Sarah's Choice

by Wanda E. Brunstetter

  Chapter 3

  What’s wrong with the mules? Why aren’t they moving?” Elias called over to his young driver.

  “Don’t know!” Bobby pushed a lock of sandy brown hair away from his face and grunted. “They was movin’ just fine a few minutes ago.” He motioned to Daisy and then Dolly. “All of a sudden, they both just stopped dead in their tracks.”

  “That’s ‘cause there’s a huge puddle in the middle of the towpath,” Ned said as he joined Elias at the bow of the boat. “Mules hate water, and Dolly and Daisy ain’t no exception. They’ll do anything to avoid walkin’ through water—even a puddle.”

  “Oh yeah, that’s right.” Elias thumped the side of his head. He glanced over his shoulder. Another boat was coming up behind them. “What shall we do to get the mules moving?” he asked Ned.

  “Gotta take ‘em around the water.” Ned leaned over the bow of the boat and shouted to Bobby, “Lead the mules around the puddle! Take ‘em through the tall grass!”

  “Haw!” Bobby shouted at the mules.

  “Not haw!” Ned bellowed. “Haw means to the left. Gee means to the right!” He looked at Elias and groaned. “Ya should’ve hired a driver with more experience.”

  “Bobby was the only boy I could find on such short notice,” Elias said. “Besides, the poor kid’s folks are in need of money, and I thought I could help by giving him a job.”

  “Humph!” Ned snorted. “Then he’d better be a quick learner, or it’ll take us a week instead of a few days to get up the canal to Mauch Chunk!”

  Ignoring Ned’s tirade, Elias turned his attention back to the mules. “Lead them to the right, Bobby. Lead them to the right!”

  “Gee!” Bobby yelled.

  When the mules didn’t budge, he grabbed hold of their bridles and had just started moving them toward the thick grass when a deep voice hollered from behind Elias’s boat, “Get outa my way; my boat’s comin’ through!”

  “We can’t do nothin’ about movin’ the boat to one side until that stupid boy gets them mules walkin’ again,” Ned muttered, shaking his head. He cupped his hands around his mouth and hollered at the other boat captain, “Just hold your boat back a minute, Bart, and we’ll let ya pass!”

  Elias was tempted to climb out of the boat and swim to shore so he could see if he might be able to help Bobby get Dolly and Daisy moving faster, but he quickly dismissed that dumb idea. It would be foolish to get his clothes wet for no good reason, because Bobby seemed to be managing okay. It was just taking much longer than Elias would have liked; especially with the burly, dark-haired fellow in the boat behind them, waving his hands and hollering, “Get that boat outa my way!”

  If I’m gong to make it as a canal boat captain, I’ll need to pay closer attention to things, Elias told himself. And I’ll have to try harder to remember more of what Grandpa taught me about running this boat.

  Sarah had just let another boat through the lock when she spotted her sister, Kelly, walking along the towpath next to the canal with her two children: Marcus, who was three, and Anna, who’d recently turned four.

  As usual, Kelly’s dark hair hung down her back in long, gentle waves. With the exception of Sundays, Kelly rarely wore her hair up in a bun.

  “It’s good to see you,” Sarah said when Kelly and the children joined her on the section of towpath that ran along the front of the lock tender’s house.

  Kelly smiled. “It’s good to see you, too. Except for our time together on Sundays, we don’t get to see you as much as we’d like.”

  “I know. There’s not much chance for me to get away.” Sarah motioned to the lockgate. “With boats coming through at all hours, I’m needed here every day but Sunday.”

  “I’m sorry you have to work so hard.” Kelly gave Sarah a hug. “I wish there was more I could do to help, but with two young ones to care for, helping Mike run the store, and trying to squeeze in time for painting, I don’t have much free time on my hands these days.”

  “You can’t sell any of your artwork if you don’t take the time to paint.”

  “That’s true, and I do love to paint. Have ever since I was a girl and could hold a piece of homemade charcoal in my hands.” Kelly smiled. “I’m ever so grateful that Mike added on to the store so I could have my own little gallery where I can paint and sell my work.”

