The holler’s valley was deep, and the sun was drowned in heavy rainclouds, so the dark was almost as thick as twilight when she pulled her horse up before the two-story cabin. Again, there were few obvious signs of life, but on a day like today, people were staying inside all they could. And she could smell that there was a fire going inside.
She swung down and landed in a muddy soup, but Ada’s need to be presentable had died around the middle of the second week. She wasn’t going calling. She was working, and the ride was hard.
Henrietta blew out an irritated huff and dropped her head. This day was no picnic for her, either. Ada patted her withers. “I’m sorry, Hen. We’ll warm up at home tonight, I promise.”
The horse snorted and pushed a sodden face against Ada’s leg.
Ada untied her book packs, heaved them over her shoulder, and went up onto the bowed porch. She knocked on the door—not a plank door, but a solid piece of wood, sanded and turned, with a few remnant stripes of peeling red paint. Once it had been a very nice door. Once, someone had cared for this house like a home.
“Hello? It’s Mrs. Donovan, from the Pack Horse Library!”
Nothing. She waited a bit, then knocked again; then, as last time, she heard the wordless roll of voices inside.
“I don’t mean to be a bother, but it’s mighty wet and chilly today. If you don’t want a book, might I ask for a moment to sit by your fire before I go on my way?”
More rumbling. Childish voices, at least two, and a man’s.
Then a deep voice, much louder, in two sharp syllables. “Bluebird!”
The latch shifted, and the door opened.
A tiny angel, with soft golden hair and enormous blue eyes, gazed up at her. She was five or six years old. Gleaming clean, though her little dress was ragged and her feet were bare. The room behind her was enticingly warm.
Ada smiled. “Well hello, miss. My name is Mrs. Donovan. People call me Mrs. Ada.” She said it the way it usually sounded, the two syllables in Missus elided to Mizz. “What’s your name?”
“I’m Bluebird,” the pretty little girl answered, as Ada had expected she would. “You want to come in?”
“Bluebird,” the man’s voice said, now a tone of warning rather than halting.
Pretty little Bluebird dropped her head, but another voice, another child’s, still young but older than Bluebird’s, old enough to sound clearly like a boy’s, said, “It ain’t right, Pa. Please.”
She didn’t know this family at all, didn’t know what kind of man these children’s father was, or how he’d react to them or to her if she pushed her advantage here, but her instinct, without any evidence at all, insisted it was safe. Maybe it was Bluebird’s sweet, clear face, or her gleaming smooth hair. She was well cared for. Maybe it was simply her name. Bluebird, a symbol of hope and happiness.
So Ada took the chance she had. “I would love to come in, Bluebird. Thank you so very much.” She wiped her boots on the bare porch, the place before the door where most people kept a reed mat, and stepped into the shadowy old house.
Chapter Five
The room was large and warm. A fire crackled in a stone fireplace. But if not for little miss Bluebird standing right before her, smiling with shy sweetness, and a tall, gaunt boy, two or three years her senior, standing off a bit, in the middle of the room, Ada would have thought she’d stepped into a haunted old relic long past its use.
The plank floor was grey with age and wear. The walls were papered with newspaper, the pages obviously many years old, yellowed and cracking. The windows were covered with decaying curtains that hardly blocked light or sight.
A small, plain square table framed with four equally plain chairs, and two straight-back rockers, were the only furnishings in the room. No—there was a worktable in the shadows of a far corner, a wood cookstove and a pump sink, and what might once have been a pie safe, though it had lost its doors.
There had to be more, but the shadows were too deep. And the man whose voice she’d heard—where was he?
Something felt strange here. Unsettling. If she’d been a less practical woman, she might have honestly believed the place was haunted, and Bluebird and her brother were mere figments of a forgotten past.
Suddenly superstitious, Ada reached out and set her hand on Bluebird’s shoulder. Bony and frail, but solid. Real. The girl’s angelic smile brightened at her touch.
“You c’n sit by the fire, if you want,” the boy said.
“Thank you.” She let Bluebird take her hand and lead her to a rocking chair.
