Seeking Morels | Chapter Nine (complete)

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Previously: Jonah discovers Reinhardt did not get the belt the day prior and kicks him down in his fury. During Noah’s absence, the possibility of moving comes out and enrages Jonah further.

JONAH flung the door of the old shop office open. The photo of Grandad and his Wood-Mizer fell off the wall without shattering—since the glass was already broken out. He glared at it; he glared around the room. It was tidy. He pounded his fist against the bookshelf.

“Where are you, Granddad!? Where have you gone? Why did you go?” He yelled at the line of journals and shoved them into the back of the shelf. Then he threw the desk chair to the floor, and with the last flare of anger, he turned the entire desk over.

The heavy oak desk made a thunderous crash into the cement floor. The top drawer bounced up spilling pencils, pliers, papers, screwdrivers, and scissors. A side panel split off the frame revealing the internal empty space behind the drawers. In the dead space a book was caught.

Angry tears clung to Jonah’s eyes blurring his vision as he stared. But the book held his attention. He rubbed the tears away with the back of his hand. Slowly he crouched down by the book, slower still he reached out, and pulled it from the dead space. He had held many others like it. He turned the binding to face him; on its hard blue surface, etched in gold, was the number ’86. Clutching the book to his chest, he collapsed onto the couch.

He flipped to the final entry which came early on within the pages; a quick thumb through revealed all the rest after to be blank. The entry was simply the date: “May 6, 1986 and a list: “Lantern, matches, pick-adze, rope, canteen, shovel, compass, watch, pack—jerky, jacket, &c.”

Jonah flipped to the preceding entry: “May 4, 1986. Great pie, God bless her. We did have to hold the picnic in the church basement though. Lots of talk about that—rain in torrents. Everyone’s chomping at the bit to get crops in. Pastor John’s sermon from Matthew (treasure in field). Must confess made me think of the spot in the woods the whole sermon. Dark and rainy all day—perhaps in a day or two if the rain subsides.”

And the previous entry: “May 3, 1986. Three inches of rain. Marilla baking all day in summer kitchen. Went walking during a lull in the rain. Due E. of sinkhole, all the way to the woods Eastern quarter where the shift in elevation is so sudden and sharp, I saw a small amount of water trickling out of the “seam” between the flat land and the shift. Above the higher ground, I saw the top of a fallen oak. It must have fallen this winter, but being so dense—and steep—I couldn’t get up to the oak. I took a wide berth northward around the area and came out of the woods on the eastern side, then following the edge south, I discovered an opening into the dense thicket. I’ve never trekked this spot of the woods before.

“At the fallen oak, I discovered a large stash of morels making this spot a gem in the rough… When the going gets tough there’s the gem in the rough! Head to the east, and find these sneaky little beasts! Anyways, happy with my discovery of the morels, I was about to leave when something caught my eye.

“At the base of the fallen oak, where the enormous root bulb had ripped the earth, I noticed the lack of water pooling—absolutely no water filling the crater. The falling of the tree also appeared to have shifted some rather large rocks. The whole spot appeared to be one big drain. I suppose the water trickling out of that seam below is fed from here. The rain picked up again, and little streams flowed into the divot disappearing between the rocks. It began coming down in torrents as soon as I reached the Quonset.”

At the end of the entry, there was a sketch of the wooded area.

The prior journal entry: April 30, 1986 had a brief timetable of planting dates, weather conditions, and forecast.

“Holy crap, Granddad, what did you find?” Jonah said aloud to himself. He re-read the entries once more, this time chronologically.

Jonah closed the journal. He pulled his to-do list from his pocket, and fetching a pencil from the floor, he wrote: Backpack, canteen, lantern, flashlight, rope. He re-opened Granddad’s journal and drew his finger down the page. On his scrap he finished: “Matches, compass, watch.” He circled the word “watch” and chewed on the end of his pencil. “Don’t have one of those,” he muttered, “and what’s a pick-adze?” He looked to where they had organized the tools from the day before. “There’s a pick-axe…” Jonah’s face, red from crying, smiled a little. “Adze,” he said the word slowly. “I always thought he was saying axe.” Jonah touched the handle of the tool: one end had a pick and the other end had a horizontal blade designed for digging and hoeing.

