All Together in One Place (46 page)

“We need to be laughing some,” Elizabeth said. She held her skirt out and fluttered it to create a breeze against her legs.

“Laughing? I'm too tired at night to eat, let alone laugh,” Betha said

“But that's what'll keep us going,” Elizabeth said, “Got to tend to business, take care of each other, and then we got to laugh.”

“How do you propose to do it, Mother?”

“I'm pondering that.”

An owl hooted in the distance, and they could hear the buzz of
insects, the low hum of returned bees mixing with the whine of mosquitoes. The women made their way back to the tents. The air felt cooler outside of the wagon box, and allowing Suzanne and Clayton to stay inside kept the child from wandering off should he wake in the night. Elizabeth pulled the muslin sheet over her head. “Maybe we should borrow some of those tin coverings that keep the bees in,” she said. “Might keep the mosquiters out.”

Evening scents of dying embers drifted around them in the dark.

“Best laugh I've had is finding that money,” Mazy said into the quiet.

Elizabeth chuckled. “Guess we can laugh at old things if we can't think of anything new. Still surprises me that it was so much.”

“The Malarkys didn't strike me as people who could cash us out.”

“And what was left over from the wagons and the brute and cows purchase, it shouldn't have been that much.”

“Something doesn't seem right about it,” Mazy said.

“Jeremy did want to provide for you. Maybe he just planned to surprise you when you reached Oregon. Me too.”

“He knew I didn't like surprises.”

Several wagons passed them going east; riders, too. Ruth tipped her hat to men leading packed mules. They rode fine ponies, sturdy, short-bodied animals. They'd be good to mix with her horses, give their animals a little more size and, in her breed, bring in more stockiness, the toughness needed for these prairies. Maybe today they'd catch up with her small herd, find Matt and Joe Pepin and travel with them. Ruth wished they had split up the wagons right away, never turned back at all, not waited for a disaster to set them back on course. She'd be farther from Zane if they had. They'd be in Laramie by now if they hadn't. But that, too, had been her story: hindsight, doubling back.

Families in wagons hauled by mules stared as they passed Ruth on the left, the side toward the Platte. Well, let them. She guessed the mens pants and the floppy hat might have thrown them off, made them wonder. But she'd seen a few women wearing bloomer costumes—hers wasn't much stranger than those. Most didn't speak to her or to anyone as far as she could tell from her view back at the end of the line. At least they weren't attempting small talk, and so she needn't worry that anyone would remember later who she was.

“We need help with one of Betha's oxen,” Mariah said. She'd ridden up on Jumper, the girls and the horse having the task of patrolling along the four wagons, passing messages back and forth, checking on yokes and mules. “His foot is bad, I think. His shoe come off.”

“We knew that would happen,” Ruth said. “Just not when. Feet should have been tough enough by now. You stay back here. Will you be all right?”

“Sure. Me and Jump can handle it.”

Ruth trotted forward to Betha's wagon, which was always second so that Zilah could be called to assist Mazy and Elizabeth if needed. She reined up next to Betha's team.

“It's Cicero,” Betha said, wringing her hands. “He's just the best one, don't you know.”

Ruth called for a halt, dismounted, then ran her hand down the ox's leg. “This one?” she asked Betha.

The big ox objected to her touch, and he shifted his weight, putting more of it on the sore hoof, which made him bellow and slip his other hoof from her hand. It landed, solid as a tree trunk. He fluttered his skin against a fly and switched his tail toward Ruth's bent face.

“Have you done this sort ofthing before?” Lura asked.

“Just seen it done,” Ruth said. “I've helped throw a horse, get it on its side to geld, but I don't know that that same procedure would work here.”

“Oh, he's already a steer, dear, I'm sure ofthat,” Lura said.

“I know that,” Ruth said, the only one of the group who didn't laugh. “I wasn't talking about gelding him, but throwing him.”

The ox let Ruth lift his foot when she tried again, but when she touched the tender spot beneath, he leaned in to her and dropped his hoof to the ground, barely missing her toes as she jumped back.

“Maybe we can use a rope just to hold him off balance,” Tipton said.

Ruth turned to look at her. “Have you seen that done?”

Tipton shrugged her shoulders.

They talked of digging a trench and tipping him in it, upside down.

“That seems dreadful,” Betha said.

“Grease his foot maybe,” Mazy offered. She swatted at flies circling her bonnet.

“We might try that first,” Tipton said. “See if he'd step into a bucket. Make up a temporary shoe with some buffalo hide, until we reach Laramie and can have a farrier look at him.”

“All that tar and tallow? That's so dirty.”

Ruth ran a rope she secured from Betha's wagon, reaching it over the big animal's shoulder. She drew it across his back and over and tied to a back hock, then around so it could be pulled to keep him off balance if he tried to lean in to her when she lifted his front leg.

“Pour all but an inch or so out of it, into someone else's grease bucket,” Ruth ordered. Her voice came out sharp. She didn't care. “Put it right beside me, Tipton. You control it. Elizabeth, when I lift on his leg, you pull on the rope to keep him off balance, so he doesn't crowd me. Tell me when you're ready.”