The fireplace was sturdy stone, with a heavy beam for a mantel. Now that she was closer, she saw a large cross-stitch sampler, framed carefully under glass, was centered on that beam, leaning against the stone chimney. It was a typical sampler, with the alphabet stitched in two neat rows across the bottom, and a stitched image of a cozy cabin, smoke wafting from its chimney, in the center. Stitched above the cabin were the words: LORD BLESS AND KEEP US, and the name The Walkers beneath them.
The dry warmth eased her fretfulness, and she sighed. She set her packs on the floor beside the chair and sat down. “Would you like to look at the books I’ve brought?”
The boy turned and looked into the shadows beyond the room. Ada looked the same way, expecting to see their father, but saw nothing except the edge of a newel post, where the stairs to the second floor must be.
Bluebird had settled on the floor beside Ada and was playing with the fastenings of her saddlebags. Ada leaned over and unwound the tie, then lifted the flap and opened the top. The saddlebags were weatherproof, but days like this, with steady, drenching rain, put that to the test. The edges of the topmost books had swelled a little. She drew a slim picture book from the pack and handed it to the girl at her side.
“Can you read, Miss Bluebird? That is such a pretty name.”
The little girl flushed with pleasure. “My momma picked it. She named me Bluebird Hope Walker.”
“Well, I think that might be the best little girl’s name I’ve ever heard. Your momma must be wonderful.”
“Our momma’s dead,” the boy said. His tone wasn’t aggressive, or sorrowful. Simply flat.
Bluebird’s big eyes went round. “Uh-huh. She died when I came.”
“Oh, sweetheart,” Ada said and brushed a finger under the girl’s little chin. She turned to the boy, her hand over her heart. “I’m so sorry.”
He held her gaze but didn’t respond.
“May I ask your name?”
He glanced toward the shadows again before returning to meet her eyes. “Elijah.”
“That’s a very fine name, too. Would you like a book, Elijah?”
He shook his head. Like his sister, he was a beautiful child, with golden hair, not shaggy, but roughly cut, and soulful blue eyes. “We ain’t got no school. Can’t read.”
Like every state in the Union, Kentucky had a compulsory education law, requiring students to attend at least grammar school. But when there was no school in reach, children like these were invisible to such laws and got an education only if there was someone in their family to teach them at home.
She glanced at that sampler. Someone had been able to read here. Their mother, most likely, who’d died when Bluebird was born—thus when Elijah was only two or three. Poor motherless children.
And a father afraid to make himself known. A widower. Ada turned again and studied the shadows beyond this room. She could almost feel eyes on her.
Turning back to Elijah, she smiled. “You know, I’m so grateful for the warmth you’ve offered me.” She set her hand on Bluebird’s silky head. “If you’d let me repay your kindness, I’d love to read you a story. Would you like that?”
“Please!” Bluebird cheered and held up the book she was flipping through. “This one!”
Yet again, Elijah turned to the shadows. “I guess it’d be alright.”
He came closer and crouched beside his sister. “What is this story?”
“That,”
Ada said and held out her hand for the book, “is The Three Musketeers. There’s a much bigger story about them that someday you can read if you want, but this is just one of their adventures.” She pulled Bluebird onto her lap. Elijah stood at the side of her chair as she began to read.
After a few pages, she heard the sound of a door open and close heavily, but no one had come through this room. She looked out the window, through the tattered curtains, and saw a figure in the rain—a man, tall and broad-shouldered, hunched into his coat and hat. He went to Henrietta.
The horse didn’t know him and shied a bit when he took her reins. But he must have spoken kindly to her, because she went easily with him, out of sight. Ada forgot the book as she watched, wondering if Henrietta was safe.
“That’s Pa,” Elijah said. “He’ll be takin’ your horse to shelter, outta the rain.”
“That’s very kind of him. I’d like to make your father’s acquaintance.”
“Pa don’t like people,” Bluebird said, brushing her little fingers over Ada’s cheek. “You got spots.”
Ada laughed. “Those are called freckles, and yes, I do.”
