My Father's World

by Michael Phillips

  He glanced at the flowers, turned toward the fireplace to smell the beans, then set his gaze on me.

  “What have you gone and done with my place?” he said, his voice sounding gruff. Then I caught the faint spark of fun in his eyes. When I didn’t respond, a smile broke on his lips—just a tiny one. “Why, I’d grown right attached to all the dirt and clutter around here!”

  “I hoped it would be all right if we cleaned up some,” I answered finally, swelling with pride inside. Somehow I could tell he was pleased.

  “Guess I’ll have to learn to live with it,” he answered, the smile gone now.

  Zack followed him in, then Pa set his rifle in a corner and unbuckled his gun belt. It was the first time I’d noticed that he wore a gun. He slung the holster on a hook by the door, then strode over toward the fire, took a closer look at the beans, and nodded in approval.

  “Looks like your ma made a right good cook outta you, too,” he said. “’Course I guess you been doing the mothering yourself since . . . Aggie died.”

  I nodded. I’d never heard anyone call Ma that before.

  “Let’s see, Corrie you’d be what—hmmm . . . fourteen? No, fifteen?”

  “Fifteen,” I said.

  “I ain’t likely to forget that winter of ’37. Coldest dang January I can ever remember, and your ma swellin’ up real big carryin’ you. I cut up more logs that month to feed that fire and keep her warm. . . . No, I ain’t likely to forget that!”

  We all stood there kind of aimless and awkward, wondering what to do.

  “Well,” said Pa finally, breaking the silence, “what about supper?”

  He helped us get everything on the table. We had to go out to the wagon for some bowls and utensils, because I hadn’t gotten everything unloaded. Then we all sat down to eat. Pa didn’t say a prayer, he just started eating. So we all did the same. No one said much. We just ate quietly, staring into our bowls of beans and munching at my attempt at cornbread. It wasn’t too good. I’d have to get used to cooking over Pa and Uncle Nick’s fireplace.

  We were about halfway through our meal, when all of a sudden Pa noticed the tablecloth. He put down his spoon deliberately, and took the edge of the white linen between his fingers, rubbing it gently. Then he spoke—his voice sounded soft and faraway—“The minister’s wife back in Bridgeville gave this to your ma the day we was married. It was always real special to her ’cause it was nicer than anything we could ever afford.”

  We just listened in silence. It was hard to know what to say at times like that. One minute Pa would seem real friendly, then the next he’d get that gruff look again that seemed to say, “Get outta my way!” It was going to be a while before I knew how to respond to either of his two sides.

  When we were done with the meal, I took the two girls with me outside to wash up the dishes. There was no water pump, only a crude table with a couple of buckets on top of it, filled with water from the creek.

  When we went back inside, Pa was sitting on a stool oiling and cleaning his gun. There weren’t any chairs, only two stools and the bench we kids had sat on while we ate. Tad was sitting in a corner silently watching Pa. Zack busied himself poking at the fire, and then finally laid on another log. We three girls just sat on the bench and folded our hands in our laps.

  We were all tired, and would have liked to have gone to bed, but I didn’t want to say anything. We were all going to have to sleep in that one room together.

  Tad finally got up, walked over to Pa, and as bold as you please said, “I have to go to the outhouse.”

  Pa looked up with a blank expression, then glanced from me to Zack.

  “We have an outhouse back home,” said Zack.

  “Guess I’ll have to build that tomorrow too,” Pa muttered. “Well, Zack, take your brother out to the woods.”

  “I’m big enough to go by myself,” Tad insisted. But when he opened the door and stared out into the night, he hesitated.

  “You afraid of the dark, boy?” asked Pa, a bit roughly.

  “No . . . sir,” stammered Tad. “I ain’t afraid of nothin’.”

  “Well boy, you’d better learn a thing or two about California,” said Pa. “Why there’s wolves out there, and bears, and . . .” He winked in my direction, but Tad didn’t catch the humor.

  “Really?” Tad whispered seriously.

  “Yep. Didn’t your ma tell you? We Californians gotta be tough.”

  Tad cleared his throat nervously, “Could you take me out?” he asked.

