Читать книгу Christmas at Saddle Creek - Shelley Peterson - Страница 7
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ОглавлениеMerry Fields
… And forth they went together,
Through the rude wind’s loud lament
And the bitter weather.
Horse and girl walked on, heads bent against the fierce wind. Bird looked around. She hadn’t seen Cody since they’d left the farm. He’d been right behind them when they went through the gate. Cody? Where are you?
There was no answer.
Sunny, have you seen Cody?
No. I don’t feel his presence.
Bird began to worry. The small coyote had looked much frailer than before, and now he was somewhere out in this storm. Maybe Cody, the one who always helped others, needed help himself.
Cody? she messaged again. No reply.
Cody would show up, she told herself. He always does. She tried not to fret as she looked for familiar landmarks. Under normal conditions, Merry Fields should have been visible from there. In fact, Bird could’ve sworn it was almost across the road from the path they’d been on. But tonight, everything looked strange.
Bird! transmitted Sundancer. I can get across here.
Piles of withered leaves and sticks were scattered on the road, possibly from upended garbage cans. The horse stepped over the icy snow bank and used the discarded foliage as a path.
Good call, Sunny. We must be really close.
Are you kidding? We’re here.
What? Bird was surprised to recognize the white mailbox that stood at the end of the Piersons’ laneway. Merry Fields 19347 was painted on it in dark green.
I would’ve walked right past it!
Duh. That’s why you’re the passenger.
You think you’re so smart.
Smarter than you.
Aside from the mailbox, nothing else looked the same. The lane was totally obscured by ice-laden branches. The old willows on the front lawn bore no resemblance to their majestic past, and the birches at the side of the house had been demolished.
As they got closer, Bird saw a bigger problem.
The huge trembling aspen outside the kitchen door had split, and a big branch had come right through the roof of the porch. Another had fallen across the stairs.
Holy, she said. This looks bad.
Bird slid down from Sunny’s back and promptly slipped on the ice.
See? Not as easy as you think.
Very true. Ouch. Stay here while I check out the house. Don’t go far. I might need you.
You’re very welcome.
Sorry. Thank you, Sunny. You did great. Really.
The big gelding snorted and stamped his feet. His mane was completely encrusted with icy strings. It made a jingly noise as he shook his neck. I’ll be in the shed, out of the wind.
Okay.
Bird crouched over, prepared to break a fall as she slid one foot, then the other, across the ice to the farmhouse. She stepped over scattered branches and then climbed over the huge branch of the aspen to reach the door.
It was wide open. The house was very dark inside and just as cold as outdoors.
“Mrs. Pierson?” she called. She crossed the threshold cautiously and stood at the door frame. She called again, more loudly. “Mrs. Pierson? Are you here?”
Bird heard a weak cough from the corner, then another. She shuffled toward the noise with her arms outstretched, feeling her way. The floor was almost as slippery as the ice outside.
“Is that you, Bird?” croaked a thin voice.
Bird jumped out of her skin. “Mrs. Pierson? You scared me! Are you all right?”
“Not really, dear. I fell down. Can you find the flashlight for me, dear? It’s in the cupboard beside the coat closet in the hall.”
“Yes. I’ll get it.” Bird turned around and felt along the wall until she got to the hall. After a minute of uncertainty, she found a doorknob and opened what she hoped was the closet door. “Mrs. Pierson? Can you give me a clue? Which shelf?”
“I think it’s on the top shelf over on the right. If not, the second from the top.”
Bird reached up and felt around, unsure of what she was searching for, and at a great disadvantage in the dark. “Is it a big, square flashlight or …” Bird’s fumbling knocked things over and caused several objects to crash to the floor. “Sorry!”
“I think I heard it. Feel around on the ground.”
“Okay.” Bird got down on her knees and patted the floor until she felt a long, heavy cylinder with a large, round end. “Found it!”
She pressed a raised button. Light shone out in a steady beam, giving the room definition.
“This is great!” Bird exclaimed. She came back into the kitchen and took a good look.
“Oh, no. This is terrible.”
The kitchen door was knocked right off its hinges. Not only had the branch broken through the porch, but it had also crashed through the kitchen wall.
The temperature was frigid inside the room, and sleet was blowing in through the opening and all across the floor. That’s what’s making it so slippery, Bird thought. And there was no way to keep out the elements. She quickly closed the hall door behind her in an effort to keep the cold from spreading throughout the rest of the house, realizing it was already too late.
