She lay with her eyes closed tight, so tight the lids began to ache. But poison things and ugly things and cruel things kept crawling through her mind. She even began to feel, after a while, as if there was something crawling over her skin. She turned on the light once to see, searching through the sheets. But no! Of course there wasn't a bug anywhere.
When she lay down again, she left the light burning. But it didn't take the ugly thoughts away. Mr. Chris himself had said there had to be lots of dead things so there could be lots of living things. It was awful to think about. The little foxes eating the nice little chickens and baby mice. She and Joe had found neat little bones by the doors of the den and tufts of fur and feathers. Even her nice cat was always eating birds unless she watched him. Once he ate a cardinal right on the kitchen step.
Laughing, Mr. Chris had said once, "Now, Marly—I guess you're not going to eat any more drumsticks or any more eggs? No more pork chops?"
They had all laughed about it then. She could hear them laughing, in her mind. It was the way, of course—everything eating something; everybody eating somebody. Even Mr. Chris and Daddy and Mother and Joe and herself—they were always eating drumsticks, every single one of them. But there was a reason for it, as Mr. Chris said; it was to stay alive.
But about Mr. Chris being sick, there wasn't any reason in the whole world that she could think of. Mr. Chris not to be alive anymore? There couldn't be any reason for that. So big and strong, as alive as a tree. Doing good in every direction, all the time.
But she kept thinking about that one big maple tree he had cut down because it was, as he said, "dying from the heart."
She tried to think of every pleasant and beautiful and wonderful thing she knew. She made a list of all the miracles in her mind. She recited poems to herself and sang softly all the songs she'd learned at school and all the songs Daddy sang. But it wasn't any good. Finally she couldn't bear it any longer and got up and crept softly down the stairs. She sat on the chair by the stove, her feet gathered under her. But it was cold in the kitchen, and she had to stir the fire up and put in some wood and coal. As quiet as she tried to be, Mother heard her. She heard Mother getting up and then the sound of footsteps down the stairs.
"Mother, I didn't mean to wake you up..."
"It's all right. I wasn't sleeping very well myself," Mother said. "I guess we're just too tired, that's all."
"I keep thinking about Mr. Chris," Marly said.
Thank goodness Joe hadn't come down, so she could cry all she needed to. Mother didn't say a word but only heated some milk, and they sat with their feet on the oven door and sipped at their steaming cups. Marly was glad for the silence and the warmth; it was cozy to sit with Mother in the night with the clock ticking and ticking and the fire crackling and the kettle slowly steaming.
At last Mother put down her empty cup and said, "Come back to bed with me this time." So they went up the stairs together.
This time Marly didn't even know when she went to sleep. When she woke up, the sun was shining and Joe had already gone off with Fritz. "Shall we hurry?" Mother asked. When they started out, she said, "Thank goodness it didn't freeze. We're all right for another day."
The sap was still coming and coming and coming, as if the earth could never give enough. How could they go on and on and on? Daddy looked quite gray. Fritz was red-faced and didn't say anything most of the morning. By noon both Marly and Joe were almost too tired to talk.
"I don't know ... If I could find some help, maybe we could do it," Fritz said. "But I've called everybody. Everybody's having his own big run, same as we are."
"I understand now why Chrissie said she hated sugar season," Mother said.
Daddy had brought his little radio to the sug-arhouse to keep him awake in the night and to keep him company. "Said in the news this morning it was apt to be the best sugar year in New England history," he said. Marly couldn't tell whether his voice was glad or not. He was just trying to make it sound glad.
Then Fritz went to the house as he did every day. When they saw him coming back, they were already gathering in the second bush. Joe was driving the horses and saying "Gee" and "Haw" and everything. When he saw Fritz coming, he said suddenly "Whoa!" and they all waited. But even at a distance they could tell that something was different. Fritz started shouting halfway up the hill.