  Pa’s expression changed. This was not what he expected. No doubt he would have preferred taking his rifle and going outside to face one of his imaginary bears. But with resolve, at last he laid down the gun he had been cleaning, got to his feet, and, glancing around kind of helplessly, headed for the door.

  When they returned about five minutes later, Pa’s only words were, “It’s time to be bedding down.”

  I think he’d had enough of his kids for one day.

  Chapter 12

  The First Few Days Together

  After that first awkward day, we were kept too busy to worry much about how strange we felt about everything. We tried to get the place livable, and Pa kept talking about winter coming on and all we had to do.

  Some men came from town on the third day, and helped with the building of the extra room. It wasn’t very big, but it fit us kids fine. There were five beds—two bunks, one for the girls, one for the boys, and a single bed for me. We each had our own place to sleep, and we hadn’t even had that back home.

  Pa built a bigger supper table, too, with sturdy benches on both sides. After being cooped up in a covered wagon for so long, all these changes were heaven to us. Pa kept muttering little comments about “making do till winter’s past” and that he’d “have to see about things when Nick gets back.” As much as I didn’t want to think so, it almost sounded like he was planning on our being there only temporarily, until he could find some reasonable way to send us back home. But then it did seem that he was going to an awful lot of trouble just to put up with us for a few months. I had to try to be happy for the present and not think too much about the disappointments that might come later.

  On the fourth day, Pa took the canvas canopy off our wagon, and took it into town for supplies.

  “Bye, Snowball,” Emily called out after him as he disappeared down the road; then she and I turned back toward the cabin to join the others. It was a strange moment, but pleasant in a homey way, walking up to a cabin we’d laid eyes on only a few days before, all alone now, with our Pa trusting us to stay by ourselves.

  Late that same afternoon he returned with that big wagon loaded down. We ran out to meet him rumbling up the road, and when he stopped, Zack and Becky clambered up into the wagon. There were straw mattresses for all the beds, and lots of extra blankets. We had been sleeping on the rough, cold boards with our ragged, moth-eaten blankets from the trip west.

  But that wasn’t all! Besides the bedding, he had dishes and some pots and pans. The equipment I had been using from the wagon was old, charred, and broken. To my delight, there was also a small pot-bellied stove and two new chairs! It was just like Christmas unloading all the new things! All the while Pa kept a gruff look on his face, and kept saying things like, “Now you be careful with that!”

  But even with those new chairs and benches, new beds and dishes and all that stuff, it seemed to me that there was something missing. When I closed my eyes, I could still see us as a family back home. But Ma was in the picture in my mind, instead of Pa. Maybe she was sitting by the fire sewing, or reading a book to us, or maybe we were all singing hymns together. Sometimes we didn’t even say much, just sitting there listening to Ma’s rocker creak back and forth, or lying in bed hearing her humming softly to herself until we fell asleep.

  But when I opened my eyes, everything was strange and new. Ma wasn’t there, and Pa sat fixing a harness, sharpening a tool, or cutting a piece of leather for something. Everything was quiet. There
was no singing, no humming. Just quiet. I was pleased with what Pa had done, but there’s something about a ma that can’t be replaced by any man, even your own pa. And it seemed as we sat around in the cabin that we just weren’t a real family, even with all the homey new things Pa had brought back from town.

  Besides all the stuff that was in the wagon, Pa brought with him the old prospector we’d met at the General Store, Alkali Jones. He helped Pa and Zack and me unload. For such an old man he was strong enough, but I guessed from the look of him that he was tough. Tough like an old buzzard. And his voice did nothing to make the similarity in my mind go away.

  He was a peculiar fellow. An ornery old cuss, folks called him. After a while I got kind of used to the creak of his voice and that cackling laugh. I had plenty of practice. Everything seemed to amuse him.

  After the wagon was unloaded, the girls and I busied ourselves getting dinner. In the several days we’d been there, Pa’d never given us many chores or jobs. Every once in a while he’d tell Zack to bring in some firewood, and the night before he said, “Best be getting some dinner started for the young’uns, Cornelia.” I guess he was so used to living alone that he figured we’d all know what to do. He never seemed to realize that except for me and Zack, the kids were young and needed a lot of tending. I guess he figured I’d do all that, too. I had done it, after all, since Ma died.