The worst sight of all was when the flashlight lit up Laura Pierson. She was lying on the floor, shivering in her nightgown and slippers, looking very small and cold and dishevelled. Her back was hunched against the wall, her bare, blue-veined legs were out straight, and one ankle was quite swollen. Her old face was pale, her puffy white hair was askew, and her glasses had smashed on the floor beside her, leaving her small blue eyes squinting and blinking against the light. A trickle of blood seeped from the bridge of her nose. Her forehead was bruised.
“What happened?” asked Bird. “How long have you been sitting here? And where do you hurt?”
“Can you get me that blanket, dear? The one on the chair?”
Bird took the plaid wool throw off the back of the armchair next to the fireplace and gently wrapped it around the old lady’s shoulders, then grabbed another blanket from the couch and put it over her legs.
“Be careful of my ankle, dear. I’m feeling rather vulnerable.”
Bird nodded. “You can’t stay here in the cold. I’ll call 911.”
“Yes. Please do that, dear. I need some water.”
Bird stood up, pulled her cell from her pocket, and punched in the three numbers. She placed the flashlight end-up on the floor to illuminate the entire room. As she waited for an operator to answer, she brought over a glass of water from the sink.
Mrs. Pierson drank it down and motioned for Bird to refill it.
Bird filled the glass again at the sink. The water pressure was lessening. Bird knew that pumps don’t work without power, and once the previously pumped water was gone, there’d be no more until the power came back on.
She gave the water to Mrs. Pierson and waited while she drained the glass, then refilled it. Good thing Cody had come to get her when he did.
Again, Bird wondered if the coyote was okay.
The call went to a recorded message, asking Bird to be patient because of an extraordinary number of emergency calls, and informing her that her call would be answered in sequence. She was asked to press one for police, two for fire, and three for an ambulance. Bird pressed three. Another recorded message asked that she be patient because of an extraordinary number of emergency calls, and informed her that her call would be answered in sequence.
Bird willed herself to stay calm. How can I be patient at a time like this? she wondered.
She thought about hanging up and calling Paul and Hannah. But the roads were impassable. They couldn’t come to help, and she’d only make them worry. They’d wake up and not get back to sleep, and for nothing.
Holding her cellphone to her ear, she checked out the oddly tilted kitchen door. She made an effort to get it closed but had no luck. The weight of the tree on the door frame was enormous.
How could she stop the continuous flow of cold air and sleet? The pipes would freeze. Bird opened the old wooden trunk next to the armchair and found a thick grey army blanket.
“Can I nail this up, Mrs. Pierson?”
The old woman nodded feebly. She was losing energy.
Bird was still on hold. She put her phone on speaker and set it on the table while she found some nails and a hammer in the hall closet, then tacked up the blanket. She put a pile of books on the blanket edge, which kept it from flapping in the wind. With the wind blocked, suddenly there was quiet. It was a bigger relief than Bird expected.
Mrs. Pierson was asleep. Bird hoped that she hadn’t fainted.
Finally, a male operator answered. “This is 911. What is your emergency?”
Bird scrambled for the phone and said, “My name is Alberta Simms. I’m at the farm of Laura Pierson at 19347 Third Line, Caledon. I’m her neighbour. She’s in her nineties. She’s hurt and needs help.”
There was a pause. “The third line of Caledon, north of the Grange, is completely blocked at this time. The hydro lines are down. No emergency vehicles are able to pass, and they will not be able to reach you until the hydro crews clear the roads of danger. What is the nature of her injury?”
Bird assessed Mrs. Pierson. She looked terrible, even worse than before. “A tree fell on her house. She’s lying on the floor, and she’s either asleep or unconscious. There’s a bump growing on her forehead. Her right ankle is twice as big as her left.”
The man asked, “Can you make her comfortable?”
Bird grimaced. “I’m not sure. She’s in a lot of pain.”
“Raise her injured ankle so it rests above her heart, keep her hydrated, and if there’s Tylenol, give her three tablets. Do not give her Aspirin because it’s a blood thinner. And try to keep her body warm any way you can.”
“Okay. How soon do you think somebody will come? The house is freezing, and she’s really old.”
