Full Speed Ahead: My Journey with Kit

I can see Kit thinking hard about how to connect people to the books. Then her face lights up. If people can’t come to the books, maybe they can bring the books to the people.

I tilt my head. I’ve seen mobile libraries, a bookmobile at home the size of a school bus, but there’s no way one could handle these steep, narrow mountain paths.

Kit already has the answer: Serena. If Miss Myrtle agrees, they can fill her saddlebags with books and magazines and go house to house, like the mailman delivering letters. I try to warm up to the idea, but my feet ache just thinking about walking the mountain with a pile of books.

We look to Aunt Millie, expecting her to call it impractical. Instead, she calls it a fine, Depression-fighting idea.

Back home, Miss Myrtle has returned with Serena. Buddy rushes up to frisk around her like she’s a very big dog. Serena cocks one ear at him and ignores him. Kit explains the plan, and Miss Myrtle listens closely, then says Serena would be honored to help. Buddy stays home. The trip would be too rough for a pup his size.

I ask if the route is long and hard, trying not to whine. Aunt Millie nods, nearly twenty miles, with buggy streambeds, steep stony trails, and a crossing at Troublesome Creek.

Miss Myrtle asks if I’ll be okay. I hesitate, but Aunt Millie snorts that a few rocks and bugs won’t get us down, we’re made of sterner stuff. Kit smiles wide. I smile weakly and bend down to cuddle Buddy, wishing I could trade places with him, but I won’t let Kit down.

The next morning, I keep clear of both ends of Serena as we load her saddlebags with books and magazines. She has big yellow teeth and a whip of a tail, but she stands still for the loading, looking almost dignified with her bulging bags. Then she swings her head around, gives me a knowing look, and hee-haws like she’s laughing at me.

Aunt Millie leads Serena by the reins. Kit and I walk behind. We start on the dirt “haul road” that lumbermen use to bring trees down the mountain. At Troublesome Creek, Serena picks her way across without a fuss while the three of us wobble from stone to stone. On the far bank she balks, and it takes Aunt Millie and Kit pushing while I call encouragement from above to get her up the slippery slope.

Past the creek, the haul road narrows into a rocky, twisting path barely wider than Serena’s rump. We go single file, dodging thorny branches and swatting bugs. I’m soon covered in mosquito bites, and knowing my luck, some are probably poison ivy.

At last we spot a crooked gray cabin with a green vine twining up the porch posts. Aunt Millie reminds us the McCorkles have nothing to spare, not food, energy, or time, so we’ll just offer books to loan and move on.

A tall woman comes out as we approach. Aunt Millie introduces us, and Mrs. McCorkle surprises everyone by inviting us in for sassafras tea. The children are out working the vegetable patch, she says. They took the school closing hard, and young Robert would love to show off the Shakespeare poem he’s memorized.

Aunt Millie declines the tea. She says we’re traveling librarians today, but we did bring books from the schoolhouse, stories of cowboys, detectives, faraway places, comedies, romances, ghost stories.

Mrs. McCorkle’s smile stiffens. She has no time for “useless claptrap,” and it’s crop month. The children shouldn’t be distracted.

Kit and Aunt Millie look as dumbfounded as I feel. Who says no to a book? The traveling-library idea seems dead before it starts, and I feel worse still as I smack another mosquito and survey my polka-dotted, itching arm.

Mrs. McCorkle asks what’s wrong, and when I explain, she disappears inside and returns with a stoneware jar of pine-scented ointment. It cools my skin instantly and stops the itching.

I thank Mrs. McCorkle and ask what it is. A family recipe, she says.

Kit’s face lights up. She pulls out the Waste-Not, Want-Not Almanac, full of Aunt Millie’s Depression-fighting tips, and asks if Mrs. McCorkle would write her remedy in it. Mrs. McCorkle agrees happily, glad to have something to give in return. I can tell Aunt Millie and Kit understand why. Offering something for nothing offended Mrs. McCorkle’s pride, the same dignity Mrs. Littlefield showed. The mountain families may not have much, but they have too much pride for handouts.

I spot a beautiful quilt draped over the porch railing, pieced from gorgeous scraps, and ask to sketch its pattern for the Almanac. Mrs. McCorkle agrees. The pattern has been in her family for years, and she’d be pleased to see it recorded.

Mrs. McCorkle invites us inside to write the recipe and draw the pattern. The McCorkle children file in, shy but glad for company and thrilled to see their old teacher. Robert recites his poem while I sketch the quilt and Mrs. McCorkle writes out her ointment recipe. When he finishes, we clap and he bows, blushing.

As we get ready to leave, Aunt Millie admits it still doesn’t sit right to take something for nothing in times like these. Mrs. McCorkle nods. That’s exactly why she resisted borrowing the books at first.

Kit sets a small book of Shakespeare’s poems on the table for Robert. Mrs. McCorkle laughs. She says that sounds like an even trade.