  Tad traipsed along with Zack to cut up some firewood. Pa and Mr. Jones went into our bedroom to finish up the beds, so we could use them that night. I went to fetch some of the new pans that were sitting in a box over on the side of the cabin where they were working, and I overheard Pa and Mr. Jones talking. I knew eavesdropping wasn’t proper, but I couldn’t help myself. Besides, their voices were so loud that I likely would have heard anyway.

  “You make a new strike or somethin’, Drum?” asked Mr. Jones.

  Pa told us not to call him Pa when Mr. Jones or anyone else was around. When Becky asked why, he just said he’d have to talk to Uncle Nick first to see what they ought to do. I didn’t know what Uncle Nick had to do with it, but Pa seemed to have some pretty strong reasons for still wanting folks in town to think he was Mr. Drum. But whatever they were, he wasn’t telling us.

  “Why you askin’?” said Pa.

  “You practically bought out the General Store. Hee, hee! Where’d you get money like that?”

  “I got the stuff on credit.”

  “Why, you’d think them kids was yourn! Hee, hee!”

  “What’d you expect?” said Pa, a little too defensively, but Mr. Jones didn’t seem to pay any heed. “They’re my partner’s kin, after all. Couldn’t just leave ’em out in the street.”

  “Well, I figured you ain’t got no cash. That game the other night cleaned you out.”

  “The mine still produces a few ounces a week, if I work it.”

  Alkali Jones let out with that cackle of his again. “That’s the rub, now ain’t it? Kids’ll take a heap o’ ounces to bring up, I ’spect.”

  “Where do you leave off knowin’ so blamed much about kids?”

  “Don’t know nothin’, thank the good Lord! But five extra mouths to feed is five extra mouths. An’ even that pie-eyed Bosely at the store will be expectin’ his money by and by. Hee, hee!”

  “I got it all figured out,” said Pa confidently. I couldn’t tell from his voice whether what came next was part of his Mr. Drum act, pretending to be indifferent toward us, or whether he was confiding his real feelings on the matter to Mr. Jones. “Come spring,” Pa went on, “them kids’ll be gone. You know Nick, Alkali. Even if he gets himself cleared with the sheriff over this mess with Judd, you don’t think he’s about to take up as no pa to a passel of kids his sister sent him, do you? Nah, come April, we’ll be free men again. But I had to take ’em in ’til then or that Parrish woman might have made things too hot for me. I’ll hang on to all this stuff I bought ’til late summer when the new wagon trains arrive, and then I’ll sell—at a nice profit, to boot. I’ll pay off Bosely and have a little extra for myself!”

  Quietly, I grabbed the pans I needed and forced myself away from the door. At that moment, I knew why eavesdropping was wrong—if nothing else, it makes the listener miserable! The part about leaving in the spring didn’t bother me as much as all the talk of money, and thinking about Pa having to go into debt because of us. I’d almost forgotten that he wasn’t a rich rancher like we’d expected Uncle Nick to be. He must not have had any money at all, and it didn’t seem like he had much of a regular income from the mine. And to make it all worse, it sounded as if he was pretty familiar with poker games and gambling tables. I’d been thinking so much about all the changes in my own life that I hadn’t stopped to consider what our coming meant for Pa and Uncle Nick.

  Right then and there I whispered a little prayer. It might be wrong to listen to someone else’s conversation, but maybe it was good I heard this one, because I needed to know these things so I could do something about it. I didn’t quite know exactly what I would do. But I asked God to show me, and I finally got an idea after we were done eating that evening.

  We were sitting around the blazing fire listening to Mr. Jones tell story after story about his life in the West. He sure livened up the evenings! I’ll never know how much truth there was to his tales, but they were interesting.

  “Danged I wish I had my fiddle with me!” he said, turning toward me with a big grin. “But since I don’t, let me tell you about a time, Miz Corrie, when I hugged a bear to death.”

  We were all listening with huge, open eyes.

