wasn’t serious.
“You gonna bring her home?” It was Eliza, standing at the kitchen door.
“Well, are you?” Momma called out. You couldn’t get away with any private conversations in that house.
Now that Hixson had been found out, he told the rest of the story. “There’s something special about her. I’m not sure if she’d leave her home.”
“What kind of special?” Poppa asked. All the kinds of special he could think of would not keep her from leaving a place.
“Well, for one thing, her home has been in her family a long time, and now she’s the only one.” They all understood that. Roots and one’s relationship to the land were very important.
“Another thing is she’s kind of a healer. A special one.” Hixson showed them the scars, still fairly red over a year later. He told them the whole story of her gift of light. He told them about the boy with the broken leg and what he saw when she healed him. He told them about the cloud of darkness around the cabin when she laid her hands on the dog.
Momma and Poppa saw the scars and realized that Hixson’s recovery from such a wound was miraculous. Their son was not an excitable kind of man. He had always been rational, intelligent and wise beyond his years. The wonder in his voice as he told them about Sarah was more revealing than what he said.
He did not tell them about the rape of her mother. That, he felt, was best left unsaid. If they ever needed to know, they would find out then.
Momma raised a question he had never thought of. “If her mother died in childbirth, do you think she’s going to be able to live through it? You said she was a little bird of a thing. Is she too small for childbearing? Why did her mother die, do you know?”
Hixson considered her question for a while. At last he said, “No, I don’t think it was that. Something else must have been wrong. Besides, you’re not very big, either, Momma, and you managed.” Hixson knew what side his bread was buttered on.
“Hmmph. You just think I managed because you haven’t tried it. It’s no easy thing, you know.” Momma snapped, but she was still pleased. No woman wanted to hear she was any bigger than she’d ever been.
Hixson yawned conspicuously and made a great show of stretching. He wanted to retire to think about what had been said, and when he should leave. In his family, to just sit and think was a sure way to get a dose of medicine. The only place to ponder anything was in bed after dark. He had to make plans. That he would go to her, there had never been a doubt.
July 3rd, 1865--Dover, Pennsylvania
The decision was made. Hixson had been wakeful most of the night, half planning and half dreaming. He planned out when he would leave. In two days, he would go. He would spend the holiday tomorrow with his family. It would be the first Fourth of July since the war began that he had the chance.
Hixson planned out what he would say. Then he would change his mind, scrap everything and plan something different. He dreamed about how she would look. He dreamed that she would run to him, that he could put his arms around her.
He announced his decision at breakfast, another huge meal, expecting an argument. To his surprise, no one did. Mostly everyone was just excited for him and hoped they’d get to meet this girl soon.
Hixson and Charlton worked in the eastern field together that day, and talked of their respective love interests. Charlton was something of a businessman at heart. The girl he was courting had eighty acres of her own that conveniently abutted the Morris’ south parcel. Hixson remembered the family that owned that farm. But he did not recall a daughter.
“No, you’re thinking of her uncle–her father’s brother. He has the farm next to that and always just worked both places. Her Dad worked the farm her Momma inherited, over in Ohio.” Charlton explained. “Both her parents died during the war. Her brother got the farm in Ohio, she got this one. So she came to live with her uncle and to take over her farm.”
That made sense. Charlton declared she had other redeeming qualities as well. Hixson suspected the eighty acres might be the most redeeming of all. He was convinced when she passed by on the road, with her aunt.
She was one of those unfortunate girls with squinty little eyes, thin hair and turned up nose too big. She was shaped like a birdhouse gourd: big on the bottom and too small on the top. Hixson looked at his brother and laughed.
“Well, but she’s really very nice.” Charlton defended himself. Then he started to laugh, too. He picked up a clod of dirt and threw it at Hixson, hitting him squarely in the chest. Hixson tackled him, and they wrestled until they were both as brown as the fields of rich farmland.
“I’m only kidding, Charlton. If she’s nice that’s all that really matters. How does the rest of the family like her?” Hixson asked.
