Backlands (4 page)

But what if she wasn't alone? Or was out in the cold night looking for him? Or maybe getting deathly sick again like he feared?

The scent of woodsmoke from the chimney made the thought of a warm kitchen and a cozy bed more appealing than a thin covering of straw in his pony's stall. Besides, he knew Ma would stay on the lookout for him all night if need be. He squared his shoulders, took a deep breath, marched inside, and shucked his coat. Ma was alone, sitting at the kitchen table. She didn't look at him, didn't say a word as she got up and took a plate of warm food from the oven and carried it to his place at the table. Matt got a glass of milk and sat, his eyes fixed on Ma, who acted busy searching through her sewing basket, as if he wasn't even there.

“Ma, I'm sorry,” he said.

She just shook her head and said nothing. Her jaw was clamped shut hard, and she had one of those icy looks in her eyes that Matt hated.

“You can switch me if you want,” he offered.

Ma flicked a glance at him like he was a complete stranger.

Miserable but hungry, Matt lowered his head and ate his food in silence.

When he finished, Ma took his plate, watched as he swallowed the last of his milk, and said, “Go to your room and stay there.”

He gathered his schoolbooks. “I said I was sorry.”

Ma pointed toward his bedroom.

Matt waited for her to say something more, but she turned back to her sewing. Defeated, he trudged to his room, threw himself on the bed, and tried hard not to cry. Sniffling, he opened his schoolbook to the arithmetic lesson Mr. Savacool had assigned for tomorrow. It would have been better if Ma had walloped him.

***

M
orning came, and Ma greeted Matt with silence until he was at the kitchen table staring unhappily at a steaming-hot bowl of oatmeal.

“Are you still planning to run away from home?” she asked as she placed a pitcher of milk next to his oatmeal.

Matt shook his head. “No, ma'am, and I wasn't really going to anyway.”

“Don't you ever put a fright like that into me again,” Ma said with a half smile.

Matt smiled back. “I won't, I promise.”

Ma ruffled his hair and gave him a quick kiss on the cheek. “Did you finish your homework last night?”

“Yes, ma'am.”

“Good. Eat your breakfast.”

Matt poured milk on the oatmeal and picked up his spoon. “I don't want you to die,” he said suddenly, the words spilling out.

“Hush now,” Ma replied gently. “I'm still here and there's no need for such sorrowful talk so early in the morning.”

Matt forced a smile, gave his ma a serious nod, and said, “Okay.”

“It's a lovely morning,” Ma said, “and a walk will do me good. Would you like some company again on your way to school?”

“Yes, ma'am,” Matt replied happily, glad all was forgiven.

***

O
n the walk to school, Jimmy Potter rushed up. “Morning,” he said to Ma as he careened to a stop next to Matt.

“Good morning, Jimmy,” Ma replied.

He nudged Matt with an elbow. “I got something to tell you,” he whispered low, almost bursting with excitement.

“What is it?” Matt whispered back, glancing up at Ma, who didn't seem at all interested in the conversation.

Jimmy shook his head. “I'll tell you at school.”

Wise in the ways of boys and their secrets, Ma slowed her pace. “You boys go on ahead.”

Jimmy grinned. “Race you!” he dared, breaking into full stride.

“No fair!” Matt yelled, chasing full tilt after him.

At the schoolhouse, the boys came to a panting stop in a dead heat.

“What's the big secret?” Matt asked after catching his breath.

“I saw a golden eagle down by the river yesterday and I found its nest high up in a big old cottonwood. It's huge—maybe four, five feet round and deep, real deep. Biggest bird nest I ever saw.”

“You sure it was an eagle?” Matt asked.

“You bet,” Jimmy replied, spreading his arms wide. “It was no more than a hundred feet above me, floating over the river, not even beating its wings. My pa says this is mating season, when they lay eggs, so there should be two of them, but I only saw one.”

“Maybe it's just an old nest,” Matt said, feeling a twinge of regret for being absent during such a grand discovery.

“Nope,” Jimmy said authoritatively. “There's fresh rabbit fur and bones scattered at the base of the cottonwood. Gopher and prairie dog bones too. Even some snakeskin. We gotta go right after school.”

“Count me in,” Matt said.

“Nobody's to know except us two and Joe Pete,” Jimmy cautioned.

“Mum's the word,” Matt said. He knew Jimmy had a single-shot .22 rifle and sometimes went bird hunting with his father. “You're not gonna shoot it, are you?”

