Posted As Missing

Chapter Thirty

"Let me put this next to your arm, Mama," David said as he brought a piece of freshly-peeled sapling into the tent. "I need to measure your size."

As he laid the forked end alongside her shoulder, Rachel said in a whisper, "Seems a lot of discussion on size lately. Confusion also. Maria seems confused. Told her size in the least important thing. Told her it's the man who matters."

"Thanks, Mama, I appreciate the reinforcement," he whispered as he notched the wood with his knife beside the bottom of her heel, at her wrist and at her armpit. "We'll have the first crutch shortly."

He had cut two slender saplings about two feet below the crotches where they had split into twinned trunks reaching upward toward the light. The idea had come to him up on the ridge above O'Hara as he fumbled to assemble a workable crutch from the simple pieces he had brought up from the slide.

After cutting shallow, but effective mortise and tenon joints for the two cross pieces at the wrist marks and half an inch below the tops of the tall Y, he bound the pieces tightly together with sisal line. Then padding the top with a piece of cotton towelling, he bound it with more sisal.

"Mama, crawl out of the tent and try this," he said after about twenty minutes of work. "Let me give you a hand."

David helped Rachel to stand on her good foot as she came out, then handed her the crutch. "Give this a try, see how it works. Have you used crutches before?"

"Many years ago, when I was still in school. I broke my lower leg and ankle when I fell off a velocipede. It took a long time to mend, and I got pretty good at using crutches. I'm sure my body still remembers the process."

Rachel took a few trial steps with her left foot off the ground, then took another with it lightly taking some weight. "There is no additional pain when I step lightly. This is an excellent crutch."

"Any adjustments? Any changes you'd suggest?"

She took several more steps, moved her hand around, shifted the top cushion under her arm, looked up and down the crutch, and said, "I can see nothing to change."

"Good, I'll start on the second one. I'll need this as a pattern, and you need to get your foot elevated again. How's the swelling?"

"It seems to be good now," Rachel said as she hobbled over toward where Maria was preparing dinner. She lay on her back on the moss and placed her taped foot up the trunk of a tree.

David took the crutch and headed back toward his workplace, asking, "How long before dinner is ready?"

"Another twenty-five or thirty minutes; I'm about to add the carrots and turnips."

"The second crutch should take about the same. We'll eat when it's done."

Maria stood. "I'll go wet some towels for your foot."

"That would be nice, Sweetheart. It eases the ache, but more, we need to make sure the swelling doesn't come back. We need to get this thing working again."

David came back a little over twenty-five minutes later with the second crutch. "I lashed a stout stick between a pair of small trees down there." He turned and pointed. "That's our new latrine. It's not fancy, simply something to sit on. Squatting would be awkward with your ankle."

"The turnip is still a bit hard, maybe five more minutes. It'll start getting get dark shortly. Is it still safe to use the stove?"

"I think it's safe. When I was looking for crutch wood, I took a look from the edge of this stand of trees, out across the fields and down the slopes. I could see the church dome and the roofs of buildings in the village. There don't appear to be any roads over on that side, nor any buildings above the village."