When Cap, with only a cane for support, came to the kitchen door, he laughed. “Look at you! The sun’s barely up, and you already have breakfast started. Where are the boys?”
“Henry’s out taking care of Pilot, and Benny is gathering eggs,” Jessie told him. “Grandfather could get here early, and we want to be ready.”
“That’s right,” Cap said. “This is the day of the big party, isn’t it?”
“A really big party!” Violet said. “Grandfather, and Mrs. Hodges, and Susie and Ned all at once. Won’t it be fun?”
“I guess I don’t even know what we’re going to eat,” Cap said, looking around the kitchen. “You never did get to take that shopping trip into town.”
Jessie laughed. “We didn’t need any grocery store. And dinner today is going to be a surprise. You do like surprises, don’t you?”
Cap laughed. “If I didn’t before, I’ve learned to this past week. I’ve sure had enough of them since you came.”
Benny was the first to see his grandfather coming. He was in the chicken yard when he saw the long black car pull up in front of the cabin. He went flying around the house without even thinking to close the gate.
First there were hugs all around, then the children had to take their grandfather for a tour of the barn and garden and orchard. Finally he joined Cap on the front porch, talking over old times.
All four of the children were working on their special meal when Benny looked out the porch window and began to yell. They crowded around him to see why he was so excited.
Violet, still wearing her long apron, ran to the front porch. “Oh, Cap, Grandfather,” she shouted. “Come and see what’s happening out in back.”
As the men came around the side of the house, they saw a huge red hen walking out of the woods, clucking happily. Behind her came about a dozen little chicks, peeping and scratching their way toward the gate of the hen yard that Benny had left open.
“Rhoda!” Cap cried. “Doodle, look at that! We’d given up our good friend Rhoda for lost. Now she’s come home!”
Jessie asked, “Where do you suppose they’ve been?”
Cap laughed. “Rhoda has always had a mind of her own. She must have gotten out about the time I was hurt and made her nest in the woods. She’s lucky that a fox or a hawk didn’t get her or those babies.”
Mr. Alden looked at his old friend a moment. “Do you mean that you’re going to welcome her back even though she went off the way she did?”
Cap stared at him. “Of course,” he said. “She was only following her own nature like any creature would.”
“People do that, too,” Mr. Alden reminded him, his voice suddenly very quiet.
Cap stared at him. “I’m not sure I know what you’re getting at, but you sound mighty serious.”
Mr. Alden took Cap’s arm and led him back to the porch. “Don’t you?” he asked. “I’m talking about your son, Jason, that’s what. He and I have been writing letters back and forth for almost a year. He wants to come home in the worst way but has been afraid to. He wasn’t sure he’d be welcome.”
Cap fell silent, staring at his hands. “He’s welcome,” he said gruffly. “I’ve never quit missing him. It’s been even worse since I’ve had your grandchildren here. But I don’t even know where he is.”
“He’s at the hotel in town,” Mr. Alden told him. “I talked to him just this morning. When he heard you were hurt, he tried to call you but didn’t have the nerve to talk.”
“That was Jason breathing on my phone?” Cap asked.
Mr. Alden nodded. “He left his ship when the children came. But he didn’t know how to make peace with you.”
“There’s no peace to make,” Cap said crossly. “He was young and stubborn and I was older and stubborn. That’s long years ago now. I want to see my boy!”
Mr. Alden rose and called into the house. “How long until dinner’s ready, Jessie?”
“About a half hour,” she called. “Is that too long?”
“It’s perfect,” her grandfather said. “Tell Violet to set another plate. Cap and I are going to town, but we’ll be right back with one more guest.”
Violet had set the table with a white cloth and a great bowl of wild blue larkspur in the center. “It’s the closest I could find to a violet color,” she said wistfully.
The Hodges family arrived right away. Benny had taken Susie and Ned out to see the new baby chickens when the big black car returned. Jessie watched from the window as her grandfather got out, helped Cap out, and handed him his cane. Then she gasped. “Violet! Henry!” she called. “Our mystery man, Mr. Jay, is here. I don’t believe this.”
Then Cap called, “Hey, children, come meet my son.”
“Jason,” Henry whispered. “Mr. Jay is really Jason.”
Now Cap’s son smiled, a broad sweet smile that was a little bit like Cap’s. “We’ve met,” he said, shaking hands with each of them. “We even traveled together, didn’t we?”
The children nodded and glanced at their grandfather.
“Jason was pretty envious that you children were coming to where he wanted to be,” their grandfather said.
“Well, he’s here now,” Violet said with a smile. “And as welcome as can be!” Her eyes flew wide open. “Jessie,” she squealed. “Do I smell something burning?” The two girls flew off to the kitchen. But within a minute Violet was back.
“Just one thing, Mr. Jay,” she said. “If you knew who we were and that we were coming here, why were you so unfriendly? Every time we saw you, you just turned your back and hurried away like you couldn’t stand the sight of us.”
“I’m not Mr. Jay to you, Violet, I’m just Jason. And the reason I turned away was that I didn’t know what my father looked like anymore. For all I knew, you might have recognized that we were father and son.” He grinned and tugged lightly at his father’s beard. “If I had known about this bush he is wearing, I wouldn’t have acted like that.”
Cap laughed right along with Violet and the others.
Benny was the last one to meet Jason Lambert. He sighed, put his hand in his pocket, and pulled out the little fire engine he had found in the tree house.
“This is yours,” he said quietly.
Jason lifted the little metal toy and looked at it carefully. Then he placed it back in Benny’s palm. “I believe you’re right, Benny,” he said. “And I’m glad to have it. It’s the perfect present for me to give you. Would you like to keep it to remember Owl’s Glen by?”
Benny smiled and closed his fingers around the tiny toy. “Oh, yes,” he cried.
The meal was beautiful. The canned ham was glazed with rings of apples dyed red with cinnamon candies. Tiny new potatoes swam in butter beside a bowl of ruby-red beets.
Mrs. Hodges finally put down her fork with a sigh. “What a wonderful meal,” she said.
“And every single thing except the canned ham is from Cap’s garden and orchard,” Jessie told her.
“We have dessert, too,” Benny said.
“I don’t know where I’ll find room for it,” Jason said.
Cap took a spoonful of Violet’s apple bread pudding with caramel sauce and grinned at his son. “Don’t even try to eat this, Jason,” he said. “Just pass it right over here. One serving of this isn’t going to be near enough for me.”
“You and I are a lot alike, Cap,” Benny said, smiling at him. “We both like good things in our mouths, don’t we?”
The grown-ups sat over coffee while the children cleaned up the dishes, then played games in the backyard. Before they left, Mrs. Hodges asked Violet for her recipe for apple bread pudding and caramel sauce. “It’s just delicious,” she told Violet. “I’ll want to make it for Cap to remind him of you. I just wish you could stay.”
“We might come back,” Benny said. “I like it here.”
As Mr. Alden’s car pulled away, Cap waved back with his rooster on his shoulder and his son at his side. “This may have been our best mystery adventure ever,” Jessie told her grandfather thoughtfully.
Benny said, “Yes, but I want to get home and see Watch and our boxcar.”
Jessie grinned at him. Funny little boy. But Jessie knew Benny was only saying what each of them felt. |