Appalachian Daughter

by Mary Salyers

  Corie Mae scolded him soundly. “I told you not to go outside.”

  “But, Mama, it’s in the shade here. You said not to get hot.”

  “You know better. Look here, you’ve got one of my good spoons out here in the dirt. I ought to give you a good whipping. Maggie, get the wash tub and heat some water. We’ll have to get this dirt off him. Don’t you know if you get dirt in your sores, you could get a bad infection? Land sakes, what’m I gonna do with you?”

  “Don’t whip me, Mama,” Johnny Ray whined. “I promise I won’t do it again.”

  “When we get you cleaned up, I reckon you can just stay in your bed for the rest of the day. And if you step one foot outside the house again, I’ll tan your hide good.”

  * * *

  Since Maggie had heard the talk about the war in Korea during Uncle Thomas’s visit the week of July 4, she had tried to listen to the news on the radio as often as possible. She often transcribed the news in shorthand to keep her skills sharp. Now almost a month after Uncle Thomas’ visit, she hears bad news. It seemed the North Koreans had pushed the Allied soldiers almost off the peninsula. The number of casualties grew larger every day.

  “What’s going to happen?” Maggie asked her father as they sat on the porch late one evening.

  “Don’t know, Honey. Guess we didn’t have enough troops and equipment when we went in there. If they can hold their position till we get more troops over there, maybe they’ll stand a chance.”

  “JD told me Walter Spinks and Larry Brown joined the Marines after they graduated last year. He thinks they’ll be sent to Korea. JD said he wished he could go fight.”

  “It might seem like a brave thing to do, but war is evil. I don’t understand why countries can’t find a peaceful way to work out their problems. JD don’t have no idea what it’s really like. He’s better off to finish school and hope he won’t get drafted when he graduates.”

  They sat quietly in the twilight, listening to the frogs, katydids, and even a hooting owl. After a while, Maggie said, “Daddy, I really want to play basketball this year. I wish Mama would change her mind. I talked to Aunt Lillian, and she said I could spend the night with her when we have games. Stuart can do the milking and the chores in my place. Do you think there’s any way we could persuade Mama?”

  “I don’t know, Sunshine. I’ll think about it. Maybe we can work something out.”

  * * *

  The next evening, Maggie, Betty Lou, Kenny, Stuart and Jeanie paid a visit to Grandma and Grandpa. “We brought you something,” Jeannie announced as she stepped onto the porch.

  “What’s that?” Grandma spit in her can sitting on the floor beside the porch swing she shared with Grandpa, who smoked his pipe while they gently rocked back and forth.

  “Mama made you this apple cobbler. She said you might want to whip up some cream and have a bite of dessert before you go to bed.” Betty Lou explained as Jeannie handed the warm pie to Grandma.

  “Thank you, Honey. Umm, it smells so good. Would you put it on the kitchen table for me?”

  The children stood in a semi-circle around the swing. “What’s that you got there? Grandpa pointed to the bundle under Stuart’s arm.

  Stuart put the bundle wrapped in an old quilt in Grandpa’s lap. “Open it up. We want to see if you know what it is.”

  Grandpa put his pipe on the swing beside him and pulled the quilt back to reveal a stringed instrument.

  “Where’d you get this?”

  “I found it in our attic,” Stuart said. “Daddy had me climb up there to cover a hole the squirrels had made. Found this bundle pushed way back against the roof. All covered with dust like it’d been there for a mighty long time.”

  “Mama said you’d probably know where it came from,” Jeannie had returned to the porch after taking the pie to the kitchen.

  Grandpa held the instrument by the neck. It had two broken strings, and the wood seemed a bit moldy. “Law, I never thought I’d ever see this again,” Grandpa rubbed his hands over the wood.

  “Where’d it come from?”

  “It’s my mammy’s mandolin.” Grandpa’s voice seemed a little hoarse. “See, my pappy forbid her to play, so I guess she hid it where he’d never find it.”

  “Why’d he tell her not to play it?”

  “Pappy said it’s a instrument of the devil. People played mandolins, fiddles, and such for dancing, you know. I remember Mammy’d get this out and play for us when Pappy went off for several days to a camp meeting somewheres. I was just a little tyke then.” Grandpa fingered the broken strings. “I hadn’t thought about this in years. I guess I thought she’d destroyed it.”

