seemed even more empty than it had before.
Once we’d gotten things out of disarray and Mom had settled by the fire in the sitting room with the mending, Katie went back out to check the mail. She always did in the middle of the day when she was home. Her boyfriend wrote a lot of letters, and she was often rewarded for the jaunt down the lane and back.
I had just finished mopping the kitchen floor and she’d taken the bucket outside with her to dump for me. In a little while, I was measuring flour for muffins, but she still wasn’t back. She wouldn’t have to wait down by the road for the mailman. He’d have gone by a long time ago. So what could be keeping her?
I looked out the window by the cupboard but didn’t see anything. So I was on my way to check the window closest to the door when I thought I heard her voice.
“Sarah—”
I yanked open the door and looked out. She was by the well, but she wasn’t alone. The biggest, blackest dog I’d ever seen stood between her and the house with its head lowered and its neck hairs standing up all scruffy. It looked almost like a black bear, and it wasn’t one mite friendly. I knew without even seeing from the front that he was baring his teeth at her, and that got my blood racing. I stepped out into the frosty air, and Katie saw me.
“Sarah—”
“Back up slow to the barn,” I told her. “I’ll run him off.”
She took a step back, but the dog matched with a step in her direction. I yelled, but it ignored me. I tried throwing a stick at it and yelling some more, but I missed, and it ignored me again. So I ran to get the hunting rifle my brother Robert had left for us. I didn’t know what else to do. Surely one shot into the air would be enough to startle this creature and make it turn tail and run.