The Braxtons of Miracle Springs

by Michael Phillips

  Again we became silent around the table.

  The magnitude of what Christopher had been telling us struck us all over again.

  What a wonderful thing it was!

  None of us could believe it . . . though of course we did believe it! I think every one of us wanted to run right over to Mr. Jones’ cabin right then and give him a big hug, but of course it was way past dark by now and much too late.

  “God bless the dear, dear man!” said Almeda after some time had passed.

  The words were scarcely out of her mouth when Ruth bounded rambunctiously through the door from having dinner with her three cousins—Erich, twelve, Joan, nine, and Jeffrey, six.

  “Hey, Ruthie!” said Pa, getting out of his chair and scooping her up into a great big bear hug. “Your Uncle Nick at home?”

  “Yes, Pa.”

  “How’d you like to do something for me?”

  “Sure, Pa.”

  “Would you run back up to your aunt and uncle’s and tell them we gotta see them as soon as they can get down here?”

  “Why, Pa?”

  “You tell them we got some big news they’re going to want to hear.”

  Pa put her down on the floor, and she was off again with even more energy than she had made her arrival with.

  Gradually the house quieted once more.

  “Well, Christopher, I gotta say it again,” said Pa, “I am deeply in your debt for what you’ve done. I want you to know how much it means to me. I see how what Almeda said a while ago is true—I couldn’t have helped ol’ Alkali see it all so clear as you’ve done.”

  There wasn’t anything more perfect to be said. We had always loved Mr. Jones so much. He was like one of the family.

  Now he truly was one of the family!

  Chapter 25

  Idle Gossip

  The morning after Christopher’s talk with Mr. Jones, the old prospector showed up at breakfast bright-eyed and smiling. He didn’t say anything about what had happened and neither did anyone else. But it was obvious he was happy about it and pleased with himself. He might have even tried to comb his hair, but I couldn’t quite tell, and I didn’t want to ask. If he had, the attempt wasn’t too successful, which was hardly a surprise because I doubt it had been combed since he was a boy!

  Mr. Jones was eager and ready to get to the mine, though he was coughing quite a bit and didn’t seem altogether well enough to work. But after what had happened, Pa wasn’t about to say anything about shutting down the mine. So everything went on as usual, and gradually we all fell back into our old ways.

  The men resumed work at the mine pretty much like before. I think the change in Alkali Jones had more to do with it than anything, because Pa still hadn’t made any more of a firm decision about the future. They didn’t find any more gold, however, and I couldn’t help wondering how long the mining would last.

  Summer came, and the weather got hot.

  I visited Jennie Woodstock another time or two. Things hadn’t gotten any better between her and Tom that I could see.

  Christopher had done his best to strike up some kind of relationship with Tom, but without much success. Tom had seemed genuinely appreciative of Christopher’s help with the fence work, but afterward he hadn’t seemed any more inclined to talk or establish a friendship. Some people are receptive to spiritual things, some are just uninterested, and still others seem to resent them. I was gradually getting the idea that Tom was the last kind. I think he resented Christopher, even though Christopher never said anything about the Lord at all, just because he knew where Christopher stood in his faith.

  Christopher and I continued to visit other people, in addition to Jennie and Tom. We also took long rides on horseback in the late afternoons and warm evenings, exploring places even I’d never been before.

  Several days a week I rode in to town to help Almeda at the Hollister Supply Company. Back when we first met Almeda, this was her business, the Parrish Mine and Freight. But after she married Pa and the business gradually changed from supplying miners to supplying farmers and townspeople, she and Pa decided to change the name. Half the time, though, we still called it the Mine and Freight.

  It was a little funny, because now that I was married, Almeda insisted on paying me a wage along with the other workers. I objected at first, but eventually I had no choice but to give in.

  “It’s only fair, then,” I said finally, “if you pay me to work for you, that Christopher and I pay you and Pa something in return for letting us live in the bunkhouse.”

