One True Love
Authors: Lori Copeland
Belles of Timber Creek
In loving memory of:
Carolyn Sue Smart, a beloved sister-in-law who went to be with the Lord on June 19, 2008. You fought a good fight, sweetie, and I know that today you're walking hand in hand with Dan, both in the presence of the Lord. Wait for me at the Gate.
Cheryl Sue (Buxton) Tapp, loving grandmother, mother, and wife who took her heavenly flight on July 14, 2008. You've left a legacy of love and caring to your grandchildren, daughters, and family. The Copelands are blessed by your daughter, Shelley, and our granddaughter, Audrey. Maws, you will be missed, but never forgotten.
Trust God from the bottom of your heart;
Don't try to figure out everything on your own.
Listen for God's voice in everything you doâ¦
Proverbs 3:5â6
(The Message)
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Copper Wilson erased the blackboard in the Beeder's Cove schoolhouse andâ¦
Gasping, Copper sat upright when cold water hit her face.
Hell hath no fury like a woman in pain. Thatâ¦
“Now what is this?” Adele's shrewd gaze focused on theâ¦
The wagon creaked over the rutted terrain. Copper lay onâ¦
So once again Copper turned a page in her Bookâ¦
The following noon, Copper gathered the children. Since time wasâ¦
Mid-morning, a Risher and Hall Stage Line galloped by theâ¦
The sun barely topped the rise as the women stoodâ¦
Heavy rain couldn't disguise the sound of bawling cattle andâ¦
“Sadie, you have to take me.” The sun wasn't upâ¦
Fourteen-month-old Carrie Snider had walked barefoot away from her wagon andâ¦
For some reason when the train pulled out the nextâ¦
Sadie had decided to ride with a family who hadâ¦
“I can't wait any longer.” Copper reached for the crutch.
The nightly fire burned low. Overhead, a quarter moon roseâ¦
A man or woman should have a proper burial. Thatâ¦
Clouds skittered across a cold moon. Anxiety settled over theâ¦
Josh Redlin's face, then Adele's studious expression. Then Josh again. Facesâ¦
“Ouch!”
Copper took the letter from Audrey and stuck it underâ¦
“Now Miss Wilson, I wouldn't read anything worrisome into this.
Copper's hands jerked when a gun went off just outside.
“Hot. How was Ellsworth?”
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opper Wilson erased the blackboard in the Beeder's Cove schoolhouse and imagined that she was wiping clean all the negative memories and consequences of the past few months of her life. Months that had been filled with more war and rain than she had ever imagined possible, and she was ready to leave both behind.
She heard the door open and turned to see Benjamin Fowler enter the room. Swiftly removing his hat, the school board member smiled. “Good morning, Miss Wilson.”
Copper returned the greeting. “And a beautiful morning it is.” Though not so welcome for her best friend, Willow Gray. Noon yesterday the bank had auctioned off her uncle's home, a place that had given Willow, Audrey, and Copper shelter after they had arrived from Timber Creek. Copper worked to put the worrisome sale aside and focus on the future, but Willow's quandary had been in the back of her mind since she opened her eyes that morning.
Mr. Fowler briskly rubbed his hands together. “I thought I would come by and check on the stove. Evenings are getting a mite frosty lately.”
“How thoughtful of you. I notice we have a sufficient stack of dry wood. Please extend my thanks to the person responsible.” Last week had been Copper's first on the job, and the adjustment had proven difficult. She had tried to start a fire after school one afternoon just to be sure the stove worked properly. The old relic had smoked, and the damp wood smoldered more than it had burned.
Finding dry wood had been difficult for the townspeople. Copper knew the children could wear their coats and mittens inside the classroom if necessary, but that was no way to start a school year. She suspected the old pipe might have gotten clogged over the summer, perhaps by some bird's nest-building activity.
Fowler nodded. “That would be Henry Franks. We didn't get the heavy rains that plagued Thunder Ridge, but we got enough to make most of our firewood wet.”
Wet. Mr. Fowler didn't know the meaning of the word. Copper's thoughts turned to all those weeks she'd spent in Thunder Ridge with her two best friends, Willow and Audrey; of standing puddles, drenched clothing, and leaky roofs she had dealt with in Judge Madison's old house. It had rained solidly for weeks. And yesterday, because of bank foreclosure, the old house had been auctioned off. Frankly, though it broke her heart to think of Willow losing her uncle's house, the loss might be more blessing than curse. Now that Willow had married Thunder Ridge's handsome sawmill owner, Tucker Gray, life might be easier for the young couple if they moved into his one-room cabin. Then when babies
started to arrive Tucker could add rooms with the help of his cousins, Eli and Caleb.
