My Father's World

by Michael Phillips

  The moment we got there, Zack and I ran up to the mine, while Mrs. Parrish went straight to the cabin to make sure Becky and Emily were all right.

  The mine shaft was jammed with men—scrambling, shouting, all trying to help at once. Pa and Uncle Nick were right in the middle of them all, frantically heaving away rocks bigger than a man’s head as if they were pebbles. Sweat was pouring down Pa’s face and his eyes were intense with anxiety. But it was more than fear for a child’s life that I saw written there. Any child in danger would stir the heart of a decent man to do heroic things. But the look on Pa’s face at that moment was the fear of a man for the life of his own son!

  Some of the rocks were huge, bigger than Tad himself, and took two men exerting themselves to the full, to push them out of the hole. The cave-in left piles of debris and white rock unlike any that I had ever noticed before.

  Ten minutes passed in no time . . . then twenty . . . then half an hour. The men were beginning to tire from working so hard and so fast, but they still didn’t seem to be getting through. No one said much. The only sounds were the groans and puffing of the men, the crashing of rocks on the pile outside, and every so often a call from Pa: “Tad . . . Tad . . . ! Can you hear us, boy?”

  Mrs. Parrish came up the hill now, and stood forty or fifty feet back, her arms around Becky and Emily. From the look on her face, I knew she was praying hard. So was I.

  All at once a cry came from Uncle Nick. His voice was muffled from deep inside the cave, “We broke through!” he yelled.

  I hurried to the shaft opening, but it was so dark inside all I could see was dust and vague figures of the men moving about.

  Apparently Pa was trying to crawl through the small hole that had been made.

  “Ye’ll never make it, Drum!” I heard Alkali Jones’ voice. “It’s too blamed small!” There was no high-pitched laugh this time. His voice was more serious than I had ever heard it. “Let Nick try.”

  A moment of silence followed.

  “Tad . . . Tad . . . !” came the muted voice of Uncle Nick through the hole. But still there was no response.

  Just as my eyes began adjusting to the dark, I saw the form of Uncle Nick pulling his head back out of the hole. He wiped the grime from his eyes and said, “Still too small . . . I can’t make it either.”

  “We’ll have to get more of this outta here!” shouted Pa, who began to tear away at the rocks again.

  He was interrupted by the sound of Zack’s voice. “I think I can fit in, Pa,” he said.

  Pa stopped and turned around, gazing at his eldest son for a moment.

  “I don’t know what’s in there, boy,” he said. “Could be dangerous. Once there’s a cave-in and you’ve lost your timbers, you never know—”

  “I want to try,” said Zack. “This is all my fault, and I’ve got to at least try to get him out!” There was no pleading in his voice, only determination.

  “It ain’t your fault,” answered Pa. “And I’m afraid of the wall comin’ down more.”

  “Then I better move fast,” said Zack, edging toward the hole.

  Pa stopped him. His eyes, filled with pride, met Zack’s. “That’s right brave of you, Zack,” he said, then paused, still looking Zack over as if seeing him for the first time. “Okay,” he said a second later, “get in there . . . and you be careful!”

  “Yes, sir!” replied Zack, and a moment later he was wiggling and squirming through the small opening.

  First his legs, then his feet disappeared. There was silence for a moment. Then, “It’s pitch black in here!” he called back, sounding very far away.

  Then we heard him calling Tad’s name.

  Everyone waited, holding their breath, but we didn’t hear anything more. After a minute or so, Pa yelled through the hole after Zack. There was no reply. All remained deathly still while we waited.

  My hands were in such tight fists, my knuckles were white. All sorts of terrible thoughts were racing through my brain. What if Tad was badly hurt . . . or dead? It would be my fault, not Zack’s! I was the one to blame, the one who had let Ma down. Tad was her baby!

  The next minutes seemed like ages. It could not have been more than five minutes, but then I thought I heard something—Zack’s voice, more muffled than before. I couldn’t tell what he was saying.

  Then came the dreaded sound of more rock and debris falling.

  I glanced at Pa. His face was white as a sheet.