  “That’s between Christopher and your father,” laughed Almeda. “As long as I’m running the Mine and Freight, you’re working for me, and I’m going to pay you—and accept nothing in return except good honest work.”

  “All right,” I laughed, “you win!”

  One day when I was in town and business was slow and there wasn’t much to do, I took an hour off and walked about and went into some shops. I happened to be in the Mercantile, away from the counter and with my back to the door looking at some fabric, when Mrs. Sinclair and Mrs. Gilly walked in. That they had no idea I was anywhere within sight or hearing was soon more than obvious.

  “ . . . how they can all stay there together when the children are grown and well past marrying age is beyond me,” Mrs. Gilly was saying as they walked in and the door shut behind them. “It’s just unnatural.”

  At first I paid little attention, having no idea who they were talking about, until the town’s most energetic gossip spoke up in reply.

  “I certainly would not have wanted mine to stay at home. I was glad to get my own four girls married off as soon as possible.”

  “Let their husbands have the trouble, I always say.”

  “They’ve always been a bit of a strange bunch, to my way of thinking,” Mrs. Sinclair went on, “ever since the Parrish woman took on that Hollister clan and tried to reform that father of theirs.”

  My face reddened, and my ears perked up, and immediately I wished I could find a hole to crawl into. Better yet, a mole tunnel like Pa had talked about, so that I could burrow right out of that shop!

  The lady at the counter, Mrs. Tarrant, wasn’t someone I knew very well, and she had been occupied when I came in. So she didn’t know I was in the shop and so did nothing to alert the two gossips. I had no choice but to stand there listening, out of sight, and look for a chance to make my getaway without being seen.

  “ . . . and that young Becky,” Mrs. Gilly went on, lowering her voice now that they were inside. “Why she isn’t married yet I can’t imagine.”

  “ . . . pretty enough, but . . . must be something they aren’t saying. . . .”

  I was doing my best not to listen, to block their busybodying voices out of my ears, but it was impossible. Especially when a moment later I heard my own name mentioned!

  “What about Corrie and that husband of hers?”

  “He doesn’t seem in too big a hurry to carry his own load, just staying there mooching off the folks.”

  “ . . . don’t know what to think.”

  I was furious! But now I had to stay calm to hear whatever else they might say.

  “ . . . thought it was a good match at first, despite the man’s peculiar views about courtship and marriage.”

  “ . . . an unusual one. . . .”

  “ . . . can’t help but wonder, what with them living right there with her parents—and in the barn, from what I hear!”

  “ . . . can’t mean it!”

  “That’s what I hear.”

  “ . . . well I never. . . .”

  “ . . . don’t know whether to believe it. Whoever heard of such a thing!”

  “ . . . and that Drummond Hollister . . . promising future in Sacramento . . . turning his back on it and returning to mining. . . .”

  “ . . . at his age. . . .”

  “ . . . and a played-out mine at that!”

  “ . . . goes to show, some men never change. . . .”

  “ . . . got
the gold fever again . . . probably be running off and leaving his family again just like he did when he was in the East. . . .”

  “There always was something strange about the whole clan . . . when the children first came down . . . father wouldn’t even claim them.”

  “What about Almeda Parrish? Acting like a man . . .”

  “ . . . wearing pants and running a freight company . . .”

  “ . . . how I hear it . . .”

  At that point Mrs. Tarrant greeted the two women and asked if they needed help. They thanked her but said they just wanted to look about, then continued on with the real purpose behind their shopping trip—catching up with one another on all the town gossip!

  “ . . . and that Jennie Woodstock—she wanted that husband so bad, you’d think she’d at least work a little harder to keep him. . . .”

  “ . . . seems like a nice enough young man. . . .”

  “ . . . well, do you know what I hear?”

  I couldn’t stand another word! By this time I didn’t care if they saw me or not—I had to get out of there!