"He's a lot better today!" he cried. He was panting and smiling. "Chrissie said she might even come home for a while tonight. I'm driving in after her when we've got through this bush..."
That afternoon Marly had to add another miracle to the list. It was how light a heavy bucket could suddenly be.
That night she slept.
13. Annie-Get-Your-Gun
The next morning a visitor came up onto the hill. Marly saw her coming. She looked familiar some way, a solid sort of woman, with a very settled-looking hat and her neck all wrapped in a big woolly scarf. She picked her way carefully along the deep muddy ruts and looked as cross as an old patch.
"Who on earth is that?" Mother asked.
Joe shaded his eyes. "Golly!" he said. "She's the nurse from school. Miss Annie. She helped with the vaccinations."
Mother stood still, watching Miss Annie coming, and then she put her bucket down and went to meet her. Marly could hear their voices but not what they were saying. Miss Annie's voice sounded like a teacher's on a day when everybody didn't behave.
Mother turned and called, "Marly! Joe!" She looked terribly upset.
"This is Miss Annie Nelson," she said. "She says she's the county truant officer."
Oh, my goodness! The truant officer!
"I came to see whether you were sick, you two," Miss Annie said, looking them up and looking them down with her sharp eyes. "But you're about the two healthiest-looking specimens I've seen in a long time."
"I've told her what you're doing," Mother said, her forehead going wrinkly with concern, "but it seems that there aren't ... Well, there seem to be rules—"
Miss Annie was looking at Joe. "Have they told you what they call me downtown at the school?" she asked. Her eyes were glittery sharp, but her mouth looked as if it might laugh, Marly thought, if she'd only let it.
"No. I never heard," Joe said uncomfortably.
"Well, they call me Annie-Get-Your-Gun!" she said. "Nobody gets away with playing hooky from my schools."
"I'm sure Joe wouldn't want to," Mother said. "It's only that we—" Her eyes swept over the sugar-bush.
"Well, one thing I know is that I'm freezing stiff," Miss Annie said. "Maybe we could go in that place where the fire is and talk this business over."
"Yes, yes, of course," Mother said. "And my husband—we can talk to my husband about it. I taught school myself for a while before I married, and of course I know how it is. You simply can't let children stay out for any little reason."
"No, you can't," said Annie-Get-Your-Gun.
Daddy was putting some more logs on the fire when they went in. Miss Annie stood inside the door, watching him.
"This is my husband," Mother said.
But Annie paid no attention. She stood looking around while she began to unwind her scarf. "Well, well, I declare!" she said. "I've lived around this part of the country all my life, and I've never actually been inside one of these places. Of course I see plenty of them from the road, all that smoke and steam. Heard they were syrup places."
"Sugar camps," said Joe.
She looked at him. "I guess you know all about it, young man?" she asked sharply. Marly thought, Oh, dear, why did Joe have to go and act smarty just now, with a truant officer?
"Yes, ma'am, I guess I do," Joe said.
"Won't you sit down?" Daddy asked hurriedly.
But Miss Annie didn't sit down for a while. She walked around the evaporator, asking questions. She wanted to know how much sap it took to make a gallon of syrup. She wanted to know how much wood it took to keep the fire going. She wanted to know more things than you could shake a stick at, as Mr. Chris m
ight have said. And talking about shaking a stick—when the bubbles started rising high, Daddy let Joe do the magic trick. Marly wanted to do it herself, but after all this was the truant officer from Joe's school, so she didn't say a single word.
"Well, think of that!" Miss Annie said. "Why, that's the most surprising thing I ever saw. I've never even thought about syrup. Why, I never..." She asked more and more questions.
Then, finally, Daddy offered her a taste.
She stood with the steam coming out of the tin cup in her hand, sniffing at it as if she was a little bit suspicious. "Smells like sweet corn cooking, only better," she said. "It smells like—" She had a way of stopping her sentences in the middle.
"It smells like spring," Marly said, to help out.
