The Heartbeat of the Mountain

by Joan Foley Baier

  Anna must have detected Luvella’s lie and jumped up from the arm of the chair. “Oh, thank you, Daddy. I won’t be long.” She made a show of helping Luvella hobble out of the lobby and down the stairs from the porch.

  Back in the caboose, Luvella told Mrs. Maarten that Mr. Smythe was still reeling from what she had told him. “I think you’d better get to Mrs. Johannson right away. The sooner we get people together on this, the better,” Luvella said.

  Anna, looking from one to the other, said, “Luvella, I knew you were bluffing!” They all giggled. “But when I get back to the hotel, I’ll ask Daddy lots of questions that will eventually bring him around.” She opened her eyes wide, the epitome of innocence, and said in a falsetto voice, “What did Mr. Johannson say about Mr. Bocke? Ohh, hmmm. And does that mean that Mr. Bocke will not be able to pay us for the hotel? Ohh, hmmm. So, unless we have this football game in Muncy Valley—the bonanza would be even better—we may have to sell the hotel and move somewhere?” She covered her giggle with her hand. “That’s how I always get him to agree with me.”

  Mrs. Maarten patted Luvella’s hand. “I must go forward into battle,” she said, “but softly, very softly.” She grinned and waved goodbye.

  Anna swung around to face Luvella. “Now! Tell me all about your Luke.” They burst into laughter and settled onto the chairs behind the desk.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Reeder and Bill stared at Luvella. Jake and Daddy walked into the kitchen from the porch and stopped.

  “A game?” Reeder asked. “My little sister is planning a football game?” Mama had stopped stirring the stewed rhubarb and faced them all, her hand still holding the spoon over the kettle.

  Luvella continued to set the table. “Mrs. Maarten came into my store today, and she was the only person to come all day, by the bye. Well, I dragged Anna over later, but I had no customers all day long.” She shook her head, still unbelieving. “Anyway, Mrs. Maarten thought about a football game because her husband had been all excited about Luke Raven having been in town. You know, with him playing for the Carlisle team and all. And she felt awful about not having the bonanza.”

  As the men washed up for dinner, Luvella told them all that she and Mrs. Maarten had decided. She told them about her talk with Mr. Smythe, and that Anna was going to further convince her father to cooperate. She didn’t share that part of her conversation with Anna, though; she didn’t think Daddy needed to know the wiles and beguilement of daughters.

  Reeder’s black eyes glittered over a wide grin. “What d’ya think, Bill? Jake?” He dried his face and hands on the kitchen towel. “I bet Luke would love the chance to get back at those tenant guys. I know I would.” The masculine rumble of get-even chuckles filled the kitchen.

  Without waiting for an answer, Reeder said, “Luke told us he’d come for a game some time. This seems like a good time, except that Luke is on his…uh, out of town.”

  Jake cleared his throat. “Why do you want it so soon, Luvella?”

  “Well, Mrs. Maarten and I think the Basket Bonanza is so necessary for Muncy Valley.” She noticed Daddy nodding. “So if we have the football game soon and people here get to like the Indians—because we think we should have more than just Luke and other players from Carlisle, some of the basket makers, too—we’ll still have time to plan and have the bonanza.” She swallowed some milk from her glass.

  “Of course, some of us will have to open our homes to the football players and to the visiting Muncees, too. Mrs. Maarten and Mrs. Kiergen already offered. And I think the Johannsons will, too.”

  Both Mama and Daddy stopped eating and stared at Luvella. Mama recovered first. “We could certainly have the Ravens all stay here.”

  Daddy set his fork on his plate. “You know, Margaret, I think that’s a good idea.”

  Jake closed his eyes, set his mouth in a tight line, and furrowed his eyebrows. After a few moments like that, he sat at the table to eat. “Here’s what I think.” He pointed his fork at Reeder. “I think Bill and I could take on your load at the sawmill tomorrow, if that’s all right with you, Daddy.”

  Daddy nodded agreement.

  “And you, Reeder, could ride hard up to Forksville. Maybe Luke finished his…trip out of town already. Maybe not. But you can talk to his folks and tell them about the game. Maybe there’s someone else there who can go to Carlisle and get a couple other players.

