The farm auction date was set for April 16, 1996. There were only two days left, but we were almost ready. The farm equipment was all cleaned up, lined up and looked good. The weather forecast sounded good, too. We had waited as long as possible before we put the appliances, furniture and household items outside in a row on the lawn beside the driveway.
Today we were cleaning out the pump house. Besides the windmill tower and well, it stored the old wringer washer, garden tools, some winter clothes and boots, and a lot of items from years ago. There were old wooden egg crates, an old doll carriage, a rusty tricycle that used to be green—stuff.
We wrestled out the wringer washer. It was new in 1965. It had been put there in working condition, replaced by an automatic washer in the 1970s, when our kids were small.
A piece of cardboard had been pushed between the washing machine and the wall. I lifted it up, turned it over. There was some writing on it. I looked at it and the memories came flooding back.
Nineteen-eighty-eight, eight years earlier, had been a tragic year for our family. My wife Inez had died very suddenly and unexpectedly in June. The rest of the summer was a whirlwind blur of grief and turmoil. Our son Dale, fresh from university, had moved to his first permanent job in Vancouver. Our daughter Joyce was in Clearbrook, B.C. attending college before entering nurse’s training in Edmonton. My mother, who lived in Edmonton, became severely depressed. She said she should have been the one to have died, not her daughter-in-law, whom she loved dearly. Finally out of hospital that included shock therapy, she was home again with Dad, recovering slowly but steadily.
That was mid-October. I hadn’t had too much time to visit them recently during the busy fall harvest season, but that also was over. It was the second Sunday in a row that I had gone to visit them. We had a good visit together.
It had been a very cool, rainy, drizzly afternoon. I still had a few evening chores to do, and I had given our hired man Virge the day off. I left my parents’ home after Mother prepared a light lunch for us. It was around 5:00 or 5:30 P.M.
About 15 miles east of Edmonton, towards Cooking Lake, I caught up to someone walking on the right side of the road. He was wearing army dress, carrying a duffle bag in his right hand. He wasn’t hitchhiking, he was just walking, trudging, not turning around, not looking back.
There was a big army base at Wainwright, but that was a long ways down the highway.
YES, he was hitchhiking! His left hand, hanging by his side had a closed fist, with the thumb extended; had it moved out from his body slightly as I passed?
I stopped. At first he didn’t notice me. Then he saw the truck and hurried.
“Thanks!” he said as he opened the door. “Thanks a lot! Thought I’d never get a ride!” He sighed deeply.
He was fairly short, slender. He had a small, round, boyish face. He wore glasses. They were like the bottoms of two coke bottles, making his blue eyes look really big. He was a soldier.
“I’m Walter,” I said, extending my hand across the seat.
“I’m Charles,” he said, gripping my hand as he put his bag on the seat between us. “Everybody calls me Charlie.”
I started driving.
“Going to Wainwright?” he asked hopefully.
“Not to Wainwright,” I said “But about half-way there.”
“I gotta get to Wainwright, really bad! Gotta get to Wainwright before midnight. You’re the first ride I’ve got since Edmonton.”
“Since Edmonton?” I asked incredulously. “You’ve been walking all the way from Edmonton?”
“Yeah, a long ways. Nobody stopped to pick me up. Can you turn the heat up a little? I’m really cold and wet.”
I turned up the heat and the fan. I changed it from the “feet” position only, to “body and feet.” I was thinking and I was getting upset. I was getting angry with Albertans, Canadians, for not picking up a soldier, a Canadian serviceman who was hitchhiking alone on a cold and rainy October Sunday afternoon.
“You started hiking in Edmonton?” I asked again.
“The Bus Depot in Edmonton. I missed the bus to Wainwright,” he said resignedly.
“Where were you coming from?”
“Calgary. But I started in Canmore. Early. I took the bus from Canmore to Calgary. Then I got on the bus to Edmonton. But I missed the bus to Wainwright,” he stated again, flatly.
“Canmore,” I said, “that’s close to Banff.”
“Right. Had a weekend pass to visit my wife. She lives on a Reserve not too far from Canmore. Have to be back in Wainwright before midnight.” Then he smiled. “We’re going to have a baby in February!”
“That’s good,” I said. “Congratulations!”
I wanted to ask him how or why he missed the bus to Wainwright. Then I thought it didn’t really matter. His problem now was to get to Wainwright before midnight. If he wanted to tell me why he’d missed the bus, he would, on his own.
“Have you got any water in the truck, or pop?” he asked.“I’m really thirsty. All that walking.”
How could he be thirsty on a cold rainy day? It had to be because of all that walking.
“No, sorry I don’t,” I said. “But we’re coming up to a gas station soon. You could get something to drink there.”
“That would be great! I’m really thirsty.”
We drove on. I pushed the speed limit. The truck was getting really warm and damp and humid.
At the Ministik Gas Station he got out and hurried inside. He was soon back at the truck carrying two cans of “Five-Alive Orange.” He got in the truck. I thought the second can was for me and I was about to say thanks but I don’t need a drink. But the second can wasn’t for me, it was for him too. He put it in the passenger seat console drink compartment beside him. He drank the first can, only stopping once. He put the empty can on the floor by his feet and popped open the second can. He sipped it more slowly.
“What happens if you don’t get to Wainwright by midnight?” I asked.
“I’m in big trouble, really big trouble!”
“You could get to Wainwright, but it might be tight. And you’d have to be a little lucky, maybe.”
“I’m not lucky,” he said “I missed the bus and I won’t get to Wainwright before midnight.” His voice was whimpering. “I’m in deep, deep trouble.” He was almost sobbing.
We drove.
