Hideaway Home

Ma, of course, had nearly come to blows with the old gossip about it—and Ma wasn’t a fighter, unless someone tried to hurt one of her kids. Then, she could whup a mad bull, and she was big enough to do it.

Red glanced out at the peaceful countryside, at the cattle grazing in a valley. Pa had actually taken on a mad bull twelve years ago—and lost. That ol’ bull had been raised on the farm as a pet, but then had turned mean, and caught Pa in the middle of the field where he couldn’t get away in time.

Ma had been left to raise Red and his brother and sister alone.

What was up with Ma now?

And how was Red going to break his news to Bertie?

Chapter Three

Bertie thought about her father as she held the fine sandpaper to the gear shaft turning in the lathe. She moved the paper back and forth to wear the metal of the shaft to smooth, even perfection—to ten thousandths of an inch of the final recommendations.

She couldn’t help feeling, again, that something wasn’t right back home. At seven o’clock, on the second Sunday night of every month since she’d come out here, she’d telephoned Dad. If she couldn’t reach him right away, he would phone her, and every time except once, he had been sitting beside the phone, waiting for her call. By the time their short talks were over—long distance cost too much to talk more than a few minutes—half of Hideaway knew what was happening in her life.

Everyone on their telephone party line got in on the call. It aggravated Dad half to death, and he wasn’t always polite to the neighbors. But that didn’t stop the townsfolk from picking up their phones, even when they knew the specific ring was for Dad and not for them. They were always “accidentally” interrupting the conversation.

Last night Bertie had tried four times, with no answer from Dad. He never called back. She’d talked to the Morrows, the Fishers and the Jarvises, but not to Dad. Nobody seemed to know where he was. Mrs. Fisher did tell Bertie that a couple of Dad’s best cows and five of his pigs had gone missing two weeks ago. Bertie had heard Mr. Fisher in the background, telling his wife that if Joseph Moennig wanted his daughter to know about the lost animals, he’d tell her himself.

Mr. Fisher was one of the few people in their Hideaway neighborhood who believed in minding his own business. His wife, poor thing, held a dim view of her husband’s antisocial behavior.

Why hadn’t Dad mentioned the animals in his letters?

Mr. Morrow didn’t have much to say about the matter, which struck Bertie as unusual. He’d never lacked for opinions before.

If Bertie didn’t know better, she’d start getting a complex. First, no letters from Red Meyer for six weeks, and now even her father wasn’t answering her calls.

She’d written Red’s mother, but though Lilly Meyer’s reply had been chatty and filled with news, she hadn’t given Bertie any useful information about Red, except that he was “takin’ a few weeks of rest from the battle.”

But where was he doin’ his resting? And if he was getting rest, why couldn’t he write to her? Was he having so much fun on his rest that he didn’t want to waste time on her?

Bertie heard news about the war from everyone but Red.

Until VE Day last month—Victory over Europe, May 8, 1945—which would always be a day of celebration, Bertie and Edith had kept up with the news from the European front through their favorite magazine, Stars and Stripes. They had especially loved war correspondent Ernie Pyle, who’d informed readers about all the things Red never wrote about—such as the living conditions of the men who were fighting so desperately for freedom.

How she missed those articles now that Ernie was dead. How the whole country missed him!

“Roberta Moennig, you know the boss is tough on daydreamers.” Emma, the utility girl, came by with more parts to work on the lathe.

Bertie’s hand slipped, fingers rapping against the shaft, and she yelped when she accidentally did a quick sanding job on her fingertips.

“Hey, you all right?” Emma asked.

“Yes, I’m fine.” Bertie had too much on her mind right now. She’d developed too much of a worry habit.

Emma hefted the parts onto Bertie’s table. “What’s got your goat? Keep this up and Franklin Parrish’ll be chucking you out the door.”

Bertie grimaced and picked up a shaft. She placed it in the lathe, tightened it in, and started polishing it. Today her concentration was about as sharp as a possum hanging from a tree limb.

“Got another letter from my soldier last night,” Emma said, leaning her elbows on Bertie’s worktable, obviously of a mind to gab a while, in spite of the whine of the lathe’s motor, and her own just-issued warning about Franklin.

