Fleetie's Crossing Read online

  “Where you going with that rifle, Burl? If you’re headed out to join them marchers, you can’t be taking no gun. We’ve got us a houseful of young’uns, and you can’t do them no good with a bullet hole in your head.”

  He jerked around to go out the front door, but Fleetie grabbed his arm and pushed him hard against the door, facing him. “I’m telling you, Burl, leave that rifle here. You can’t be caught carrying no gun.”

  He yanked his arm loose, and as he did so, the rifle slipped and hit her hard on her mouth, smashing her lip.

  “Damn it, Fleet. You’re not making no fool out of me. Them boys out there in that truck is going to fight to keep our jobs, and by god, no damn woman is ’bout to stop me. Get out of my way. I mean it, Fleet. You’re fixin’ to make me mad.”

  As Burl stormed out the screen door, she clamped her hand to her mouth to stop the blood before it dropped on her clean dress. Leatha and the other kids always cried at the sight of blood. They acted like they hated blood more than the injury.

  I could see Fleetie’s mouth was beginning to swell. I scurried from under the table and grabbed a soft washcloth off the rack and held it under the cold water in the sink. As I handed the wet cloth to her, the three of us stood behind the screen door to watch. Burl pulled away with seven men loaded in his truck. They were all hell-bent on joining the union march against the operators’ scabs and goons. The scabs were men who would walk through the picket line for a job in spite of the sacrifice of friends and neighbors to chance the miserable work conditions and lousy pay. The goons, on the other hand, were trucked in from who-knows-where to serve as enforcers. Both sets of men were hated by the miners, but the goons would kill at the blink of an eye, and that terrified the miners’ wives and children.

  Fleetie shook her head. “’, they act like little kids out raising a Halloween ruckus. You’d think they never heard tell about how quick them goons are with their rifles,

  We watched as the truck tires threw up a spin of sand and gravel as a choking dust cloud billowed behind the truck. Almost before the dust settled behind the overloaded truck, Fleetie gathered up the kids and started herding them toward the river crossing. About five miles north of the valley, a small mine that was worked by men who were not yet union members was the temporary headquarters for the owner and operators and their hired henchmen. If they used the same location too many times, it would be blown up. The rumors had it that the union organizers and miners were planning to march to the mine and “show them goddamn union busters.” Showing them would mean using the shotguns and rifles they all mostly carried on their shoulders. Bloody battles during coal strikes were pretty common, and if the march really happened, it would be headed straight for Ross’s Point with Coburn’s store sitting in the middle of the skirmish.

  Fleetie didn’t have time to wait for me to go home and get permission to go with them, and without Mother’s okay, I knew Fleetie’s answer, even if I begged to go. She would never go along with anything that Mother did not first approve.

  I watched them as they hurried down to the riverbank. By crossing the river, she could cut off the two miles extra it would take to go along the track to the road and double back to the store. She’d get to the settlement that much sooner to wait out the march with the rest of the wives and children. Leatha waved to me, and I wanted to cry, knowing that whatever happened, it would have been better if we had stayed together. Ever since we were toddlers, the world always seemed a safer place when we stuck together. If she thought it, I could answer. If I wanted it, she would find it. We quarreled often with our sisters but never with each other.

  The fishing boat was not big enough for all of them. I watched as Nessa, Dorotha, and Leatha took off their shoes, tied the strings together, hung them around their necks, stepped into the cold water, and waded across the shallow river. Fleetie settled Emma and Rebecca into the boat, untied the mooring rope, and began poling across the shallow water. Usually, this trip was as much fun as swimming. We’d skip rocks, splash one another, and race to see who could get across first. But today, even the youngest kids were silent. They watched Fleetie’s every move as any hint of fun floated down the cold stream.

  Just as soon as the boat shuffled upon the narrow bank at the far side, I could hear Fleetie say, “Hurry up, kids. Get your shoes back on. We have to get on up the road to Susanny’s. Them men’ll be tromping through here and run over ever’body in their path. Quick now.”