  Sarah nodded. “So what brings you over here today?”

  “Things have been kind of slow at the store this morning, so I decided to take the kids outside for some fresh air and a walk.” She glanced down at Marcus, who was now down on his knees inspecting a beetle. Anna stood beside him, her face lifted to the sun. “I thought maybe they could play with your kids awhile.”

  “Sammy’s at school, of course, but Willis and Helen were playing on the porch awhile ago, when I was doing our laundry in the metal washtub,” Sarah said. “When the last boat came through the lock, I sent them inside.”

  Kelly gave Sarah’s shoulder a tender squeeze. “Are things going okay? Are you managing to keep up?”

  “Everything’s about the same, but there’s always so much to do. Between tending the lock, washing clothes, and making bread to sell to the boatmen, I hardly have any time to spend with my kids.” Sarah sighed deeply. “Seems like they’re always trying to get my attention, and there’s just not enough of me to go around.”

  “What about Maria? Isn’t she keeping the kids occupied during the day?”

  “Maria’s not doing well. Her vision problem seems to be getting worse, and she’s always so tired. It’s all she can do to keep the house clean and help cook our meals, much less keep an eye on my two youngest all day.”

  Kelly’s mouth formed an O. “Are you saying that Willis and Helen have been fending for themselves when you’re out here tending the lock?”

  “Maria does what she can to keep them occupied, but she’s not up to caring for them the way I would if I could be with them all the time.”

  “Say, I have an idea,” Kelly said. “Why don’t I take Willis and Helen home with me for the rest of the day? That way they can play with Marcus and Anna. It’ll give Maria a break, and you won’t have to worry about them while you bake bread and tend the lock.”

  “Are you sure you don’t mind? I mean, how are you going to help Mike in the store if you have four kids to keep an eye on all day?”

  “I told you, things have been slow at the store today. Besides, Willis is old enough to keep the other three entertained if Mike needs me for anything. Since our house is connected to the store, if there’s a problem, Willis can come and get me.”

  Sarah hesitated, but finally nodded. “You’re right, Willis is always thinking up something to keep Helen entertained, and it would be a big help if Maria didn’t have to be responsible for the kids today.”

  “Let’s go inside and get them now,” Kelly said. “Then the five of us will be on our way.”

  When Sarah, Kelly, and Kelly’s children entered the house, Sarah was surprised to see her six-year-old son and four-year-old daughter sitting in the middle of the kitchen floor with a bag of flour between them. They’d scooped some of it onto the floor, some into a baking pan, and a good deal of it was in Helen’s dark hair.

  “What in the world are you two doing?” Sarah asked, squatting down beside them.

  “We’re makin’ bread.” Helen smiled up at Sarah, and swiped a floury hand across her turned-up nose. “It was Willis’s idea.”

  “Where’s your grandma?” Sarah asked. Surely Maria wouldn’t have let the kids make a mess like this if she’d known what they were doing.

  “Grandma’s in there.” Willis pointed to the door leading to their small, but cozy, parlor. Sarah noticed then that he had some flour in his light brown hair as well. So much for Willis keeping Helen entertained.

  “I’ll clean up this mess while you talk to Maria,” Kelly offered.

  “Thanks, I appreciate that.” Sarah rose to her feet and hurried from the room.

  When she ente
red the parlor she gasped. There lay Maria, facedown on the floor!

  Chapter 4

  Well, wouldn’t ya just know it?” Ned shouted from where he’d been stirring a pot of bean soup sitting on the small, coal-burning cookstove in the middle of the boat. For some reason, Ned preferred cooking on it rather than the slightly larger stove that was below in the galley.

  Elias, not wanting to take his eyes off the waterway ahead, glanced quickly over his shoulder. “What’s wrong, Ned?”

  “We’re outa bread. Shouldn’t have ate any at breakfast, I guess.”

  “That’s okay. We can do without bread for lunch.”

  “Maybe so, but we’ll need it tomorrow, and the next day, too.”

  “We can stop at one of the stores between here and Easton and pick up a loaf of bread.”