Miss Annie gave her a quick look, surprised. "Yes. Yes, of course it does—like a spring morning." She took a deep breath over the cup. "After a rain, maybe," she said, and reached her tongue out, tasting the very edge. The cup was hot, and she pulled her tongue in again in a hurry.
"Let me set the cup in the snow a minute. There's still a drift back of the sugarhouse," Joe said.
When he brought the syrup back, just right to drink, Miss Annie was sitting by Daddy and Mother on the old couch. She was eating a boiled egg.
"I declare I never tasted anything so grand in my life," she said. "My grandfather used to say, I remember, that anything but first-run syrup was an insult to his appetite. I think people have forgotten how good these things can be."
"Especially things they make themselves," Mother said, smiling. "We came from the city a year ago, and we've said that over and over."
Suddenly Miss Annie seemed excited. She looked at Joe and then at Marly, and her eyes began to sparkle over her cup. "Children ought to learn about that," she said. "Why, every child ought to come out here and have a taste—" She stopped again. But Marly could see the thought finished on her face. "Every child in that school ought to see a place like this. It's part of their American heritage, that's what it is, and they don't even know it."
"Sometimes teachers do bring their classes here. Mr. Chris told me," Marly said.
"Field trips," said Joe.
"Well, I'm glad to hear it." Miss Annie's eyes had a real sparkle now that she was warm and full of sap. "But how did this sugar-thing start? I mean who discovered you could get that—" she pointed to the deep amber of the last pan that was draining slowly out into the can, "—from that?" She pointed to the first long pan at the back, where pale watery sap was running in from the storage tank.
"Mr. Chris said it came right from the Indians," Marly said.
Miss Annie turned to her. "But how did they find it out?" she asked.
None of them knew exactly how that had happened. Even Fritz didn't know. When Miss Annie went off down the hill again, the last thing she said was, "I'm going to find out if anybody knows how those Indians knew!"
The next to last thing she said was to Mother. "Now, you just don't worry about school for a few days for that pair of yours. If they had the measles, they'd be excused, and they'd come back after and get along just fine. They're getting part of their education right here in this sugarbush, and I don't mind reporting what I think to the principal."
Mother watched her out of sight, and turned with a smile. "Well, I guess we converted her," she said.
"The syrup did it," Joe said.
But Marly was sure it had been the miracle. It was an odd thing, she thought, how one miracle seemed to make another. And later that evening, she really knew how true it was. They were finishing supper when the telephone rang. Marly answered. She loved to answer and always tried to beat Joe to it if she could. Sometimes they argued over the receiver, and Mother had to take it away from both of them before the person who was calling thought there was a house afire. Tonight, though, Joe was so tired he didn't even get up from his chair.
"Hello. This is Annie-Get-Your-Gun," came over the telephone.
"Who?" For a minute Marly was too surprised to remember.
"This is Miss Annie, the lady who came to the sugarbush today—the truant officer."
"Oh. Yes—"
"Well, I talked to the principal, and I talked to the superintendent. They both said to talk to Joe's teacher, so I did."
Goodness, Marly thought, all that fuss because Joe stayed out of school.
"The teacher talked to the class, and ... Maybe I'd better speak to your father?"
"My daddy's not here. He's out at the sugar camp," Marly said.
Mother was listening. "I'll talk to her, Marly," she said.
"My mother is here—"
Miss Annie's voice was so sharp and loud that Marly could still hear every word she said, even after Mother took the receiver. Besides, Mother held it about five inches away, so Miss Annie's voice wouldn't hurt her ear. Miss Annie told about the principal and the superintendent all over again. Then she said, "Joe's teacher agreed with me that nothing on earth could do those kids more good than coming out there to help—if they could help and not be in the way. Or maybe just some of the strongest boys? Your husband said you needed help."
"Why, yes—we do—" Mother's eyes went wide.
