Henry smiled as he stepped past her and opened the passenger’s door.
“Here you go,” he said as he beckoned her to get into the vehicle.
“Why thank you, sir,” she replied playfully as she stepped up onto the running board and slid onto the seat. Henry closed the door as she put her purse on the floor behind her feet. She looked around at the small and simple interior of the cab and felt like a child at an amusement park anticipating the start to a great ride. It was charming and surreal to say the least. As Henry opened the driver’s door, Millie was nearly bursting with excitement.
“You know, I’ve never even sat in this truck?!”
“Really? Never?” Henry asked in disbelief as he slid inside and closed the door.
“Nope, never! I’ve seen it over the years on 4th of July or when you’d wash it or take it out but never been in it myself until now.”
“Well, what do you think of her?”
“Are you kidding me? She’s fantastic!”
The compliment brought a huge smile to Henry’s face as he started the motor. The antique vehicle was his greatest family heirloom and being able to share it with her made him happy. The old truck came to life and Millie giggled with joy.
“Kid, you ain’t seen nothing yet,” he said impishly as he moved the gear shift and released the clutch and the brake. Suddenly the old truck eased forward, and they were on their way around the island and headed down the hill.
“You might want to crack your window a bit; no air conditioning in this old lady,” Henry suggested as they passed the pond and began the climb toward the mailbox. Millie heeded his advice and turned the hand crank on the door with her right hand until the window had dropped a couple of inches.
Henry brought the truck to a halt at the top of the driveway to make sure that no other vehicles were approaching.
“So tell me, Mr. Engel, where are you taking me?” Millie asked with a hint of intrigue.
“You’ll see,” Henry replied slyly in a comical high-pitched voice. Millie laughed at his clowning.
After confirming that the coast was clear, he pulled the Model A out onto County Road 27 and headed it down the pavement. Millie was shocked by the action because instead of pulling out to the left toward Lewis, he had turned to the right and was traveling away from town. In her entire life, she had never proceeded past his driveway and had no idea what lay ahead.
“So where in the world are we going?” Millie asked again, now extremely curious about what he had in mind.
“You’ll see,” he repeated with the same silly intonation as before. Millie laughed again as she slapped his right shoulder lightly with feigned aggression.
“You’re mean!” she protested.
“Oh, quit your squawking and just try to enjoy the ride,” he commanded cheerfully with a grin. Millie reluctantly surrendered and decided that he was right. She didn’t care where she was going; she was simply glad that it was with Henry.
The road snaked along through rolling hills lined by dense forest. The trees created a wall of green, which was intermittently broken by meadows and farm fields. The sky was blue and clear, and bright yellow sunshine washed over the landscape. The hum of the motor and the sound of the tires rolling on the warm asphalt combined to play a soothing song as they rode along.
“You know, I learned how to drive in this very truck,” Henry said with pride out of nowhere.
“You did?” Millie knew that the Ford had previously belonged to Henry’s uncle and that Henry loved the classic truck, but she hadn’t heard this story before.
“Yep. My Uncle Ed taught George and me both back on the farm when we were just a couple of snot-nosed teenagers. George picked it up right away, but I needed a little more practice than he did,” Henry confessed with a chuckle. He was recalling the day he had misjudged a turn and found a large fence post. The net result was a broken fence in need of repair, a healthy dent in the front fender of the truck, a sore neck for Uncle Ed, and a bruised ego for Henry. Time heals the wounds of men, fences can be mended, and the damage to the Ford had long ago been repaired when the truck was restored. However, the details and pictures of that day were etched into Henry’s memory forever. As he related the events leading up to and after the accident, Millie listened intently and gasped and then laughed as she imagined the scene. She enjoyed hearing about Henry’s family and his past. Though they had been together for decades, there was still much they did not know about one another, and it was fun to explore that territory now.