  “Stoppin’ at a store would take too long. We’d end up lookin’ at other things we don’t really need, and there’s no time for lollygaggin’ today.” Ned pulled a hunk of chewing tobacco from his shirt pocket and popped into his mouth. “Already spent too much time up in Mauch Chunk, waitin’ on the other boats that was ahead of us. When that noisy, sooty train showed up, it took a load of coal before we even got up to the loadin’ chute.”

  “You’re right, it did take a long time to get our coal.” Elias hoped it wouldn’t be that way every time they went to Mauch Chunk, but if it was, they’d just have to deal with it.

  “Guess we could always see if that lady lock tender in Walnutport has any bread we could buy,” Ned suggested. “She often sells bread to the boatmen who come through her lock.”

  “Sure, we can do that.”

  They traveled in silence for a while, interrupted only by the sound of the water lapping against the boat and an occasional undignified grunt from Ned as he stirred the soup on the stove.

  “Here’s a cup of soup for ya, boss,” Ned said, stepping up to Elias a short time later.

  Elias took the warm cup in his hands. “Thanks.”

  “Got any idea what you’ll do once the railroad takes over haulin’ all the coal in these here parts?” Ned asked, leaning against the side of the boat.

  “I’m not sure. To be honest, I haven’t really thought about it that much.”

  “Well you’d better think about it, ‘cause it’s bound to happen sooner or later.”

  “I guess I’ll deal with that when it comes. I’m just taking one day at a time right now.”

  “If the time comes that you can’t boat any longer, will ya go back to work at your daddy’s newspaper office?”

  Elias shook his head. “That will never happen. My father’s not even speaking to me right now.”

  “How come?”

  “He thinks I was foolish for leaving the newspaper and taking over Grandpa’s boat. The way he talks about the poor man, you’d never know Grandpa was his father.” Elias frowned. “Father said if I left Easton to captain Grandpa’s boat I’d never work for him again.”

  Ned leaned his head over the boat and spit out his wad of tobacco. “Aw, I’m sure he didn’t mean it. Probably just said that, hopin’ you’d change your mind. If you was to leave the canal and return to Easton, he’d probably welcome ya back with open arms.”

  “I’m not so sure about that.” Elias shrugged. “But I’m not going to worry about it either. I’m just going to do the job Grandpa wanted me to do.”

  “Guess that’s the best way to deal with things all right.” Ned pointed up ahead. “Looks like Walnutport’s comin’ into view. You’d best get out the conch shell and let the lock tender know that you’re needin’ to come through.”

  “Maria! Maria, can you hear me?” Sarah’s heart pounded as she knelt on the floor beside her pale-faced mother-in-law.

  Kelly entered the room just then and gasped. “Oh my! Is…is she dead?”

  “No, thank goodness. I can see by the rise and fall of her chest that she’s breathing.” Sarah cradled Maria’s head in her hands. “I think we should get Dr. McGrath.”

  Kelly stood. “I’ll run into town and see if he’s at his office. If he’s there, I’ll ask if he can come look at Maria right away.”

  Just then, Maria’s eyes fluttered open, but she stared at Sarah with a blank expression. “Wh–what’s going on? What am I doin’ on the floor?”

  “Kelly and I were outside visiting, and when I came into the parlor, I found you lying here.”

  “What happened, Maria? Did you get dizzy and pass out?” Kelly questioned.

  “I…uh…was heading upstairs to do some cleaning, and all of a sudden everything looked real blurry. Guess I must have tripped on the braided throw rug. Then I lost my balance, and…” She rubbed her forehead. “I must’ve hit my head, and then everything went dark.”

  “Let’s get you over to the sofa so you can rest,” Sarah said. “Then Kelly’s going into town to get the doctor.”

  “There’s no need for that.” Maria pushed herself to a sitting position. “Once I get my bearings, I’ll be fine.”

  “You’re not fine, Maria. You fell and hit your head. Now I insist that you lie down awhile,” Sarah said.

  “Oh, all right.”