She limped to the stove sitting in the corner of the room, a large black atrocity that looked capable of warming Hades had it been in good repair. The way it had smoked last week caused her to wonder about the history of the potbellied monster. The top hinge on the door was crooked and seemed weak. The left front leg was missing and had been replaced by an uneven block of wood. The pipe had a definite slant to it because the stove had not been placed directly underneath the hole that went through the roof.
It seemed a little unsafe, and she had mentioned it to Mr. Fowler on her way to work this morning. Mr. Fowler focused on her limp. “Did you suffer an accident over the weekend?”
Copper glanced at the injured foot and shrugged. “Actually I injured the ankle a few weeks ago and it hasn't fully healed. These chilly mornings seem to aggravate the condition.”
“How'd you hurt it?”
“It's a long story.”
“I'm in no hurry.”
But she was. The children would arrive shortly. Yet he was her employer. “My friend Audrey and I were carrying ice one night to help break a friend's high fever. Willow had received a blow to the head that left her unconscious for days. She almost died.” Sadness washed over Copper when she thought how close she'd come to losing her best friend. “Those were dark times. We thought she might not survive the injury, but our prayers were answered.”
“I trust she's doing well now?”
“Very well.” She smiled. “She married Tucker Gray this past Saturday.”
“Ah yes. Tucker. Good man, as are his cousins, Eli and Caleb. We do business with the mill.” Thunder Ridge and Beeder's Cove were a short distance apart.
She bent to carefully place wood into the stove. “They are indeed fine men.”
Fowler took a step back and his gaze followed the stovepipe to where it jutted through the roof. “Better let me climb up there and take another look before we light a fire. The building sat empty since the war started, and someone was supposed to clean the flue, but it's very possible a bird or two has built a nest up there again. I'll go take a quick peek.”
She nodded. “Be careful.”
When the front door closed, she absently stacked dry branches around logs in the stove, thinking about all she had to do before the children arrived. Automatically she reached for a match. Then she remembered Mr. Fowler. He was on the roof, peering down the chimney. She tried to stomp out the small blaze but quickly withdrew her good foot. The tinder had a good hold. She glanced overhead, noting the sound of footsteps. By the time the wood ignited Fowler would be on his way down. In seconds the dry tinder blazed. Glancing at her timepiece locket, she quickly rose and hobbled to her desk. Children would be arriving soon and she had not yet registered their last test scores.
A dull ache settled around the rim of her shoe and she winced. The ankle was truly acting up today. Must be a coming change in weather.
Fowler opened the front door and stuck his head in, all
smiles. “I believe we're in business. The stove seems to be drawing fine.”
Copper glanced up from the recording ledger. “Thank you, Mr. Fowler. The room is starting to warm nicely.”
“Anything else I can do?”
“Can't think of anything. Thank you.”
“Sure am glad to have you, Miss Wilson. It's nice to have school open again.” With a tip of his hat, he closed the door.
Precisely at eight-thirty, Copper rang the large brass bell that hung on the outside wall above the small porch. The sound carried to the entire community, signaling that class was about to begin. She had thirteen pupils, ranging from six to fifteen years of age. The two youngest, Emily and Mackey, belonged to the Matthews family. Their grandfather was reportedly the wealthiest man around. The children wore clothes far superior to those of the others. Most of her little flock came from various parts of the district and were poor as church mice. She dropped the cord and took her stance at the front door.
“Good morning, Miss Wilson.”
“Good morning, Suzanne. Edward.”
And so it went as the children filed by swinging their dinner pails. Coats were hung on the pegs in the short hallway and dinner pails stored beneath the desks. By eight forty-five class was in session. The two youngest Matthewses sat in the front row, fidgeting.
“Today,” Copper began, “we're going to talk about American history and the Revolutionary War.”
She picked up her ruler. “Now. Warren Brown.” She knew full well the younger children needed to settle down before she addressed their study, but she had already noted that
Warren had a tendency to forget his homework assignments, and she thought he might improve if she made his lack of responsibility obvious to the other students. “One of the most famous quotations from the Revolutionary War period is, âI only regret that I have but one life to lose for my country.' The words, spoken as British authorities executed him for spying, were spoken by whom?”
Something in the stove made a loud
pop
, and in the silence it brought a startled sound from little Emily. Someone else giggled.
Copper glanced at the stove and then scowled at the giggler. Silence returned. “You have all heard sounds like that from a stove. Now settle down.