Bertie nodded, wishing Emma would leave it at that, hoping the noise of the lathe would keep the conversation short.

“You heard from that man of yours lately?” Emma asked, raising her voice.

Bertie frowned. “Not for a few weeks. You know how the mail gets bundled up for days at a time, then a bunch of letters comes at once.” Even to her own ears, the excuse sounded overly bright.

Emma gave Bertie a narrow-eyed look. “Red’s never gone this long without writing to you, has he? He still a scout with the Army?”

Bertie suppressed a sigh and turned off the lathe. “He’s called a fire support specialist.”

“I thought it was a forward observer.”

Bertie released her pent-up breath. How many times had she corrected Emma about Red’s title? She didn’t want to sound boastful, but she was proud of Red and what he did. He’d received several commendations for his skills—and his bravery. It was the bravery that worried her something awful.

Emma stepped closer, her pinched face and mouse-brown eyes sharpening with concern. “You don’t think he’s…I mean…you think he’s—”

“Hush, now.” Bertie gently patted Emma’s thin arm. “Honey, you know we can’t start thinking that way. Gotta have some faith that God’s in charge. Our men are helping to win this war. Besides, bad news always seems to travel faster than good these days. If something had happened to him, we’d know by now. I got a letter from his mother a few days ago.”

Emma’s eyes narrowed even more as she nibbled on her chapped lower lip. “That man that got killed? You know, that reporter out in the Pacific? He wasn’t even a solider, Bert! It’s dangerous all over, and men are being killed every day, and what with our own president dying, it feels like everything’s out of control.”

“Nothing is out of control,” Bertie assured her. “President Truman knows what he’s doing. He’s a Missourian, born not too far from my hometown. He’ll see things through. We Missourians are made of tough stock.”

Emma didn’t seem to hear her. “Lives can be cut short just like that,” she said, snapping her fingers. “It could happen to anybody.”

Bertie shook her head. She didn’t need to hear this kind of talk right now. “It could even happen to you or me if Franklin catches us chatting instead of working,” she said with a wink to keep her words from sounding too harsh. “He’s already threatened to fire me once today.”

To Bertie’s relief, Emma nodded, sighed and returned to her cart. Bertie turned on the lathe again, which she shouldn’t have turned off in the first place; there was no standing around talking except at break time.

At least once a week, poor Emma got all perturbed about her soldier. Every time, Bertie prayed for them both. She’d offered to pray with Emma, but that seemed to be going too far.

As it was, Bertie often felt overwhelmed with the amount of work she and Edith Frost had volunteered for these past months. During her free time, Bertie signed people up for war bonds, and she and Edith helped with the blood drive, which included giving their own blood as often as they could.

So many of her hometown friends had left for the war as boys and had returned as men. Three men from her hometown had returned in caskets.

She switched her attention back to the shaft in her lathe, trying her hardest to shake off the worry that Emma had helped stoke like the cinders of a woodstove.

Red sat with his feet planted firmly on the floor in the swaying railcar, growing more and more conscious of the cane he’d shoved beneath the seat and the attention of his friend, Ivan Potts.

It would be easy to reach down and pull out the cane and show it to Ivan. Everyone in Hideaway would know about it by tomorrow, anyway, so why not show it first to someone he knew he could trust?

But something kept him from it. It was almost like another bad dream—if he kept pretending the problem wasn’t there, maybe it would disappear.

Like the war?

Ivan peered out the window, then stood and gestured to Red. “Why don’t you come up to my car with me? I’ve got to collect my things before we get off. Dad said he’d be waiting for me at the station, and I bet Mom will be with him. You can catch a ride with us.”

Red hesitated for a few seconds, then declined. Ma would want to pick up Red herself, so they could spend the long ride back home catching up, just the two of them.

“Thanks, but I’ve got a ride,” Red said. “Ma told me she’d see to it I got picked up.”

Ivan nodded, then grinned. “Lilly probably cooked your favorite meal, knowing you were coming back today.”

“If she had time. She’s been awful busy.”

“But if I know your mother, she’ll have her famous chicken and dumplings waiting at the table for you as soon as you walk in the door.” Ivan licked his lips. “And blackberry cobbler with enough butter in the crust to make a grown man cry.”