  “C’mon!” he yelled. “Let’s clear away more of this rock!”

  His hands were already bleeding, but he started to tear away at the pile more frantically than ever. Before anyone could move to help him, Zack’s voice came again, clearer this time.

  “I got him!”

  The next moment, Tad’s head thrust through the hole, his face covered with grime and blood from a gash on his forehead. Then his little body wriggled through, and he was free.

  A great cheer went up from the men, who immediately fell back to make room. I grabbed Tad in my arms and hurried him outside, where he blinked and squinted from the bright sunlight.

  Zack was out of the hole next, and he and Pa emerged from the mine side by side. Before he came to us, Pa turned to Zack and extended his hand. “That was quite a thing you done in there, son,” he said. “No man coulda done better . . . I’m right proud of you.”

  Then Pa reached for Tad, scooping him up in his strong arms like he was a feather.

  “You okay, lad?” he asked, his voice shaking a little.

  “Yes, Pa.”

  “You gave us quite a scare, Tad.”

  “I’m sorry. I made it fall down—but I wanted to help with the mining. Was it my fault?”

  Pa gave a big laugh. “You couldn’t have caused that cave-in, son,” he said. “I think it had a little help from the outside. I’m just glad you’re safe.”

  I’m sure Pa intended to say more, but the words wouldn’t come. He quickly looked away, and when he turned again, I could see the grime on his face was splotched with moisture.

  “Blasted dust!” he muttered, brushing a hand across his face. “Can’t keep it outta my eyes!”

  “Hey, this is some family you got, Drum!” shouted Patrick Shaw, the man who’d given Zack the ride into town. He had just talked to Mrs. Parrish, and seen the young girls for the first time.

  His statement took Pa by surprise. He looked at him as if he was thinking over all the implications of Shaw’s innocent comment.

  “Yeah,” he replied slowly. “I guess you’re right, Pat. It sure is.”

  He paused briefly, then added. “But there’s only one thing you’re mistaken about.” He looked toward the men milling around the mine. “Hey!” he called out, “Mr. Shaw’s just brought up a topic that seemed of considerable interest to all of you back at Lil’s. I figure this’d be just about as good a time as any to make a clean breast of it, once and for all.”

  The men gathered ’round with growing interest.

  “My name ain’t Drum,” Pa went on, glancing momentarily in the direction of the sheriff, perhaps having second thoughts about what he was about to say. But he didn’t stop.

  “Well, that is, it ain’t my family name, though it’s served me well as a given name all my life. The man you’re all gawkin’ at is a Hollister by birth—Drummond Hollister, to be exact.”

  “But why, Drum?” spoke up Alkali Jones, perhaps the most dumfounded of anyone; besides Uncle Nick, he had been Pa’s closest friend for several years. “You in trouble with the law or somethin’?”

  Pa shot him a quick glance, but then only said, “I had my reasons. What’s past is past.”

  “What about ’ol Nick?” Jones pressed.

  “I married Nick’s sister. Anything else, he’ll have to tell you himself—if he wants to.”

  Before Mr. Jones had a chance to say anything more, the sheriff walked up to Pa, looking straight at him. I was a little scared, but Pa didn’t flinch. He just looked right back at him straight in the eye.
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  “I gotta tell you,” the sheriff finally said, “there’ve been some folks hereabouts curious about you suddenly turning up with a family out of the past with a different name.”

  “You got a problem with that, Rafferty?” asked Pa.

  The sheriff only had to think for a second or two before he answered. “Nah,” he said. “I been in the diggin’s long enough to know that half the men here are using assumed names.” Then a smile broke out on his face. “Shoot, half of them are lawmen now!”

  Several of the men standing within hearing of their conversation chuckled.

  “So my havin’ a past I’d rather keep quiet about don’t bother you none?”

  “Far as I can see, you ain’t done nothin’ to arouse no suspicions, Drum—or whatever I’m supposed to call you! Like I said, half the men who came here looking for gold’s got their name on a sheriff’s office wall someplace. My job’s to keep the law here in Miracle, not go borrowin’ trouble by asking too many questions about everyone’s past.”