“Now, was the quote spoken by Benedict Arnold, Patrick Henry, Nathan Hale, or Paul Revere?”
She had just posed the question to Warren when a loud crash turned everyone's attention toward the front door. Before Copper could even form a thought concerning the cause of the racket, a large yellow tomcat streaked down the aisle toward her, followed by two large hound dogs, both barking at the tops of their lungs. Evidently the front door had been left slightly ajar and the cat dashed through. With typical canine enthusiasm the dogs had slammed into the door and continued the chase into the classroom.
The cat, openly desperate to find a perch above the yapping jaws, jumped onto the stove but immediately leaped back to the floor on the other side. Skidding to a halt, the lead dog slammed into the stove and knocked it off the block of wood. The stove tipped over, causing the door to fly open.
Reversing direction, the feline headed back toward the door. This time it jumped up and dug its claws into a jacket
hanging from a peg, and then climbed up onto a shelf running the length of the coatrack above the pegs.
The episode took only scant seconds and Copper hadn't had time to comprehend any of it when someone cried out, “The floor's on fire.”
She whirled to look and was immediately grabbed by an inexpressible terror. A schoolteacher's greatest fear is a burning schoolhouse with the children still inside, and this was exactly what she was facing. To make matters worse, the doorway out of the building was blocked by the warring animals.
Instinctively the children flocked to her, and without instruction they moved in a huddle to the side of the room opposite the stove. The pipe that had been dangling from the roof fell with a loud bang, and soot flew out to mix with the smoke. With incredible speed the fire expanded in a semi-circle along the floor.
A child started to cry, and then another joined in. Copper knelt down and wrapped her arms around the weeping ones. “It's going to be all right,” she cooed, hoping that she sounded more confident than she felt.
She scanned the windows on the clear side of the building with the idea of maybe escaping through one of them. “Harold,” she said to the fifteen-year-old, “try to open a window. Hurry.”
He tried the closest one, then another, and then a third. None would budge.
“Never mind,” she shouted. “See if you can do anything with that cat so the dogs will clear the doorway.”
Harold moved to the back of the room where the age-old battle between cat and canine was still in full progress.
When he got close to the nearest hound it turned and bared its teeth and growled at the boy. He hesitated and looked back at Copper, clearly undecided about what to do next.
“Grab the cat and put it out the door,” Copper yelled. “
Now!
”
Plunging into the fray, he reached up on the shelf and tried to snatch the cat. It immediately scratched him several times, and Copper had a fleeting thought that the tabby might jump on his head. He leaped back and glanced at Copper.
She assessed the fire's movement along the floor. It had almost reached the front-row seats and looked as if it might soon start to climb up the wall. Suddenly she had an idea. “Harold, put on some gloves and seize that cat.”
Harold took a pair of gloves from the nearest jacket, snatched the cat, ran over to the door, and threw it outside. The dogs nearly knocked him down as they rushed through the doorway.
By now smoke enveloped the room.
“Children, quickly, everybody outside.” Copper urged the traumatized children to hurry, without causing them to panic. It seemed an eternity before they reached the door and exited into the clear air.
“Keep moving. Don't stop. Get away from the building,” she shouted. When she felt they were safe she turned and looked back. By now smoke was boiling out of the front door. She counted the children. Ten, eleven, tweâ
Count again
. Ten, elevenâ¦A thought more horrific than death struck her. There were two children missing.
She turned to Harold. “Harold, count the children. How many are here?”
Confusion, then comprehension, flashed across the boy's face. He reached out and touched each head as he counted. “There are only eleven, Miss Copper.”
No, dear God. Please no. Please.
Whirling, Copper ran back up the steps onto the porch and through the door. The smoke was so thick she couldn't see more than two feet in front of her. Coughing, she raised an arm to her eyes as they began to water. As she moved past the hanging coats she stumbled over something. Reaching down, she encountered a handful of curly hair. She knelt and reached out to grab the child, and her hand hit another small neck. Both of them! They were huddled together on the floor. How had she reached the outside without them? Which two were they? It didn't matter! She had them both.
All three were coughing and gagging as she crawled toward the door, dragging the children with her.
Don't let go of either one of them
, flashed over and over in her mind.
You'll never find them again.
It seemed an eternity, but it was actually only minutes before they reached the porch. She tried to get the children to stand up and go down the steps ahead of her. As she started to take the first step down she fell against the railing and it collapsed. The last thing she remembered was a fiery pain shooting through her ankle into her leg and then the sensation of falling.