  Susanny was Fleetie’s favorite aunt, and she lived in the middle of the settlement and not far from Coburn’s store. Her porch would be filled with the women and little children, while nearby, the old men and young boys would gather on Coburn’s porch to watch.

  Fleetie carried Rebecca and pulled herself and the other kids up the steep path from the river. The older kids were waiting for her at the top of the bank. They crossed Lloyd Wallace’s field that lay along the river’s edge and hurried to the paved road and walked a good quarter mile toward the settlement before I lost sight of them.

  I turned from the river and left the Sargeants’ yard. All our foot-tromping during the cold winter had left the yard as bare as a barn floor. After Burl’s getaway, the yard gate was still hanging open. You would think with Emma and Rebecca so little and as close to the road as they lived, he might stop to shut the gate. But no, not Mr. Meany Burl. That piece of carelessness was just one more in my long list of reasons why he made my blood boil.

  As I plodded up the long hill, the railroad crossing well behind me, I spotted my little brother, James Logan. He stood looking past me, and when I turned, I saw a line of men marching down the road that ran parallel to the river and the railroad. Talk of the strike and picket lines had been on the tongue of every adult in the valley for weeks. Logan had heard much of the same talk as I had, and even though he didn’t know what picketers were, he knew the angry-looking bunch of men walking along the road looked out of place.

  “The picnickers are coming, the picnickers are coming.” Logan’s short legs pounded down the driveway that girdled our twenty-acre hillside farm. He got to me just as I curved into the yard. He hurled himself against me and, using my bones and flesh as ladder rungs, scrambled up and wrapped himself around my neck. “Picnickers! Picnickers! Hide, Rach, hide. They get us.”

  “They are picketers, Logie, not picnickers.” I tried to break his strangle hold.

  “They’re coming. I see them.” He slid down my side and grabbed my leg and then began pulling my hand as if to retrace my steps down the driveway. “Look with me.”

  “No, Logie, let’s go to the point.” I swooped him up in my arms and ran across the field to the persimmon tree that grew just above the cliff where the point once stood.

  The point, a sheared-off nose of land cut fifty yards from our house, jutted out above the railroad. From there, we could see the entire settlement of Ross’s Point. We watched as the miners’ picket line formed itself three abreast on our far left and marched from the Gaton Gap and down the narrow valley. As the picketers moved south, a gathering of thugs worked around Tunnel Hill and marched north toward the picketers. A gradual rise in the middle of the valley blocked one group from seeing the other.

  We were standing where we could see both lines as they moved closer and closer to each other. From the kitchen window, Mother spotted us staring at something beyond her view. She yelled, and I could almost feel her racing around the house and across the yard, coming to us on the point.

  At breakfast that morning, all the conversation was about the strike, and Daddy left us early to talk to Mr. Ben across the valley. Ben was almost as old as the rocks on the mountain and kept his thumb on the pulse of the entire valley.

  As Daddy was about to leave the house, my sister Jane threw a tantrum to go with him. It figured. We didn’t call her Bug for nothing, pet that she was. Daddy gave in after about two seconds. It occurred to me that I should have stuffed her mouth with a
sock—as if that would have made any difference. Her blond hair, blue eyes, and pretty little face could win any argument. I gritted my teeth as I watched them take off together.

  The miners, many of them neighbors and friends, had been getting more desperate as winter wore old. On the other hand, mine bosses, determined to get the mines open, pushed the goons and scabs.

  Now Daddy and Jane’s path was headed right into the middle of the battle. Blocked by a row of pine trees on a rise of land, Daddy couldn’t see the angry two-headed parade coming toward them, both sides ready to explode with the hatred of months of anger and frustration built up between them.

  Logan yanked my shirt. “Look, Daddy and Bug.”

  As Mother came nearer the point, she saw them too, Daddy walking across the valley with my baby sister. Her hand was swallowed in his, and her blond curls had to be flying under the green felt bonnet, which I could see bobbing along beside Daddy.

  I heard Mother whisper, “Oh my lord, no!”