Jimmy shook his head. “Pa says not to. But I'd sure like to find some eagle feathers.”

“Me too,” Matt echoed.

“I'll bring along my pa's field glasses,” Jimmy said.

Joe Pete caught up to Matt and Jimmy just as Mr. Savacool rang the school bell. As they hurried to their classroom, they told him about the after-school expedition.

“That's okay with me,” Joe Pete said with a grin as he shoved Matt up against the crowded hallway wall.

“Get off me, you lug!” Matt hooted, shoving back.

During recess and lunch the three chums made plans for the adventure. According to Jimmy, the eagle's nest was a far piece outside of town, deep in the bosque. To save time, the boys agreed to travel by horseback, which would give them plenty of daylight to look for the eagle and investigate the nest. Joe Pete, who didn't have a pony, would ride double with Matt on Patches, and Jimmy would be on Blue, his roan mare. Matt volunteered to bring snacks and Joe Pete agreed to bring a canteen of water.

When school let out, the boys split up and raced home. Matt slammed inside the house, out of breath and flushed with excitement, and told Ma about their plans to go by horseback to look for an eagle Jimmy had spotted in the bosque.

“Jimmy's bringing field glasses, Joe Pete the water, and I'm to bring something to eat,” he added. “Can I take some cookies?”

“Of course,” Ma said, smiling at Matthew's bubbling enthusiasm. “I'll put up a bag of snacks for you and the boys while you change and saddle Patches.”

“You're the best,” Matt said with a grin.

“But I want you home before dark,” Ma said, “and you must promise to be careful.”

“I promise,” Matt replied as he hurried to his room to change out of his school clothes.

He dressed in a hurry, had Patches saddled and bridled lickety-split, and came upon Joe Pete running down the road from his house, the canteen looped on his belt and bouncing against his hip. He gave him a hand up and broke Patches into a trot. Up ahead, past the last building on Main Street, Jimmy sat ahorseback waiting. They joined up, Jimmy took the lead, and soon they were past the last levee in thick bosque, dodging Patches and Blue around stands of brush and trees.

They broke into the open, crossed a wide, sandy channel where the river had once wandered, stopped under a stand of old cottonwoods heavy with buds on thick branches, and dismounted.

“We'll walk from here,” Jimmy said in a low voice.

“I don't see any eagles,” Joe Pete noted, his head craned skyward. “You made it all up, didn't you?”

“Did not,” Jimmy replied, punching Joe Pete on the arm.

Joe Pete playfully shoved Jimmy to the ground.

“Stop horsing around,” Matt said. “Where's the nest?”

“Yonder a ways,” Jimmy replied as he brushed twigs and leaves off the seat of his pants.

“Let's go,” Matt urged.

Once again, Jimmy took the lead, and soon they were at the base of a mighty cottonwood with a trunk wider than the smokestacks of the power plant in town. High up, an eagle nest lodged against the tree trunk, supported by two large lateral branches, the bottom bulging fit to burst.

“Holy cow,” Joe Pete said.

A shadow flashed above the crown of the cottonwood, followed by a high-pitched scream of
kee-kee-kee,
and there it was, floating away, white at the wing tips, gold at the nape.

“Hot diggity,” Matt said, pointing at a speck high above it. “There's another one!”

Mouths agape, the boys watched in silence as the majestic birds danced in the sky, swooping up, plummeting down, sweeping around each other in an ever-shrinking arc. Finally, the eagles circled away, across the Rio Grande toward the rock-strewn Robledo Mountains northwest of town.

“I bet there are eggs in the nest,” Jimmy said. “I'm climbing to see.”

“Dibs after you,” Matt called as he watched Jimmy hoist himself onto a low branch that curled almost to the ground.

Jimmy made his way quickly up the tree, pausing halfway to smile down at his pals. “Whoo-e,” he hollered. “This is high. Any sign of the eagles?”

“Nope,” Joe Pete answered. “I'm last, so hurry up. Otherwise it will be too dark for me to get a look.”

“Just hold your horses,” Jimmy said as he continued climbing.

“I'm starting up,” Matt announced, swinging onto the low branch. He threw a leg over it, pulled himself upright, found his footing, and scrambled upward. Above, Jimmy had almost reached the nest.

“What do you see?” Joe Pete yelled.

“Nothing yet,” Jimmy replied.

Matt was a good twenty feet above the ground when Jimmy crawled out on a branch that supported the nest and rose to take a look.