He tucked the list in the front pocket of his flannel and set Journal ’86 on the shelf. His hand hesitated on the book. “I’ll be back,” he said to the journal.

Jonah returned to the farmyard. A racing heart and shaky hands ailed him, and though anxious, he was careful to tend to the animals without mishap. While going from barn to shed, he looked for the items on his list. All he found was a coil of rope which he stashed just inside the farrowing barn door. Jonah frowned and reassessed the list. He looked to the house, swallowed, and straightened up.

“Sorry, Mom, for my attitude.”

“I forgive you.” Eleanor stood still, staring at him. Her silence forced him to continue.

“Where is Reinhardt?”

“He’s in the basement. I was just going down there myself. I’ll join you.” Eleanor went first. They descended the old creaky basement steps. There was a deep freezer in the basement that Eleanor went to in view of where the logs were being stacked. She watched Jonah closely.

Reinhardt looked up from where he stacked the logs.

“I really am sorry for earlier, Reinhardt. It’s just… it shocked me in the moment, and seemed unfair. But either way, I got over it.”

“I forgive you, and I don’t know why Dad gave you the belt but not me.”

“Let’s just forget about it. Okay?”

Reinhardt nodded. “Look, I got most of this stacked.” He pointed to the logs and offered a smile.

“Thanks, good job.”

Mom went back upstairs empty handed, and together the boys finished the stacking.

“Hey, listen,” Jonah said, dusting his hands off on his pant legs, “we’ve pretty much finished our chores. I think we have time to look for morels again, and maybe do a little exploring in the woods.”

“Okay. Is the list really done?”

“Pretty much, there are a few things that need gathered up, and taken to the Quonset, but we can do that on the way.”

“Okay, I’m down.”

Returning up the creaking stairs, their mother called from another room in the house, “How you boys doing?”

“We’re good, Mom! We’re going to—uhfu—”

Jonah had shot out an arm to silence him. “We’re going to head outside for a bit,” then he whispered to Reinhardt, “I thought the morels should be a surprise if we actually find some.”

“Oh, gotcha’.” Reinhardt gave a thumbs-up.

Then Jonah continued in a loud voice speaking to his mother, “May I have that sandwich? I’ll take it with me.”

“Okay.”

“And wrap it up, please?” He fished the list out of his front pocket and said to Reinhardt, “I’m going to grab my backpack from upstairs, can you get the sandwich, oh, and also let’s take some jerky if there is any, and fill a canteen of water for us too, okay?”

Upstairs, Jonah filled his backpack: a compass from his nightstand drawer and from the closet a small battery powered lantern used for camping—a quick flip of the switch showed it still had battery power. When Jonah returned downstairs, Reinhardt was in the mudroom putting on his boots. The food supplies sat next to him on the bench; there was a nice supply of pork jerky too. All this, plus matches and two more flashlights from the mudroom shelf were stowed in Jonah’s backpack.

Reinhardt asked, “Are we camping?”

“Huh?”

“What’s with all the stuff?”

“I just want some stuff, and that reminds me there are a few things, some here and some outside, some stuff that needs taken to the woods. But you can help me since we’re headed that way.” Jonah had a matter-of-fact expression and was looking around the small room. He grabbed a jacket from a peg and stuffed it in his pack as well. “I don’t know? It’s been unseasonably warm. You know, Reinhardt, I think we will find some morels today.”

Reinhardt just smiled, and together they went outside. Jonah grabbed the coil of rope from inside the farrowing barn and took one last glance at the pigs. “Thanks for the jerky,” he said and waved farewell. Down the lane to the Quonset the brothers went.

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