  “Wasn’t Luke saying that Pop Warner had some ‘blocking dummies’ at Carlisle?”

  “Ayup!” Reeder and Bill said together. Reeder added, “Maybe they could bring one here for us to practice with before the game.”

  “What’s a blocking dummy?” Luvella asked.

  Bill, sitting at the table, held up one hand to about two feet above his head. “It’s a big bag, filled with cracked corn, I think. Long metal prongs on the bottom, pushed into the ground, lets it stand up in the field. The team tackles it in practice, just as if it was another player.”

  Mama spoke, getting everyone’s attention as she passed a platter of meat to Jake. “Maybe we could make one for ourselves.”

  “Well-ll”—Bill’s mouth scrunched up, making one eye almost wink—“it would take an awful lot of cracked corn away from our chickens.”

  “Hmm,” Daddy said. “Would sawdust work?”

  Jake dropped his fork onto his plate, the clatter bringing all eyes to him. “You are really something. Sawdust would be perfect.” He took his serving of fried chicken and passed the platter to Bill. “But we’d need something really strong to put it in, so we don’t have sawdust all over.”

  For a few moments, the only sounds in the large room were bowls being passed, spoons serving, knives cutting. Finally Reeder spoke. “Where’s that old piece of canvas we used to cover the hay? Would that be big enough?”

  Luvella leaned back in her chair and released a long, quiet sigh. Mrs. Maarten was absolutely right. The excitement of having a football game with Carlisle players on our team was very contagious. She couldn’t wait to hear tomorrow how Mrs. Maarten had made out with her husband and her friends.

  The Anderssons started their day early the next morning, just as the sun was barely ground level with the forest. Reeder was packed with Mama’s food and Daddy’s gun and left immediately after he ate eggs, bacon, home fries, and thick slabs of bread washed down with cold milk from the spring house. He gulped down a mug of hot coffee just before he mounted Daisy. “I’ll see you just about twilight or a little after,” he called back and departed in a brisk canter.

  Luvella waved goodbye. “Watch out for the rattlers!” she said, her hands framing her mouth to direct her voice to him.

  She could feel the eagerness, the intensity in her whole family. Even Mama said she’d start sewing the canvas today for the blocking tackle. So, it was with an early start Luvella rode the wagon with Daddy to the caboose. Her father talked to the horses, calming them. They were prancing down the mountain road, seemingly assuming their own version of football fever.

  Entering the caboose, Luvella inhaled the piquant fragrance of Mrs. Maarten’s lavender soaps and smiled, knowing her customers would have the same pleasure. She was barely finished putting her reticule behind the desk when Anna stomped up the steps and burst through the door.

  “Luvella! I’ve been watching for you for hours, I declare.” Anna’s face was pure cream, as usual, but there were tinges of pink on each cheekbone. “It took me most of last evening, but now Daddy’s all interested in this football game. I think he’d really like to play on the team, but he knows it’s best for him—and the hotel—if he stays to fix the food and keep the hotel ready for guests.” She raised her shoulders and let out a huge sigh. “Have you heard from anyone else yet?”

  “Anna! You realize how early it is, don’t you? No one’s out and about yet. But…”

  Luvella began to tell Anna about her own family being so excited when the door opened again. Mrs. Maarten, a grin the size of a slice of cantaloupe on her face, sidled in. S
he waved her gloved hand and bent over at the waist, laughing hard. Luvella and Anna started laughing, too, just to see a very different, but delightful, Mrs. Maarten.

  “Luvella, you too, Anna,” she was finally able to say. “Erik is beside himself, thinking about playing football alongside Carlisle stars. One minute, he worries about having Indians all around us and the next minute he’s bragging about having them here.”

  Anna nodded, her blonde curls bobbing. “Yes, Daddy’s like that, too. But,” she added, “can you imagine how hard it is for lots of people? Remember, we still hear stories about the tomahawk raids out west just about twenty years ago, and that’s all some people know about Indians.”

  “I know, Anna,” Luvella agreed, crimping her lips to a straight line. “But so much has changed in the last twenty years.” She reached for paper, pen, and her inkwell. “Mrs. Maarten, your football game idea is the most brilliant one I’ve ever heard. How did Mrs. Johannson and Mrs. Kiergen feel about it all?”