As they rounded the next curve, Henry slowed the truck in anticipation of making a turn. Millie watched with keen interest as a discreet opening in the forest appeared on the left in the distance. As they neared it, she could see that it revealed a lane that led back into the countryside. Henry eased the truck to nearly a complete stop before coaxing it into the entrance and slowly proceeding along the gravel drive. It had the look of an old farm road that had long ago become grown over and was now seemingly interspersed with as many weeds as there were rocks.
“Do I dare ask? Are we getting closer?” Millie quizzed Henry, who responded with a smile.
“Yeah, we’re close. Just ahead there’s a nice little place I wanted you to see.”
Further up the lane, Henry could see a rise. He knew that just on the other side of it there was a clearing that gave way to a large meadow. Once upon a time this had been a farm field but the man who had tended it was put in the earth long ago leaving only debt behind him. The current owner of the property was the Lewis Bank & Trust. The bank’s president, Tom Donaldson, had made arrangements with a local farmer to sharecrop the place and it was now covered in clover. Tom was an avid hunter, and he and his friends used the place for turkey hunting in the spring and deer hunting in the fall. Henry knew this, and he also knew about a beautiful spring on the property just below the field that Uncle Ed had taken him to as a boy. On Monday, he had called Tom to investigate if the access to the spring was still tenable and if he could have Tom’s permission to come here. He had received a thumbs up on both accounts.
Henry guided the Ford up the road and over the hill before bringing it to a halt along the edge of the field where the gravel ran out. The lush green meadow provided for an inviting setting, but Millie couldn’t quite understand what was unique about it yet. In her estimation, it was certainly no more special than the pasture below Henry’s house at Oak Forest. She surveyed the surroundings while Henry exited the cab.
“Everybody out,” he joked as he closed the door and moved around to the rear of the vehicle. “From here, we walk.”
Millie opened her door and stepped out as Henry pulled back a large gray tarp that he had draped over the bed of the pickup. In all of her excitement, she hadn’t even noticed that he had something concealed in the rear. It suddenly occurred to her that this was to be a picnic so of course there must be some sort of lunch, or at least she hoped so as she was starting to get hungry.
“Here you go, take this,” Henry called out as she closed her door and walked behind the truck toward him. He was pointing to a small blue and white plastic cooler. Henry already had a large wicker basket by the handle, which was covered by a red and white checkered cloth. With his left hand, he reached into the truck bed and retrieved a thick old tan quilt that Millie recognized as being one of his spares from the upstairs closet.
“Isn’t this nice! Thank you for doing all of this, Henry.”
“All right, follow me,” he said without acknowledging her last statement. “We’ve got just a short walk, and we’ll be there.”
Millie grabbed the small cooler, which jingled with ice and glass bottles, and followed behind him. Her eyes were trained onto the field to her left in an attempt to discern where he might be going. Henry, however, marched forward along the tree line and down a gentle slope away from the meadow and toward more forest.
“Down below there, just inside the woods there’s a natural spring I used to come to with my Uncle Ed when I was a kid
. It’s a top-notch spot for a picnic,” he explained. “Or at least it used to be,” he added with caution.
“Oh ok, I gotcha. That sounds real nice!” she agreed with growing anticipation.
As they neared the edge of the forest, a well-designed stone path appeared out of nowhere. Henry’s eyes lit up when he saw it.
“Yes! It’s still here, just like I remember!” he proclaimed excitedly. Millie could see that the path led down at a somewhat sharp angle into a little glen. A small creek was flowing below, fed by water emanating from a pool at the base of a rock formation. The ripples of the water glistened like diamonds in the sunlight.
“Oh my goodness! It’s breathtaking, Henry!”
“Isn’t it? Now, come on, follow me. Just watch your step in case any of these stones are loose.” With that, he went ahead of her and tested the way but there was no cause for concern. Clearly Tom and the hunters had made sure that the access to the spring was indeed safe and well-maintained. As they reached the bottom of the trail, Millie could see that someone had erected a half-circle-shaped wall of red bricks at the base of the rocks. The structure was mortared to the natural stone and stood roughly three feet high while extending out approximately six feet. In the end, the man-made portion combined with nature to create a catch where the spring water that was falling along the stones above would pool before running over the bricks and into the creek bed. It was an ingenious and simple way to capture the water before it flowed away.