“I want freckles, too.”
“God decides about freckles, I think, Bluebird.”
“Then I’ll ask Him when I say my prayers.”
“Can you read some more?” Elijah asked.
“Of course.” Ada picked up the story again.
This strange house was turning out to be her best stop of the day.
She read The Three Musketeers and Little Sallie Mandy and the Shiny Penny. Though the children couldn’t read them, she signed both books out to Elijah and Bluebird, and a primer called The New Path to Reading, helping Elijah with the first few pages and promising to help him more when she returned.
Nearly two hours had passed, and she needed to be on her way, but still she’d seen no more of Mr. Walker than his hunched form collecting her horse. The rain had stopped, except for the dripping from the trees that would continue for the remainder of the afternoon.
As she returned her ledger to the pack and closed her coat over her clothes, Ada asked, “Do you children have enough food?”
Elijah answered, his brow creasing with offense. “Pa takes good care of us, Mizz Ada. We got all we need.”
“That’s good, then. I’m glad. I meant no offense, Elijah. I only wanted to be sure.”
As Ada went to the door, Bluebird ran up and threw her arms around her legs. “Don’t go! I like stories!”
Ada crouched to the girl’s level. “I left the stories for you, Bluebird. And I’ll be back. Do you know how to count?”
“Yes’m. One-two-three-four-five-six-seven-eight-nine-ten!”
Ada grinned. “That’s excellent! If you count ten mornings and then four more, I’ll be back, with more stories, and I’ll read to you again, if you’d like me to.”
“One-two-three-four-five-six-seven-eight-nine-ten-one-two-three-four!”
“That’s exactly right! Well done!”
Bluebird hugged her again. Elijah shook her hand like a young gentleman, and Ada went out the door, still without having met their father.
She followed the path she’d seen him take Henrietta and found, behind the house, a small barn that was more lean-to than full structure. Most of it was little more than windbreak, with only three full walls and a partial fourth. Henrietta was tied under shelter. A dairy cow, an aged Holstein, was penned under cover as well, tucked into the nook where there were three solid walls. She heard a sleepy bleat and peered through a rough doorway into the shadows of the small, fully enclosed area. A few goats seemed to be clustered inside at a far corner.
Beside the barn, behind the house, was a small patch, less than a quarter acre, that had mostly been harvested, though a few vines of small pumpkins remained. A small chicken coop made a far wall boundary for the garden; it was closed up against the poor weather.
Henrietta was still saddled, but she was dry and munching contently at a box of dried mountain grasses. Her bridle had been removed and was hanging on a post. She was tied with a rope halter. Mr. Walker had taken very good care of her.
Ada peered into the protected part of the rough little barn. Aside from the pen of goats, she saw only hand tools, and some bundles of mountain grasses hanging from the ceiling to dry.
Mr. Walker provided for his family with what he could grow in that little patch, what this old cow and few goats and chickens could give, and what he could hunt or forage in the wilds.
She turned toward the post where Henrietta’s bridle hung, and nearly jumped clear through her skin. Mr. Walker stood there. His hat was tipped low over his face, and his head canted down, as if he studied his own boots. His trousers and coat were both a dark grey that had once been black, and his hands were shoved into his coat pockets. He was like a dark, hulking specter.
“Oh!” she gasped when she could breathe again. “You startled me.”
He lifted his head, and Ada nearly gasped again. Over the course of the afternoon, she’d conjured an image of Mr. Walker in her mind, but the man before her was not remotely the same. This man was ... well, he was handsome, in a rough kind of way. Or maybe not handsome, but interesting-looking. Ada found herself fascinated, and her eyes focused on all of him in turn.
He was taller than she’d even realized, and broader as well. His face was made of harsh angles—square jaw and chin bristled with greying hairs, sharp cheekbones, heavy brow, blunt mouth. His hair was dark and shaggy under his hat. She couldn’t really see his eyes, under the shadow of his hat and that serious brow, but she could almost feel them boring into her.
“Mr. Walker.”