  Mrs. Maarten started to laugh again, more like giggling. “I’m sorry, girls, but everyone has acted so excited about this that it just tickles me to watch them. Even Lars Johannson jumped up—I’m telling you, he jumped—to write down what he wanted to say on the telegraph and who he’d send the message to.” She wiped a tear from one eye with her glove, still chuckling.

  “Shall we get everyone together for another quick meeting, Luvella?” she asked, all business now. “We already have an idea of what to do because of our plans for the Basket Bonanza.”

  Luvella clicked her fingernails on the desk in rapid succession, forefinger, middle finger, ring finger, pinkie, over and over, sounding like a horse galloping in the distance. “I think we should let everyone work this out for themselves. Let them come forward, for a change, with ideas and suggestions. I think you talking personally to everyone has made the difference, Mrs. Maarten.

  “The men will surely plan that game and make all the necessary arrangements. I heard Reeder say they could play on our main road, in front of the hotel and stores, even though it isn’t as large as a regular football field. It’s the best place, actually, Reeder said. They have to set markers or goals or something,” Luvella continued, “but we don’t have to worry at all about that. Reeder and Bill and Jake are taking care of everything for the game itself.”

  Mrs. Maarten laid her hands, one each on Luvella’s and Anna’s arms, and giggled again. “You will never guess who offered to have an Indian couple stay at his house.”

  Luvella and Anna stared.

  “Mr. Melk?” Anna asked.

  Mrs. Maarten shook her head. “Well, yes, he and Hilda said yes, too, but Mr. Harley overheard me talking about it at the post office, and he said Mrs. Harley was interested in having a couple stay with them when he told her about the bonanza. So he said the Harley home is definitely open for Indian guests. Luvella, we have oodles of room for our Indian friends.”

  A pain shot up Luvella’s leg, and she realized she’d been standing on it the last few minutes. She slid her chair out from under the desk and sat on it. “Mrs. Maarten, can you organize things just like you were planning to for the bonanza? Try to have Mr. Smythe help you.” She lifted her leg to rest it on the wastebasket next to her stool. “How many rooms do we have for the people from Forksville?”

  Mrs. Maarten beamed. “First of all, Luvella, it’s time you called me by my name, Thirza, since we’re in cahoots together.” She widened her smile and continued. “Well, we have the Melks, the Harleys, the Johannsons, Mrs. Kiergen—she can only have a woman—ourselves, and your family, Luvella.”

  Luvella had kept count. “That’s at least eleven guests…Thirza,” she said with an embarrassed grin. “You know, several of the people are not Indians; they’re white. I know Mrs. Raven is white, and one of the ladies who helped me with Aunt Hilda is white. There may be more than that.”

  Mrs. Maarten patted her hair into place unnecessarily. “Ummm, my Erik would really like to have two of the Carlisle boys stay with us. I’ve never seen him so elated. He feels it’s an honor to have those football players coming here, whether they’re Indian or not.”

  “And he’s right about that.” Luvella nodded her head for emphasis. “I don’t know how many Carlisle players will be able to come, but if Luke comes, he’ll stay with my family.” Luvella felt the heat rise to her face as Mrs. Maarten—Thirza—stared at her, and Anna put her head down to hide her grin. She rushed her words. “His family will already be with us, so it makes good sense.”

  When Thirza left the caboose with a swish of her long dress and the rapid clacks of her high-laced shoes on the boardwalk, Anna pursed her lips and squinted at Luvella.

  “So, Luke will stay at your house, huh?”

  The girls chuckled together.

  Luvella said, “He’d better!”

  ****

  Two weeks later, as she prepared for bed, Luvella went to her bedroom window and studied the mountain, bending to peer upward and leaning from right to left to see both sides, even in the dark. “I am asking you all—my God, the powers of the East, the West, the North and the South, Mother Earth and Father Sky—please help us all do the right thing tomorrow,” she whispered. She closed her eyes to envision the trees nodding, and on the ground, the purple and yellow chrysanthemums and anemones waving. “We know tomorrow’s football game is a good thing, and we know the celebration afterward is even better. Good people being with good people. Together, we can become our goal.”

