Authors: Peg Kehret
“I got them, Willie,” I said. “I got all your leg bones.”
I thought the least he could do was come to offer his congratulations.
Halfway up the hill between the cemetery and the river, I stopped to rest. The metal box was heavy, and
I wished I didn't have to carry it uphill and back. The hatchet and the shovel weren't light, either.
I took the box out of the backpack and fiddled with the brass lock, which held securely.
“What do you have?” Willie appeared, finally, and sat beside me.
“I found this buried in the grave with your leg,” I said. “Do you know what it is?”
“It ain't my leg coffin, that's certain. You'll need a file or a heavy pry bar to open that box without the key.”
“Your wooden coffin was rotted, but I think I found all your leg bones.”
“Could I see them?”
I laid the towel on the ground and carefully unwrapped the bones.
Willie touched the largest one, running a finger gently down the length of the bone.
“This was a fine leg,” he said. “All the years I walked on it I never gave it a thought, but I missed it sorely when it was gone. I didn't appreciate what I had until I lost it.”
I wrapped up the bones and put them in the backpack again. “Someone must have used your leg's grave as a hiding place,” I said as I slid the metal box in beside the towel.
“Who would bury something with my leg?” He sounded as puzzled as I felt.
I thought of the “five
W
's” I had learned in schoolâthe questions a news story should answer: Who? What? When? Where? Why? I knew where I'd found the box, but I didn't know who had buried it, what was in it, when it had been put in the grave, or why. Five questions, one answer.
I drank more of my water, then hiked the rest of the way to the river. The sun was high now, and when we emerged from the trees to the open riverbank, the rays beat down on my back. I could almost hear Mom's voice: “You need sunscreen on your face and arms.”
I always used to get annoyed at her nagging. Now I missed it. Nobody cared if I read past midnight or if I went to bed without brushing my teeth.
I wondered what she and Steven were doing today. Maybe this afternoon when Aunt Ethel and I got the mail there would be a letter for me.
I set the backpack beside Willie's grave and removed the hatchet. I raised and lowered my shoulders a few times, working out the kinks.
The hatchet cut through the rose branches, but it was slow work; the thorns grabbed my hands as I chopped. I wished I had asked Aunt Ethel for some
gloves. I tried pulling my sleeves down over my fingertips, but they didn't stay down.
After I cut off each branch, I used the hatchet as a hook to drag the branch to one side. By the time I got all the brambles off Willie's grave, my hands and wrists were covered with scratches. I wiped the blood on my pant legs and used my teeth to remove one especially large thorn from my thumb.
I picked up the spade and began to dig. The soil here was more sandy than at the cemetery, which made the digging easier.
As I worked, I thought about the metal box. Yesterday I'd told myself it was OK to dig up Willie's leg because I wasn't really taking anything from the grave; I was only moving the bones to a new location.
Now I
had
taken something. The metal box didn't belong there in the first place, but it wasn't Willie's, and it certainly wasn't mine. The excuse I'd practiced, in case I got caught, was “I didn't remove anything except Willie's bones.” I couldn't say that anymore.
I had believed that once I dug up the bones and got safely away from the cemetery without being seen, my worries were over. Now I wasn't so sure. I didn't think there was any way I could be linked to the removal of the box, but it made me uneasy all the same. I hoped whoever had buried the box wouldn't
discover it was gone until fall, when I was safely back in Minneapolis.
When I'd dug down about two feet, I paused to wipe the sweat from my forehead and to drink some more of my water. Puffy blisters had popped up on both of my palms. I eliminated grave digging from my list of possible future careers.
I wondered how deep I needed to go. I didn't want to dig until I found Willie's skeleton. I was getting used to freaky situations, but that would be too weird even for me. On the other hand, I didn't want to bury the leg so shallow that a dog or coyote would dig up the bones and run off with them.
Willie made the decision for me. He looked into the hole I'd dug and said, “You're deep enough.” I don't think he wanted to look at his skeleton, either.