  He stopped, then flashed a sharp glance at Uncle Nick. “But that brother-in-law of yours is another matter. I’ll be lenient for your sake, Drum, but only so far.”

  “Don’t worry about Nick, Rafferty,” said Pa. “He’ll keep to the straight and narrow—if I got to hog-tie him!” He also shot a glance at poor Uncle Nick.

  My uncle squirmed a little, but his sincere smile let us all know he intended to try.

  “So the two o’ you is kin!” exclaimed Alkali Jones, who could keep quiet no longer. “And the young’uns?”

  “They belong to my sister and Drum,” Uncle Nick said enthusiastically. I think he wanted to tell more, but thought better of it in public. Still no mention had been made of his using the name Matthews, and I figured he wanted to keep it that way.

  “Well, blamed if that don’t beat all! Hee, hee, hee!” croaked Mr. Jones.

  A general murmur of contentment, mingled with nods and smiles and comments like “I knew there was something. . . .” spread through the small crowd. There was a good deal of back-slapping and hand-shaking.

  Suddenly something jolted my memory. With all the commotion over Tad, its full impact hadn’t registered till just this moment. A smile broke out across my face.

  “Pa!” I said excitedly, “What was it exactly that you said to Mr. Royce?”

  “I don’t rightly know, girl,” he replied with a puzzled look. “I just told him to keep his scoundrels away from us, that’s all.”

  “No—no—that’s not it! What did you say exactly?”

  “I don’t know,” he insisted.

  “You said that if any of his hooligans ever came near . . .” I paused, trying to get him to remember his exact words.

  “Oh, yeah. I told him if his hooligans ever came near my family again, I’d—”

  All at once he stopped. The word family had brought him up short, and suddenly he got what I’d been driving at.

  Gently he knelt down, keeping Tad on his knee. Zack and I were standing beside him. As if understanding what was coming, Mrs. Parrish, with tears brimming in her eyes, nudged Becky and Emily toward us. They stood right in front of Pa. He reached out with his rough, grime and blood-smeared hands and took first Becky’s and then Emily’s small, white palms in his. Then he glanced around at Zack, then me. He seemed to hold my eyes a moment longer than the rest, then looked back at the little ones.

  “This sure has been some day,” he said finally. “I don’t reckon I’ve had one quite like it in a coon’s age!”

  “I guess we been a heap of trouble for you, Pa,” blurted Zack.

  “Yeah, I suppose you have,” he said. Then a slow smile spread across his face. “But I don’t guess I been much better.”

  Timidly, I rested my hand on Pa’s shoulder.

  “Did you . . .” I began shyly, “—did you really mean what you said to Mr. Royce?” I asked.

  “About keepin’ his good-for-nothin’ rascals away from you all? ’Course I did!”

  “No,” I said quietly. “I mean—did you mean—you know, what you called us?”

  He thought again for a few seconds. “I guess we ain’t been much of a family up ’til now, have we?” he finally admitted.

  None of us said anything, but by now the younger girls’ initial intimidation was gone and they were crowding closer to Pa, and Tad’s arm was wrapped around his neck.

  “Well,” he went on, “maybe we can have a clean beginning—starting today! What do you all think?”

  I had never told the kids what went on the night Pa and I had our talk outside. I did tell them some of the reasons why Pa left us, but I had never told them about his crying and asking to be forgiven. Somehow, it seemed it was meant to be our own private moment. Pa had been a lot different since then, really making an effort to make up to us the lost time.

  But right then, with all of us gathered around him, for the very first time I felt all our hearts were open to one another. He and I had gotten a little head start in trying to understand each other. But now I felt it was going to happen with all the kids and Pa—even Zack.

  I looked straight into his eyes and smiled. He smiled back, and I think he was remembering our earlier talk.

  “We’d all like a clean beginning, Pa,” I answered for all of us.

  Then Tad stirred in Pa’s lap. I guess he’d been still long enough. As he started to stand, I noticed his hand was clutching something. Pa noticed it at the same time.

  “What you got there, son?” he asked.

  “A pretty rock from the mine,” replied Tad innocently. He opened up his hand to show us.