  She tore down the rocky path from the point to the valley. Loose rock rolled beneath her feet, and she seemed to defy gravity as she flew, barely touching the ground. Logan and I waved and screamed, but our warnings were lost in the wind circling past us. Maybe it was because we wanted it so, maybe one of our piercing yells found its mark, or perhaps it was luck, but something stopped Daddy.

  He swept Janey into his arms and ran up the rise where he saw the two dangerous columns advance, ready to engulf the two of them. Way too late for them to run for the safety of the mountain, he perched Bug on his shoulder and began a slow, deliberate walk directly into the path of the two sides of men as they moved ever closer to each other. I could almost hear him humming his steadying tune, “John Peel.” He even turned and waved at us high up on the point as the two angry armies came near enough to strike blows.

  Mother’s frantic run took her behind a long row of pines, and she would have lost sight of Daddy and Jane. Hidden as she was, she couldn’t see that Daddy had deliberately taken himself and her baby girl into more danger than her heart could stand.

  Both “picnickers” and the sullen-faced scabs slowed then stopped and stared at Daddy, who was standing in their path. Daddy turned and spoke first to Burl and his brother. The two studied the ground and lowered their rifles. Then he turned to the other group and singled out that sorry Jimmy Bascam and Larry Hensley. Those two were always looking for one fight or another. This time, they were lined up with the operators against the union. They loved to fight, and neither one cared who they worked for just so long as there were money, whiskey, knuckles, and blood.

  We could make out a word or two of what Daddy was saying to them, but I didn’t have to hear it then. He preached the same sermon at me every time he got really worried about the miners. He would urge them to put away the guns before there was bloodshed and warn that if there was a killing, the governor would call in the troopers, and nobody would win. I figured he would add for good measure the warning that a man oughta think about what would happen if there was no contract, no coal, nothing.

  Daddy held great store with thinking. He started lots of sentences with “A man oughta…” It was his way of telling people to stop and think before they went off like a bottle rocket and got themselves and others in big trouble.

  A hateful moan rose from the strikers, and I could see a ripple of anger skip through the cluster of scabs and hired guns. The two crowds pressed closer, watching to see who would be the first to attack a man with a child perched on his shoulder. With all the anger and frustration goading them, there was no one willing to play coward and turn from the fight. My heart beat so hard, it caused a roar in my ears.

  I held on to the hope that it must be hard to make a move against a man who was one of them. At one time or another, many of those men had gone to Daddy’s office for advice, wills, or settlements. He hunted, fished, and got drunk with them. He played the fool for their kids. The men knew Daddy was honest, a quality pretty scarce among the big wheels in the county, and they trusted him whether it was in a poker game or the courtroom.

  Daddy waited and watched both sides, but as far as I could tell, no one gave an inch. The men showed no sign of stopping this fight. He moved slowly and lifted Jane from his shoulder. Holding her high, he pointed to Mother, who now stood just inside the ring of miners who were crowding close.

  My knees trembled when I saw Mother move through the cluster of miners. She looked so tiny and defenseless. Even little Logan knew she was in danger. He jumped into my arms and threw his face into my neck.

  “Don’t worry, Logie. Mommy will be fine.” I hoped with all my heart I wasn’t lying. It was one thing for Daddy to be facing a mob, but Mother was not strong or tough or even very well liked. Too many people thought she was stuck-up, and no one could deny that she was not a mountain girl.

  I could see her as she began to speak to the men as she walked by. Many of them were our neighbors, husbands, and brothers of women she knew well. Daddy stooped down and placed Janey’s feet on the ground. He whispered to her as he set her on a path through the miners. She turned and waved bye-bye, and with her joy at seeing Mother, she plunged into the middle of the crowd. The knot of miners split apart as she bobbed her green bonnet and golden curls through them.

  Daddy turned and strode into the huddle of scabs nodding and shook their hands and called each one by name. The wind was picking up, and I could no longer hear him, but I knew Daddy would ask about their mothers and grandmothers, their dogs, their children. Every man was forced to talk to him. He skipped no one. Whether they liked him or not, people found Daddy an impossible man to ignore. The crowd began to separate, and the men broke off into smaller groups. Even way up here, it seemed some of the anger had cooled. Fists dropped, and rifles came off shoulders to lean against legs. The loud shouts stopped, and in their place was a soft murmur.