I laid the towel at the edge of the hole, then unwrapped the bones. I lifted one long side of the towel and gently shook it until the bones slid down into the hole. I grabbed the spade and shoveled the dirt back in, quickly covering the bones.
When I had replaced all the dirt I'd removed, I used the hatchet to drag some of the rose brambles back on top of the grave. I heaped them all across the dirt so if anyone happened this way, it wouldn't be
obvious that someone had recently been digging here.
When I finished, I looked at Willie. He stood beside the pile of branches, smiling at me. “I've waited a long time for this,” he said.
“Do you want to say a prayer or something?” I asked.
He shook his head. “Sarah prayed for me the first time,” he said. “Nobody needs two funerals.”
“I guess we're done then.” I rolled up the towel, put it and the hatchet in my backpack, and slid my arms into the straps.
Willie still stood beside the grave. He removed his miner's hat, then laid it gently beside the pile of branches. I realized Willie wanted a marker for this spot, something permanent like the gravestones in the cemetery.
I thought of Florence's gravestone that said B
ELOVED DAUGHTER, SISTER, AND TEACHER
and wondered what Willie's ought to say. L
OVING HUSBAND AND FATHER
seemed appropriate, but I knew there would be no such marker.
I wished I had dug up the small
W.M.M.
plaque and brought it along to identify this grave. I didn't offer to do it now, though. I had dug up the bones and made it out of the cemetery without being seen; the
last thing I wanted to do was return to dig up Willie's marker. Especially now, after I'd taken the box from the grave.
After Willie laid his hat on the grave, he noticed me watching.
“Something to mark the spot,” he said.
“When you disappear, your hat does, too,” I said.
“Only if I'm wearing it. I can leave it here.”
“Won't you miss it?” I asked.
He rubbed one hand across the top of his head. “Yes, and I worry someone will take the hat, but it's all I have.”
I picked up the shovel and started to walk away, then turned back. “Keep your hat, Willie,” I said. “I'll remove the little gravestone with your initials on it, bring it here, and put it in the proper place.”
“You are the best friend this old coal miner ever had,” Willie said as he put the hat back on.
My arms ached, my back hurt, my legs were sore, and the blisters on my hands were oozing, but I felt good inside. After more than one hundred years, Willie's leg was finally reunited with his body.
T
he straps on the backpack chafed on the way downhill, but my good mood overcame any discomfort. I had done it!
Willie floated beside me, grinning at me all the way.
The sun hid behind gathering clouds. By the time we reached the cemetery, the wind had come up.
I collected the bucket, then headed up the railroad trail. By the time I got to the tree house, every muscle in my body ached. I looked forward to a hot shower and a cold lemonade, but first I wanted to try to pry open the box I'd found.
I didn't see Mrs. Stray or her kittens, but the cat food was gone. I refilled the dish, then climbed up the ladder and sat on the big pillow.
I removed the heavy metal box from my backpack and fiddled with the lock for a minute. It held fast.
Then I remembered the railroad spike in my backpack. I stuck the narrow end of the spike under the box lid, then pressed down as hard as I could on the spike's head. The edge of the metal lid bent slightly. I moved the spike half an inch and tried again. The metal bent there, too. I worked my way methodically along the edge of the box, prying the lid as much as I could.
Around and around the box I went. Each time I pressed on the spike, the box lid gave a tiny bit more. I shoved the spike in as far as I could and pressed with both hands until one side of the lid raised up far enough so I could peek inside.
I held the box up to the window so the light shined inside it. Then I peered into the box and gasped. The box contained money! I couldn't tell if there was a whole stack of paper money or merely a bill on top of something else. I also couldn't tell what denomination the money was. The opening I'd made wasn't wide enough for me to stick my fingers in and pull the money out.
In my excitement, I forgot all about my hunger and thirst and aching muscles. I focused on opening the metal box. I pried the edge of the lid a while longer, trying to loosen the hinges, but I couldn't open it farther. I needed sturdier tools. I'd gone as far as I could go with the old railroad spike.
