A View from the Buggy by Jerry S. Eicher

Author:Jerry S. Eicher
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780736956871
Publisher: Harvest House Publishers, Inc.

All’s Well That Ends Well

Grace Elaine Yoder

For he shall give his angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways (Psalm 91:11).

MY BROTHER, JOHN, AND SISTERS, SHARON AND LORANNA, AND I WERE on our way home in our wagon from an evening fishing at Hicks Lake. John and Sharon rode up front and Loranna and I were huddled under the canoe in the back, squatting on the bumping wagon bed. Whenever we moved just a fraction of an inch we bumped our heads against the underside of the canoe. Through the cracks we could see that the sun was sinking fast, and we all wanted to get home before the night fell.

To pass the time, Loranna whispered in an eerie voice, “Imagine it’s years ago and we’re slaves running away from the slave catchers.”

I imagined and could almost hear the galloping feet of the slave catchers’ horses as they came closer and closer. Bravely I whispered back, “It’s fun under here.”

“I think we’re going about a hundred miles an hour,” Loranna exaggerated.

I peered at the road whizzing by beneath us. It did look and feel as if we were going fast, but not that fast.

Loranna and I jabbered on, so busy having our conversation in the dark, cramped quarters that we didn’t hear the older ones talk in hushed and frightened tones.

Klink! A piece of metal rod zipped by right beneath my nose. A loud, peculiar sound rose around us, sending shivers up and down my back. The horse swerved. The canoe jerked to the side and bumped my head. Beneath the wagon the road turned from blacktop to gravel as we gained speed around a curve. Soon the canoe shifted forward as the horse took off at a gallop down the hill.

“What’s happening?” I managed to squeak.

“Everything’s all right,” Sharon said from up front. By the tone of her voice I could tell that everything wasn’t all right.

While I worried, I lost my balance under the canoe and bumped into Loranna as we rounded yet another curve at top speed. Finally the gravel gave way to grass as we went across a field. This put enough drag on the wagon to slow it down, and then we came to a stop.

Quivering all over, I stiffly crawled out from under the canoe and staggered to the front of the wagon. There I met John and Sharon and saw what had happened. One of the shafts had broken. This left us with only one holdback on the horse’s harness. John had been driving, and he had a hard time stopping the old wagon without a brake. Neither could the horse stop with only one holdback.

So we now quickly unhitched the wagon while speaking gently to the horse the whole time. Once she was loose from the remaining shaft, we shoved the wagon toward a house which lay a short distance from where we had come to a halt. We figured we should ask permission before we left the wagon there, so Sharon and Loranna went to the front door.

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