Chapter 24
What an Idea!

The room was silent.

Pa and Almeda both felt relieved, I think. I could tell a burden had been lifted from Almeda’s shoulders. The peace on her face was visible. And since I had been expecting it, the shock wasn’t as great for me.

But for everybody else, the news was awful!

I knew every single person wanted to start shouting out reasons to make them reconsider. But because Almeda had said not to, no one spoke.

The silence went on and on for a minute or two. Finally Rev. Rutledge broke it.

“Does this represent your decision too, Drummond?” he asked. “Is this what you want?”

“I reckon,” Pa answered. “At first I didn’t like it any better than the rest of you. And she’s right—I spent an hour trying to convince her that I did want her to be mayor. But then after a while I saw what she’d been driving at. And so I reckon I do agree that maybe a woman—at least a wife, who’s carrying my baby!—ought not be mayor. I’m not saying that no woman should do something like that. But we got ourselves a family here, and it’s gonna be an even bigger family in a few months. We got our hands full without her trying to manage a town’s business besides. So yeah, Reverend, I’m in agreement with this decision, even though I can’t abide the thought of Royce being mayor any more than the rest of you can.”

The silence fell again, and Rev. Rutledge seemed satisfied. A long time passed before anyone said anything.

“Well, I reckon there ain’t but one solution t’ this here fix,” cackled Mr. Jones at length.

Pa looked over at him with a blank expression. I know he was expecting one of his old friend’s wisecracks.

“And what’s that, Alkali?” he asked.

“Fer you t’ take the lady’s place. Hee, hee, hee!”

As his high-pitched laughter died down, silence again filled the house. We could all feel an unexpected energy of hope rising out of the disappointment of only seconds earlier.

Faces gradually started glancing around the room at each other. Eyes grew wider and wider.

Mr. Jones’ words were like a stick of dynamite exploding right in the middle of the room! For the first few seconds everyone wondered if they’d heard him right.

Then light began to dawn on face after face!

Uncle Nick was the first to say what everyone else had felt instantly. “If that ain’t the dad-blamedest best idea I’ve ever heard!” he exclaimed, jumping out of his seat. He walked over to Pa and stuck out his hand.

Dazed, Pa shook it, still hardly believing what he’d heard. The moment he took Uncle Nick’s hand, everyone in the room began letting out cheers and shouts of approval. The next instant we were all out of our seats and crowding around Pa, who still sat bewildered.

“Drummond,” said Rev. Rutledge somberly, “I think Mr. Jones has hit upon an absolutely wonderful idea.”

“The perfect answer!” chimed in Katie and Miss Stansberry almost in unison.

“Will you do it, Drummond?” asked the minister. “We’re all behind you one hundred percent.”

Almost in a stupor in the midst of the sudden excitement, Pa still didn’t seem to grasp what all the fuss was about.

“Do what?” he said.

“Take Almeda’s place, you old goat!” said Uncle Nick. “Just like Alkali said.”

Still Pa’s face looked confounded. The idea was just too unbelievable for him to fathom.

Finally Almeda turned from where she was sitting beside him. She took one of his hands in hers and looked him full in the face with a broad smile. “Drummond, what these friends of yours are saying is that they want you to run for mayor . . . yourself!”

“Me . . . run for mayor?” he exclaimed in disbelief. “The notion’s crazier than Alkali shaving his beard and taking a bath!”

“No crazier than me being hitched and having a family, Drum,” rejoined Uncle Nick.

“This here’s Californeee, don’t ya know! Things is done a mite looney out here. Hee, hee, hee!”

“Times are changing. You might as well change with them,” added Mr. Shaw.

“But I’m no politician,” objected Pa. “I don’t know anything about that kind of stuff.”

“Nobody else does either, Drummond,” said Almeda, growing in enthusiasm over the idea herself. “I’m no politician either, and Franklin is only running so that he can gain more power for himself and his bank. Surely you don’t want him to be elected?”

Her words sobered Pa and quieted everybody down.

For the first time the look on Pa’s face indicated that he was giving serious thought to the reality of the possibility—as outlandish as the whole thing still seemed to him.