“An ambulance will arrive at the earliest possible time, but it might be several hours. I’ve put in a request. That’s all I can do. Please continue to do what you can for her, and we will get to her as soon as possible.”
“I’ll do my best. Thank you.”
“Can I reach you at this number?”
“Yes.”
“Good. We’ll call with an update as soon as we can.”
“Okay. I hope it’s soon.”
“Good luck, Bertha.”
Bird pressed “end,” suddenly very unsure of what to do. Would Mrs. Pierson be okay for several hours? She understood their problem with the hydro lines down, but could the old woman survive this cold and the pain in her ankle, and maybe a concussion, for much longer?
The way Bird saw it, Mrs. Pierson likely slipped on the icy floor when she got out of bed to investigate the crash in her kitchen. Bird calculated how long she’d been lying there. Cody had woken Bird just before midnight. It would’ve taken Cody at least twenty minutes to get from Merry Fields to Saddle Creek Farm, so he left to get help around 11:30 p.m. Bird’s cellphone read 1:36 a.m., so Mrs. Pierson had been sitting on the floor for at least a couple of hours, plus however long she’d been there before Cody noticed. How much longer could they wait?
Bird knelt at the woman’s side. “Mrs. Pierson?”
She didn’t respond. Bird gently shook her shoulder.
Laura Pierson groaned quietly and let out a tiny cough, like the one Bird heard when she first entered the house.
Bird stood up. She made her decision. Mrs. Pierson could not wait until the hydro lines had been cleared. She needed to come home to Saddle Creek now, and Bird had a plan.
She picked up the flashlight, walked to the washroom, and looked behind the sink mirror and in all the drawers for the drugs that the man had prescribed. None. Bird ran upstairs and checked the bedroom and cupboards. Finally, she found a bottle of Tylenol. It had expired six years ago, but Bird deemed it would be better than nothing.
She came downstairs, was able to fill the water glass one more time, and urged Mrs. Pierson to take the pills, which was very difficult for her because while she could briefly open her eyes, she was still not anywhere near alert. Instead of three tablets, Bird gave her four. Whatever strength they had left, Mrs. Pierson would need.
Bird? Are you in there? What’s taking so long? Her horse stretched his neck and pushed the blanket over the door with his nose, causing it to come away from one of the nails.
Sunny! I was just coming to get you.
Can we go home? I want to go back to my stall.
Yes, we can, but we’re taking Mrs. Pierson with us.
That’s crazy. She’s too old to learn to ride.
We’re going to pull her in a sled.
We’re going to pull her? Or I’m going to pull her?
You’re going to pull her.
What’s in it for me?
You go home to your stall.
Done.
First, I need to find a sled.
What’s that?
A flat piece of wood that people slide down hills on.
Hey! There’s one in the shed, where I’ve been waiting forever and ever.
Great! Are there ropes in there, too?
There are metal ropes.
Chains? I’ll go look.
Bird took another look at Mrs. Pierson. A large bruise was forming on the bump that was growing on her forehead. Bird noted how transparent skin gets as people age, and she worried again about a concussion. She hurried outside with the flashlight.
She was relieved to find that the wind had died down, which made the night feel warmer, and the icy rain had stopped. Thankfully, the moon was beginning to show through the cloud cover. With much better visibility, things boded well for the trip back to Saddle Creek. At least there was some good news in the pile of bad.
Bird followed Sunny to the shed beside the house. A fresh pile of manure indicated where her horse had sheltered.
Just as Sunny had said, an old wooden toboggan was hanging on the far wall. The front was curled up so it could slide through snow, and the end had a back support so kids wouldn’t fall off. There were green cushions nailed on, and it was long enough for several children to go for a ride down a hill. Long enough to pull Mrs. Pierson to Saddle Creek. It looked homemade. Bird felt sure that Mr. Pierson had built it, and he’d be glad for it to be used to get his wife to safety. Mrs. Pierson had been the treasure of his life.
She lifted it off the wall and set it on the ground.
The chains that Sunny had mentioned were meant to pull trucks out of ditches and far too heavy for this job. She shone the light over the walls and along the shelves. Just when she was about to concede defeat, she noticed a blue plastic container behind some water barrels. She lifted the lid to find coils of rope covered with grease, probably from some machine. They would do perfectly.
