Room for Hope

by Kim Vogel Sawyer

  “I’m gonna drop this rope down. I need you to slip it over your head and under your arms.”

  Hold him, dear Father, in Your loving arms, and bring him to safety.

  “Do you understand, Bud?”

  Give him strength, God.

  “I…I understand. But I can’t do it. My arms…my hands…I can’t feel ’em. It’s like they’re not even there.”

  Bud’s raspy confession weakened Neva’s knees. She stumbled forward, impatience writhing through her. “I’ll go after him. Send me down.”

  Mr. Caudel shook his head. “You’re not a large woman, but that hole isn’t big enough even for you. None of us here are small enough to fit. Bud’ll have to grab hold, or we’ll have to dig that second hole.”

  The men with shovels moved forward in readiness, their gazes aimed at the sheriff.

  “I’d fit.”

  Every gaze shifted to Charley, who stepped forward with his big brown eyes flitting from one face to another. He stopped next to Neva and Mr. Caudel and held out his hands. “I’m little enough to fit in the hole, aren’t I?”

  Neva’s heart rolled over in her chest. She touched the boy’s hair. “Charley, you’re too little. You aren’t strong enough to pull Bud out.”

  His chin quavered. “But I wouldn’t have to pull him out. I’d just put the rope on him. Then Mr. Caudel and the others could pull him out.”

  Mr. Caudel went down on one knee in front of Charley. “You’re a very brave boy for offering, but—”

  Reverend Savage moved behind Charley and put his hands on the boy’s shoulders. He looked fervently into Mr. Caudel’s face. “Jesse, Bud is in a dark place. He’s hemmed in, and he needs rescuing. In front of you is a willing rescuer. Use him.”

  The two men stared at each other, both as still as statues. The breeze lifted the collars on their coats, and from the windbreak a turtledove cooed and its mate answered, but neither seemed aware of their surroundings. The others remained silent, too, and Neva almost held her breath, sensing the unspoken communication that sizzled between the preacher and the sheriff.

  Mr. Caudel bowed his head briefly, heaved a tremendous sigh, and then looked again at Reverend Savage. “All right.” He rose and caught Charley by the arm. “Come with me, son. We’ll rig you up and send you after Bud.”

  Bud

  Something landed on Bud’s head and rolled down his cheek. Another something, bigger than the first, hit his shoulder, and then a small shower sprinkled his face. He wanted to bat away whatever it was, but his hand refused to move, and he grunted in aggravation.

  Opening his eyes, he gingerly shifted his face toward the opening, where only a little while ago flashlight beams had blinded him. There was still light, but a big blob of something blocked most of it. Thin fingers of light that shifted from one edge of the hole to the other sneaked past the black blob.

  More bits pelted him, and a large chunk—earth, Bud now realized—clunked him on the chest. Panic rolled through him. Was the wall caving in? He opened his mouth to yell, but only a grating whisper emerged. “Don’t bury me. Please don’t bury me.”

  “It’s okay, Bud. I’m not gonna bury you. Gonna getcha out.”

  Bud blinked and squinted at the shape bobbing above him. Slowly his brain registered what his eyes were seeing. Not a blob, but a person. A person coming facedown, arms stretching toward Bud, and bringing bits and pieces of the dirt walls with him.

  Sheriff Caudel’s voice boomed from above. “Bud, keep your eyes closed so you don’t get dirt in them. Charley will let you know when he reaches you.”

  Charley? Grit rained down and Bud grimaced, closing his eyes and pressing his face against something soft—his own upraised arm. Why couldn’t his arm feel his face? He tried again to close his fingers, to move his hands, but nothing happened. Would the doctor have to cut his arms off because they were dead? Even though Bud was fourteen years old, practically a man, he started to cry.

  “Don’t cry, Bud. You’ll be all right. Don’t worry.”

  Charley…comforting him. Bud had never been so humiliated and so humbled at the same time. The feelings made him cry even harder, which turned out to be a good thing, because the tears washed the dirt bits out of his eyes.

  “Okay, Bud, I got you.”

  He did? Bud forced his eyes open. Charley dangled right above him and held on to his hands. And Bud couldn’t feel a thing.

  “Gonna put this rope over you. Hold still.”

