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Mystery of the Trunk: Part 3

By Chuck Clegg - | Feb 9, 2022

That April morning arrived too quickly for Mathew and Annie. They knew this meant good bye for an unknown period of time. Mathew had requested reposting to Washington, but his commander realized his experience over these last several years gave them valuable insight into the political world of Europe.

Mathew knelt down and hugged his son. He took his small hand and placed in it the book, Moby Dick. “Have your mother read to you until we see each other again. Promise me.” Will shook his head and held out his arms to his father. The young boy trying to be strong, but could not hold the tears as they ran down his face. He squeezed his father’s neck, “I love you Daddy.” The captain turned his head for a moment as he blinked to hide the tears in his own eyes. Mathew kissed the woman he loved and then closed the family quilt around Will to keep him warm. With that, they turned and walked up the long walk way onto the great ship. Mathew watched until he could no longer see the ship as it left for America.

On the second day of the trip, Will asked his mother if they could sit outside in the ocean air and she read to him. As she read, the boy stared out over the ocean and imagined the great whale waiting for Captain Ahab.

The air was often to cool for the young boy on deck. His mother in their warm stateroom told him of home along the Ohio River.

The warm summer days she spent with her family growing up on a small farm just outside of town. She smiled as she told of meeting Will’s father. “My family and I often went for a picnic lunch after church on warm Sunday afternoons. Near the mouth of the creek under the willow trees, we would sit on the banks and watch the small birds feed in the gravel bars. Young boys would swing from an old rope tied in a tree and drop into the water. Those were good days.”

“That is where I first saw your father. He would swing further than anyone else and land in the water with a great splash. Come up from under the water and look to see if I was watching… I was.”

Those were the words Will remembered as he fell into a deep sleep under the family quilt.

A short time later, Will was suddenly awaken by his mother. She quickly wrapped the young boy in the quilt and began making their way through the half darken passage ways. He was frightened by the panicked voices and people struggling in confusion. Annie carried her young son close as she made her way out of the chaos.

After what seemed an eternity of crushing people and disorder, they made their way onto the deck of the ship. The floor beneath their feet was tipped toward the bow. The ocean’s surface was dark, but the night sky made it possible to see outlines of small boats just past the reach of the remaining lights of the sinking ship.

Annie ran from one boat station to another to another. The boats were gone. Had she missed her chance to save Will and herself? About then, a ships officer grabbed her by the arm and pulled her without a word through a center passage way to the other side of the ship. “There may be room in one last boat but we must hurry.” As they emerged onto the deck the last boat was being lowered away. Annie ran over and could see there was no room left for her. She looked at a woman who had four small children surrounding her in the full boat. “Please, can you take my son? Please?” The woman did not hesitate, she reached out her arms toward Annie’s son. “I will always love you,” Annie whispered to her son with one last kiss good-bye. With that, she pulled the locket from her neck and placed it in his pocket along with her journal. Wrapped in the quilt, she handed the stunned boy to the woman in the boat.

The last time he saw his mother’s face, she was looking down at him as the boat was lowered into the water. He remembered the sounds of that moment in time. Air rushing from the ship filled the night with it sound as icy cold water flowed into its hull. Tearing metal pierced the night as the ship began ripping itself apart. Then a great sound of air and water followed by the quiet of the night. In the dark around the boat the sound of crying and calls for help. Those sounds of the dying did not last long.

When the survivors arrived in New York, Will was still in shock. He just stared and held his quilt tight around him. The mother who had opened her arms to the young boy that night, spoke little English. She realized the only family the young boy now had was to be hers. She raised the boy as if he were her own.

Will grew up in New York and became a well-known writer. After many years his adopted mother passed away. But before she died, she gave him a key and told him it was to an old trunk in the attic. She told him that he may find answers within the trunk.

The trunk had been forgotten for many years in its dark hiding place. Will took the key and removed the lock. As he opened it, memories of a life so long forgotten came rushing back. Inside he found his mother’s silver locket along with her leather bound journal. The journal’s last entries were made by his adopted mother. She wanted him to someday know the truth of that night and how he was given to a stranger by his mother to save his life.

Inside the locket a picture of a beautiful woman. He remembered the face was that of the woman he last saw looking down on him in the boat that long ago night, his mother. She threw him a last kiss as she faded from view. All things he long ago hid in his memories to dull the pain of his loss. Also in the trunk was a yellowed newspaper. Its headlines, “1517 Titanic Passengers Lost.”

Lastly inside was the quilt he remembered so fondly. That warm blanket of security he remembered from his youth. As he spreads it out on the floor of the attic he realized why his mother called it a family quilt. Generation after generation had stitched the family history into panels on the quilt. And there in a panel of blue homespun was perhaps the answer to one last question. Where is home, that his mother had told him about.

Will boarded a train and set out to find his real family’s home town along the Ohio River. When he arrived he questioned a porter working at the station. He did not remember the name, Mathew Doolin. The worker directed him to the local newspaper editor who knew most everyone in town. The old editor told Will, “I believe the man you are looking for is in the county nursing home.”

As he walked up to the old brick building, he was filled with emotions and questions. Was this man his father? If so, would he remember his son? Inquiring at the desk about the man, the nurse referred him to the staff doctor for answers. The doctor explained this man came home from the First World War and became a teacher. He would sometimes talk of his wife and son who were lost long ago coming to America. The last few years his mind has failed him and now he sits at the window and watches the passing sky.

Carrying the small trunk, Will sits down beside the man he recognized as his father that he had not seen in over fifty years. He takes the quilt from the trunk and covers his father’s legs and then places the silver locket in his hand. Mathew touches the homespun fabric and looks down at the silver locket. That tear he had blinked away so many years ago, now ran down his cheek.

Will opened the book he had hidden inside his coat along with the journal and began reading to his Father, “Chapter one, call me Ishmael……………………..

After reading the final entry into the journal, Bill Handleson replaced both books into the trunk. He wondered why Mathew and Will decided to hide the trunk in this place and what had happened to both of them. The county records showed no trace of Mathew or Will Doolin after 1962. Bill began to realize the answer is one of the many mysteries lost in the old county home never to be told again, Through the Lens.