“Ah, Tommy! This is harder on me than you. Yes, to be sure! Somehow, it will work out. Precious little man! Don’t fret your heart, dear boy. We Edmonds have always survived. Besides, you’ll be able to visit me every weekend. Every Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, why you can come here! And we’ll read, rock on the porch, and do all those other things. And just watch! Come Sundays, you’ll be eager to rush back in town, even go to church, play ball, and show those teachers at school just how bright and smart you are. Now, I don’t want to hear another word. No more pouting or pitiful curling of the lips! No, sir! We Edmonds must be resolute and unwavering. Why, as resolute as the old Captain and as calm as Quilly! Now, run along! Time is of the essence and the bird is on the wing!”
She kissed my neck as I went outside to play.
The process of relocating to Abingdon was now immanent. I was asleep when my mother and Mr. Chappels arrived from their honeymoon, but the very next morning, Mr. Chappels hired a truck and several men to transport our clothes and any special furnishings my mother wanted, into town. She kept these to a minimum; however, she determined that our room at Quilly Hall should remain as intact as possible, and ready at a moment’s notice for us to use on weekends.
Reluctant to leave the only quarters I had ever known as home, I soon discovered that the move into Abingdon afforded numerous advantages. Marion’s house backed up to the Norfolk and Western rail line, and engines and coal cars, passenger trains and flatcars, box cars and cabooses rumbled along its tracks, night and day. A grove of cedars and a high fence, mantled in vines and honeysuckle, muffled the roar of the thundering trains that whistled along the steel rails, or that huffed heavily under the strain of a hundred coal cars trundling by. Marion helped me build a tree house, and from its “lofty heights and perilous deck,” as he dubbed it, I could sit and watch the trains pass. “Clank, clank, clank,” the wheels thumped along the tracks, as the cars rolled by. Where were the trains going? From whence had they come? Coal soot blackened the limbs of the cedars and sifted through the vines onto my perch. Tiny particles of grit and cinders accompanied billowing smoke.
There was an oil station one block down from our house. Trucks came and went, bearing loads of heating oil for half the town’s furnaces and indoor stoves. It served as a filling station as well, and one could buy soft drinks, candy, and ice cream bars inside. And farther down the street, began the first long storage sheds for the county’s tobacco harvest, which brought auctioneers and scores of buyers from miles and miles around. In the winter, especially, the mellow aroma of the tobacco barns permeated the air over the entire south end of town.
Marion’s property even boasted a barn. An elderly lady across the street kept her milk cow pinned in it and raised chickens and ducks in her own backyard. When she discovered my love for chores, she “hired” me to weed her garden, water her ducks, split kindling, and shoo stray dogs away. The dimes I earned from her purchased the coveted items I so desired at the filling station. No happier child skipped along our street. Still, I missed the farm, my grandmother, Pearl, her father, Earl, and Quilly Hall. I felt bereft without its porches, swings, elms and yard, springhouse, cabin, and, above all, the portrait of the old Captain and the serene German maiden on her pedestal.
From the earliest days of his marriage to my mother, “Marion,” as he encouraged me to call him, won my heart more and more each day. Large of frame, but physically fit, with a receding hair line and groomed goatee, his unaffected manner and genteel winsomeness made him a beacon of stability, amidst a family of sometimes emotional turbulence. He loved my mother, tolerated my Aunt Rachel, respected my grandmother, bonded with Uncle Everett, and devoted hours of attention to me. His death in 1952, at age fifty-seven, fell upon us with all the irony and bitter trappings of a Greek tragedy. While visiting the wards of the mental state hospital in Marion, a crazed kinsman of Olan Crawford’s family stabbed him with a piece of glass. It severed his jugular vein. He bled to death before anyone could attend to his wound. Hundreds of county residents and members of both the Virginia Senate and House of Delegates stood in the snow for his burial.
He taught me how to shoot birds on the wing, how to lead them and care for the dogs. He took me hiking and camping, fishing and canoeing, and taught me how to drive a car. The hunting we did with Uncle Everett, at both his and my grandmother’s farm. The camping, fishing and hiking were products of adventures around Whitetop Mountain and nearby Mt. Rogers. Its rocky ridges and alpine meadows proved no match for Marion’s steady stride and muscular frame. He carried the tent and food packs, while I panted and huffed to keep up, laden with my backpack of underwear, socks, and bedding.
We had not resided long in Abingdon before my seventh birthday came around. My grandmother insisted that she bake my favorite cake—devil’s food with white foamy icing—and we eat that the coming Sunday with her.
Uncle Everett attended, along with Pearl and Earl, and Uncle Jim and Aunt Viola. Uncle Jim appeared very feeble at the table and had to lie down after dinner. The couple had walked all that morning to my grandmother’s and had intended to walk back. “Absolutely not!” my grandmother squelched any such idea. “Everett, will your truck make the journey? The road is harder now. They can’t go back on foot! I forbid it!” she addressed her remonstrance to her brother and sister-in-law.
“I doubt it, Mama,” replied Uncle Everett. “But we can take them in the wagon. Marion, why don’t you and Tommy come with me?”
“Capitol! We’ll both enjoy it, won’t we, Tommy?”
Thus the decision was made.
We had not quite reached the ridge above the river, when Uncle Jim signaled for us to be silent. Uncle Everett slowed Sally and we sat still and listened. “Somethin’ or someone’s following us in the woods. Cain’t you hear it?” Uncle Jim said in a low voice.
Uncle Everett brought the wagon to a halt. In the stillness of that languorous afternoon, we sat motionless on the buckboard’s seats and strained our ears for the slightest noise or movement he must have heard. The hazy mist of drying leaves hung in the treetops above the narrow lane. “Shhhh! There it is again!” he whispered. The faint snap of a fallen branch caught our ears. The woods plunged into silence. Sally’s tail swished from side to side and the flesh on her hindquarters quivered. Then it happened. The shadows in the underbrush on the bank above us burst with a crackling sound. Out of the silent darkness lunged a huge opaque form. It landed on the opposite bank without making the faintest sound. Sally neighed and pawed the ground. The big cat hissed and bared its teeth. It’s eyes burned with yellow-green fire. It hissed a second time, turned slowly away, slipped into the bramble and vines, and disappeared.
“Damn!” Uncle Everett blurted. “He must be nine feet long!”
I looked about. Uncle Jim was smiling. “I knowed he was up here. He’s been spookin’ deer for weeks. Must have been waitin’ for us to come back from Ginny’s.”
Neither Uncle Everett nor Marion said a word, but Aunt Viola’s face twitched with worry. “We’d better get home, Jim,” she urged. “The livestock’s not pinned up and Lord only knows where the chickens are.”
“Was that a panther?” I asked.
“Yes,” Uncle Everett answered softly. “I’m afraid so.” He raised the reins and flicked them for Sally to move forward.
“I’m seven, now,” I ventured.
“I know,” he intoned. “I’ll keep my promise.”
Two Saturdays later, he came by the house in his pickup truck with his big hounds. Marion was attending a rally in Bristol and had left earlier that morning.
“Why did you ever promise such a ridiculous thing?”