by Bill Dodds
Chapter 22
Fire!
Right away Charlie grabbed two buckets and ran to the horses’ water trough out by the corral fence. I followed him and could see black smoke pouring out of the side door to the house.
“Call nine one one,” I said.
“Take these,” he answered, ignoring my suggestion. “I’ll find more.”
They were heavy and I tried not to slosh too much out of them as I ran up to the house. By this time the little kids were out in the yard. Brigid was keeping them back.
“I’ve got water!” I shouted as I climbed the steps.
“Here!” It was Sean. He took my two at the doorway and handed me two empty ones. In the meantime Pat came out of the regular kitchen’s door and had a big pot of water in his hands. Both of them dashed back into the summer kitchen.
Smoke made my eyes burn. I could taste it.
I ran back outside and met Charlie half way to the trough. He had found and filled another pail. “Take it,” he said, thrusting it at me and grabbing the two empty buckets I had dropped. I turned and Pat was right there.
“Ma’s using the kitchen pump,” he said. “You get the buckets from Charlie and bring them to me. I’ll take them to Sean.”
“Where’s Uncle . . .”
“In there,” he said and I knew where “there” meant. The summer kitchen. “Now hurry up but don’t go so fast you spill a lot.”
He dropped two empty buckets on the ground at my feet, took the full bucket Charlie had just given me and sped away. I brought the empty ones back to the trough and picked up two full ones.
That was my job for the next several minutes. Taking the empty ones from Pat and giving them to Charlie and taking the full ones from Charlie and giving them to Pat.
Smoke was rising straight up in the late afternoon sun. I could hear the burning wood crackling. There were small orange flames licking at the side of the summer kitchen where the outside wall met the roof.
I kept listening for a siren, a wailing off in the distant that would get louder and louder until the fire engine would finally pull up in the driveway.
Instead there were horses. The riders—three men—came from two different directions but arrived at almost the same time. Each had brought more buckets and they joined the line between the house and the trough, quickly passing empty buckets one way and full ones the other.
I don’t know how much time passed. It seemed like hours but it was probably only a few minutes. The smoke was turning from deep black to gray to almost white. The flames were no longer along the eaves. The snap, crackle and pop —I couldn’t help thinking of a breakfast cereal—were growing dim.
Still we kept passing the buckets. My arms were getting tired. Everyone coughed a lot. It was very hot.
More time passed but the sense of tension wasn’t there anymore.
“Saved the house anyway,” one of the men said to another and the second one nodded.
“Almost got away from us,” the second said.
By now Brigid had moved the little kids way down by the barn and most of them were crying. She kept one eye on them while she continued to help Charlie scoop up water.
It was probably another ten minutes before Aunt Mary came out of the house. She was filthy. She looked as if she had tried to climb down a chimney. The only clean spots on her were pale, white streaks on her cheeks. She was crying and coughing. She took about five steps into the side yard and then sat right down on the grass.
Uncle Peter came out about a minute later. He stumbled past her and then leaned over, his hands dangling in front of him. He threw up.
Two of the men who had come riding in to help took two full buckets each and went into the house. The third man knelt down next to Aunt Mary. He had a full bucket, too. He stripped off his shirt, dipped it in the water and handed it to her. She buried her face in it.
Then he went over to Uncle Peter. “Oh, Lord,” we could all hear the man exclaim. “Dear, Lord.”
He helped Uncle Peter sit down and had him lean against a tree. Then the man looked around until he spotted Brigid. He signaled to her and she went running. “Watch the little ones,” she yelled at Charlie and me.
When Brigid got up to where Uncle Peter was she stopped suddenly and put her hand up to her mouth. The visitor was talking to her. She nodded and hurried into the house. She came back quickly with something in her hand. It looked like a small bowl.
“Butter,” I heard Charlie whisper. “Pa must have got burned.”
Butter? That wasn’t right.
“Brigid, wait!” I yelled and ran up toward them. She and the man stopped and looked at me. Uncle Peter wasn’t paying much attention. He looked dazed. Aunt Mary hadn’t moved.
I gasped when I saw Uncle Peter’s face. His mustache was singed: burnt hair and ashes. His eyebrows were almost gone. And his hands . . . . His hands were bright red and blistered. He was holding them in front of him as if they were made out of wood.
He had second-degree burns. I remembered that description from that Boy Scout first aid class. Red is first degree. Blistered is second. Black is third.
“Let me see,” I said and everyone was so shocked that I was butting in or so numbed by what had already happened, no one objected.
I closely looked at both sides of his hands and his wrists. There were no third degree burns but some of the blisters had already started to pop. Gunk was oozing out.
“Not butter,” I said. “They’ll get infected.”