“It's empty,” Jimmy reported as the branch cracked and gave way. He tumbled down, arms and legs flailing, crashing against the boughs, the eagles' nest disintegrating around him as it also fell. He landed with a thud, his head bouncing hard against an old log.

Matt scurried down the tree to Joe Pete, who was at Jimmy's side trying to rouse him. Blood gushed from a wound in the back of Jimmy's head, and he wasn't moving.

“Take Blue,” Matt ordered. “Ride to town. Get help. Leave the canteen.”

Joe Pete stood frozen, staring at Jimmy's bloody head and vacant eyes. “Is he dead?”

“Go on,” Matt shouted. “Get!”

Joe Pete dropped the canteen on the ground and ran to get Blue.

Matt shucked his coat, took off his shirt, and tried to stem the blood from the wound, but it just soaked through the shirt and kept bleeding. He poured water on Jimmy's face to wake him, tried shaking him conscious, yelled his name over and over. Jimmy didn't move.

He lowered an ear to Jimmy's mouth. He wasn't breathing. He put his ear to Jimmy's chest. His heart wasn't beating.

Matt sank back on his haunches, tears rolling down his face. He kept Jimmy company without moving, shivering in the cold until Joe Pete and a posse of men with lanterns gleaming in the dusk arrived.

“I should have caught you,” Matt whispered into Jimmy's ear as hands pulled him away. “I should have caught you.”

It was the worst day of Matthew Kerney's young life.

P
atrick Kerney slipped into one of the last remaining empty seats at the back of the church. Up ahead, the small casket containing Jimmy Potter's body stood in front of the altar rail. Except for soft organ music from the choir loft above, the occasional shuffling of feet, and a stifled cough or two, silence reigned. In the front pew Patrick could make out the broad back and big shoulders of Jimmy's father, Luke Potter. Luke had been a friend since his arrival in Engle some years back. He'd come from Kansas to supervise the vast freight yards built by the railroad to store and ship materials to the massive Elephant Butte Dam construction project on the Rio Grande. When the job ended, Luke got promoted and transferred to Las Cruces. Patrick hadn't seen much of him since then.

Luke's wife, Jeannie, sat next to him. She was a tall, thin woman, quiet by nature. Her sunny personality and intelligent brown eyes livened up her otherwise plain features. She slumped against Luke as if the spark in her had been permanently extinguished.

On the same aisle two rows back, Emma sat with Matt, her arm wrapped protectively around his shoulders. Patrick had long given up the notion that Emma would ever reconcile with him enough to let him back into her heart or into her bed. Instead, they had forged a tense, polite truce based on his promise to do his best to be a good father to the boy. Two years of trying hadn't done much to strengthen the ties that bind. Patrick accepted his share of the blame, but Matt had never warmed to him, and Emma always seemed to have one reason or another to cut short their ranch visits.

They'd settled into a routine of three ranch visits a year during Matt's school holidays. Although Patrick would never say it aloud, that suited him fine. He just didn't have much of a talent for fathering. He'd proved that long ago with CJ, the day he shot the boy's pony after riding it half drunk, getting bucked off, and crashing headfirst into the stubbing post. They scuffled over it, and CJ left the ranch that very day, never to come back.

That was the last Patrick saw of him. His sodden stupidity caused CJ to run off to the army and get himself killed in France. The memory of it pursued him daily, one of many dim-witted blunders he'd made over the years that had kept him drinking until Emma forced him to stop.

In the pulpit, the preacher cleared his throat, shuffled a few pages in his big Bible, and looked out over the congregation. Not one for religion or speechifying, Patrick stopped listening before the preacher's sermon began, his thoughts wandering to Matt. He'd heard tell that some folks held the boy responsible for the accident, saying he'd shamed and bullied Jimmy into climbing that old cottonwood tree to peek into the eagle's nest. Patrick didn't believe it and hoped Luke and Jeannie didn't either. But if they did, he'd stand behind Matt come what may, no matter where the balance of truth fell. Emma would rightly expect no less from him. The boy had to be hurting miserably over seeing his friend die before his very eyes. Patrick knew that feeling all too well from his experiences with the Rough Riders in Cuba.

Patrick couldn't tell how Emma was faring through the tragedy. He knew she'd been mighty sick until recently, with the folks in town who knew her best worrying about her and fearing the worst. But last week, his lawyer had sent a copy of the registered deed for two sections of homesteaded land in the San Andres Mountains backlands Patrick had bought from a hardscrabble sheep rancher. In a note inside it, the lawyer wrote that Emma was much improved and back to her old self again.

