The Treasure Hunt Page 9

  Outside on the porch, Stormy began whimpering loudly. Lydia asked, “May I let him in? He’s afraid of thunder.”

  Mother looked at Father, who nodded. Just as Lydia opened the door, torrents of rain began to fall. Stormy slunk gratefully inside and lay down under the table. His body quivered.

  Father stood at the window. “Hail!” he said suddenly. Then Lydia heard it, rattling on the roof.

  “Those hailstones are the size of plums!” Joe shouted above the din.

  In minutes the yard was white with ice, and still the hail came down, and the thunder crashed. Mother moved closer to Lydia. She understood how an eleven-year-old girl felt at such a time.

  At last the noise subsided. Father said quietly, “The crops. They’re smashed.” His voice sounded hollow.

  Lydia went to the window. The devastation was hard to grasp. Where there had been beautiful fields of waving, golden wheat, there was nothing but acres of flattened, shredded stalks.

  “The LORD gave, and the LORD hath taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD,” Father quoted from Job.

  The kitchen was silent as the four of them continued staring out the window. The clouds had sped away, and already the sun was melting the drifts of hailstones.

  “How do you think Ben’s sugar beets look?” Joe asked finally.

  “Pitiful, I’m afraid. Unless the hailstorm missed his place,” Father replied.

  “I guess we’ll just have to pan for gold if we can’t grow crops,” Joe blurted out.

  Father stared at him. So did Mother. Father said sharply, “We didn’t come to Colorado to find gold.”

  Joe studied the toes of his boots. “But why not? What’s wrong with gold?”

  Father thought a while before replying. “The Bible says we are to make a living by the sweat of our brow. In other words—by working hard. I suppose panning for gold can be hard work too, but the Bible also says, ‘Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.’ ” He paused. “Faith in Jesus is the greatest treasure, Joe. If we seek for earthly treasure, I believe there’s a danger that we don’t leave enough room in our hearts for the greatest treasure of all.”

  Joe nodded. He gazed out across the glittering yard to the slashed wheat fields and thought to himself, The power of God. Nothing else could have done this. Suddenly Joe wanted a clear conscience before such an almighty God, and so he blurted out, “I-I’ve panned for gold.”

  “When?” asked Father quietly as though he wasn’t really surprised.

  “Last summer…and last fall. I quit in the winter. I knew you didn’t approve.”

  “Do you understand now why I don’t approve?” Father asked searchingly.

  “Yes, I think I do. But I…I only wanted to help, you know…because the crops failed and all.”

  “We appreciate that you wanted to help,” Father said softly. “And you do help. With your strong arms and willing heart.” He smiled at Joe, and Joe smiled back.

  That was the evening Lydia decided to set Bunny free. “I’m pretty sure his wing is healed,” she said as she carried the box out of the barn. Carefully she pried off the screen.

  At first Bunny didn’t understand what was happening. He had been in prison for so long that he hardly remembered his flying days. Then with a flutter of wings, he burst free and landed on the roof of the chicken coop.

  There he stayed for a minute, flexing his wings as if to make sure they were all right. Then he soared high into the sunset sky, winging westward toward Pikes Peak.

  “Come on, Bunny, sing!” Lydia shouted. “We want to hear a song from you. You never sang for us in the box.”

  It came floating down to Lydia and Joe—a series of crystal, trilling notes that went on and on as if the little songster could hardly stop!

  “He’s happy to be free,” Lydia said breathlessly, tipping back her head to watch the tiny speck in the sky.

  As for Joe, he thought he knew how that little bird felt.

  19

  The Hundred-Mile Trip

  Sam and Polly’s baby was born the week after the hailstorm. On the baby’s first day, Father took Mother to see little Manasseh. On the second day, Father hitched up the team again to take Lisbet to be Polly’s help for a few weeks. Much to Lydia’s delight, she was allowed to go along.

  As they turned onto the Peachys’ lane, Lisbet exclaimed, “There comes Barbara with the children.”

  “She’s just like me,” Lydia said with a chuckle. “She can’t wait to see her new nephew.”