I looked at my own hands. They were filthy. “I need two buckets of water,” I said. “And some soap. And some clean cloths to use as bandages. Then we’ll take Uncle Peter to the hospital.”
“Hospital?” the man said. “What hospital?”
“Is there a doctor?” I asked and he nodded.
“I’ll go get him,” he said and hurried off toward his horse.
Brigid brought the water, soap, and cloth. I washed my own hands and then just set Uncle Peter’s in the cool, clean water of the second bucket. He winced and cried out a little but then stopped.
“After a bit we’ll loosely wrap them in the clean cloth and wait for the doctor,” I said.
“Did Heinrich Manhover teach you this, too?” Brigid asked and I nodded.
Uncle Peter was shaking his head. “We’ve lost it all,” he said. “I’ve lost it all.”
“No, Papa,” Brigid said. “The house is fine. You saved the house.”
“The sideboard,” he said. “I won’t be able to finish the carving for the sideboard. I’ve lost the farm.”
Chapter 23
Forty-seven Dollars Short
It was still light out when the doctor showed up in a buggy being pulled by one horse. He said Uncle Peter’s hands would be all right but he had to keep them wrapped. The doctor said he was glad he didn’t have to spend time cleaning butter off them.
Other people came by, too. Neighbors with food and blankets and clothes. They had seen the smoke and weren’t sure what was left.
Aunt Mary kept telling everyone how lucky we were. We were all alive and we still had the house. I asked her how it had started and she said a kettle of lard on the stove had gotten away from her. It had gotten too hot and had caught fire.
She looked so sad, as if it were all her fault. Uncle Peter looked as if he thought their troubles were his fault.
We couldn’t use the house. Charlie and I went inside and smoke had left a layer of dark gray over everything on the first floor and one of light gray over almost everything on the second. It smelled awful in there.
Besides that, Uncle Peter was afraid some ember might still be going in the summer kitchen and if it took off again he didn’t want anyone asleep in the house.
Two neighbor men volunteered to stay up all night in the summer kitchen to keep a fire watch.
We slept in the barn on blankets spread over hay. I didn’t think I would be able to fall asleep but I did. I had a dream that I was back home, riding my old bike down t
he street past a bunch of parked cars.
A rooster started crowing in the early hours of the morning and I got up like everyone else to begin the chores. Instead of helping Charlie with the horses I went with Jerome into the one-story building between the house and the barn. It was a hen house, filled with a lot of big, brown chickens and a couple of even bigger roosters.
Most of the hens were sitting on straw nests and Jerome showed me how to reach underneath each one and take the egg the hen had laid that morning. The eggs were big and brown and still warm.
The hens didn’t appreciate my taking the eggs. They pecked at me and made me flinch and I think Jerome would have had a great time watching me and how chicken I was if it hadn’t been for the fire the night before.
Sean and Pat brought the kitchen table and chairs outside and scrubbed them off. Aunt Mary and Brigid cooked in the kitchen. We had eggs—really fresh eggs that didn’t taste like store-bought eggs—and toast and bacon and more thick, warm milk.
Uncle Peter could use his hands a little but not much.
By the time we were finishing the meal, people were driving up in their wagons. They had brought stuff to help us clean the house and that was how we spent the day.
Some of the men tore down what remained of the summer kitchen. By dinner time—I mean supper time—it was gone and the house was clean enough that we could move back in.
It still smelled in there.
I asked Charlie what Aunt Mary had been cooking and he said she was making “crullers.” I thought he said “crawlers” and wondered if they ate fried worms. Together we figured out “cruller” and “doughnut” are pretty much the same thing.
“She was making them for you,” Charlie said. “She felt bad you didn’t have any special treat made just for you on your birthday.”
So if I hadn’t been there . . . .
How did the Farrells lose the family farm? They lost it because I came visiting, that’s how. Now I would be able to answer my sister Sarah’s question.
The next day, Tuesday, Sean drove Uncle Peter to see the Widow Dixon and Mr. Meyer, the banker. When they got back in the late afternoon, it was obvious the news wasn’t good.
“Widow Dixon is right,” Uncle Peter said to Aunt Mary and the rest of us. “She and I had an agreement. Cash on delivery.”
“But surely . . .” Aunt Mary began and Uncle Peter shook his head. “She’s sticking to our agreement,” he said.
“What about Julius?” she asked, meaning Mr. Meyer.
“He wants this land,” Uncle Peter said. “He said he was sorry to hear of our misfortune but he didn’t look very sorry.”
“So we have less than a week to come up with one hundred and fifty dollars,” Aunt Mary said.
“Will we have to move, Papa?” Brigid asked softly.
“Not right away,” he said. “We’ll see.”