“Momma likes her because she is such a good cook. Her grandparents were German, only recently from the old country. She knows all the dishes. She even speaks German, so Momma can talk to her in the old tongue a little bit. What she remembers of it.
“Poppa likes her because she works hard and sings while she works. He says that means she works cheerful, so I’ll never have to scold her. And Eliza loves her because she is funny and tells wonderful stories.
“Oh, I know she isn’t the prettiest one, but she is a dear, she really is. She’s never cross or complaining. She has a knack for seeing the humor in ordinary situations. She’s a lot of fun to be around. You’ll like her.” Charlton was earnest.
“If you like her, I will too. Be good to her, huh? Treat her like she is the prettiest one.” Hixson said, and wondered at his own tenderness.
The brothers went for a swim in the duck pond to wash off the wrestling dust. Eliza watched her big strong brothers and thought how handsome they were. Someday, she said to herself, she’d find someone as wonderful as they were.
July 4th, 1865--Dover, Pennsylvania
Momma had packed a picnic lunch and they were all going to town. It was the first Fourth of July since the war was over, since the war began, for that matter, and they intended to celebrate.
The day was bright and hot. Nearly every lady had a parasol; the church grounds looked like so many brilliant mushrooms had sprouted.
They had a big day planned, with all of the events they could think of: a parade, a band playing and contests of every sort.
Eliza walked on her oldest brother’s arm like the young woman she was fast becoming. Hixson noticed many hopeful young eyes looking in her direction. Good big brother that he was, he made sure to scowl at every hopeful young face, trying to scare them off.
Hixson met his brother’s intended at lunch time. She brought over a basket of black bread and wonderfully smelly soft cheese to share. Hixson stood and took her hand and smiled warmly. “You must be Annie? I’m delighted to meet you, Miss Annie.”
“And you must be Hixson, our beloved Lieutenant! I feel like I know you already, what with your letters home and Charlton’s stories about you.” Annie replied.
“You can’t believe the things Charlton says about me, you know. I wasn’t half as mean to him as he says I was.”
“Oh, he never said you were mean. He always told me you were very smart and very brave. But I won’t believe him, if you tell me not to.” Annie was smiling, and somehow, the smile improved her looks immensely.
Hixson laughed, “That, you will have to decide for yourself. I can’t be very smart, or I wouldn’t have walked into that one so easy!”
They all sat on the ground to eat, and Annie entertained them with a story.
“We learned an important lesson at home, this past week.” She began.
“My Auntie found one of her favorite hens dead in the hen house just over a month ago. No idea what killed the old girl, but she had started brooding a clutch of eggs only a couple days before. So there we are with a clutch of eggs started, and none of the other hens were setting.
“Auntie liked that hen a lot, and really wanted to have some of her chicks around. Auntie was getting ready to make an incubator in
the house to try to hatch out those eggs. That’s when my little cousin comes in and says that one of the geese is sitting on a nest, and why don’t we just slip the eggs under her?
“Well a goose should be able to hatch a hen’s egg just fine, so we tried it. Sure enough, one day we see the mother goose with six little goslings and six little chicks, parading around like the queen. Oh, it was so cute! You should have seen it.
“What we didn’t think of, though, was that mother goose taking a notion to teach all those little ones how to swim! Of course, the little goslings just go right in the pond, but the chicks don’t want any part of that. So mother goose starts getting frustrated. She encourages them over and over by taking to the water, pretty as you please, and showing them how easy it is.
“The chicks just stood at the water’s edge, peeping like their momma was going to drown. She keeps trying to show them, and then lead them in, but they won’t go. I expect she’s thinking she’s got some of the dumbest goslings ever hatched. Pretty soon, she’s picking up the chicks in her bill and throwing them in the pond!
“Auntie runs out there to rescue the chicks from being drowned by their new momma, and the goose figures that she knows how to raise her chicks. She doesn’t like being interfered with, so she starts going after Auntie.
“That big old goose was just honking and flapping. Then Auntie tries flapping her apron back at the mad goose.