He didn't doubt it, looking at her straight back and square shoulders. She'd always been slender, but now she looked frail. He wondered if her latest recovery would hold true for long. So many times during their marriage, he'd seen her recover from a bad spell only to decline again into poor health. So many times, he'd heard the doctors warn her to take better care of herself or accept the inevitable that someday she'd become a bedridden invalid. So many times he'd gone to sleep next to her wondering if he'd wake up in the morning to find her dead.

He'd never stopped worrying about her. In spite of their breakup, all the harsh, bitter words that passed between them, and the times she'd driven him half
loco
with her ways, he'd never loved anybody more. He studied the line of her long neck, just visible above her collar, and yearned for their happier days together.

As the pastor read a lengthy passage of scripture, Patrick shook off his glum thoughts and mulled over what he planned to do with his newly bought two sections. The twelve hundred eighty acres were some distance away from his ranch holdings and mostly surrounded by marginal government land that drew few pilgrims willing to stake a homestead claim. It had been overgrazed by the sheep rancher but not chewed down to the roots. If the wet weather held through spring, the grasses would start to come back.

With the war over these last two years, the Brits no longer buying American beef to feed their army, and on-the-hoof prices falling, he had no intention of buying more cattle to pasture on his new acreage. After spring works, when his steers, the barren cows, and some of the culled yearlings sold, he'd pay his outstanding bills, fence the two sections, knock down the small shepherd's shack, sink a well near the live water source, and hold it in reserve for the next drought, which would surely come; of that he was certain. And when it came, a rested, high-country pasture with live water and good browse might mean the difference between the survival and the failure of the Double K.

The service ended and Patrick ducked outside to wait on the street for Emma and Matt. As the congregation slowly left the church, he wondered how she would greet him. He'd missed the wake, so would it be with stony silence or a cold reserve? Either way, neither mother nor son would show him much warmth, if any, and he had little of it to offer to them himself.

He waited with the ever-present twinge of uncertainty that always came over him just before he saw her. He never quite knew what to expect from her and often guessed wrong. Her looks, her smarts, her fierce emotions, and her strange ways had baffled him when they first met and still baffled him now.

As Emma and Matt emerged from the church and approached, Patrick removed his hat, ran a hand through his freshly cut hair, and nodded by way of a greeting.

Emma nodded back. “Say hello to your father, Matthew,” she said.

“Hello,” Matt replied dutifully, his voice hollow. He looked pained and miserable.

Patrick forced a smile. The boy mystified him. “It's good to see you, son. Are you holding up all right?”

Matt nodded stiffly. “Sort of.”

Patrick patted Matt's shoulder. “That's the spirit.”

Matt dropped his head and stared at his shoes, refusing to look up until Patrick removed his hand.

“Did you just get here?” Emma asked snappishly. “You weren't at the wake.”

Patrick stifled a curt reply. “No, but I was in the back during the service.” Emma's cheeks were rosy and her eyes bright, but somehow she looked fragile, although he couldn't say why. He looked at Matt, who had walked on ahead of them a few paces. “Are Luke and Jeannie blaming Matt for the accident?” he asked softly.

Emma shook her head. “No, they know it was Jimmy's idea from the start.”

“That's good.”

The low murmurings of the waiting mourners who'd gathered in tight groups drifted away to silence as the pallbearers carrying the casket emerged from the church, followed closely by Luke and Jeannie. Bells tolled from the steeple as the mourners slowly assembled behind the grieving couple for the short walk to the nearby cemetery.

“Walk with us,” Emma whispered.

Patrick nodded and joined Emma and Matt as they stepped out to join the slow-moving procession.

At the grave site, the preacher said comforting words to console Jimmy's parents and then read a short prayer to lay the little boy to rest. With a final
amen,
the casket was lowered and folks began to disperse, leaving Luke and Jeannie standing alone, frozen, clutching each other at the foot of the open grave.

Matt turned away, walked to a nearby headstone, and stood with his back to the grave site.

“Her doctor says she can't have another baby,” Emma whispered as she blinked away the tears in her eyes. “She's lost her only child.”

“I didn't know that,” Patrick replied, glancing at Matt, who hadn't budged from his spot a few feet away.

“That's so tragic,” Emma added.

“I reckon so.”

“I remember how eager you were for us to have children so I wouldn't leave you.”

Patrick's eyes widened. “Don't go making things up, Emma. I never said anything like that.”