Red couldn’t help grinning at his friend. “Could be.” Ivan loved a good meal, and though his mother was brilliant and kind and an excellent hostess, her finger pastries and cucumber sandwiches didn’t exactly stick to the ribs.

“Think Lilly could be persuaded to set an extra place at the table for me?” Ivan leaned toward Red, looking like a hound about to tree a coon. “My mom has a party planned for my homecoming tonight, but man, oh, man, Lilly’s chicken and dumplings for lunch would make the whole ordeal worth enduring.”

Red sometimes kidded Ivan that he was not his mother’s son. Arielle Potts was a cultured lady—an accomplished hostess, who loved to entertain. She was a savvy political wife who enjoyed helping her husband campaign for mayor of Hideaway—not that there’d been much campaigning to do. Gerald Potts’s only opponent had been Gramercy Short, who likely didn’t get more than a total of ten votes, all from his relatives, and there were probably at least two dozen Shorts in Hideaway.

Ivan, on the other hand, would rather go huntin’ with Red and his coon dogs any night than socialize with the town’s high and mighty.

“Sure,” Red said, “come on over. Even if Ma hasn’t made chicken and dumplings, the meal’s bound to be good.”

Ivan nodded. “I’ll do it.”

Ivan had the kind of face that revealed his thoughts several seconds before he spoke them. And he always spoke them. He didn’t believe in keeping things to himself. As long as Red had known him, there was most often a hint of humor in Ivan’s eyes, not quite mischief, but almost.

As Red watched, all humor left Ivan’s face, and the darkness entered his expression again. Red didn’t have any trouble knowing what was going through his friend’s mind.

“Red, the war’s taken something from us that we might never get back.” He glanced up and down the aisle at the other passengers.

Red waited without speaking. This wasn’t the time to talk about it. Not now. Not on this train with other people listening. Besides, he couldn’t help thinking that if he spoke aloud what had been on his mind the past few weeks, it would make everything that happened over on those deadly fields too real.

“I think it’s hit you harder,” Ivan said at last. “Hasn’t it?”

Red swallowed. “Not sure what makes you think that. We’ve all been through a lot.”

Ivan leaned closer and waited until Red met his gaze. “Because I know you, buddy. You bury things down deep inside. Me, I sit by myself and write my poetry and get it out of my system. You should see the stack of poetry in my duffle bag. I’ve probably sent poems to half of Hideaway, and several of Bertie’s friends in California.”

“You oughta try to get them published. You’ll be rich.”

Ivan laughed out loud at that. “You think there’s money in poetry? My Daddy taught me how to make a living, don’t you worry. And don’t change the subject.”

“Thought the subject was poetry.”

Ivan sobered. “You’ve lost something, Red.” His words were soft and gentle, but they felt like broken strands of chicken wire digging into Red’s heart. Ivan didn’t know the half of it. “It’s like all the laughter’s dried up inside of you.”

Red didn’t know what to say. He’d not seen much to laugh about.

“Find some way to get this war out of your system,” Ivan told him. “Don’t let it keep you down.”

Red nodded toward the window. “We’re getting close. Better get your things. I’ll see you for dinner.”

Ivan frowned. “Lunch, Red. Noon meal is lunch.”

“Not where I come from.”

“You come from here, same as me.”

“Your mother comes from Baltimore.”

Ivan chuckled and gave Red a playful sock in the arm. It was one of their favorite arguments.

To Red’s shame, he felt only relief when Ivan shook his head and walked back up the aisle toward the door that led to the forward car.

Chapter Four

Thoughts of Red once more filled Bertie’s mind as she struggled with a misshapen part. She tossed it to the side so Emma could pick it up to send back for repair.

Time to switch the lathe to a higher gear and get some of these parts finished. Hurriedly, she turned off the machine, released the tension on the v-belt, and reached down to move it to a larger v-pulley. Her hand slipped. The belt which hadn’t come to a complete stop, grabbed her forefinger. Before she could react, her finger was snatched into the pulley.

Pain streaked up her arm. She gritted her teeth to keep from crying out as she jerked her hand back.