  I put down the bolt of fabric and walked to the front of the store, along the aisle next to the window, opened the door quickly, and hurried outside, taking in several big lungfuls of air to calm myself. Then I half-ran across the street and back to the Supply Company.

  I didn’t know whether to be hurt or angry, and I must confess to probably more of the latter than was good.

  I was distracted most of the afternoon, but by the time I got home and told Christopher, I was ready to laugh about it with him.

  It was a hot evening, much too warm to cook and eat inside. We invited Uncle Nick and Aunt Katie and the cousins down for a barbecue. Pa cooked up a side of beef over the fire pit, and we ate together and talked outside between the house and the bunkhouse, sitting on makeshift benches and chairs from the house.

  I recounted what I’d heard, without telling the names of the gossipers and of course without mentioning a word about what they’d said about Becky. By the time I was done, everyone was laughing hard.

  “Mrs. Sinclair and Mrs. Gilly, eh?” said Uncle Nick.

  “I didn’t say who it was.”

  “You don’t have to, Corrie!” laughed Aunt Katie. “Everyone knows how this community keeps up on its news . . . and it’s not from the newspapers!”

  Again there was laughter.

  “But why us?” said Zack. “Of all the people they could talk about . . . why us?”

  “Anyone who tries to do something a little different than everyone else is an immediate magnet for the interest of such types,” said Almeda.

  “We’re not different,” remarked Tad.

  “Probably more than it seems to us,” laughed Almeda.

  “Different from the likes of them two ol’ biddies, that’s for sure,” laughed Uncle Nick.

  “Now, be nice, Nick,” chided Almeda.

  “Aw, you’re right—but people who go about spreading hearsay about other people get my goat.”

  “Don’t they know that families are supposed to stay together?” said Christopher. “Why, who was in the ark?—Noah and his sons and their wives and families.”

  “And Noah was six hundred years old at the time!” added Almeda. “That’s a really long time to keep a family together.”

  “Why, the Hollister clan is doing no more than Noah’s family did!” added Christopher. “I think it’s the most natural thing in the world.”

  “It is sad,” said Aunt Katie, “that families break up, and children go their own way all too soon—and wind up too far away to visit home.” Her voice began to tremble as she realized she was describing herself, so many miles away from her Virginia birthplace. Uncle Nick moved over behind her and put his hands on her shoulders. She smiled up at him and patted one of his strong, rough hands.

  “Or fathers leaving when they shouldn’t,” remarked Pa with a tone more serious than the rest, obviously thinking of his own past.

  “Noah’s sons remained with him in a single though extended family unit for years,” added Christopher, “maybe even hundreds of years after they were grown and married. One of his sons was ninety-eight at the time of the flood, and who knows how long they remained together afterward, because Noah lived for another three hundred fifty years.”

  “So—there you have it, Tad,” said Almeda triumphantly. “If we are different from most families because we’re all still here together—all except for Emily anyway—and because Drummond and I like having you here with us, we’re only different because we’re doing what Noah did!”

  “Well, then, that sets my mind at ease,” laughed Tad. “Though I’m not sure I’ll stay here with you quite as long as Noah’s sons did. By the time I’m ninety-eight, I plan on moving on to some other things!”

  Chapter 26

  Waylaid

  The jail in Auburn wasn’t the worst he had seen. But it was a jail, and that made it bad enough.

  “Hey, deputy,” he called out, “when’s lunch?”

  “Shut up, you!” replied a voice from the other end of the small wood and brick building. “Lunch is when it comes, and you’re lucky to get any at all.”

  “When’s the sheriff gettin’ back? I gotta get outta this hole.”

  No reply came. A moment later booted footsteps sauntered toward the three bare cells, two of which were empty and the third of which contained the troublemaker who had shot up half the town the night before. The deputy stopped a yard or two in front of the occupied cell and stared at his prisoner with considerably less fear than he would have had the bars not stood between them.

