Leona laughed and said: “I bet she’s the one who yelled at Jill and me last summer, when we were going up to the stream. What’s she look like, Papa?”
“She’s a short, chubby woman.”
“That must’ah been her all right,” Leona said.
“Why did she yell at you?” Murdock asked. “What did you do?”
“Nothing, Papa. Something must’ah been eatin’ at her. Jill and I were jus’ foolin’ around, and maybe laughing a little loud, that’s all. Guess she didn’t cotton to that.”
“Amazing? Wonder what got under her skin?”
Leona shrugged her shoulders.
“Why do you suppose she’s like that, Papa?”
“Damned if I know,” her father answered.
—2—
“Papa, your wagon rides so smooth,” she said a short time later, as they made their way along Haleys Trail.
Upon coming to the Stream Road they made a right-hand turn onto it, heading north. The woods behind the Haleys’ back field and, indeed, the woods all the way to the stream was full of Murdock’s logging trails and roads; and he was explaining how he chose names for them when Leona asked him a question.
“What’s the difference between woods roads and trails, Papa?”
“Well, it’s a little complicated, but I’ll give it a shot,” he said. “A woods road—or logging road, as some call ‘em—is wide enough that two wagons can pass each other. Although, one or both might have to pull way to the side of the road to do so. Whereas, a trail is too narrow for more than one wagon at a time. In fact, it’s barely wide enough for that purpose, and in some places isn’t. Usually trails, and paths, which are narrower still, are meant for walking. You’ll find that hunters and nature lovers use ‘em the most.”
“But I’ve seen you drive your wagon on all the trails you made,” Leona said.
“That’s because my slagon is narrower than most. Even so, standard-size wagons can travel on most trails, but not all. However, if a wagon is on a trail that is wide enough, and it happens upon another wagon, then one of them has to find a place to pull all the way off the trail so the other can pass.”
“What about paths, Papa?”
“Paths are strictly for walking. Oh, sometimes paths are wide enough to allow a small wagon like mine to pass, but usually not. Friendship Path is an exception. Since I knew you’d be using that path a lot, I made darn sure that my wagon could travel on it. But I can’t guarantee that anyone else’s can.
“You know the place about halfway up Friendship Path where there are two large birch trees, one on each side of the path?” Murdock asked.
“Yes,” Leona answered.
“Well, my slagon can barely fit between them—with only a couple inches on both sides to spare—so a standard-size wagon wouldn’t be able to. And, since the birch are not fully-grown, in a few years my slagon won’t make it through either, and I’ll have to clear a path around them.”
“Why don’t you just cut one down, Papa?” Leona asked.
“I don’t like cutting down mature trees, Leona. God put them there and He let them live this long, so I’m not gonna kill them unless I have a very good reason.”
“But you cut down trees for firewood,” Leona replied.
“That’s one of the very good reasons, dear,” Murdock answered. “People need firewood to survive.”
Leona thought about what her father said, and said: “Yeah, that’s a good reason.”
Murdock had only been on the Stream Road for a few minutes when he began whistling Beautiful Dreamer. And just as he had hoped, Leona began to sing along with him. Soon thereafter he stopped whistling, just to listen to her sing. When she stopped singing, not long after he stopped whistling, Murdock said: “Don’t stop, Leona.”
“But I like to hear you whistle, Papa.”
“Well, I’ll tell you what, how’s about I whistle along softly, so I can hear you better?”
“Okay, Papa.”
Murdock started whistling again and Leona began singing. Both felt warm inside. Leona because she could enjoy her father’s familiar, always soothing whistling; and Murdock because he could hear his daughter’s beautiful voice singing his favorite song.