  Her brows knit together with her intensity. “I can feel your…your support, like my crutches.” She stood there, with eyes closed, brows still pinched, and moving her head back and forth. “Please be everybody’s crutches tomorrow.”

  She turned toward her bed. “Oh!” She twisted to face the window again. “Um, could you please bring Luke tomorrow, too?”

  Chapter Nineteen

  After breakfast, Luvella cleaned her room and gathered an extra pillow and blanket for herself. Mr. and Mrs. Raven would be sleeping in her bedroom; she would sleep on the davenport downstairs.

  Reeder, who had started and ended each day with tackling the dummy with his football friends and practicing “plays,” was assigned to killing and plucking the chickens for the picnic. At noon, Daddy, Jake, and Bill left with the wagon to meet the Muncees at Daddy’s sawmill. The host townspeople decided to all meet there. They didn’t want any men who might be at the tavern making trouble. Also, at that time, each family could lead their guests to their homes. The plan was to have the guests “settle in,” and then everyone go to the main road for the football game and the picnic in front of the hotel.

  When she could hear the sounds of the horses’ hooves on the road coming up the mountain, Luvella hustled out to the porch and waited. Soon she saw Mr. and Mrs. Raven, sitting together on the driver’s bench of their wagon, following Daddy in his wagon, with Jake and Bill in the back. Luvella tried to hide her disappointment; she noticed immediately that Luke was not with them.

  But she hobbled to the wagon to greet the Ravens, hugging Mrs. Raven warmly. “I am so glad to see you,” she said. “And now you can meet my mother. You’ll love her.” She said “Pleased to see you again” to Mr. Raven and led Mrs. Raven inside.

  “How is Hannah?” Luvella asked, fairly bouncing with excitement, even on her crutches.

  “Hannah is a very happy mother these days,” Mrs. Raven beamed. “Little Matthew is five days old. But what has happened to you, Luvella?”

  “Oh! Didn’t Luke tell you?”

  “No, I haven’t seen Luke since the day after you left us. Have you seen him?” Mrs. Raven’s face was suddenly serious, a mother’s concern written all over it. “Did something happen to him?”

  Luvella told how Luke had rescued her and brought her safely home. So he had met her parents and some other people in town. “He must still be on his vision quest,” she ended.

  “Oh, Luvella, please don’t mention that,” Mrs. Raven whispered, looking around. “That w
ould be so dangerous for Luke, and all of us, if people learned of it.”

  “I only say it here, Mrs. Raven, because Luke explained it to my family when he brought me home. None of us will ever say a word about it, I promise. Here we are, Mama, this is Mrs. Raven. Her mother-in-law was Uncle Isaac’s sister.”

  Mama rushed, with her arms open, to Mrs. Raven. “Let’s see, that makes us friends and relatives.” They both laughed. “Call me Margaret.”

  “And I am Elizabeth.”

  Mama had already poured mugs of coffee, and the women sat at the table, prepared to chat and get acquainted. Mr. Raven and Daddy came in with satchels that carried the Ravens’ change of clothing and some sample baskets. The satchels were made of loosely woven soft reeds, with a drawstring closing at the top, and were perfect as bags for carrying clothing or anything. She knew better than to interrupt the conversation of the adults, but eventually there was an opening.

  “Mrs. Raven, I’ve been sneaking peeks at your baskets there.” She nodded toward the stack of three baskets near the door. “They’re even prettier than I remember them.”

  Mrs. Raven blushed and smiled. “We are taking special care to make beautiful baskets for your bonanza,” she said.

  Luvella thought about telling the Ravens right then that the bonanza may not even happen, but she made an instant decision to not say anything. Let’s see how our football party turns out today.

  Then she asked, “Mrs. Raven, those satchels for your clothes…do you make them, too?”

  “Oh, my yes,” she answered. “But they’re just for when we want to carry a lot of things easily. We use them when we pick our corn and apples, too.” She tucked a tendril of loose hair behind her ear. “They’re just, oh, what’s the word? Handy.” She laughed.

  “Well, if you think you have time to make some of them for my store, then figure out what you need to charge me for them. I think some of my customers, even just from Muncy Valley, would love them.”