Jubilee's Journey (The Wyattsville Series) (2 page)

Anita was the exact opposite.  She frowned for the entire two hours they lingered over sodas, and on three different occasions tapped her finger against the face of her wristwatch indicating it was time to go. The glares she gave Bartholomew were so icy they froze in midair. 

When Bartholomew asked Ruth if she’d like to go to dinner the next evening, Anita spoke up.

“I’ll not hear of it!” she snapped. “The Walker girls are not the type to date total strangers!”

“Oh, Anita,” Ruth said with a laugh. “Don’t be such a fuddy-duddy. Bartholomew’s not a stranger.  Why, we’ve spent the entire day with him.” She turned to Bartholomew and told him she would be delighted to join him for dinner. From that day on they were inseparable. Two months later, on the day Bartholomew was discharged from the Navy, they were married. Anita, who was Ruth’s maid of honor, never once cracked a smile.

Bartholomew got a job making twenty-eight dollars a week at a warehouse where he and thirty-seven other fellows crated replacement parts for tractors. Confident that good times were here to stay, he and Ruth moved into a two-room walk-up and bought a used bedroom set and a brand new radio.

Nine months later the warehouse closed its doors without paying the men their final week’s wages.

“Don’t worry,” Bartholomew told Ruth. “I’ll get a job. A week, two at the most.”

But other than strength and a willing heart, he had no skills. A month passed, and he found nothing. First they sold the radio; then the bedroom set. After that they moved to a furnished room so small Ruth had to walk sideways to climb onto her side of the bed.

For three months Bartholomew looked for a job. He left the room early in the morning and returned long after dark. He went from door to door asking for work. “I’ll do anything,” he said, “wash dishes, mop the floor, scrub toilets.” But he always got the same answer. “Nothing right now, try again next week.” At night he’d drag himself home, ashamed of returning empty-handed but so weary he could barely manage to slide one foot in front of the other.

Ruth stretched what little money they had and made every penny count. She ate the tiniest scraps of food and used a single tea bag for a week, leaving it to soak in the hot water just seconds before pulling it out and setting it aside for the next day. There were no more movies, no dinners at restaurants, no ice cream sodas. Many nights they shared a half can of Campbell’s soup. Ruth would eat two or three spoonfuls, then suggest Bartholomew finish the bowl. By that time she had begun to look pale and hollow-eyed. Several mornings in a row she could not hold down even the weak tea she’d brewed. But when Bartholomew asked what was wrong, she simply smiled and shrugged it off.

When he finally insisted, Ruth told him she was carrying a child. That’s when Bartholomew made the fateful decision—the decision he swore he’d never make. It was the one place where he knew he could find work. The same work his daddy and granddaddy had done.

They packed one small bag and walked to the railroad station. Using their last three dollars, Bartholomew bought two tickets to Coal Fork, West Virginia.

That spring Ruth gave birth to a baby boy, and they named him Paul.

“He’ll grow to be a man of wisdom,” Bartholomew said. “As soon as he’s old enough to speak I’ll teach him what he needs to know so that one day he’ll leave this mountain and never look back.” 

Before the boy was three Bartholomew’s hands had become blackened and his soul weary, so it fell to Ruth to teach the boy and she did.

The second year Ruth planted a garden behind the house. She grew corn, tomatoes, string beans, and summer squash. When the bounty was harvested, she planted turnips and potatoes. She planted more than they could eat in a summer, and when there was plenty she cooked the extra and packed it in mason jars sealed with a layer of wax. She continued to do it year after year, so Paul grew healthy and strong. She nourished the child’s body with the food she’d grown and his mind with words and stories from the books she loved. 

Then the summer Paul turned nine, Ruth again grew pale and queasy. Most mornings she’d turn away from the strong coffee sitting atop the stove and drink only a cup of weak tea. Even then, she’d start to gag moments after the second swallow. 

“Do you think possibly…?”  Bartholomew glanced at her stomach.

“After all these years, I doubt it,” Ruth answered laughingly. But by November she knew for certain. By then her breasts were swollen and tender. She could not stand the smell of tomatoes, and even the briefest glance of raw meat made her retch. In late December Ruth felt the baby move for the first time. It was different from the way Paul had moved. He’d shifted himself slowly from side to side in movements that were barely perceptible. This baby kicked at Ruth’s ribs as if it were anxious to be free.

“This one is certain to be another boy,” Ruth said, laughing, “and a feisty one at that.”

Pleased with such an idea, Bartholomew began thinking of what he would call the boy.

Bartholomew trusted that choosing a name from the Bible brought special blessings, so each night he sat in the rocking chair and turned page after page looking for the right name. With Paul he had wished for only wisdom, but that was before he spent nine long years hacking bits of coal from the hardened walls of the mine. Nine days later Bartholomew settled on the name Jeremiah. This boy would be named after a man who could look to the future and be wise in the ways of the world. Surely he would be a child not destined to spend his days in the mine as Bartholomew did. 

“Such a big name for a little baby,” Ruth said, but since it was Bartholomew’s will she accepted it. That winter Ruth bought several yards of bunting at the company store and hemmed it into four soft baby blankets. In the center of each one, she embroidered a large “J”.

In February, two days after a blizzard passed through West Virginia and left the mountain covered in snow so deep the mine closed down, Ruth’s labor pains began. For almost forty hours she was wracked with pain, and by the time the baby passed through the birth canal her eyes had rolled to the back of her head.

“No!” Bartholomew screamed and lifted her into his arms. “Please, Ruth, please don’t leave me.” He held her for hours as little Paul wiped the baby clean, wrapped her in a warm blanket, and placed her in the same cradle they’d used for him.

Just before dawn, Ruth’s eyelids fluttered open and she asked, “Jeremiah—is he okay?”

For the first time in many hours Bartholomew smiled. “Your prediction was wrong. Jeremiah is a girl.” He placed the baby in Ruth’s arms and sat beside them. “I think maybe we’d best come up with a new name.”

Ruth looked up at her husband. He was so strong and yet so gentle. He was a man who asked for little and gave much. She thought back on how this baby had kicked, how she’d struggled to be free. Paul was like Bartholomew, strong but gentle. This child was stronger. She had a lust for life and a fierce determination to live it. She’d waved her tiny arms and legs and celebrated life even before the time had come. The words Ruth spoke were her gift to Bartholomew.

“We’ll name her Jubilee,” she said, “because this child is a celebration of our love.”

Bartholomew smiled and nodded his approval.

And so it was.

Cruel Winter

T
hey called the child Jubie for short. Right from the start she was small, undersized even for a girl. Whereas Paul had been a content child who slept for hours after being nursed, Jubilee was a red-faced, squalling bundle of energy who cried through the night and slept during the day.

Before she was a year old, Ruth could see the girl was the spitting image of Anita.