Blood spread over and down her fingers, and for a moment, because of the pain, she thought all her fingers had been mangled. She closed her eyes and breathed deeply to keep from passing out, then turned to look around and see if anyone had noticed what had happened.

No one looked her way.

She reached for the bandana on her head. Her hot hair once again fell over her shoulders as she tore off a strip of the cloth and dabbed away the blood. To her relief, only her index finger was torn.

Maybe she could take care of this herself, without going to First Aid.

But she discovered she would have no choice. The blood kept flowing from a fair-sized cut over her knuckle. There was no way to deal with it on her own.

She used what was left of the bandana to tie her hair back into a ponytail, her movements awkward.

Reluctantly, she went to find her supervisor for permission to go to First Aid. She’d catch an earful this time.

Red peered out the window at the passenger cars curving along the track in front of him. He thought he saw Ivan’s blond head in one square of window, but it was too far away to know for sure.

He couldn’t say why he was relieved that Ivan had gone back to his seat. It’d been good to see his friend, to know there was someone else, someone he knew, who could understand what he’d gone through.

But then, looking into Ivan’s face, Red had been able to recall the war that much clearer, when what he really wanted to do was forget it, not be reminded of every detail, every death. There were too many.

Rubbing his fingertip across the corner of one of the envelopes in his pocket, Red resisted the urge to pull them out again. He knew what the letters said. He had most every word memorized. He could see Bertie Moennig’s face against his closed eyelids—her sweet, saucy smile, her thick, fair hair, and turned-up nose.

The letters he’d gotten from her were nearly falling apart, he’d read them so often. The latest ones, of course, were full of questions, full of worry and wondering why he hadn’t written. Those were the ones that ate at him.

He remembered one letter he’d gotten last year, soon after he returned from leave. It had been even harder than leaving the first time, and it’d apparently been hard for Bertie, too.

I’ve made a decision, the letter had said. I’m going to learn how to be good at waiting, because I know there are some things—some people—worth waiting for. Dad and Uncle Sam are urging me to take some training and work in one of the defense plants, and I think I’ll do it. I want to do all I can to help win this war, and get our men home again. Write me soon, Red, and let me know you’re okay.

He’d written to her then, telling her how much he already missed her, how proud he was of her. He’d written more during just one week of war than he’d done all through school. Bertie had always been so good for him.

Problem was, he didn’t know what to write now. Whatever he told her, it wouldn’t be something she’d want to read. And she didn’t need to know. Not yet.

He’d even told Ma not to let Bertie know about his injury. What good would it have done? Ma, of course, had argued, but he knew she’d done what he’d asked.

Thing was, he’d seen too many hearts broken already in this war. Too many of his buddies had died, leaving wives alone to grieve as widows, leaving mothers brokenhearted over their dead sons.

He’d also seen too many friends going back home as damaged goods, to wives who’d have to take care of them the rest of their lives. He couldn’t do that to Bertie.

Nosiree, Joseph Moennig had a good farm that needed running, and what with his son, Lloyd, off in Kansas with a wife and family, his only daughter Bertie would be the one to take over the farm someday. She’d need a husband who was whole to help with that. A woman like her wouldn’t have any trouble finding someone.

Red closed his eyes and tried to think of something else, because the thought of Bertie loving another man almost made him sick to his stomach.

Bertie watched the suture needle prick the skin of her knuckle in the first stitch. She jerked, in spite of her determination not to. How embarrassing! All this time she’d followed all the safety rules, been so careful about every single movement. And now this.

That was what happened when a person got in a hurry. She’d known better.

“That hurt?” asked Dr. Cox as he tied the stitch.

“Not at all. You do what you have to do.”

“Are you left-handed?” He started the next stitch.

“No, sir.”

“Good, because I would have to warn you against using your finger any more than necessary. Flexing that knuckle will make the healing time longer.”

“I’m glad it didn’t come to that. I have letters to write.”

He worked quickly, his fingers moving with precision. He was the company doctor, and had probably done this a lot. “You have a beau in the war?”

Bertie hesitated. Was Red her beau? She nodded. It was how she thought of him, even if he couldn’t seem to write now that he was on leave.