I left the spade and hatchet outside the tree house, then carried the box to Aunt Ethel's house. Although I was curious about the contents, I was starving, and I needed a shower. I itched where the sweat had trickled down my neck.
I decided to eat first, get cleaned up, then take the box out to the barn, where all the tools were. I'd open it there and see how much money it contained. Maybe it's only play money, I thought. The box might have been buried by kids pretending to be pirates. There might be a pretend treasure map showing the cemetery, with a big
X
on the grave of Willie's leg.
Once I knew for sure what the box held, I would show it to Aunt Ethel. If it contained real money, she could call the police for me. It might be unjust, but a phone call from an adult would be taken more seriously than a call from a kid.
I had already concocted my story to explain how I found the box. I planned to say I went to the cemetery to plant some daisies on Aunt Florence's grave. After I got there, I decided to put a few on one of the other graves, too, so I chose one that looked neglected.
When I dug a hole for the flowers, I discovered the box. I didn't know what it was, but I knew it was too new to have been buried very long. It seemed suspicious,
so I brought it home. If it was supposed to be there, I'd take it right back.
The story sounded plausible. There was no reason for anyone not to believe it.
“I'm home!” I called as I set the box on the kitchen table.
The house was still. “Aunt Ethel?”
No answer.
I looked around the kitchen. A large pink bakery-type box sat on the counter next to a sheet cake frosted with white frosting. Yellow roses made of buttercream icing decorated the edges of the cake, but the center part, where it would say “Happy Birthday” or “Congratulations” or whatever it was supposed to say, was still blank. She had not finished the cake.
A tube of frosting with a pointed tip lay on the counter next to the cake. I squeezed the end of the tube, and a line of yellow frosting came out the tip onto my finger. I licked it off.
“Aunt Ethel?” I called again. “Are you here?”
I found her lying on the living room floor. Her eyes were closed, and her face was the color of fireplace ashes. I knelt beside her. “Aunt Ethel?”
She didn't answer.
She was unconscious, but I could tell she was breathing.
I grabbed the phone and called 911. “My aunt needs help,” I told the operator. I explained the situation and gave Aunt Ethel's name. “I don't know the street address,” I said, “but it's up the hill from Carbon City. It's the first driveway after you pass the cemetery.”
“We'll find it,” the operator said. “Help is on the way.”
Later I learned Carbon City has a volunteer fire department, and the medic unit consists of local people, most of whom had lived in the area all their lives. The only address they needed was “the Hodge place.”
By the time I hung up, Aunt Ethel had opened her eyes.
“Are you okay?” I asked. “What happened?”
“I tripped on the edge of the rug.”
“I called nine-one-one. There's an ambulance on the way.”
“Call them back and tell them not to come. I'll be fine.”
She sat up.
“Maybe we should let them come and check you, just to be sure.”
“No! They'll want to put me in the hospital. Help me stand up.”
When I tried to help her stand, she groaned and
sank back down to the floor. “I sprained my ankle,” she said. “Get me a package of peas from the freezer.”
I found the peas, thinking it appropriate that Aunt Ethel would use frozen vegetables for an ice pack. “Which ankle?” I asked.
She pointed to her left side, and I placed the frozen peas on that ankle.
Fifteen minutes after I made the call, an ambulance drove in Aunt Ethel's driveway. Two men carrying medical supplies hurried to the door.
“You can leave,” she called as I let them in. “I don't need help after all.”
“Since we're here, ma'am,” one of the medics said, “we're required to examine you.”
“Fleas and mosquitoes!” Aunt Ethel said. “All I did was sprain my ankle. I don't need doctors.”
Ignoring her protests, the medics listened to Aunt Ethel's heart, took her pulse and blood pressure, and examined the ankle under the bag of peas. One of them said, “I think that ankle's broken. You'll need to go to the hospital in Diamond Hill for an X-ray.”
“I'm not going. I hate hospitals.”
“If your ankle's broken, ma'am, you'll need to have a cast put on it.”