Samuel Peterson's Arc

Chapter 1 of 4

Samuel Peterson stood in his kitchen with a list of eleven families and no teacher to offer them. His son Kyle had come home last week saying a teacher told the class some boys were girls inside. Sarah had cried for her brother. Samuel had decided that night to pull the kids and start a small school of his own, run out of the country church down the road until he could build something real. He had the parents. He had the building. He had no one to stand at the front of the room. Katherine set coffee in front of him. "You can't teach it yourself," she said. "You'll be in the field by six." "I know." "Then go ask." He drove to the ranch first. Casey McAdams was his neighbor, and the closest thing Marshwood had to a real teacher outside the system. She met him at the fence in a flannel shirt with hay on her sleeves. Her two girls watched from the porch. "I need a teacher," Samuel said. "For eleven kids. Maybe more. Starting this fall." Casey didn't answer right away. She looked at her girls, then back at him. "I've got my own two. And a woman staying with me now with three of hers." "I know what you do on Sundays. I'm asking you to do it Monday through Friday too." "I can teach reading and math. I can teach the Bible." She paused. "I can't teach it all." "Then teach what you can." "You need someone for scripture who knows it cold. That isn't me." He nodded slowly. "You have someone in mind." "The pastor at the country church. The young one." Samuel drove there next. The church was small and weathered, with peeling paint at the steeple and a hand-lettered sign nailed above the door. Father Johnson was inside on a ladder, scraping mold off the ceiling. He was nineteen, thin, with a black mustache and dark eyes that didn't blink much. "I know who you are," the young pastor said before Samuel spoke. He climbed down. "I want to start a school here. In this room. Eleven kids to start. Casey McAdams will teach the day. I need someone for scripture and history." Father Johnson set the scraper on a pew. "I run two churches on rice and beans." "I'll feed you. I'll pay what I can." "That isn't why I'm asking." He looked around the room. "If I say yes, the state will notice. They notice small churches with children in them." "I know." Father Johnson was quiet a long moment. "Three mornings a week. I keep my churches." "Done." Samuel drove home with both names written on the back of an envelope. Katherine read them at the table without a word. Then she said, "You should call the families tonight." He reached for the phone. Before he lifted it, it rang. It was one of the fathers from his group, the one who never came to pickup. He was asking where the meetings would be held now.