  Abner and Noah were manfully tugging a little homemade wagon. On it sat one-year-old Hannah, chortling with glee as the wagon lurched over the rutted road.

  All of them arrived at Polly’s door together. From inside they heard Polly’s voice calling, “Come in.” She looked properly surprised to see so many family members at once. “We must be having a sisters’ gathering today,” she said.

  Lydia went shyly over to the rocking chair where her sister sat with the baby. Manasseh looked like a doll, only better because he was real! His tiny red face was all scrunched up, and in a moment he let out a lusty cry. Lydia nearly jumped. To think that such a small baby could make so much noise!

  Lisbet and Barbara took turns exclaiming over the baby and decided which grandpa he resembled. Then they all sat down for a visit while Barbara’s three children played in the yard.

  “On the way over here this morning, I felt almost like I was on the way to a funeral,” Barbara confessed. “Those fields—They are such a sorry sight. To think that by now they would have been filled with rows of stocks…”

  “It’s a scene of disaster,” agreed Polly. “Has Ben been talking about…about what he’ll do to make money since his sugar beets aren’t much good anymore?”

  Barbara nodded. “In fact, he’s made up his mind. He’s starting off tomorrow for Ordway.”

  “The other Amish settlement in Colorado? What will he do there?” Polly asked.

  “Haven’t you heard? They’re begging for seasonal workers over there. They have acres of melons, cantaloupes, and sugar beets ready to be harvested,” replied Barbara.

  “And they had no hail?” Lisbet asked.

  Barbara shook her head. “No hailstorm there.”

  “Well, with our new baby and all, Sam won’t be going far away for work. He went to town today to see about getting work at the lumberyard.”

  “Jake is going to work for a carpenter,” Lisbet told them.

  “Will it be hard for you if Ben goes so far away?” Polly asked Barbara. “Ordway is a hundred miles away.”

  “In a way it’s hard, yes, but I’ll probably end up going too. If he finds a place for us to stay, he’ll send for us, and I’ll help pick melons,” Barbara answered with a smile. “In this summer weather, even a tent would be good enough for us to live in.”

  “A tent!” cried Lisbet enviously. “I wish I could go too.”

  “Me too,” echoed Lydia.

  “Wait, Lisbet. I thought I’d hired you for my maid,” Polly protested.

  In the end Joe got to go to Ordway. This is how it happened. Less than a week after Ben had left, Barbara drove to her in-laws’ home. She was a fearless driver and had no problem hitching up two horses on her own.

  After Father helped Barbara tie up the team, she went to the house with the three children. “I received a letter from Ben. He said that there’s lots of work at Ordway, and he has a tent for us to live in. He even sent money for our train fare, but…we really can’t afford to spend that money. I’ve decided I’d like to drive over there.”

  “With your horses?” Mother asked in surprise.

  “I can’t see why not. It would be good to have our horses over there. However, I was thinking that it would be very nice to have a strong young man along for the trip. It would take us a couple days, you know.” Barbara locked eyes with fourteen-year-old Joe.

  A grin lit Joe’s face, and he instantly asked, “May I go, Father?”

  “I guess you could p
ick melons too,” Father said slowly.

  “But what would you and Mother and Lydia do with me and Lisbet both gone?” Joe asked.

  “I think we could manage. Don’t you think so, Mother?”

  Mother looked at Lydia. “You have been a good help in our garden. Maybe you can help Father with the chores too.”

  “Yes, I can,” Lydia said stoutly. In a way she felt envious of Joe, but then again she was glad to stay home with Father and Mother.

  On the very next morning, Barbara was back to pick up Joe and start off on their hundred-mile trip. “Why, she has a covered wagon!” exclaimed Lydia, staring out the window.

  Mother came to have a look. “Isn’t that something. She must have had a piece of canvas handy and used it to make a roof for their wagon. They’ll be glad for shade from the sun on their long trip.”

  “It might rain too,” Lydia pointed out.

  “It might, but you know how seldom it rains.”