  “Me an’ my companions was all sittin’ about our campfire eatin’ our vittles, when we heard a growl so deep we practically jumped clean outta our boots. We didn’t know what that dad-blamed noise was, but I told the other greenhorn prospectors, ‘Leave it to ol’ Alkali here, an’ he’ll take care of it.’

  “So I got up and walked a little deeper into that there box canyon we was camped on the edge of. I was lookin’ all ’round and didn’t see nuthin’, when all of a sudden I turned around and there was a great big brown bear standin’ face to face with me.”

  “Were you scared?” asked little Becky innocently.

  “No, Missy! If you think starin’ down a bear’s hard, why you jest wait ’til I tell you ’bout the time I jumped clean across the lake to get away from the pack o’ wolves that was after me! Hee, hee!

  “Well, I tell ya, I jest stood there for a minute eyein’ that mean ol’ cuss of a bear. An’ then the story ’bout ol’ Davy Crockett came to my mind, so I grinned real big at him, made a leap toward the varmint, an’ grabbed him and hugged him hard ’til he couldn’t stand it any longer, and he jest dropped to the ground.” I saw Pa look at Zack and wink.

  Another one of Alkali’s stories took place in ’48 just after gold had been discovered.

  “Me an’ a handful o’ others was gettin’ mighty ’xasperated by the pickin’s down t’ Coloma way,” said the old miner when he had us all listening again. “By then, Californians an’ Mexicans was pourin’ into the mine fields an’ things was gettin’ mighty close. Hee, hee! If we’d only knowed what was a comin’ in the next year! Well anyways, we moved upriver a spell, an’ puttered around fer a few days but didn’t hit no payload. An’ then ol’ Charlie Pelham up and got hisself bit by a rattler an’ just plumb died. Jest like that! Well, Charlie, he was a good friend so we gave him a right fine funeral. We even had an ex-preacher in our gang, so’s it was as official a layin’ to rest as you ever wanna see. Now we was all standin’ round that open grave, an’ preacher Jones, he was a prayin’ his heart out fer the departed soul o’ ol’ Charlie. But he went on and on with them sentimental notions an’ my mind began to wander some. I guess I was starin’ down at my boots an’ was a diggin’ my toe absentmindedly in the dirt, without even payin’ no attention to what I was doin’, when suddenly I seen somethin’ sparklin’! Prayer or no prayer, I fell down on my knees an’ grabbed at the little pebble like thing, an’ before
I realized what I was sayin’ I yelled out, ‘Gold!’ Hee, hee!

  “Well, I can tell you this, that was the end of that there funeral. I mean, it was plumb over! The preacher, he left off his prayin’ pronto, an’ we all commenced diggin’ quicker than a polecat’s spit can hit the ground. Without no disrespect to poor ol’ Charlie who missed all the fun, he didn’t get right proper covered up fer two days! Hee, hee! Why, I drew two hundred dollars worth o’ dust an’ nuggets that first day alone, and the others was close on my heels! Turned out to be one of the richest strikes on the American River. We drank to Charlie Pelham that night an’ thanked him fer the right nice inheritance he done left us!”

  Chapter 13

  My Idea

  Mr. Jones was a fine spinner of tales, and I right enjoyed them. But on this particular night I could hardly wait till he was finished, ’cause I wanted to get Pa alone and tell him my idea. But even after Alkali finished up and ambled out to the tool shed for the night, I still had to get the young’uns ready for bed.

  That seemed to take forever, especially with the excitement over the new beds and all. When everyone had finally settled down, I peeked out the door of our room to see if Pa was still awake.

  “What’re you doing?” asked Zack.

  I closed the door. “I had a mind to say good night to Pa, that’s all,” I whispered back to him.

  “Why? He don’t say good night to us.”

  “’Cause I want to, that’s why. Now quiet, Zack, and go to sleep.”

  I opened the door again and crept out.

  The kerosene lamp was turned down low, but the fire still burned bright and sent out odd-shaped shadows against the walls. Pa was on his knees, bent over the hearth laying on another oak log, and his shadow looked like a giant’s.

  I cleared my throat shyly, because I still felt a little timid around him. He turned at the sound I made. Maybe it was from the warm reflection of the fire on his face, but all of a sudden he didn’t seem quite so terrifying.