  “You ain’t going nowhere anytime soon,” he said in the haughty tone of one who enjoyed lording his position over another.

  “I want to talk to the sheriff. I gotta get outta here—got business t’ tend to.”

  “Business! Ha, ha, ha,” laughed the deputy. “What kind of business could the likes of you possibly have?”

  “My own business, that’s what kind!” the prisoner shot back.

  “You tell me your business, and I’ll see what I can do,” baited the deputy, who had not the slightest intention of doing anything.

  “Let’s just say I got business in the gold country.”

  “Don’t you know the gold’s all gone?”

  “My business ain’t got to do with gold, but lead,” said the prisoner, the hint of a grin revealing not as many teeth as it should have.

  “Well, the sheriff ain’t gonna be back for a few days,” rejoined the deputy, tiring of the pointless banter, “so you just get used to your new quarters. ’Sides, he said you might be our guest here for a coupla months.”

  “Months! On what charge?”

  “That’s what comes of losing your head over a poker game and shooting up a saloon. Unless you can pay the three hundred dollars in damages, you might as well get used to that cell of yours. Ha, ha!”

  “I ain’t gettin’ used to nothing. I gotta get north, I tell ya.”

  “Well, you’re a blamed fool if you think you’re gonna talk me out of the key to that door. And you’re even a bigger fool if you think you’re gonna bust out.”

  The deputy turned to walk back to the office.

  Chapter 27

  Through New Eyes

  In May Mr. Henderson died.

  None of us had known him too well. An elderly widower, he was one of the many newcomers to Miracle Springs during the years of growth after the gold rush. He’d arrived shortly after I left for the East during the war, come from New York alone to spend his last days in the booming new state of California. How or why he wound up in Miracle Springs I didn’t know. But he did wind up here, and from what everyone said he had loved every minute of his last few years.

  People said he was wealthy, though he didn’t look it or act it. Books, he said, had always been his passion, and his collection of three or four thousand titles was one of the few things of value he had crated up and brought with him through Panama by ship.
The town gossips had had a wonderful time speculating about what was in all those boxes he arrived with!

  No one knew if he had any relatives, but the whole town found out soon enough right after he died. Mr. Henderson had left almost everything he owned to the town of Miracle Springs—especially his books!

  The books of theology, about two or three hundred of them, went to Rev. Rutledge. All the rest went to the town for the establishment of the Miracle Springs Library, along with five thousand dollars to build a new wing on our small town hall to house the books. If any money was left over, which Pa said there surely would be, it was to be placed in a fund for the purchasing of additional volumes.

  Miracle Springs was all abuzz when the news came out. Nobody’d even ever thought about a library, and now we would have the nicest one north of Sacramento.

  “I doubt the church cost us more than a couple hundred in materials,” Pa said when we were talking about it after the church service where Rev. Rutledge had made the surprise announcement. “If all the men chip in and do the work, why, I can’t imagine there’d be less than four and a half thousand left over!”

  “It will no doubt be the finest library in northern California outside of San Francisco and Sacramento,” Almeda had remarked. “Quite a thing for a little place like Miracle Springs.”

  “I can’t wait to see the books!” I said.

  “Nor can I!” added Christopher, his mouth watering at the thought of it.

  A ground breaking was scheduled to coincide with the July fourth celebration.

  Pa and Rev. Rutledge and some of the other men got together and made plans. The annual town picnic was moved up from early fall so it could all happen together.

  They would break the ground, we’d have a picnic feast and fireworks, and construction on the new library wing would begin the following week.

  It was too bad it took a death to do it, but the news about what Mr. Henderson had done sent an excitement through the whole community. Nobody talked about anything else, it seemed, for weeks.

  “It makes you realize, though,” Christopher reflected when we were alone together one evening in June, “how easy it is to take people for granted. Every day I pray that the Lord will open my eyes to those around me. Yet here was this man living among us that, now that he is gone, we realize we hardly knew.”