  Joe came downstairs with his parcel of belongings.

  “Goodbye. Have a good summer,” chorused Mother and Lydia as he went out the door.

  “Goodbye!” he called back to them.

  They watched as he climbed onto the seat beside his sister-in-law. As she handed the reins to him, three excited children bounced around in the back of the wagon among the pots and pans and bedding.

  To Noah and Abner, riding in a covered wagon was fun—for the first three hours. After that Abner wondered if they were almost there. When his mother explained that it was going to take three days, he began to whimper. Noah complained that he was tired of sitting.

  By noon, even Joe was glad for a break. Finding a grassy spot beside the road, he allowed the horses to graze. Barbara spread a cold lunch on a piece of oilcloth, and they all ate hungrily.

  Noticing the children’s drooping eyelids, Barbara said, “We’d better start off again before they fall asleep. They can take their naps in the wagon.”

  Joe found his own head nodding a few times as the horses plodded along. The scenery was monotonous. The flat prairie stretched for miles in every direction.

  Barbara, Joe, and the three children made the long trip to Ordway.

  Suddenly Barbara said, “What’s that up ahead? Looks like a town.”

  Joe jerked erect, realizing guiltily that he had been dozing. That was no way to drive a team! He focused on the cluster of buildings on the horizon. “Those houses don’t look very good.”

  As they drew closer, they saw that all the buildings sagged in various stages of disrepair. Some roofs had caved in. The horses’ hoof beats sounded unnaturally loud as they clopped along between rows of forlorn, quiet buildings.

  “I don’t think anybody lives here,” Joe remarked. “The whole place is dead.”

  “This must be a real ghost town,” said Barbara.

  Noah’s head popped up suddenly behind them. “What’s a ghost?”

  “There’s no such thing,” his mother was quick to tell him. “Some people imagine they see ghosts, but there aren’t any.” Barbara gestured toward an old store with a crumbling false front. “Colorado has a lot of these ghost towns.”

  “They were built during the gold rush, I guess,” said Joe.

  “Yes, and when there was no more gold, the gold seekers quickly left town and moved on,” responded his sister-in-law.

  At the far edge of town, they passed the last old house with its rotten rafters and broken walls. “This is a picture of how it goes if we seek our happiness in the things of this world,” mused Barbara. “We might think that a nice home or lots of money will make us happy, but those things are like a ghost town. They don’t last. Lasting happiness comes from our faith in God.”

  Joe sat beside her and said nothing. Barbara had no idea what an impression her words made on him.

  20

  True Treasure

  When the evening shadows lengthened, Joe asked his sister-in-law if they were going to stop at a farm for the night.

  “That’s what I was thinking,” Barbara answered.

  “I would be fine sleeping in someone’s barn.”

  “Then let’s turn in at this farm,” Barbara suggested.

  Joe drove the horses in the lane and pulled them to a halt in front of the barn. A man appeared in the doorway. Joe’s heart sank when he saw the frown on his face.

  Still, Barbara managed to ask, “Could we please sleep in your barn tonight? I’m from Wild Horse, and I’m on my way to Ordway to meet my husband. This is my brother-in-law.”

  With every word she said, the man’s frown seemed to deepen. “We don’t allow Gypsies on our place.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry. We’ll leave,” Barbara said hastily.

  Joe bade the tired horses to start off again. He couldn’t resist saying over his shoulder to the man, “We aren’t Gypsies.”

  “Wait!” shouted a woman from the porch. Barbara and Joe turned to look in her direction and noticed her beautiful smile. “We have no spare bedroom, but you may sleep on our kitchen floor,” she said.

  Joe looked at Barbara. “Do I turn the horses around again?”

  “Of course. We need shelter.”

  Joe directed the horses in a circle, through the grain stubble, and back onto the driveway. The man seemed friendlier now and helped him unhitch. “Guess I misjudged you,” he said.

  Joe answered, “That’s all right. Maybe we do look like Gypsies. Can I help you with your chores?”

