John Thomas "Jack" Wagner
1935-2013
Jack had a walk-on part in Chapter Fifteen "The Old Homestead", but it was an important part because his preference for the wistful youngest daughter Faith over her man-stealing sisters changed her life.
Passage from PRECIOUS JEWELS about Jack.
In addition to glads in the summer and teaching in the winter, Ralph
continued to work in pulp wood. His son was his constant companion at his labor,
and Lester was cheerful and industrious, not given to the rebellion of his
sisters. What Ralph didn't expect was that one of his daughters would turn her
hand to pulp wooding as well. Faith, still casting around for a sense of place
within her family, chose to position herself alongside her brother.
Ralph let her come along because her presence allowed him to innovate on
how to load the wood. They needed a team of three for Ralph's strategy to work.
Most people loaded each 5-1/2 foot log by hand, but Ralph had mounted a boom
behind the cab with a cable running through it with a hook. Ralph stood on the
truck, Faith attached the hook to the log, and Lester backed up the tractor,
pulling cable and hooked log up to Ralph. Ralph placed and unhooked the log, and
Faith was ready to take the hook back to the next log.
Ralph's "hookman" was a crucial member of the team, but it didn't occur
to him that she needed to be told so. He might slap his son on the back in
satisfied camaraderie, but he didn't slap his daughters on the back, and when
her brother strolled along with his father's arm draped across his shoulders,
the hookman watched them wistfully.
Faith might be able to keep up with a logging crew, but when she dressed
up, she was every bit as pretty as her sisters. She looked older than her age,
so the young men who dated her sisters paid her attention also, unaware that she
was six years younger than Joy. Even Joy didn't take into account the age
difference. She was making a great game of breaking up other people's
relationships. It was a rare fellow who could withstand Joy's charm when she
turned it on. "He's cute," she might say upon spying one of her sisters with a
new fellow. "I think I'll take him away from her!"
Both of her sisters had fallen victim to Joy's game playing. Joy was now
in the process of taking over the correspondence that Garnet had going with
Mason Malpass who was now a sailor on his tour of duty. "They always liked each
other," Joy said to Faith. "He's liable to come back home and marry her once she
comes to her senses and leaves that old Bill. Let's see if I can get him before
that happens!"
Increasingly the red, white and blue airmail envelopes from oversees
were addressed to Joy instead of Garnet. Even Grace wasn't pleased about this.
It had always seemed to her that there was something special between Garnet and
Mason with their shared musical abilities and the way they sparred. Despite the
fact that Garnet had proven that she was not likely to languish away her life as
a spinster, her mother still felt protective of her.
But there was one young man who seemed immune to Joy's games. Jack was
tall, muscular, with a handsome baby face. He had taken Joy out a time or two,
and he had also gone out with Garnet. But he made Joy edgy the way he seemed to
look right through her little wiles, while Garnet tended to have long, serious
relationships. Jack wasn't ready to get serious. At least, not until he noticed
Faith. She resembled Joy in her looks, but she didn't have her careless banter.
Faith saw him eyeing her and she glowered back at him. He was
smitten.
Faith would never forget the day of their first date. She had gone out
in the woods as usual with Ralph and Lester and they had worked until the
weather turned. A tropical storm was blowing in when they got home, and the
willow fronds were blowing sideways in the gale.
"Tell Mother to come home," said Ralph to Faith, and his daughter
obediently hopped out of the cab and dashed up the dirt drive toward the Babcock
house where Grace had spent the day with her mother who wasn't feeling
well.
Ralph and Lester went into the Denton house, and Lester was standing at
the window of his attic bedroom peeling off his dirty shirt as Faith reached the
pine tree at the curve of the driveway across from the Babcock house. Just as
his sister reached the tree, a bolt of lightning hurled out of the sky and
struck it. He heard the ripping crash and saw the searing flash — and he saw it
reach out to Faith.
"No!" he cried, already in motion. He thundered down the steps past his
Dad, who called after him, saw that his son wasn't stopping, and followed. Faith
lay face down in a mud puddle as the tree beside her burned. Lester scooped her
up in his arms and kept running. Grace had the door open and she stepped back as
her son staggered past her and laid his sister down on the bed.
"Oh my soul!" cried Grace, as Pearl pushed her way past them to examine
her granddaughter. Faith was already struggling to sit up. "I'm
f-f-f-f-f-f-f-ine." she stammered, but she couldn't stop shaking.
"Give me my robe!" snapped Pearl, and Grace grabbed the terrycloth wrap
from its hook.
They got the girl out of her wet dirty clothes and swaddled her in
Pearl's robe. It was too bad that Faith was in shock and wouldn't remember much
of the next few hours because she was, for once, the center of her family's
attention.
"Dear Jesus, my poor baby," said Grace, her arms around her, rocking
her, nearly as stunned as Faith. Her prayers were garbled, an illogical plea to
save her from what had just happened and a prayer of thanksgiving that she
wasn't hurt badly.
Lester tried to lighten the mood. "Hey, maybe you'll have a scar like
mine!"
Faith glared at him through the cradle of her mother's arms. "I
d-d-d-d-d-d-don't w-w-w-w-w-w-want it."
"Sssssh," said Grace, sternly, "You're upsetting her. Poor baby, we'll
take you home and tuck you into bed for the night and I'll bring you some supper
in bed.
But this had the opposite of its intended effect. "N-n-n-n-ooo! I have a
d-d-d-date with J-J-ack!"
"You can't go anywhere until you stop shaking like a leaf." proclaimed
Pearl.
"All of you stop making her talk," said Grace. "Let her rest and if she
feels like seeing him tonight, then she may."
By evening, Faith's nerves were still jangled but she was determined to
keep the date. By the time Jack arrived, she was ready to go. Ever after, when
she told the story of how she had been struck by lightning and had gone out on
that date anyway, she would say, "And I am so glad that I did!"
For Jack turned out to be Faith's future husband, and with him she would
find where she belonged.
----
In Memory of Uncle Jack from his "Favorite Niece." *
*Rumor has it that he told each of his nieces that she was his favorite, but I know the truth!
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