  Sarah took hold of Maria’s left arm, and Kelly took her right arm; then they guided her to the sofa. They’d no more than gotten her settled when a knock sounded on the door.

  “I’ll see who that is.” Kelly hurried from the room.

  When she returned, young Pastor William and his wife, Betsy, were with her.

  “We were taking a walk along the towpath and thought we’d stop in to visit and see how things are going here.” Betsy smiled at Sarah, but her bright eyes and cheerful expression quickly turned to a look of concern when she saw Maria on the sofa. “What’s wrong? Is Maria sick?”

  Sarah quickly explained what had happened. “Maria’s vision seems to be getting worse, but she refuses to see Dr. McGrath,” she said, hoping Pastor William or Betsy might intervene. “I’ve suggested that Maria move back to Easton to live with her son, but she’s flatly refused.”

  “Sarah’s right.” Pastor William moved over to the sofa and took Maria’s hand. “The last time I was here, you were having trouble seeing, and I think you ought to see the doctor today and tell him what’s happened,” he said in his usual gentle tone.

  Maria shook her head stubbornly. “I’ll be fine; I just need to rest awhile.”

  “When Dr. McGrath examined Maria’s eyes a few weeks ago, he said her vision’s getting worse,” Sarah said.

  Betsy’s pale blond hair, which she’d worn down, swished across her shoulder as she knelt on the floor in front of where Maria sat. “If you moved back to Easton, you’d have access to a hospital and many good doctors, and you’d be cared for in your son’s house and wouldn’t have the responsibility for caring for Sarah’s three active children.”

  Tears welled in Maria’s eyes. “I…I love those kids, and I couldn’t move away and leave Sarah alone with no one to watch them. Who would take care of things while she’s outside tending the lock?”

  “I’ll manage somehow,” Sarah said with a catch in her voice.

  “Maybe I can come over to help out when things aren’t real busy at the store,” Kelly volunteered.

  “Better yet, I can come over here to help out.” Betsy looked at Maria. “Would you be willing to move back to Easton if I did that?”

  Before Maria could reply, the low moan of a conch shell floated through the door that Kelly had left open.

  Sarah stood. “A boat’s coming through, and I need to go out and open the lock. We’ll have to finish this discussion when I come back.”

  Chapter 5

  As soon as Sarah ran out the front door, she realized there was more than one boat waiting to come through the lock. In fact, there were three.

  “Oh great,” she moaned. “It’ll take me forever to get back inside.”

  Lifting the edge of her long gray skirt, she hurried to open the first set of gates. Once the boat was completely in, she clos
ed the gates and opened the wickets in the lower set of gates so that water flowed out of the lock, allowing the boat to drop slowly. Then the next set of gates was opened, allowing the mules to pull the boat on down the canal.

  As the second boat came through the lock, Sarah’s face contorted. The captain of the boat was Bart Jarmon, a tall burly man with thick black hair and a full, wooly-looking beard to match. Bart’s foul mouth and overbearing ways were bad enough to deal with, but ever since Sam had died, Bart had often made suggestive remarks whenever he saw Sarah. Once, he’d even been so bold as to suggest that the two of them should get hitched, saying she could quit her job as lock tender and spend her days on his boat, cooking, cleaning, and washing his dirty clothes.

  This canal would have to freeze over solid in the middle of summer before I’d ever consider marrying someone like Bart. Sarah gritted her teeth. And what kind of stepfather would he make for my kids?

  She thought about the time, before Betsy married Pastor William, when Bart had gone to Betsy’s place to pick up some clothes she’d washed for him. She could still see the look of disgust on Betsy’s face when she’d later confided that after Bart had boldly kissed her, she’d thrown his wet shirt at him and told him never to come back.

  Bart would be a lot wetter than he was then if he tried something like that with me, Sarah thought. I’d push him into the muddy canal if he even looked like he was going to kiss me!

  Much to Sarah’s relief, Bart wasn’t steering the boat. His helper, Clem Smith, an elderly man with several missing teeth, was at the tiller. Sarah figured Bart was probably below on his bunk, sleeping off the effects from the whiskey he’d likely had the night before.