  “If you want to work, you can feed the pigs. I’m Dan, by the way.”

  “And I’m Joe.”

  So Joe and Barbara and the children spent the night, warm and dry and well fed. The next morning when they started off, the horses seemed refreshed. By nightfall, when they again found shelter with a friendly farm family, Barbara felt sure it would be their last night on the road.

  On the third day, the scenery changed. Orchards lined the roads, and straight irrigation ditches ran between fields of cantaloupes, melons, and sugar beets. “We’re almost there,” Barbara told the tired children.

  Noah scrambled to his feet and peered out from beneath the canvas. “Where’s Daddy?”

  “I’m not sure. We’ll find him.” Barbara scanned the dozens of workers bent over the rows of melons. There were many Amish men, but none looked familiar.

  “We’ll just keep on driving,” Barbara told Joe. “If we don’t find Ben soon, we’ll stop and ask.”

  They passed field after field. The little boys kept asking where their daddy was, and their mother kept assuring them that they’d find him.

  Suddenly a very surprised looking Ben appeared beside the wagon. “Well, what’s this? Did you drive all the way from home?”

  In one joyful bound, Noah catapulted out of the wagon and into his father’s arms. Abner stayed on board but begged to be held. Hannah also stretched out her arms to Daddy. Ben ended up sitting on the tailgate with all three on his lap.

  “Let me show you our tent,” he said when the children allowed him to put them down. “Bring the horses over here please, Joe.” He led them to a wide, grassy area where a number of tents were pitched. Numerous horses were staked out nearby.

  Ben scratched his head. “I’m afraid there’s no room in our tent for you, Joe. I didn’t know you were coming, but I’m sure glad you did.”

  “I can sleep in the wagon,” Joe offered.

  Ben helped Barbara build a campfire to cook supper, just as many of the other workers were doing. By the time darkness fell, everyone was too tired to do anything other than roll into a blanket and fall asleep.

  The next day, Joe started working in the fields with Ben. It was a new kind of work for him. Hour after hour he toiled with bent back, picking melons. Learning which ones were the ripest took a bit of practice. At first Joe couldn’t pick nearly as fast as Ben could, but with each passing day, he grew quicker.

  One morning Barbara said to Ben, “I need a few things at the store.”

  Ben looked at Joe, who sat on the grass fini
shing his breakfast. “Would you like to go to the general store in Ordway?”

  “Sure,” said Joe, always eager for something new. “Is there only one store?”

  “Just the one general store called Merkel’s. It’s right on the main street,” Ben told him. “Here’s some money and the list of things we need.”

  Walking down the town’s dusty main street, Joe found the store easily. It had a tall false front and a blue-and-white sign that said Merkel’s General Store.

  Immediately inside the door was the wood paneled checkout counter. Behind it stood a middle-aged man with silver rimmed glasses and a bald head. “Hello,” he said, smiling a welcome and stretching out his hand. “I don’t believe I’ve met you before. I’m Tillman Merkel.”

  Joe shook his hand. “I’m Joe Yoder from Wild Horse. I’m working in the melon fields with my brother Ben.”

  “Ah. I know Ben. How can I help you?”

  Joe showed him the list, and Mr. Merkel bustled off to get the items. Wandering down the aisle, Joe noticed another room at the back of the store. In it sat an old man with a purple blanket spread across his knees. He had a book and was reading aloud to himself.

  As Joe passed by, the old man looked up. Suddenly his wrinkled face broke into a smile. “Why, if it isn’t Joe Yoder!” he said with a voice that cracked.

  Confused, Joe stopped in his tracks. How does this stranger know me? Then he recognized the old man. He was not a stranger at all. “Willie!” he said, going into the room.

  “Didn’t you know me at first?” the old prospector said with a chuckle. “I probably look older than I did the last time you saw me.”

  Joe recognized Willie.

  “You were pretty sick the last time I saw you,” Joe said. “Are you— Is your last name Merkel?”

  “Yes, I’m Tillman’s oldest brother. Had I never told you my last name?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “What brings you way over here to Ordway?”