"Well, then, how many do you want?" Miss Annie asked briskly. "If you'll find out from your husband, there's no reason why the bus couldn't bring all the boys you need right to the spot in the morning."
"Why, that's wonderful!" Mother said. "I'll go right on over and ask him and Fritz."
Miss Annie told her where to call back, and Mother wrote it down with her fingers trembling. She hung up before Miss Annie had entirely finished with her fourth good-bye. Then she just stood there for a minute, looking amazed. "Well, imagine that," she said.
In an hour she called Miss Annie back again. If a dozen boys could come the first day, later they'd see what happened to the weather. It looked to Fritz as if it might freeze any day now, and keeping the sap gathered would be a wonderful help. Then there might be a rest for a while if the cold snap held. Then, of course, in another thaw, there'd be another run.
"We've decided the boys can take turns at it," Miss Annie said. "No one boy is going to suffer much loss of school if those runs last a solid month or more."
Marly stood by the telephone, poking Mother with her elbow. "Mother—ask her why the girls can't come. Why, I can carry as many buckets as Joe can!"
"You can't either!" said Joe.
"I can!"
"Ssssh!" Mother said.
There was a little silence on the other end of the phone. Then Miss Annie's voice came again. "I heard that," she said. "I didn't even think about the girls. I don't know why I didn't. Actually..." Another little silence. "I'll talk to them about it. If there are any girls who want to come and work, I don't see why they shouldn't."
"Maybe they won't want to, really," Mother said. "I'm afraid Marly's different. She's rather a tomboy—"
"Mother, I'm not!"
"You are too," said Joe.
"Just wait and see then!" Marly said.
Miss Annie was laughing over the phone. She had a good big laugh, and Mother had to put the telephone twelve inches from her ear or it would've popped her eardrums. "Tell that girl of yours I learned about those Indians today," she said. "I looked it up in a book in the library. The librarian told me where to find it. The story goes that an Indian squaw was cooking for her husband, see, some sort of porridge Indians ate. I guess we'd call it mush now. Anyway, she didn't want to go clear to the spring for the water and happened to have set a pot near a maple tree where her husband had stuck his spear up, and his bow. So she used the 'tree water' that had dripped into this pot, and her husband said he'd never tasted his mush so good and sweet. So she showed him what she'd cooked it in. And after that they boiled mush in 'sweet tree water' every spring."
"What a nice story," Mother said.
"And that superintendent—honestly, I thought I'd never get out of that office, he was so interested. He used to live on a farm himself. Said he remembe
red when his grandfather used to drive a team of oxen to pull the flatboat in the bush. It was so deep with mud even horses couldn't make it, he said. He rode on top of the sap tank—"
She went on and on. Everybody in that school seemed to have told Miss Annie a story.
Mother had barely hung up when the phone rang again. And it was Chrissie! She said that Chris was a lot better, and that he was so happy about the sugar crop going right along in spite of everything that it was helping him to get better. To have the children come and help would relieve him even more, she said. "The only thing that worried him was you folks having to work so hard—especially Marly," Chrissie said.
About Annie-Get-Your-Gun she laughed and laughed. She said she could hardly wait to go back and tell Mr. Chris all about it.
The next day the school bus went by as usual. But pretty soon it came back again. Boys and girls simply swarmed up the hill! Fritz got them organized, so many to go out with him each time. It seemed like magic how quickly the buckets were emptied and into the storage tanks. Long before noon everybody was back in school again—even Joe and Marly.
"Why didn't you tell me so I could come, too?" Margie wailed when Marly told her the story of Annie and the children and the Indians and everything.
Next day the teacher let her come. It was getting colder and colder, and the wind changed and blew from the north. When it froze that night, only a little bit of sap was in each bucket, so nothing was hurt at all. Little round islands of frozen sap simply waited in the buckets for the next thaw.
Miracles on Maple Hill (Harcourt Young Classics) Page 13