  “Why’d she do that?”

  “Ever time Pappy’d go off to one of them meetings, Johnny and Jimmy, they’s my two older brothers, and they’d beg Mammy to get out her mandolin and play. And we’d all jump around like we’s dancing. One time we didn’t hear Pappy coming, and he walked in right while we’s jumping and sanging. He had a awful mighty big temper. He grabbed his horse whip and started hitting Mammy.”

  Maggie gasped and grabbed Betty Lou’s hand as Grandpa continued his story. “Johnny and Jimmy took the whip away from Pappy. Johnny ran out to the chopping block and cut it up in pieces with the ax. They was scared to come back in the house, so they hid out in the woods for days till they saw Pappy hitch up the buggy and start off. Then they come in and told Mammy they’s going to leave. She helped pack up their clothes in bundles and fixed some food, and they left. That’s the last I ever seen them. Mammy never played the mandolin again. I thought she’d probably burnt it up or something.”

  “How old was you then?” Jeannie asked.

  “I’s about six, I guess. Johnny and Jimmy was about fifteen or sixteen. Mammy knowed they needed to leave because Pappy had such a temper, he’d probably killed them. But after that, she never would sing no more.”

  “That’s a really sad story, Grandpa,” Maggie said. “Did Grandma ever hear what happened to the boys after they left?”

  “They’d send letters addressed to the sheriff. He’d slip them to Mammy when Pappy wasn’t nowhere around. They was out in Kansas for a while. The last she heard they was living in Indian Territory out in Oklahoma.” Grandpa sat up straighter and rubbed his hands over his thighs. “After that she never knowed what happened to them.”

  It must have grieved Great-grandma to lose her boys like that. Maggie swallowed her tears. I can’t imagine what it would be like. After several moments of awkward silence, Stuart asked, “What you going do with that mandolin, Grandpa?”

  “Don’t know. Ain’t got no use for it myself. Don’t believe in playing them either.”

  “Can I have it?” Stuart asked.

  “Guess so, but you know them is the instruments of the devil. So just clean it up and hang it on the wall so it won’t cause no harm.” He carefully wrapped it in the old quilt and handed it to Stuart.

  “Thanks, Grandpa. I’ll take good care of it.”

  “Just remember what I told you.” Grandpa picked up his pipe and struck a match to relight it.

  Maggie stepped closer to the swing. “Grandpa, something else was wrapped up in that quilt.” She held out a writing tablet with yellowed and tattered pages.

  Grandpa stared at it for several seconds before he reached for the tablet. “What is this?” After carefully turning some pages and reading the entries, he said, “Mammy must of wrote this, but I never saw it before.”

  “Do you think it’s Great grandma’s diary?” Maggie hadn’t had a chance to read more than a few pages, but she believed Great Grandma had written it.

  “Sure looks like it.” Grandpa turned to the last pages and read for a few minutes. “My, my, she’s talking here about when Johnny and Jimmy left. That’s the last thing she wrote. Musta been when she hid the mandolin and this book. Let’s see...” He stared at the ceiling in thought. “That woulda been over fifty years ago.” Grandpa closed the tablet and lay it tenderly on the swing beside
him.

  Maggie couldn’t tame her desire to read what great grandma Campbell had written. “Grandpa, could I have the diary?”

  Grandpa smiled, picked up the book, and hugged it to his chest. “No, Maggie, not now. Someday I will give it to you, but for now I need to keep it.”

  “Thank you, Grandpa.” Maggie bent to lay a kiss on Grandpa’s forehead. “Okay kids, it’s time we got back home. Mama said not to stay long.”

  On the way home, Jeannie walked beside Maggie, who strolled with her head down thinking deeply about what secrets that diary might reveal.

  “Our great-grandpa had a really bad temper, didn’t he?” Jeannie asked when they had passed the old spring house. Maggie sighed. “Maybe that’s where Mama and Uncle Thomas got their hot-headedness. “Do you reckon it will come down to any of us?” Jeannie stepped closer to Maggie and whispered. “I don’t want to be like that.”