  Caught like a cork in a bottle, Bud didn’t have any choice about holding still. The rope slid down Bud’s arms, but it didn’t even tickle. It scratched the back of his neck, though, when Charley looped it behind his head. Charley made little grunting noises as he worked the rope to Bud’s armpits and then tugged it until it bit into Bud’s flesh. Bud winced.

  The little boy cringed. “Sorry if that hurts you, but it’s gotta be tight. Mr. Caudel said so. We don’t want it fallin’ off when you’re halfway out of the hole.”

  Bud didn’t want that either. “I’m all right.”

  “I know.” A slight grin lifted one corner of Charley’s mouth. Pop used to grin crooked that way when he was tired or worried about something or even teasing. Charley grabbed Bud’s hands again.

  Bud wished he could feel it. He needed to feel it. The deadness scared him and made him sad all at once.

  “We’re ready!” Charley’s shrill cry echoed against the close walls and made Bud’s ears ring. “Close your eyes, Bud. We’re going up.”

  And then the rope went tight. Bud couldn’t feel Charley’s hands on him, but he felt that rope. Even through his jacket, it bit into his underarms and beneath his shoulder blades. He gritted his teeth and held back a moan. Eyes closed to block the clumps of dirt that peppered his face, he didn’t know he’d been pulled free until arms wrapped around his torso and lowered him flat on his back.

  He opened his eyes to a circle of men holding flashlights and Ma leaning over him, tears streaming down her face. She stroked his hair and his face while she cried and murmured his name. He tried to talk but no sound came out. His throat had worn out just like his arms. So he worked his lips, shaping the word Ma again and again while her warm tears dribbled onto his cheeks.

  Then another face leaned in—Charley, all puckered up with worry. Dirt smudged his forehead and cheeks. Dirt clumps matted his hair. His chin was scraped and bleeding. Bud turned away from Charley’s face, and his gaze landed on Charley’s ankles. His trousers had ridden up and his socks sagged down. In between, a raw, ragged line showed where the rope used to pull the two of them out of the hole had burned into his skin.

  He’d never been nice to Charley, but the boy had come down after him. Those well walls might have fallen in. On both of them. Charley had risked his life to come after Bud. Now he sat there bruised and bleeding, but instead of feeling sorry for himself, he looked at Bud with concern.

  Bud turned his head and met Charley’s worried gaze. He formed a different word. Why?

  Charley gave him Pop’s tired grin and lifted one shoulder in a lopsided shrug. “ ’Cause you’re my brother.”

  A sob left Ma’s throat, a sound as raw as the wounds on Charley’s legs. She grabbed hold of Charley and held him. Rocked him. Pressed a kiss on his temple. Charley burrowed into Ma’s embrace and wrapped his arms around her neck as tight as that rope must’ve held Bud. Both of them cried. Neither of them were looking at him anymore, but Bud mouthed it anyway.

  Thank you, little brother.

  Jesse

  Something inside Jesse seemed to break loose. He knew he needed to put Bud in one of the vehicles and get him to the doctor. But he couldn’t tear his eyes away from the scene at the center of the wavering beams of light.

  The way Mrs. Shilling held Charley—snug to her breast, lips pressed to his temple—carried him back to Severlyn, Nebraska, and the woman he’d called Ma but had never really accepted as a mother in his heart. She’d tried to hold him close like Mrs. Shilling now held
Charley, but he’d pushed her away. If not physically, then emotionally. Resentful because—

  His thoughts jammed. Why had he been resentful? The Caudels had given him their name, had sheltered and fed and nurtured him with the same attention they gave their birth children. But somehow he’d built up walls around himself.

  Standing there in the moonlight, witnessing Mrs. Shilling openly embrace her husband’s illegitimate son, he battled a desire to swing his arms outward, knock down his walls, remove himself from the hemmed-in place he’d created, and be as free as Bud must feel right now with the wind on his face.

  Jesse lurched forward and slipped his arms under Bud’s shoulders and knees. He rose with his burden and barked out orders as he strode toward Ernie’s vehicle. “Somebody find some scrap lumber in Deering’s shed or barn and get that hole covered so no one else tumbles into it. Preacher, get Mrs. Shilling and Charley and let’s get Bud to the doctor.”