“Wow!” Millie exclaimed breathlessly. “This is amazing!”
“I’m glad that you think so,” he said with satisfaction at her reaction as he put the basket and quilt down. He walked over to the edge of the collecting pool and reached his hand down into it. The water was very cool and crystal clear. He scooped a small portion into his hands and brought it up to his lips. It tasted fresh and sweet, exactly as he remembered.
“Now that’s real spring water!” he declared. “Come here, you’ve got to try it.”
Millie raised her eyebrows with a look of mild skepticism. She had drunk lots of water over the years but never any directly out of the ground. She preferred hers from a faucet or from a bottle that said it had been “purified.”
“Oh, come on,” he scoffed, noting her trepidation. “I promise it’s a lot better than that stuff they’re pawning off on you at the store in the bottle. Where do you think they get all of that spring water? Trust me, this won’t kill you,” he assured her with a light chuckle.
She stepped beside him and reached down with her free hand to gather a sample. The temperature of the water surprised her. “Why, it’s cold!” she reported.
“Sure is; comes right up out of the earth. It’s like that year round. This was the best place to cool off in the summer when I was a kid.”
Now emboldened, she brought her hand to her lips and tasted it.
“It’s kinda sweet too, ain’t it?” she said with astonishment as she reached back to get a little more.
“Yeah, I guess it has something to do with the minerals around here.”
“Well, isn’t that just something?” she muttered as he turned to find a suitable location for their picnic.
Henry noticed a level grassy spot just off to the left with light shade and a perfect view of the spring, and he moved to it. “I’m going to spread the blanket over here; it looks like a good place.”
“Sure does! Hold on, let me help you,” she said as she put the cooler down and walked over to assist him. They each took opposite corners of the quilt and soon had it spread neatly on the ground providing a perfect place to sit and eat lunch.
“There!” Henry declared as he moved the picnic basket to the middle of the thick blanket and sat down. Millie followed suit and soon she and the cooler were seated beside him.
“Oh Henry, this is such a gorgeous place! How on earth did you ever find it?”
“My Uncle knew the farmer that lived here. They were friends. He’d bring Bill and me over to visit, and we always took time out to come down here,” he said while looking around.
Millie was surprised by the mention of Henry’s brother Bill but let it pass without pressing for more details. She was well aware that this was a topic that normally was off-limits. The mood was far too joyous and the day far too nice to risk introducing a discordant note.
“That’s a nice memory,” she commented as she stared off at the flowing water.
“Yeah, the old man was a guy named Jim Briscoe and we’d come over every now and then to see him. His wife had passed, and he didn’t have any other family, so he was always happy to have us stop by. Now that I think of it, it seems like he always had a bunch of cats around too. Anyway, there’s a house just over there where he lived with a bigger entrance to the road. That’s where the majority of the tillable ground is,” he said, pointing off to the east through the woods. “This over here is a secondary field that he had, and he used to keep it in corn or wheat or beans.”
Millie imagined what things might have looked like back in the day. She pictured Henry as a young boy racing down the stone path with his brother and uncle in tow to see the spring. It was a touching scene, and it made her feel close to him to share in it.
“Was that farmer the man that put all those bricks down here?”
“Yeah, he was a really sharp old guy. He and my uncle built that,” Henry answered with pride. “Pretty damned ingenious, huh?”
“I’ll say. I think it’s just beautiful!”
Henry paused to enjoy her praise and to think back to his youth. He could see his uncle and brother standing there as if it were yesterday. He remembered Jim and Uncle Ed sipping on cool bottles of beer on the banks of the creek while he and Bill played in the water on a hot summer day. The pictures in his mind were clear and vivid. He was briefly completely lost in his thoughts before snapping himself out of it and returning to the present moment.