  The crowd of men who had been watching silently, slowly gathered around us. Pa was still kneeling next to Tad, the rest of us leaning against Pa. Uncle Nick stood beside me.

  The incredulous silence lasted only a moment, finally broken by Alkali Jones’ shrill voice.

  “Well, blamed if little Tad hasn’t discovered ol’ Potter’s vein after all! Hee, hee!”

  “He’s right, Nick!” called out another, who was examining the heap of quartz chunks piled outside the mine opening. “That cave-in loosened the lode. This here quartz is full of gold!”

  In an instant, all the men were shouting and running back to take a look for themselves. Uncle Nick, not one to be sentimental, was off with the others like a shot. But Pa slowly rose to his feet, not as exuberant as might have been expected. Then a slow, easy smile crept across his face.

  Of course, the claim was in Uncle Nick’s name—Matthews that is. But maybe Pa’s composed reaction to the discovery had another cause. Maybe he felt a little like I did—that in reality, we had made an even greater discovery just moments before little Tad had showed us his rock.

  We had found each other at last. Perhaps we were ready now to be the family God had wanted us to be from the very first day—when we unexpectedly met our father in Miracle Springs.

  Chapter 38

  The Newspaper Man

  The town was abuzz for a week.

  In the boarding houses, in the mining camps along the streams and rivers, and in every saloon, all folks were talking about was the new vein, and Pa’s “new family”, and how he and Uncle Nick were kin, and wondering about how we came to be separated. At least that’s what Mrs. Parrish and Alkali Jones told us—and who should know better than those two? It wasn’t long before the newspaper man, Mr. Singleton, paid us a visit, wanting the whole story.

  “I can tell you, Mr. Singleton,” Pa said to him, “it ain’t that I don’t want folks to know that I found my kids after all these years. But there’s no way I’m gonna tell more’n that.”

  “I’ll pay you for it, Mr. Hollister—pay you real good.”

  “But you see, money ain’t so much our worry no more,” he said with a smile.

  “How good?” piped up Uncle Nick. He was still not above turning an easy profit if he could find one to be made.

  “Oh, as high as thirty or forty dollars, if you give me exclusive rights to thre
e stories,” the newspaperman replied.

  “Nick!” said Pa sternly. “What’re you thinkin’? Have you forgotten already that there’s certain folks we still best stay clear of? We ain’t puttin’ no news about us in no paper!”

  “What about the children?” asked Mr. Singleton. “We could change their names, tell about their coming west, the wagon train, the hardship of the journey, their Ma dying on the trail, adjusting to this new life. It’s a wonderful human interest drama—just the sort women love to read. I have no doubt it would be reprinted in papers all the way back to the East Coast.”

  “Would we be famous, Pa?” asked Becky.

  We all laughed.

  Pa shrugged. “I still don’t think it’s a good idea,” he said. “There’d be those who’d put two and two together—”

  “Those boys from the gang can’t even read!” piped up Uncle Nick.

  “That don’t mean I’m ready to start bellowing our whereabouts to the whole world! One of the reasons I left home and came out here in the first place was to keep the kids out of danger, and I sure ain’t of a mind to start up our troubles all over again.”

  “What about the gold?” asked Mr. Singleton. “That’s a story you could hardly object to.”

  Pa shrugged again. “Nothing much I could do to stop you even if I wanted to, on that score,” he said.

  “Why, it’s as much as started a second gold rush,” went on the editor. “I’ve never seen such a fever of activity and excitement as in the last week. This’ll put Miracle Springs on the map!”

  “I’d like to see ’ol Royce get his hands on a single piece of property now!” chuckled Uncle Nick.

  “My only trouble,” said Mr. Singleton, “is that I’m too busy to get the story written in time. I’m still just working to get the paper on its feet, what with advertising and setting up the presses and all. And I’ve got a big area to try to cover—all the way from Sacramento north. This story about the new gold is already spreading fast. If we don’t run it soon, it’ll pass us by. Are either of you gentlemen interested in helping me? It was your strike. You could tell it from the ‘inside,’ as we say.”