Emma almost smiled. “You didn't have to. The fact that you never gave a hoot about being a good father is proof enough.”

“Are you going to chew on me about that again?”

Emma took two steps in Matthew's direction and halted. “No, you made an honest attempt a time or two, when I asked, but it just wasn't in you. And I do appreciate you making an effort with Matthew as best you can.”

“Well, ain't I just about a worthless wreck of a man,” Patrick growled.

“Don't get in a dither, Patrick,” Emma soothed. “I guess I should thank you for giving me Matthew. He's all I have to save me from Jeannie's fate. I don't think I could endure losing an only child. Burying Molly and losing CJ in the war were bad enough.”

Patrick's jaw dropped a little. He searched Emma's face for any hint of mockery and found none. She'd divorced him after he'd forced himself on her, calling him a loathsome rapist and an incompetent father and compelling him to sign legal papers acknowledging Matthew as his natural son before the child was even born. Now she was thanking him.

“Do you mean that?” he asked.

Emma smiled slightly. “Don't take it as a full pardon of your behavior.”

“There are no halfway pardons,” Patrick noted emphatically.

Emma shrugged off Patrick's strong reaction. “I was just being snippy.” She walked to Matthew, took him by the hand, and continued down the path to the street.

“What were you talking about?” Matt asked.

“Nothing important,” Emma replied.

Matt frowned at her answer.

“She was telling me that I'm a damn fool who made too many mistakes,” Patrick explained.

“Is that why you're divorced?” Matt asked.

“Yep,” Patrick answered.

“I'm glad,” Matt announced.

“I'm sorry to hear that,” Patrick replied.

Matt shrugged and fell silent.

Emma yanked Matt's hand. “Don't be disrespectful, young man.”

“No harm done,” Patrick interjected.

“Sorry,” Matt said obediently.

Emma sighed and shook her head in displeasure at Matthew as they turned the corner onto Main Street. “Come with us to the house. We have a lot to talk about.”

“Such as?”

“Matthew's future,” she answered. “Someday it will be in your hands. At least a part of it, and I want no misunderstandings between us.”

Patrick's throat tightened. “Got it all figured, have you?”

“Why, yes, I think I do.”

“I'm not going home,” Matt said, yanking free from Emma. “I don't want to hear it, not ever.” He clamped his hands over his ears and scowled at them.

Emma pulled his hands away from his ears. “Stop that.”

Matt struggled, broke free, and covered his ears again. “I shoulda caught him!” he cried. “I shoulda stopped him. It's my fault Jimmy's dead.”

“No, no, no,” Emma said, reaching to embrace Matt, who turned and took off running full tilt down Main Street.

“That boy is hurting something fierce,” Patrick said as he watched Matt dart around pedestrians on the sidewalk and disappear down a side street.

“It's not just that. Ever since the accident he's been asking me when I'm going to die. He hates the notion of it now more than ever.”

“I hate that idea myself.”

Emma raised an eyebrow. “Really?”

“Yes, ma'am. Aren't you going to fetch him back?”

Emma shook her head. “Let him go. Are you coming to the house?”

“I surely am. I can't wait to hear what you've got cooked up for the boy.”

Emma looked up at Patrick and smiled. “The
boy
is your son, Patrick, and I'd appreciate it if you call him by his name.”

“I'll surely try.”

“Thank you. You probably won't like what I have to say to you.”

“Well then, let's get it over and done with.”

***

P
atrick Kerney sat silently at the kitchen table over a cup of coffee as Emma skimmed through the general terms of the trust she'd established for Matt. It effectively cut him out from any say or control over how her assets could be used to benefit the boy. While she made it sound like it was all simply the best for Matt, Patrick took it as a slap in his face. Her trust document might as well have just come out and said that he was a scoundrel not to be counted on to look after his own flesh and blood. It made him plenty irate.

When Emma finished talking, Patrick took a long minute to stifle his aggravation for fear she'd fall silent at any hint of displeasure and send him away before he learned more. Instead he asked, “How much will there be to care for him?”

“Enough to see him to his eighteenth birthday,” Emma replied.

“I didn't ask how long it would last. I asked how much.”

“Why do you need to know that?”

“The boy will be living with me. It's helpful to know.”

Emma took a moment to consider her answer. “It's money for Matthew only.”

“I understand that. I ain't gonna steal from him, Emma. How much?”

“You've always put your own needs first, which is why I've made these arrangements. He'll have fifteen hundred dollars a year.”