—3—
While riding with her father along the Stream Road, Leona noticed that he barely moved the reins that lay softly between the fingers of his hands. That’s when it occurred to her that Prince had traveled these woods roads so many times with her father that he instinctively knew where to go. All her father had to do was softly vocalize the sounds he had patiently taught Prince and he would either take the path to the left or the one to the right. When he wanted Prince to turn left, he said “hay-yah”; and when he wanted him to turn right, he said “hi-yah.” And when he wanted the horse to go faster, all he had to say was “giddy-yup” and it would pick up the pace. To slow Prince down he said “easy boy.” And to make it stop he would say “whoa.”
Leona had always marveled at the utility of the simple language her father taught his horses. She had watched him spend hour upon hour training them, and was especially impressed when both horses were pulling the slagon perfectly in sync with his commands.
Fifteen minutes into their trip the slagon neared Friendship Path, off to the left. If they had taken it they would be a Jill’s place in less than 10 minutes, but that was not their destination, so Murdock continued along the Stream Road. Not long thereafter they were crossing over the School Road, continuing their journey to hopefully find the perfect Christmas Tree.
“We’re halfway there now,” Murdock informed his daughter.
But Leona’s thoughts were elsewhere and she didn’t hear him. As she curiously peered through the woods that surrounded the road—half awake, half in daydream—Leona noticed a sign on her side with Pine Tree Trail written on it. By chance she eyed a jackrabbit hopping merrily along the trail, its once brown fur now nearly white in camouflage for the snowy months that lay ahead.
“Look, Papa,” Leona said. “That rabbit is all white. Is it an albino?”
“No, dear, all jackrabbits turn white when winter is nigh, to blend in with the snow.”
“Why?” she asked.
“So predators won’t easily see them. Rabbits aren’t fond of being eaten by wolves, foxes, or the like.”
Leona laughed and then said:
“God is so amazing, Papa, to have a rabbit turn white like that.”
“He sure is, Leona; and that’s just the tip of the iceberg of the amazing things He does.”
Not long after the hard-to-see jackrabbit left the trail and disappeared deep into the woods, Leona felt a jolt and bounced a good half-foot off the wagon’s seat, with gravity causing her to slam roughly down onto the front edge of that seat.
“You’d better pay more attention, Leona,” her father warned. “The path gets mighty bumpy from here on in.”
Leona grabbed onto the seat, recalling what her mother had told her.
“Don’t worry, Papa, I’m gonna hold on real tight from now on. My poor butt can’t take another jolt like that,” she rubbed her backside and said, causing her father to laugh hysterically.
Even though Leona was sure the next morning would see a huge bruise on her bottom, she was almost glad that the jolt occurred when she heard her father’s deep baritone laugh. Nothing could match it. Indeed, she often saved her best jokes and funniest stories for him, purposely avoiding telling anyone else first, only because she didn’t want anyone to beat her to the punch, else she might miss out on the sound of his roaring belly laugh. And knowing it was she who was making him laugh made it even more special to her. Leona enjoyed another thing about her father: his passion for the Red Sox.
“How’d the Sox do last year, Papa?” she asked.
“Not as good as they could of,” he answered, “if they’dah kept Babe Ru
th. I’ll never forgive that idiot owner for sellin’ him to the Yankees. Why on Earth anyone would get rid of a player that can both pitch and hit like him, I’ll never know. Especially after he shattered the major league record by hitting 29 homers that year. And darn if he didn’t shatter it again by hitting 54 for the Yankees last year. It was the day after Christmas in 1919 when he was sold, and, I’ll tell ya, when I read about it, it was the worst day of my life. If he had been traded for a good player it wouldn’tah been so bad. But to just up and sell the Babe…. Oooo, I’m getting mad jus’ thinking about it.”
“What did the Red Sox get for him, Papa?”
“As I recollect, one-hundred grand. And they say the demented owner only wanted the money so he could finance a Broadway play of his. It wasn’t even used to help the Sox get better. The owner of the Red Sox is a doggoned turkey, if ever there was one.”