  On the other side, the miners focused on my briggedy sister and my terrified mother as they made their way through the men. Mother’s courage might have deserted her, but her good manners and instinct held firm and forced her to ask the men about their wives and children. I could see her holding Jane’s hand, moving rock steady through the quarrelsome men. She would be asking about their children by name, forcing each one to look at her and acknowledge the common ground they shared. Slowly, the boiling anger cooled for them too, and they began to move back down the path that had led them here, spoiling for a killing. Daddy moved closer to where Mother was standing, but she gave Daddy “the look.” Poor Daddy. It was going to be leftovers and slammed doors for a good spell. She picked up Janey and, without a word or a smile, traced her steps back through the scattering miners. Relief shot through me. She might be mad at Daddy, but she was on her way home.

  “Look, Logie, here comes Mommy. I bet she wants to see you.”

  A little more liquor, a few rifle shots, and four or five hours later in the day, and stopping the fight would have been impossible. Daddy must have sensed the men were farther down a dangerous path than any of them wanted to risk. I never could figure out how he did it, but he could always understand both sides of an argument and figure out a way to shut it down. Pappy always said, “Ed’s staring brown eyes can see right through the righteous and the unrighteous.”

  Maybe he was just lucky because you could count on it that both sides would be at it again. The strike had already brought gunfire echoing in our troubled valley. Mothers cried as good men and bad died for little more than a day’s pay. But today, Mother, Daddy, and my baby sister had tricked Logan’s picnickers into a short peace.

  Chapter 2

  THE VISIT

  Black winter had sunk its roots into the mountains surrounding us. An unusual cold-weather drought just plain refused to give way to spring. With no early spring rains to nudge the weather on, we stayed trapped in the long ugly season. The valley hunkered down to wait it out.

  The Ross’s Point march
had pressed the union negotiators’ and operators’ lawyers into new talks, filling the court café and various warm offices, but clouds of smoke from the rusted metal barrels still hung over the weary picketers standing as sentinels at the gap. The cold worked through freezing gaps in every layer of flannel and shrunken wool the women could scrape up for the men to wear. The meager fires gave off more smoke than heat and more gas than spark.

  In spite of their desperate hardships and what seemed like no hope, the striking miners stayed on the line. I hated to look at them. It felt rude, like I was seeing them cry when they would be ashamed of their tears. Of course, they didn’t cry, and there was even harsh laughter and roughhousing, mainly, I guessed, to keep their spirits up.

  I had spent the night with Leatha, and when I was standing by the front door, trying to talk myself into going home, Fleetie reached behind me and picked up her granny’s ancient shawl and wrapped it around herself against the biting cold. Once, the shawl was probably deep black with bright pink trim, but the years had left it more gray than black, and the pink so faded, it was almost white.

  “Dork, Nessa, you watch the little’uns. I’m walking up to Mrs. Hill’s.” She wrapped herself in the knitted shawl against the raw cold. Leatha grabbed her daddy’s mackinaw, and we took out across the porch, giggling like we had pulled off something feisty. We crossed the dirt road and raced up the steep bank leading to the railroad crossing. We both stopped to throw pebbles in the creek that flowed by the road while we waited for Fleetie to catch up.

  Leatha’s aunt Geneva was already just a few weeks away from delivering another baby to join the toddler twins now crowding her lap. The custom was to provide for necessities and extras by giving the new mother a shower. A few days earlier, Fleetie sent out the word and invited a houseful of cousins and aunts to the party. Everybody in the valley loved Gen with her huge blue eyes and hair as black as a miner’s eyebrow. She wasn’t as big as a cricket, and when she was pregnant, which now seemed like most of the time, it was hard to tell where the baby stopped and Gen started. Her voice was as soft as a mourning dove and almost as melancholy, but her children were a perfect delight, and she made us feel that her babies belonged to everybody.