“You were good to my children,” he said, and she recognized the voice as the one she’d heard earlier from the other side of the door. Pitched low, it rumbled is if it traveled over a rocky riverbed on the way to his mouth.
“They’re wonderful children. I was happy to spend time with them. I left some books, and I’ll be back in two weeks with more. If that’s alright by you.”
He stood still and didn’t answer. Ada was sure he was staring and wasn’t sure what to do. Then he touched a finger to the brim of his hat and walked away.
Ada watched him walk to his house, his broad back hunched again. She didn’t know what to make of Mr. Walker.
Ada’s father switched off the radio, and the new report went silent. The three souls of their little family sat in silence for a moment. The report had been full of turmoil in Europe and around the globe.
“I’m glad you’re a woman, Ada Lee,” her mother said to end the quiet. “It sure sounds like they want to make another war like before, and it’d kill me to send my last child to die like the first two.”
“Don’t you worry ‘bout that, Bess,” her father said. “What’s goin’ on over there’s none o’ our affair. President Roosevelt, he musta learnt from before. He won’t send no more American boys to do Europe’s dyin’.”
“Well,” her mother said and pushed herself up from her chair. “Leastwise, we don’t gotta worry ‘bout our girl.” She turned a wry, sightless look on Ada, turned right to her as if she could see her. “All’s we got to worry is if she falls off the mountain in the dark. Or gets et by a panther. Or gets shot by a somebody thinks she’s up to no good in they business.”
As her mother made her way to the kitchen, holding a hand out to be sure of her way, Ada rose from the floor and followed.
Her mother was at the plate of cookies on the table. In the month she’d been riding the mountain, Ada had taken to spending Sunday afternoons baking, making breads and biscuits, cookies and pies for the week. She liked something sweet in her lunch pail, and she liked to leave something sweet for her parents to enjoy as well.
A batch of pumpkin cookies had been her last of the day. She’d harvested the bulk of the pumpkins on Saturday afternoon, and had canned enough for them to eat through the winter and to use for trade, too. Her mother’s pumpkin soup was famous among their neighbors.
“Momma, what I do, it’s not dangerous.”
Her mother sat at the table and nibbled at a cookie. “Sit down, Ada Lee.”
Ada sat.
“You know I was raised up there in Red Fern Holler. Till I went off on my own, I hardly ever saw a stranger wasn’t lookin’ to collect a tax.”
“I know, Momma.” She’d visited her grandparents in the holler when she was a girl. She was no stranger to the mountain, not before she’d taken this job nor since.
“Ever’ time I hear you ride off, I wonder if you ain’t gonna get shot by somebody don’t want a stranger snoopin’ at his door. Or maybe Hen’ll put a hoof down on a loose rock, and you’ll fall off a crag. Or a bear’ll stand up right in front of you. Ever’ time you go, I worry I’ll not see you again.”
“Momma ...” she reached over and covered her mother’s hand with her own.
“Don’t tell me you’re safe, Ada Lee. A woman alone ain’t never safe. I know we need you to take this wage. You and your daddy, you try not to let me know the way things are, but it’s my eyes that went, not my head. I know. I can taste when you’re stretching ingredients to make ‘em last. I can hear when Zeke don’t turn the lights on. And I know good and well how much he hurts when he tries to work hisself. So I know we need what you can earn. I jus’ want you to tell me you know how dangerous that mountain is, and that you’re bein’ smart as you can be.”
“I am, Momma. I changed my route so I can be sure to be home before full dark. I keep a rifle with me, and I keep it loaded. I’m being as smart as I can be. And tomorrow, I’ll go into Callwood and get my first wages. Then we won’t need to stretch the flour and sugar or keep the lights out so much.” With twenty-eight dollars in her purse, she meant to stock well up on supplies.
“That’s well and good, but it’s you I care most for. I need you to come home, Ada Lee. Ever’ night. I need to know you’re here with us.”
Ada squeezed her mother’s hand, hardened by work and bent by arthritis. “I will be, Momma. Always.”
Carry the World Page 6