“Is he from Missouri, too?” Dr. Cox asked.

Bertie blinked up at him, her attention distracted from the needle. “How’d you know I was—”

“I pride myself in my ability to pick up on an accent within seconds of meeting someone. Southern?”

Bertie stared into his kind eyes. “You mean Southern Missouri? Yes, Southwest, almost into Arkansas.”

“Ozarks, then. Your beau is from the Ozarks, too?”

“He sure is.” Bertie felt herself relaxing. “We grew up in the same town along the James River.” How she wished for those times again. “We went to school together and were close friends for as long as either of us can remember.”

The doctor smiled. “Think you’ll get married once this war is over?”

Bertie felt herself flushing at the thought. She’d considered it a lot. In fact, the thought of marrying and settling with Red was one of the things that had gotten her through her homesickness, her worry, her fretting. Until now.

“My father wouldn’t mind,” she told the doctor. “Red comes from a good, solid family. Dad knows Red real well.” There were times Bertie had felt as if Dad preferred Red’s company to her own. “He’s already like a son to Dad.” She grimaced. “Why am I telling you all this? You don’t want to hear my life story.”

Dr. Cox chuckled. “Sure I do. It keeps your mind off what I’m doing, and when you’re relaxed, I can work better.”

“Do you see many more patients now that so many doctors are helping in the war?”

“I sure do. Two of the other doctors with offices in this building are on hospital ships somewhere in the Pacific.” He looked at her. “I love hearing stories from my patients, especially those involved in the war effort. Now,” he said, fixing her with a pointed stare, “you were telling me about Red?”

She smiled at him, relaxing further, enjoying the chance to talk about her favorite subject. “Before Red’s father died, the Meyers had two hundred acres of prime farmland along the James River. After her husband’s death, Mrs. Meyers sold off a parcel of land every couple of years to the town, which was expanding and needed more room.”

“To help get her family through the depression?” the doctor asked.

“Yes, even though Red warned her not to sell. He feels they could’ve gotten by without selling. It would’ve been worth more with the James River becoming part of a new lake, with a dam south of a tiny burg called Branson. That would’ve made her property lakefront. Now I guess it doesn’t matter, though, since they had to put the plans on hold for the dam when war struck.”

“Sounds as if Red is a smart man.”

“Yes, but he comes by it honest. Lilly, his mother, opened their big house to paying guests. She did so well with it she was able to help send her two older kids to university in Kansas City.”

“What about Red’s education?” Dr. Cox asked.

Bertie shrugged. “He didn’t go to college.”

“Why not?”

“He knew his mother needed help with the guesthouse. He loves working with livestock, and he’s won blue ribbons at the state fair for the cheese he cultured from their cows’ milk.”

“So he gave up his opportunity to go to college to help with the family business,” the doctor said. “He sounds like quite a man. It looks to me as if you and your young man are a perfect match.”

She shrugged, studying the neat work the doctor was doing on her hand.

Dr. Cox paused for a moment, frowning at her. “Am I detecting some hesitation about him?”

She shrugged. “We only started dating a few weeks before he went off to war.”

“Maybe it took the war to show him how much he cared about you.”

Then why had Red stopped writing now that the war with the Germans was over? “I know why everyone suddenly wants to see stardust,” she said. “Life’s too scary right now. When all this began, a body didn’t want to think he might go off to some strange land and die without ever knowing if someone besides his folks could love him. Later, when he comes back alive and whole, he might change his mind. He might find someone he likes better.”

Dr. Cox placed salve over the sutured wound, then gently wrapped gauze around her finger. “I like my theory better.”

Bertie looked into the doctor’s sincere gray eyes. “I hope you’re right.” But he didn’t know enough about Red to judge.

“There you go, Roberta,” he told her as he finished bandaging her finger. He gave her final instructions for sutures to be removed in ten days.

She thanked him and walked back out to the waiting room, where she found Connie, the company nurse, reading a magazine and chuckling at a “Joe and Willie” war cartoon.

Connie looked up at Bertie and grimaced at the bandage on her finger. “Guess you’ll be put on special duty.”

“No need,” Bertie said. “I’m right-handed.”