Tipton filled a bucket almost to the top. Then she set the nearly empty bucket where Ruth directed. “Ready,” she said.

Elizabeth tugged slightly on the rope, the ox being used as its own pulley, and when Ruth lifted the big foot, Elizabeth pulled the rope, holding it.

“Let it down!” Ruth said, sliding the bucket under as she did.

Cicero lifted his heavy foot again, out of the bucket, just as Mazy handed Ruth a large square of buffalo hide cut from the Pawnee gift. Ruth dropped the hide, and Cicero put his greased foot square in the middle. Ruth shouted, “Rawhide!” and Naomi handed her the twists that Ruth used to tie the buffalo hide around his hoof.

But something about the rawhide bothered Cicero. He shifted his weight now, bellowed and lumbered his body side to side, moving the wagon forward and back.

“Pull the rope, Elizabeth,” Ruth yelled. “Chock the wheel! He's not liking all this. Everyone step back.”

What happened next came quickly.

Cicero yanked Plato, his yoke mate, distressing the four oxen behind them Mazy struggled to set the wheel chock. Shouted orders drifted back. Then from the side came Pig chasing Fip.

Little black nubbins like buttons on Fip's head could be seen like snake
eyes
by the women as the two made straight for the wagon. They ran under the oxen, Fip squeezing beneath the oxen's bellies, Pig panting and bounding over the tongue.

Betha, who'd climbed up onto the wagon stood, yelled, “No, Pig!” just as she lost her balance, toppled over the side onto Lura, who'd been standing too close to the grease bucket—the ftill one—which spilled over them both.

Women, grease, dirt, and skirts rolled together just beyond the oxen's feet while Ruth steadied the team on one side and Mazy at the other.

“Whoa, Cicero. Whoa, now,” Ruth cautioned. The ox bellowed, shook his head and long horns. “Get over here, Betha,” Ruth shouted. “He knows you. Help setde him.”

“He won't know her now,” Mariah said.

Black tar and resin, thick tallow and dirt covered both Betha and Lura, who pulled each other up. Betha laughed first, pointing a filthy finger at Lura.

“Do I look as bad as you?” she said.

“Much worse,” Lura told her. “I always wanted a cocoa-colored apron Just didn't want it sticking to me!”

Cicero calmed with Betha's chuckling Ruth shook her head and snickered, the rest joining her in relief. The laughter started as a ripple and grew until even Sister Esther s stiff shoulders shook. The Celestials smiled and waved their arms in excitement. They ducked their heads beneath their mushroom-shaped hats Deborahs wide sleeves collected the breeze as she pointed and laughed.

“What is it?” Suzanne said. “What's so funny?”

“Kind of hard to describe,” Mazy said. “Two pretty dirty women.”

“Try to describe it,” Suzanne said, and Ruth heard a pleading in her voice, a wish to join in such as Ruth had never heard from her before.

It was Tipton who described it

“Pig chased the antelope that startled Cicero, who jerked the wagon that discombobulated Betha, who toppled onto Lura, and both splattered on top of the full bucket of grease that I filled. Both are sitting in the dirt, spitting up grease.”

A smile moved across Suzanne's face. “I'm trying to picture it,” she said

“Good thing I had padding to land on,” Betha said, shaking her hands as if the muck would flick off.

“Are you talking about me or something else?” Lura asked, attempting to stand. Her tight little curls of brown hair wore splattered grease that spread as her fingers forgot and scratched at her nose. “How can such a little amount of grease go so far?”

“That blasted Fip,” Betha said.

“Elizabeth?” The women said in chorus.

“I know, I know,” Elizabeth said coming from around the other side. “I've a heap of cleaning to do, maybe all the way to the Pacific. But Pig helped”

“Pig, how could you!” Mazy said, but she was laughing.

“Oh, let's blame the ox,” Elizabeth said. “Our wagon shouldn't bear the full brunt. We'll be cleaning in heaven if we have to make amends for everything.”

“Why, that'd be a joy,” Betha told her.

Tears rolled down their faces, and Mazy thought how odd tears were—that they arrived looking alike whether worn by grief or relief. “At least Cicero survived,” she said.

“And Clayton didn't cause this,” Suzanne said. “I'm glad ofthat.”

“Nope, the kids are out of this one,” Mazy said, wiping her eyes with her thumbs.

“Where are they, anyway?” Betha asked. They all turned to search.

At that moment they heard Mariah's cry.

Behind the wagon, Sarah spied something white. The breeze lifted it, but she caught and unfolded it. She tried to read the big words, wishing they still had the classes studying letters and such. There were lots of numbers and lines and rectangles. She thought she read the word
propolis
and maybe
frames.
The paper had some weight to it, perfect for folding into a kite. She creased it and threw it. It lifted, rose, and then dropped. She skipped after it, refolded it, and this time sent it soaring, somewhere far behind the last wagon toward the stock. It caught in a bramble of greasewood and sage. She had started toward it when she heard Mariah's cry and rushed back to that excitement instead.

Mariah carried the small boy. She cried as she handed him off to Mazy's outstretched arms. He was wailing, and Mazy was grateful.

“I didn't mean to,” Mariah said. “I mean Jumper didn't. He just showed up. I never saw him.”