“I wish I could finish your carving,” Sean said. “I’m just not as good as . . .”
“You’re getting better all the time,” Uncle Peter said. “The carving is why Widow Dixon asked me to do the work and why she was willing to pay so much.”
“If you weren’t the best carver in the county then someone else could finish for you, huh, Pa?” Jerome asked and Uncle Peter smiled and nodded.
Just before supper a couple of men came riding up. They talked with Uncle Peter out by the barn and it looked as if the three of them were arguing and the two visitors won. On Wednesday a man and woman came in a wagon and on Thursday even more people stopped in, maybe a dozen in all.
Aunt Mary and Uncle Peter would go out to talk to them and from the kitchen window we could see before the visitors left she had started crying. The men gently patted Uncle Peter on the back and the women gave Aunt Mary big hugs.
At supper on Thursday night Uncle Peter said friends and relatives had loaned the family one hundred and three dollars.
“Couldn’t we sell something, Pa, to get the rest of it?” Jerome asked. “Like the team or piano or something?”
“No one has much cash right now,” Uncle Peter said. “Not that kind of money to spend on something, no matter how wonderful a bargain it might be.”
“Julius Meyer has money,” Aunt Mary said.
“Now, Mary,” Uncle Peter answered.
“I know how we can get fifty dollars,” Pat said and everyone turned to look at him. “At the Founders’ Day Festival,” he said. “In town on Saturday. There’s a contest. First prize is fifty dollars.”
“Fifty dollars!” Sissie said.
“Who would be giving away all that money?” Uncle Peter asked and Pat blushed.
“I heard about it at church Sunday,” Pat said. “Mr. Meyer is sponsoring it.”
“You mean he’s making money with it,” Uncle Peter said.
“There are twenty teams that enter,” Pat said. “Two people from each family. The winner gets fifty dollars.”
“And what are they competing in?” Aunt Mary asked.
“General knowledge questions,” Pat said. “Poems and spelling and such. Tug of war. And . . . .” He paused and smiled. “Horseshoes.”
“Horseshoes!” Charlie said. “Why, you’re the best . . .”
“And how is Julius Meyer making money at this?” Uncle Peter asked.
“There’s any entry fee,” Pat said. “For each family.”
“How much?” Aunt Mary asked.
“Five dollars.”
“Five dollars!” she said.
“So he takes in one hundred and gives out fifty, is that right?” Uncle Peter asked.
“Yes, sir,” Pat answered.
“Son,” Uncle Peter said, “I don’t trust Julius Meyer and we can’t spare five dollars.”
“What if we came up with the money?” I butted in. “What if the kids raised the entrance fee?”
“How?” Uncle Peter asked me.
I had no idea.
Chapter 24
A Pile of Rabbit Skins and One Knife
Friday morning after chores and breakfast, Pat drove Charlie and me into town. Pat had brought along a pile of rabbit skins that he hoped he could sell for at least part of the five dollars he needed to enter the contest.
“Last time Mr. Wilkins paid me five cents apiece,” he commented as we road along, all of us on the seat up front with me in the middle. At least there was no hump.
“You have one hundred skins there?” Charlie asked.
“No,” he admitted. “But maybe he’ll pay more this time.”
“Why would he?” Charlie asked.
“I don’t know,” Pat growled, “but maybe he will.”
“I hope so,” I said. “They sure look to me like they’re worth more than a nickel each.” Nobody said anything. “And at least it’s not raining,” I added. “Another beautiful day. And I’ve never seen so many stars at night. There must be millions of them.”
“Aren’t there stars where you come from?” Pat asked, sounding annoyed.
What did he mean “where you come from”?
“Besides,” he said, “we need the rain.”
“We do?” I asked.
“You don’t,” he said. “Farmers do. Last year it was too dry. The crops never really got going. This year there’s been too much rain and then not enough.”
“How can there be too much and not enough?” I asked. He wasn’t making any sense.
“Too much at one time,” he said, “isn’t good for the crops. And not enough isn’t any good either. It has to be just the right amount over just the right amount of time.”
“Or what?” I asked.
“Or Pa goes deeper in debt,” Pat said. “Don’t you know anything?”
“You mean just the weather can . . .”
“Just the weather?” Pat said. “Weather’s one of the most important parts of farming.”
“But you can’t control . . . .” I began. “That’s no fair. You could work all season and then . . .”
“Lose it all. It’s happened.”
“No fair,” I repeated.
“I’m not going to be a farmer,” Charlie said. “I’m going to sail around the world.” He looked at me and smiled.
We rode on the rest of the way to town without any of us really saying anything. Once we got to Culver City, Pat drove straight to a two-story brick building with a painted sign that said “Wilkins’ General Store.”