Leona laughed at her father’s remark. And for the next few minutes she was either laughing or smiling at the things he said, as he went on and on about the Red Sox. Whether it was talking about the good things they accomplished that brought a smile to his face, and Leona’s, or about the “bonehead decisions” the manager and owner made that caused her father to be angry, comically so she thought, Leona just loved listening to her father talk about “his Sox.”
—4—
Fifteen minutes later, while Leona was staring into the woods on the right, daydreaming about finding the perfect Christmas tree, Murdock yelled “hay-yah” and the wagon turned left onto one of five closely spaced snow-covered trails that intersected the Stream Road in that area.
As it did he spoke: “We’re almost there, Leona. Another 5 or 6 minutes maybe.”
Since Leona wasn’t paying close attention she wasn’t sure just which trail he took, but shortly after they turned onto it she saw something about 500 feet up ahead that caught her eye.
“What’s that, Papa?”
“What’s what, dear?”
“Up in that tree, down there on the right; that white thing at the top of it. See?”
“Which tree? I don’t see anything.”
“The dead one. The one just past the big pine,” she said while pointing down the trail.
“Gee, I don’t know, Leona. I suppose we’ll find out when we get there.”
“How much longer before we get to Mr. Tyler’s land?” Leona asked.
“About 5 minutes,” Murdock said, wondering why he had to repeat himself.
“Do you think we’ll be able to find a good Christmas tree, Papa?”
“You don’t hav’ta worry your pretty little head about that, Leona. I saw plenty of nice looking trees there when I was cutting wood last fall.”
“Great!” the excited girl responded.
When they reached the dead tree that she had mentioned earlier, Leona looked up and spoke to her father.
“Papa, the white thing is gone.”
“Huh? Maybe it was just a clump of snow that up an’ decided to fall off,” he said.
Leona smiled and looked for signs of snow on the lower branches, but saw none.
“Maybe?” she said, appearing perplexed.
Five minutes later they came to a large birch tree that marked the boundary of the Tyler property. Nailed to that tree was a sign that read: KEEP OUT! Leona wondered why the sign was there, so she asked her father.
“Mr. Tyler had a bit ah trouble with some boys trespassing and smoking on his property,” he answered. “He was afraid that they might start a forest fire, so he put up that sign.”
“But he lives way up on the School Road, so, with no one around to see them, why would they obey that sign?”
“Most everyone knows to obey that sign, Leona. It’s well known in these parts that Sheriff Crowley is Mr. Tyler’s son-in-law. He patrols down here, off and on, as a favor to his father-in-law. And besides, you don’t mess with the law. Even if they don’t catch you in the act, they have ways of finding things out.”
“How come Mr. Tyler lets you on his land, Papa?”
“He trusts me; and a few others I hear tell. And those he does, he writes ‘em a note that says they can be on his property, just in case the sheriff runs into ‘em. I always carry mine in my wallet whenever I plan on being down here. Although, it’s not really necessary since the sheriff knows I’m one of the few Tyler allows on his land. Still, it’s better to be safe than sorry.”
A couple minutes later Murdock yelled “whoa” and Prince stopped dead in his tracks. He tied the horse up near an unusually narrow path that was identified by a sign with Tylers Path on it. As Leona got off the wagon, she heard the babbling stream and knew it must be close by.
“I think we’ll find a good tree down this path,” Murdock told his daughter. “Grab the ax from the back of the wagon and let’s get to it.”
Leona did as she was told and then ran as fast as she could to catch up with her long-legged father. When she came to the beginning of the path she noticed a cluster of birch trees and stopped dead in her tracks.
“Those are the trees I saw in my dream,” she thought; and then an eerie chill came over her body, just as it had in her dream.
“Papa!” she called out.
“What is it, Leona?”
“Nothing,” she said, thinking better. “I mean, wait up!” And then she ran to her father.
“Are you okay, Leona? You’re as pale as a ghost.”
“I’m okay, Papa. Let’s go.”
