Beneath the Apple Leaves(5)
“He’s seventeen now, not five!” Frederick bellowed from the bedroom. “Besides, he’s a good fighter, good as any of those boys. Brought in more last night than I made all week.” His last words came slightly drowned as he splashed water on his face. “We’re getting this boy to university one way or another.”
Carolien’s shoulders rose to her ears as if the words were a shriek. Andrew stayed quiet, remembered the slashed bill under the canister.
Frederick took his seat at the table, the black bristles of his mustache shining with the early washing. Morning was the only time they saw the man’s chiseled Dutch features uncovered from coal dust, even though the black stains of years underground still etched every crease in his face and knuckles and blackened his nails. Each breakfast Carolien fed a white, clean version of her husband, and by end of day she fed a blackened one.
Carolien picked up a small shipping box behind the stove, dropped it with disinterest on the table. “This was at the post for you.”
Frederick inspected the return address and handed the package to Andrew. “Think this is the one you wanted.”
Andrew put down his fork and started opening the cardboard. Inside was a worn copy of A System of Veterinary Medicine, the cover half-torn and the pages stained and bloated but the ink clear. “Where’d you get this?”
“Library in Harrisburg got flooded. Got it cheap, too,” chimed his father.
Carolien folded her apron and dabbed the oil spot that darkened in a circle. “Can’t get enough flour to last the month and you’re spending money on books.”
“Hush now! Making my food taste sour,” Frederick snapped. “Besides, like I said, got it for cheap. Hardly more than the post to ship it.”
Carolien ignored him and picked up Andrew’s creased and blackened boots, hand-me-downs from one of the boys who had died in the mine last year, decapitated by a dinky engine. She placed them near the stove to warm and swallowed. It was bad luck to argue before the sun was up. “I’m sorry,” she said quietly. She kissed her son, then her husband on the cheek. “You know how the cold aches my joints.”
The sun barely inched above the ridge when the men headed out. Andrew looked back at the small house, the weathered brown clapboard no different from that of the other homes lined side by side down the hill like stair steps. Next to the front door, three Sears, Roebuck shipping crates were stacked neatly. On hot evenings in the summer, they’d take dinner outside and sit upon the boxes, watch the sky as hues of pinks and orange waltzed and twirled with the gray, soot-filled air.
The coal miners appeared on the road, manifested from the mist of the pearly dawn. Those from eastern Europe strode with sleeves rolled above elbows, untouched by the cold, while the English, Dutch, Scots and Italians wore moth-eaten wool sweaters buttoned to their chins. And these men spoke little, just passed one another with a nod, their metal supper pails clanging against their thighs.
“Saw your light on late,” Andrew’s father noted to his son. “Not sure how you read with that eye bulging like it is.”
“Still have one good one, remember?” Andrew said casually. But truth be told, his eye ached in pulses as if a tiny mallet tapped endlessly upon his brow bone.
“Figured I’d find you stumbling in near morning, especially seeing that pretty girl hooked to your arm.” His father elbowed him, gave him a sly wink. “It’s the Houghton charm, my boy! No one woman can resist it.”
They crossed the center lane, the sides gutted from wagon wheels and remnants of water lashes from earlier storms. The line of telegraph poles stopped. The hole in the mountain, a mouth to the earth, its lips the wooden head frame over the shaft, beckoned ahead. Activity buzzed near the entrance to the coal mine, each miner grabbing his pick and shovel, his lantern and breath, as they hooked the mules to the shuttle cars and followed them into the pit.
His father stopped and motioned to the side for Andrew to follow. Frederick’s strong, fine face turned nearly impish as he dug into his pocket. “Was planning to give this to you at breakfast, but you know how your mother gets. Turns into a goose about all this talk.” He handed Andrew the folded papers, his lips twisting to hold his mirth, and finally blurted, “It’s an application. University of Pennsylvania.”
Andrew’s throat closed. He stared at the school’s seal at the head, the ache to leave the coal patches throbbing. “Even if I got in, we couldn’t afford it,” he said quietly, feeling the burn of this life again. He tried to hand the paper back, but his father refused.
“The money will be there.” Frederick showed his palms, rough and tight as stretched leather. “Long as these hands can work, we’ll get you there.” The man rubbed his wrist across his nostril and wiggled his shoulders against the emotion. “Just mail it, Son. Leave the rest to me.” He pulled down Andrew’s flat cap, slapped him on the back.
Andrew watched his father slip into line toward the shaft, adjust his carbide lamp and mining helmet. Frederick Houghton gave a wave to Andrew, glanced at the sun as if he wanted to kiss each ray before entering the pit and then walked into the darkness.
“Andrew!” Mr. Kijek hollered from the open-stalled barn, waving in frantic swats. The man’s cheeks bruised purple and he cradled his right rib. “Jesus Christ, stop starin’ outta space, ya idiot! Ya think I’m payin’ ya to look at that damn sun? Is that what you think, ya stupid ass?”