  “Me either.” Maggie pointed to the evening star twinkling just above the top of the ridge. “Let’s make a wish on that star to be calm like Daddy.” They stood quietly in the middle of the dirt road, soaking up the evening–hearing the songs and croaks of the birds, frogs, and insects and letting the coolness of the evening breeze fill their souls with peace.

  * * *

  “They’s somebody here to see you, Maggie,” Junior ran around the corner of the house to the backyard where Corie Mae and the girls sat in a circle peeling apples in the shade of a large maple tree.

  “Who is It?” Maggie wiped her hands on the flour sack she had over her lap and stood up.

  “It’s just me.” Maggie turned and saw Bud standing at the corner of the house.

  “Well, hello. I see you’re back home.” Maggie walked toward him.

  “Yeah, football practice starts next week, so I came home for that. I thought maybe we could sit on your porch and catch up on how the summer’s been, if that’s okay with you, Mrs. Martin.”

  Corie Mae didn’t look up from the apple she was working on, but she nodded and said, “Reckon, that’s okay.”

  Bud walked closer to the apple-peeling operation and watched for a few seconds. “Maybe I have a better idea.” He pulled his pocket knife from his pocket and handed it to Maggie. “If you’ll wash this knife for me, I’ll just sit here and help peel apples.”

  Maggie gave a quick look at her mother who just raised her eye brow and didn’t say anything. “I’ll run into the kitchen and wash your knife and bring out another chair. Be right back.”

  Bud took the chair where Maggie had been sitting. “What are you planning to do with all these apples?”

  “Today we’re fixing apples for drying.” Jeannie gave Bud a big grin.

  “Oh, by the way,” Corie Mae asked, “you had the chickenpox?”

  “Yes ma’am. In second grade. Why?”

  “Johnny Ray’s just had a terrible time with them and now Junior and Jay’s got them.

  “Is Johnny Ray going to be all right?”

  “The doctor says he got some kind of brain fever.”

  “It’s called encephalitis.” Maggie came back carrying a chair and a baking sheet.

  “I keep forgetting that big word. Anyway, he was real bad sick for a week. We thought we’s going to have to put him in the hospital, but finally he started getting better. Seems like he don’t want to do nothing but sit in the shade. I hope he gets stronger by the time school starts.”

  “Here, you can put your apple peels in this pan.” Maggie handed the pan and knife to Bud and placed her chair beside him.

  “Okay, tell me how to do this.”

  Maggie explained how to peel, core, and slice the apples for drying. Bud took an apple from the tub of water in the center of the circle. He began to peel the skin in narrow strips. “Now, what do you use dried apples for?”

  “What I like best,” Betty Lou smiled at Bud, “is to make a stack cake with them.”

  “What’s a stack cake?”

  “Mama makes these cake layers that are real thin like big cookies. She cooks the apples into a sauce and flavors it with sugar and spices. Then she stacks them up with a layer of cake and a layer of apples. You let it set for two or three days so the cake soaks up all the moisture. Then you whip up a big bowl of whipped cream and have yourself a real treat.”

  “Sounds really good. I’ll have to try it sometime.”

  “Mama always makes us a stack cake for Christmas. Maybe you can eat Christmas dinner with us.” Jeannie looked to see if her mother agreed. Corie Mae, concentrating on the apple she was peeling had just a hint of a smile.

  “Oh, damn, here’s a worm!”

  “Watch your language, girl”

  Jeannie hung her head and her face reddened. “I’m sorry, Mama, but I hate to find a worm.”

  “Mrs. Martin, did you say both boys have chicken pox? Are they okay?”

  “Don’t seem to have as many spots as Johnny Ray did, and so far, they haven’t been very sick. Most of their spots have started drying up now, so they should be fine in another day or two.”

  “When we finish here, is it okay if I go in and read them a story?”

  “They’d love that. Even little Jay likes to look at books. Then maybe you can stay and eat supper with us.”

  Maggie looked at Bud with an amused smile. His charm seemed to be working with her mother.

  After supper, on the way over to Kenny’s house to shoot baskets, Maggie smiled at Bud when he reached for her hand. “I think you’re making a hit with my mother.”