As they walked along the path, alternately looking left and right into the woods for the perfect Christmas tree, a whitetail deer ran across the path, just a few feet in front of them, startling Leona nearly out of her wits. When she saw how pretty the magnificent animal was, she said:
“I wish I had a picture camera, Papa.”
Remembering how Leona cringed each time he brought in his yearly deer kill, he jokingly countered:
“I wish I had my rifle.”
But when Murdock saw the disbelieving look on his daughter’s face, he laughed, put his arm around her shoulders, and assured her:
“Don’t you fret, darling, I’m just pullin’ your leg. You know I only hunt wildlife for food, and we have more than enough meat stored in the icebox to last the winter.”
With that, they continued walking, looking this way and that, searching the woods for just the right tree. Finally, after rejecting three or four perfectly good ones, they found one that to their eyes they deemed the perfect tree. It stood seven feet tall, and Leona knew it would take very little pruning on her father’s part to make it their best Christmas tree ever. Just as he started to chop it down with his double-blade ax, she asked a question.
“How come your ax has two blades, Papa?”
“Cause an ax dulls pretty quick, and there’s nothin’ I hate more than chopping with a dull blade or taking time to sharpen an ax. You’ll find that you can do twice the work with two sharp blades.”
It took less than a minute for Murdock to cut the tree down. With the ax safely in his left hand, he grabbed the fat end of the tree with his right and had Leona take the top. After carrying the tree for ten minutes they arrived back at the beginning of the path where Prince was feeding on hay that Murdock had placed on the ground for him. He lifted the tree onto the back of the wagon and then helped his daughter climb into her seat. All of a sudden the snow, which had been falling lightly for the past five minutes or so, started coming down harder and harder, and the wind began to pick up.
“I hope this isn’t a Nor’easter,” Murdock said in a serious tone.
Leona noticed that her father looked worried, and wasted no time climbing onto the wagon. He quickly grabbed the reins, released the brake, and said “giddy-yup.” Prince started off at a relatively slow gait, and then Murdock gave the command a couple more times until the wagon was moving at a comfortable speed, not too slow and not
to fast for the road conditions.
“Hang on tight, Leona. We’ve gotta get back home quick, before the snow gets too deep,” he said with a sense of urgency in his voice.
—5—
When they were nearly halfway up the trail that intercepted the Stream Road, with the newly cut Christmas tree bouncing about in the back of the wagon, the snow was falling heavily and the wind was blowing so hard that it was difficult to see more than a few feet ahead. That made it almost impossible for either Leona or her father to see where the trail lay, let alone its condition. All of a sudden Leona felt the wagon jerk and she went flying toward her father. Fortunately, his body softened her blow, but she still ended up on the floor of the wagon. Upon looking up she was surprised to see that her father was nowhere in sight. Leona frantically picked herself up when it finally hit her that he had fallen off. She saw him lying motionless on the side of the trail, and immediately jumped off the wagon. Leona felt herself shaking as she kneeled by her father’s back and gingerly leaned over him.
“Are you okay, Papa?” she asked.
When he didn’t answer she tried to shake him, and quickly realized that he was unconscious. She noticed that his head was resting on a snow-covered rock, and in panic looked to see if there was any sign of blood in his hair. She felt relieved when she saw none; but still, he was not moving and she grew more anxious.
“Wake up, Papa,” she pleaded while trying to shake him.
Still, he did not move. Leona then remembered to check his breathing; it seemed to be normal. She thought her father would be okay if she could just get him to wake up, but she saw no signs that he was going to. It was then that the 10-year-old realized she needed to go for help, and she was grateful that Prince had not run off with the wagon when Murdock dropped the reins.
“Papa trained his horses well,” she thought.
The snow was starting to come down faster and faster, so she decided to drag her father under the wagon for cover. Before she could do that she needed to engage the wagon’s brake, unhitch Prince from it, and tie him to a tree. When that was done she managed to roll her father onto a canvas she retrieved from the utility box under the front seat. Thanks to Margaret, he always carried it there.
Journey With the Comet Page 37