  The doc should check Charley’s legs, too—Jesse hadn’t done a good job of protecting the boy’s skin from the rope’s bite. His open wounds were an invitation for infection. “Come on, everybody, move!”

  Urgency—to see to the boys’ needs but also to find his way out of his dark places—chased Jesse across the field and rolled in his chest all the way to town. He reached the doctor’s house first, and he banged on the door until the doctor groggily answered. The man came to full wakefulness when Jesse told him who was coming to see him and why. Within a few minutes he’d dressed and readied his examination room.

  Ernie pulled up with Mrs. Shilling and the boys. Jesse trotted to the car, amazed his legs still worked, given the little sleep he’d enjoyed over the past two days and the tension of the evening. Maybe God had answered when he asked for help. The thought brought an element of peace Jesse found both welcome and confusing.

  He carried Bud into the house, and Mrs. Shilling followed with her arm around Charley’s shoulders. Jesse placed Bud on the examination table and turned to leave, but Mrs. Shilling reached for him.

  “Mr. Caudel, I know you have other duties, but could you go to the mercantile and let Belle know we’ve found Bud? She’ll be awake, waiting for me to come home.”

  “Reverend Savage and I will go together.” It would give him some time to talk to the preacher without anyone overhearing. He closed the door behind him and approached Ernie, who leaned wearily against the foyer’s paneled wall. “You all right?”

  “I’m fine.” The preacher grinned. “Tuckered, but more grateful than anything. Our prayers have been answered. The lost is found.”

  “And he was in a dark place, hemmed in, just like you said.” Jesse eased toward the door. “I told Mrs. Shilling I’d let Belle know where her ma and brothers are. Would you…come, too?”

  Something glimmered briefly in Ernie’s eyes. He clapped his hand on Jesse’s shoulder. “Your automobile or mine?”

  Jesse got the odd feeling the young preacher already knew about the restlessness niggling in Jesse’s heart and had advice to offer. And Jesse was ready to listen. “Do you mind driving?” The way he quivered from head to toe, he’d likely run them onto the sidewalk.

  “Not at all.” The two ambled across the doctor’s yard to Ernie’s waiting car. They slid in, Ernie cranked the engine to life, and he pulled onto the street. He sent a lingering look left and right, then flashed a grin at Jesse. “Awfully quiet. Looks like Halloween’s over.”

  “Good.” Jesse wasn’t up to handling even one more conflict tonight. If Buffalo Creek proved as active every night as this one had been, he’d petition the town’s council to hire a deputy. Or two. He sagged against the seat. “Sure am glad Bud’s safe. Hope that boy stays close to home from now on for his ma’s sake.”

  He cringed as the words left his mouth. Mrs. Shilling’s stricken face as she’d begged him to find her son had closely mirrored his mother’s face the day he’d set out from the farm. He’d never gone back. Did his ma lie awake at night, worrying and praying over him?

  Jesse jerked upright. “Ernie, I…I did a terrible thing.”

  Ernie had turned into the alley behind the mercantile. He pulled up beside the Shillings’ barn, turned off the engine, and angled his face to Jesse. “I’m not a priest, Jesse. You don’t need to confess to me. You can talk to God Himself.”

  “I know.” Frustration smote him. He popped the car door open. “I better go tell Belle about Bud.” Light shone behind the kitchen window. As Mrs. Shilling had said, Belle was awake. “Then you’d better go back to Doc Zielke’s place. Mrs. Shilling and the boys will need a ride home.”

  Ernie caught Jesse’s sleeve. “Come to service tomorrow morning, then have dinner with Lois and me. I can see you need to talk, but it’s late. You also need rest. Let’s plan on visiting tomorrow, all right?”

  Although Jesse’s tormented thoughts needed release, he recognized the sensibility of Ernie’s suggestion. A night’s rest would do him good, and the preacher needed his sleep, too, or he might yawn in the pulpit. “All right.”

  He hurried across the lawn to the mercantile’s back door, a flicker of hope following him. Maybe, just maybe, tomorrow he’d find a way out of his dark, hemmed-in place.

  Had Ernie prepared this sermon in advance, or had last night’s events prompted it? Either way, Jesse listened in rapt attention to Jesus’s parable of the prodigal son. He’d heard the story before. His entire childhood and youth, his adoptive parents carted him off to church every Sunday. But this morning the story took on a deeper meaning.