“My name’s not even on the ballot,” he said at length.

“If enough people voted for me and I should happen to win,” suggested Almeda, “I could then step down and appoint you mayor.”

“Is that legal?” asked Miss Stansberry.

“Royce would probably challenge it and call for a new election,” said Katie. “Something similar happened in Virginia a few years back.”

“And then once that happened, he’d think we’d deceived him and would no doubt start in again with his shenanigans and financial pressure on everyone,” said Almeda, thinking aloud.

“There’s got to be some way to get Drum elected mayor,” said Mr. Shaw, “even if the election’s only three days off.”

The room got quiet for a minute. When Almeda spoke next, her voice was soft and earnest. It was almost as if the two of them were alone, continuing a conversation they’d been having in private.

“Drummond,” she said, “it seems to me that this could be exactly what the Lord has had in mind all along. Perhaps this is the reason things have worked out as they have, and why he unsettled my heart about my being out in public view trying to make something of myself. Maybe all along God wanted me, and perhaps the whole community, to be looking to my husband for leadership. I see God’s hand in the way events have unfolded. And I can’t think of a better way for me to defer to you, and for you to move up a step in taking hold of the firm hand God might want you to exert, than for me to step aside so that you can take the lead in this election.”

She paused, and her eyes were filling with tears of love as she went on. “I can’t tell you how pleased it would make me,” she said softly. “It would make me feel as though these past two months had not been in vain, that maybe God was even able to use my independence to accomplish his purposes. But of course,” she added, “it has to be your decision, and I will understand and stand by you whatever you think is best.”

She stopped, and now all eyes rested on Pa as he considered everything that had been said. A long time—probably two or three minutes—passed before he said a word.

“Well, you’re all mighty convincing,” he said finally. “And I have to say it’s flattering that you’d think I could even do the thing—that is, if I had a chance in the first place.”

He paused and took a breath.

“But it occurs to me,” he went on, “that one of the first things a mayor probably has to do is make decisions of one kind or another. And it occurs to me, too, that if I’m gonna start taking more of a lead in this marriage partnership Almeda and I are trying to figure out, then I have to get more practiced in finding out what the Almighty wants me do, instead of just taking things as they come, or figuring that Almeda’s supposed to handle most of the spiritual side of things, while I just go on without paying much attention.

“All that is my way of saying that I guess I do have to make the decision myself. I appreciate all your thoughts and advice. And I’d appreciate all of you praying for me, because I’m gonna need it. But first I have to get alone and ask God what decision he wants me to make, and then hope that he’ll put the thoughts into my heart and head plain enough that I can figure out what he’s saying.”

He let out a deep sigh, then hitched himself to his feet.

“So that’s what I’m going to do before I say anything else, and before you all try to do any more convincing.”

He went to the door, opened it, and walked outside.

Gradually those of us left in the house started talking a little. Katie had to entertain little Erich, and Becky and Tad had had enough sitting for one stretch and had to get themselves moving again. Almeda went into her and Pa’s bedroom and closed the door, to pray for Pa and the decision he was wrestling with.

About twenty minutes later Mr. Shaw was about to leave, and Rev. Rutledge was helping Miss Stansberry with her coat, when the door opened and Pa walked in.

From the look on his face, every one of us knew instantly that he’d made his decision.

Almeda had heard him return and emerged from the bedroom just as he spoke. “It’d be a shame to waste all those good ‘Hollister For Mayor’ signs and flyers,” he said with a big grin. “So if it’s not gonna be one Hollister, it might as well be the other! Move over, Royce—I’m in it now too!”

“Now the varmint’ll find himself in a real scrape!” cackled Alkali Jones. “Hee, hee, hee!”

More hollering and hand-shaking went around the room, while Mr. Shaw and the others took off their coats again. Over to one side of the room I could see the person more involved in this turn of events than anyone but Pa, and she wasn’t yelling or whooping it up.

Almeda closed her eyes briefly and softly whispered the words, “Thank you!” Then she opened them, and walked forward with a smile to join her husband in the midst of the commotion.