“Anyway, are you getting hungry?” he asked as he turned his attention to the basket he had brought along.
“I sure am,” she answered enthusiastically.
“All right then, let’s see what we have.” Henry’s eyes sparkled as he peeled back the checkered cloth from atop the basket to reveal its contents. Inside were an assortment of wrapped items and containers and Millie eagerly tried to peek to see what he had brought for them to eat.
“With a little help from our old pal Jake, I think I might have some goodies in here you’re going to like,” he announced. The reference was not to Henry’s liquid friend but rather to Jake Le Detour, who was the proprietor of the town’s most renowned barbecue restaurant. It also just happened to be Millie’s favorite eatery.
“I was hoping you took the hint!” she laughed aloud recalling their conversation about picnic menus from Monday.
“Hint? It was more like blackmail, I’d say!” he teased.
“Oh, you go on with yourself!” she responded in mock defense.
Henry pulled out two white china plates, some silverware, and a pile of snow-white napkins and handed them to her. Millie smiled as she accepted the items and arranged two place settings between them while Henry fumbled among the remaining contents inside the basket.
“Ok, I believe you ordered the pulled pork,” he said as his hands emerged with a large sandwich wrapped in foil and handed it to her. Her eyes lit up as she pulled the aluminum open and released the aroma of the smoked meat.
“I also think you asked for coleslaw,” he said as he removed the lid from a carton of the salad and placed it in front of her. Millie sat and watched with a wide smile as Henry unveiled the smorgasbord.
“Hmm… we also have some baked beans and as requested, real thick, crunchy potato chips,” he added with a note of sarcasm trying to do his best impression of her.
Millie giggled at his wit.
“Of course, no picnic is complete without ice-cold root beer out of a glass bottle. Therefore, if you’d do the honors…” he said as he motioned for her to open the cooler that was n
ext to her and just beyond his reach. True to his word, when Millie opened the lid of the cooler she discovered four bottles of the soft drink nestled in a bed of ice. As Millie retrieved a pair, Henry dove back into the basket for a bottle opener and popped the tops.
“And if you’re still hungry after all of that, I’ve got a couple of dandy pieces of apple pie here to finish things off.”
“Well Mr. Engel, you have truly outdone yourself. I’m totally speechless,” Millie proclaimed as her eyes beamed.
“Well, that’s gotta be a first!” he joked as she flashed him an overly melodramatic frown. “Nah, I’m just fooling. I’m very happy that you think so.” Henry held his bottle up and made a motion for Millie to do likewise. “I want this to be the start of a new chapter for both of us. I guess by now you’ve figured out that I have feelings for you. I truly care for you, and I regret it took me this long to realize it. I don’t know exactly where it all goes from here, but I know what I want now and I… I really want to find out. To the future!” he declared with confidence and excitement.
Millie’s eyes moistened at his sincere expression of his affection for her. She understood how hard it was for Henry to cross the chasm that had long separated them, and it was deeply moving to her. She also knew what she hoped the future might hold, and it was surreal to now see it beginning to unfold.
“I feel just the same way, Henry,” she tenderly said as she tapped her bottle against his. “To our future!” Her words made his heart soar and their eyes locked for a few seconds as the emotion between them was palpable. Henry had wondered how or when they would share their first kiss and right then seemed the ideal moment for it. However, they were seated opposite one another with lots of obstacles between them including various containers of food. Had he been in his twenties, he might have smoothly dashed around to her in an epic romantic gesture and taken her into his arms for a kiss worthy of the silver screen. However, since he was now in his seventies, he imagined it might take a bit more effort and be a bit more awkward than the situation called for. Regretfully, he reasoned that this opportunity would have to be squandered. Sensing that it was time to move forward to their meal, they each took a drink from their bottles and savored the exchange they had just had. For now, the first kiss would have to wait.
Celebrations With Jake and Joe Page 13