“I could drive you to Wainwright,” I said. “I don’t want to drive you to Wainwright, but I could. I’ve only got a few chores—maybe half an hour, maybe less. Then we’d hit the road, be in Wainwright by 11. Could be done.”
“You don’t need to drive me to Wainwright,” he said, but it sounded like it wouldn’t take too much to change his mind.
We drove. He began to nod.
“I’m really getting tired now,” he said. “Do you mind if I have a sleep?”
I told him how to put back the seat. He leaned back, shuffled around and was soon asleep.
I looked at him as I drove. He was a gentle soul, a gentle soldier. He wasn’t a smoker, the humid air coming from his body told me that. I couldn’t smell liquor either. He wasn’t a loud, smart-alecky, swearing soldier, he was a short, slender, near-sighted Canadian Serviceman. I smiled to myself. I wanted to say to him in a very low, very serious voice, “Our Nation’s Security Lies in Your Hands.”
Charlie was sleeping very soundly. He looked a bit funny, the round 20s face, the coke-bottle glasses. He looked like a young boy. He wasn’t really a soldier, Charlie was a Canadian Armed Forces Peacekeeper. He was even more than a Peacekeeper. Charlie was probably a Peace-Maker!
I was thinking hard. I didn’t want to drive to Wainwright and back to the farm in the dark, more than an hour each way. Probably 12:30 till I got home.
The rain stopped between Tofield and Ryley. It always did, in the summer and in the fall.
How could I get Charlie to Wainwright? I got an idea.
Maybe it would work, but maybe not.
We were nearing our town of Holden. I pulled into P&R Service and Groceries and stopped the truck—not by the gas pumps—close to the door. Charlie was stirring, waking up.
“Go back to sleep,” I said, “I’ll be back in a few minutes.”
Patrick, the Hong Kong-born, friendly Chinese-Canadian owner was at the counter. He greeted me warmly, “How’s Walter tonight?”
“Good,” I said. “Patrick I’ve got a hitchhiker in the truck.”
“Phone Police?” Patrick interrupted, his eyes widening.
“No, Patrick, no!” I said, “He’s a soldier, stationed at Wainwright! Has to be back by midnight. I want to make a sign for him, a sign to help him get a ride. I need a piece of cardboard and a black felt pen. A black marker. As quick as you can!”
“Cardboard! Marker!” repeated Patrick as he hurried to the back of the store.
He was back in a few seconds with a small cardboard flap, torn off the top of a small box.
“No, Patrick.” I said, “I need a BIG piece of cardboard. Really big. Like this.” I held my hands apart and then up and down. Patrick hurried back and returned with a large cardboard box. I cut out one full side of the big box with my jackknife. Patrick brought a black marker.
I printed “WAINWRIGHT” in heavy, black capital letters, a little above the centre of the cardboard. I double lined the letters. Underneath, in large handwriting, I wrote “Please.” I added a big exclamation mark. I double lined “please.” I held up the cardboard and showed Patrick.
“Good sign,” said Patrick.
I thanked Patrick and left him to clean up the cardboard pieces on the floor.
Charlie was sitting up, awake. I showed him the sign, then I put it on the seat between us.
“Here’s the plan,” I said. “The road to our farm is just a few miles ahead. I’m going to drop you off right by that road. You’re just going to stand there. Don’t walk. You’re going to hold out the sign so every car that goes past you will see it.”
Charlie looked at me, dubiously.
“I’m going to the farm to do the chores, half an hour, three-quarters tops. I’ll come back here, right to this spot. If you get a ride to Wainwright, leave the sign right by the highway. If you don’t, just wait here and I’ll come back, I promise. I’ll take you to Wainwright.”
Charlie picked up the sign and his bag and got out of the truck. I did too. He put down his bag and held out the sign with both hands.
“Like this?” he was smiling.
“Maybe a little higher,” I said. “And maybe turn with the sign towards the car as they’re going by. And smile a little, just like you’re smiling now. Good luck, Charlie.” I held out my hand and he shook it. “And I hope I don’t see you soon.”
He laughed. “Thanks for the ride. Thanks for everything.”
It was getting dusk. Maybe half an hour, maybe an hour and it would be dark. No one likes to pick up a hitch-hiker in the dark.
I looked both ways down the highway. Not a car in sight. It was a long, lonely, perfectly straight, uninhabited stretch of Highway 14 between Holden and Bruce.
I hurried home and changed my clothes, leaving my Sunday clothes on the bed. I brought in Brooksie, our little family milk cow and her large calf from where she was tethered behind the machine shed. I separated her calf and put him in the small corral behind the barn. Virge and I were going to need milk; I had taken a gallon of milk along for Mother and Dad. Dad liked farm milk. I gave Brooksie some grain; I put some hay out for her too. It was October, there wasn’t much grass left for her.
Virge and I had culled a few of the beef cows when we had moved the main herd to a big, recently combined stubble field. Their calves were back in the big calf pen, getting weaned and started on hay and grain. I fed them in a couple of minutes.
If I was going to drive to Wainwright and back again, I’d probably need more fuel in the pick-up. I drove to the diesel tank and filled up.
I didn’t change from my chore clothes. I drove two miles straight north of the farm towards the highway. It was getting dark. I passed McMorran’s corner. I got to the highway.
I didn’t see anyone standing there. I swung the truck slowly around to the right. No one there. The headlights shone on the cardboard lying right beside the pavement.
I stopped, got out and put the cardboard on the seat. I was getting a funny feeling. Relief, other emotions. I wanted to cry, I don’t know why.
I drove home. I took the cardboard and the two empty Five-Alive cans out of the truck and walked to the pump house. I put the cans in the returnable box. I looked at the cardboard sign, then I pushed it behind the old wringer washing machine.
Eight years later, in 1996, I found the sign again. It made me want to cry. I still don’t know why.