  Holding his Bible open in one palm and lifting his other to the congregation, Ernie paced on the raised dais. “Can you picture it? Consider the father at the window, watching with expectation, never once losing hope that he would see his son appear on the horizon. Look at his face creased with longing. Can you hear his heart beating in anticipation? Can you feel his yearning?”

  Jesse’s pulse beat a thrum in his ears. His chest grew tight.

  “And then one day—oh, joyous day!—the father’s diligence was rewarded. His son! His son!” His eyes alight, Ernie pointed to the back of the sanctuary. “Look!”

  Every person seated in the pews gave a little jolt. Several turned their heads in the direction Ernie pointed, and Jesse couldn’t keep from looking, too, fully expecting to see a bedraggled young man with sunken cheeks and a defeated spirit standing in the aisle.

  “Here he came…”

  Jesse turned forward again, his gaze pinned on the minister’s shining face.

  “And when the father saw him, what did he do? He ran.” Tears pooled in the minister’s eyes. His clutched the Bible to his chest, an expression of wonder blooming on his face. “He ran to his son, and he swept him into his arms. Oh, how foul that boy must have smelled after wallowing in a pigpen. The filth clinging to his clothes must have transferred to the father’s fine robes. But did the father shy away?”

  Jesse, almost without conscious thought, shook his head.

  “No. No, he didn’t. He kissed his son, and he placed his own robe over the boy’s shoulders, and he called for a celebration because the lost had come home!” Ernie pulled in a breath and let it go with a satisfied ahhhh, the way a man did when he’d just finished a good meal. Then he moved to the pulpit with slow, measured steps, his head low. He laid the Bible on the wooden stand, placed his hand over it, and lifted his gaze to the congregation again.

  “This story is a parable meant to illustrate a biblical truth. The truth is this. The father in the story is our Father God. The son is any person who has strayed away. The welcome the son received? The embrace, the kiss, the robe, the ring, the fatted calf?” A smile grew on the minister’s face. “That’s what waits for anyone who turns his feet toward the Father.”

  Ernie tapped the Bible, nodding as if agreeing with some private thought. “The father ran to greet his son upon his return. Right now God stands with open arms, watching, waiting, ready to run and meet you on your return trek. Are you ready, dear brothers and sister
s? Are you ready to run to the arms of the Father?”

  He yanked up the hymnal lying on the edge of the podium. “Rise. Let’s sing together, ‘Turn Your Eyes upon Jesus.’ As we sing, as the Spirit leads, you come. Come to His arms.”

  The organist played the opening bars, and the congregation began to sing. “ ‘O soul, are you weary and troubled? No light in the darkness you see…’ ”

  The words wrapped around Jesse, stirring to life a longing unlike anything he’d experienced before. He wanted to go. He wanted to return to the Father, but there was something else he had to do first.

  Jesse snatched his hat from the seat, settled it on his head, and hurried out the doors with the words “ ‘And the things of earth will grow strangely dim, in the light of His glory and grace’ ” ringing in his ears.

  Arthur

  From his spot at the end of the very last pew, Arthur watched the sheriff scurry from the church building. He considered going after the man and asking if there was an emergency. Just to assure himself nothing more had befallen Neva Shilling. He’d come to church this morning in the hopes of seeing Neva. Perhaps sitting with her. But she wasn’t here.

  Back when Mabel was alive and the boys were young, he’d attended church regularly. Then Mabel passed away, and it had proven too challenging to keep the boys quiet without his wife’s help. Within a short period of time, churchgoing lost its appeal. Lazing at home—rising late, puttering around in his bathrobe and slippers, doing nothing he didn’t want to do for a solid day—on his only day away from the store replaced the habit.

  But as he listened to the worshipers singing in harmony, he realized he’d been missing something by staying away from service. The message had spoken to him. The words of the song now reminded him of the faith Mabel held dear. The faith he’d once viewed as important. Just like the son in the parable, Arthur had strayed. Oh, he hadn’t wallowed in a pigpen or otherwise wasted his life. But he hadn’t honored God. He’d only honored himself.

  Moneygrubber. The word Bud Shilling used to describe him returned and flayed him with its selfish meaning.