Bird threw the ropes on the sled and pulled it over the branches and into the kitchen. After briefly thinking about the best way Mrs. Pierson should travel, she decided that feet first might be easier. She took some cushions off the couch and laid them on the sled. She put two throw pillows at the back for Mrs. Pierson’s head and neck, and a third pillow at the front for the swollen ankle to be raised.
Now she uncoiled the soiled ropes and figured out how to fit them on Sundancer so he could pull the sled. With kitchen shears from a drawer, she cut a length to be used around his rib cage, just behind his front legs. She cut another to hang around his neck, and another to form loops to run the rope through, which would attach to the sled.
Mrs. Pierson groaned. Bird glanced at her and noticed that her skin had turned almost blue. There was no time to waste. Bird ducked under the hanging blanket and, once outside, fastened the ropes onto Sunny like a harness.
These ropes stink.
They’re the only ones we have. And they’re on top of your blanket so they mostly don’t touch you.
The horse snorted and pawed the ground. Hurry up, then.
She fed another, longer rope through the loop on his left side, across his chest, supported by the loose rope around his neck so it wouldn’t slip down over his front legs, and back again through the loop on his right. Both ends of that rope would fasten the sled to the horse. She studied her work and was satisfied.
This rope on my chest? It’s going to rub the fur right off my shoulders.
Through your blanket?
Yes, through my blanket. Too much pressure on one spot.
If you insist. Bird dashed back to the kitchen and grabbed two dishtowels. She wrapped them around the sections of rope that came into contact with the gelding’s shoulders. Better?
Maybe.
Okay, I’m going to get Mrs. Pierson on the sled. Don’t move, or these ropes will get all tangled up in your legs.
This is not how I imagined spending Christmas.
Dream of all the bran mash you can eat.
Promise?
Promise. I couldn’t do this without you. She patted her horse’s nose. Really.
Sunny put his head against her chest. He was pleased.
Bird ducked back under the blanket over the door, into the kitchen. She pulled the sled as close to the woman as she could get. “Mrs. Pierson, can you help me?”
The old woman opened one eye and blinked. She coughed again and began to shiver. “Bird? What are you doing here? Where am I?”
“You’re lying on your kitchen floor, and you’ve been hurt. We have to get to Saddle Creek. You’ll freeze if you stay here. Your ankle is swollen, and you might have bonked your head.”
“I did, dear. I did bonk my head. It hurts,” she said weakly.
“I’m so sorry.”
“It’s not your fault, dear.”
Bird was touched that, even in pain, Mrs. Pierson was considerate of her feelings. “Can you slide your body over a little, onto the sled?”
“I’m very cold, dear. Can you bring me another blanket?”
“Yes, I’ll wrap you right up.” Bird ran to the hall closet, and she found a long, down-filled red coat, a padded hat with earflaps, big plaid mittens, and some old fleece-lined boots that had belonged to Mr. Pierson. Mrs. Pierson hadn’t had the heart to throw his stuff out, thought Bird. And a good thing, too.
Mrs. Pierson was as helpful as possible as Bird dressed her. She tried not to whimper when the big boot was pulled over her ankle, but cried out in pain when Bird began to move her onto the sled.
“Ooooh. Sorry, dear! Owwww. Oh, sorry. Ahhhhhh!”
“You’re doing great, Mrs. Pierson. Just a couple more inches, and you’re on. Great! Good work!”
“Oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh!”
“You did it!”
Mrs. Pierson was now on the sled. Bird poured the last of the water from her glass into a thermos and put it at her feet, along with the flashlight, and then checked the cushions to make sure that her precious patient would be as comfortable as possible.
Bird saw a problem. Mrs. Pierson could roll off. Not good. She cut a long length of rope and wound it tightly twice around the entire circumference of the sled. She used the curl on the front and the backrest on the rear to secure it, successfully fashioning a railing made of rope. It would have to do.
Ah, Bird?
I didn’t forget you, Sunny. We’re ready to go. Can you back up to the porch?
Righto.
He backed up as close as he could get, straddling the thick branch of the fallen tree.
Bird pulled down the grey army blanket that had been covering the door, and she carefully wrapped it around Mrs. Pierson. She took the ropes that she’d threaded through Sunny’s makeshift harness and tied them through the front curl of the sled, then double-knotted them on the ropes that formed the railing.
Let’s go home, Sunny.
Music to my ears.