  “I’m really trying to make a hit with you.” He squeezed her hand.

  “It’s working.” Maggie squeezed his hand back.

  Later, when they got back to the house, Bud asked Corie Mae’s permission for Maggie to walk with him to the highway. As they walked along, they talked about school starting soon. Bud told Maggie he’d heard there was a new math teacher and a new history teacher.

  Bud stopped and looked at Maggie. “Do you go to church on Sunday nights?”

  “Sometimes, especially if the weather’s good.”

  “Can I go to church with you tomorrow night? Do you think your mother would agree?”

  “Sure. I think she wouldn’t object. If she does, I guess we can just sit on the porch or something.” Maggie couldn’t help grinning. Wait until I have a chance to tell Mary Ann.

  When they reached the highway, Bud put his arm around her and gave her a hug. “I’ll see you tomorrow then.” Maggie had never felt so happy. As she walked back to the house, she felt she floated on air.

  * * *

  “Did Great-grandpa scare you?” Maggie looked cautiously at her grandmother. They sat on Grandma’s back porch breaking beans. Corie Mae had offered to let her mother use the new canner so she didn’t have to string up the beans to dry for leather breeches, and Maggie had agreed to help prepare the beans for canning.

  “Well, Honey, I tried to stay out of his way. He never threatened me, but I saw lots of times when he’d go to pieces and beat the horses or kick a dog when he got mad about something. I never saw nobody with such a bad temper. And he’d always quote some scripture verse to justify it.”

  “Why did Great-grandma agree to marry him in the first place?”

  “Well, you see, they grew up as neighbors. They’s knowed each other all their lives. Granny told me when he came back from the Civil War, he asked her to marry him. She told him she would marry him when he had some property and a house for her.”

  “I still don’t understand why she would want a man with such a temper.”

  “Oh, he could charm a rattlesnake–so good looking with his distinguished beard and curly hair. He provided well for his family, worked as hard as anyone I ever knew. He was funny, told funny stories, and clowned around with the kids. I reckon Granny must have loved him or she wouldn’t have stayed here with him.”

  “Why did he ever decide to live here in this lonesome holler?”

  “This is what Granny told me.” Grandma spit into her can and wipe
d her mouth with a handkerchief. “Harvey fought with the South in the Civil War, but his older brothers all joined the Union army. After the war, they was so much hard feelings between them that Harvey decided to move as far away as possible.”

  “But why would he choose to live here?”

  “I’m not sure how he learned that this land was available. But if he planned to get away a way from Union sympathizers, he made a mistake cause most of the people around here had sided with the Union too.”

  Maggie worked quietly for a few minutes. “So...Great-grandma left all her family to live in this God forsaken holler with very few neighbors around and a mean husband. I don’t see how she could stand to live here with him.”

  “She was a strong woman in her own way, and she mostly tried not to provoke him. I guess he knew if he pushed her too far, she’d do something drastic, like when she took Helen to Kentucky to live with her mother.”

  “I always wondered how Aunt Helen came to live in Kentucky when she was born and raised here.”

  “Of course, this was before I ever knew Doug, and he don’t much like to talk about it.” Grandma usually called her husband “Papa,” so Maggie had to think just a minute to realize who Grandma meant by “Doug.” “He was still pretty young hisself when it happened, so he probably didn’t know the whole story. But what I know is that all of a sudden one day when Helen was about fourteen or fifteen, Granny packed up the buggy, and they left while Harvey was out in the field. She told Doug to tell his daddy she’d be back in a few weeks.”

  “So where’d they go?”

  “They went to Harlan where Granny growed up. Gone about six weeks, but when she come back she didn’t have Helen with her. Helen never saw her daddy again. She lived with her grandparents in Harlan till she got married. She never even come to his funeral.”

  “Why? What happened?”

  “I don’t know it all. I guess Helen was a little wild. She would slip out at night, take one of the mules and ride out to a party somewheres. One night Harvey caught her when she was putting the mule back in the barn. I think he probably whipped her. But they was more to it than that. I tried to ask Granny about it one time, but she just said it warn’t safe for Helen to be here no more.”