Garters.htm (10 page)

Cracking an egg into the beans, Esme sighed in exasperation now as she did then. There was just no talking to Pa. The way she felt—the worthlessness, the shame—he felt no part of that. Maybe that was a good thing. Glancing over at the twins who were cheerfully trading tickles with Armon Hightower, she decided that it apparently didn't bother them, either.

Shuddering, she felt it again. Standing before them all in her ragged dress was as if she were naked. And Cleav… he saw her. He saw her shame. She wondered if he pitied her. A lone tear fell unheeded into the big pot of boiling beans.

A scream of laughter abruptly halted her thoughts, and she looked toward her sisters. Adelaide was actually lying back on the bench screeching with laughter as Annon leaned over ostensibly tickling her ribs. Agrippa had her arms around the young man's chest and had pressed herself tightly against his back, pretending to be protecting her sister.

What immediately caught Esme's attention was the serious heated look in Armon Hightower's eye. The look was not playful, it was dark with passion.

Grabbing up a bucket of water, she poised it threateningly before them.

"Stop that this instant! Or I swear I'll give you something to cool you off in a hurry!"

The action froze immediately. With calm careful movements, as if not wanting to startle Esme
into any drastic moves, the three disengaged themselves from their naughty
little entanglement.

Esme set the water back in its place with a thud.

"Adelaide, Agrippa, you two sit on this side of the table and behave like young ladies."

The two quietly and without comment followed their younger sister's orders. Esme hurriedly turned back to the beans and gave them a quick stir to keep them from scorching before continuing her tirade. Holding the bean-splattered spoon before her like a weapon, she turned her attention to Hightower,

"Young man, I expect decent behavior in my house," she told him angrily. "If you cain't conduct yourself with propriety, you're going to find yourself real unwelcome around here." Esme's chin was raised stubbornly, and her eyes blazed with fury. Armon Hightower was five years older and twice her size, but he knew a formidable enemy when he saw one.

"I apologize, Miss Esme," he said quietly. "I guess it's this warm spring weather—it's got the sap running, I reckon."

Esme started to make a reply about not letting his sap run around here but thought the better of it.

She turned back to her beans.

"Cornbread's done," she stated with exaggerated calmness. "Best call Pa in to supper."

The meal did not set her in a better frame of mind. Armon turned his considerable charm toward her father. The bright-eyed, smiling young man had Pa laughing and grinning until Esme wanted to reach over and slap him. Armon was clearly looking to get on Yo's good side, and he was probably succeeding! Esme had little taste for her supper. How was she supposed to keep the twins respectable and safe if Pa wouldn't even scare off a no-account like Hightower?

She was more convinced than ever that her plan was the proper course of action. As long as they lived in a cave and were, as the preacher had said today, the most "bowed down" in the community, Esme knew any good-for-nothing male type with an itch in his britches was going to come looking for the twins. There must be some unwritten law that said poor women were fair game, because when fellows went looking to sow wild oats, that's exactly the girls they picked.

In a big blue house with a wraparound porch, menfolk would come courting the twins. They would woo and spark 'em on the porch swing maybe. But they wouldn't be laying 'em on the kitchen bench.

"Mr. Hightower,'' she said with great formality, "am I to understand that you are interested in paying call on my sisters?"

Armon glanced quickly at Yo and then the twins.

"Well, sure, Miss Esme, your sisters are a couple of mighty fine gals."

Esme's words were in as haughty a tone as she could project. "Then I'm sure Pa would agree to allow you to pay call to
one
of them."

"One?" Armon amazingly seemed surprised.

"We've always shared everything!" the twins protested.

"You cannot share a man." Esme was adamant.

Staring dumbfounded across the table for a moment, Armon scratched his head thoughtfully.

"Miss Esme, I ain't got the faintest idea of how to choose between these two."

"But you must choose!" she insisted.

"Well, he don't have to choose right away," Yo said, causing Esme's mouth to open in shock and her eyes to blaze in anger.

"Pa!"

"All I'm saying is a man's got to take his time about these things." Pa smiled, giving the twins a wink and Armon a slight nod of approval.

"A man can't call on two women at once!" Esme would not give on the point.

"That's right, Esme-girl," Pa agreed, hoping to make peace. "That why I'm saying he can call on Agrippa on Fridays and Adelaide on Saturdays."

"What!"

"Just till he's had a chance to make up his mind."

"Oh, please, Esme, please." The twins were bright-eyed with hope.

Even Armon seemed content with the compromise.

"I still don't like it," Esme said slowly. "But I suspect it's okay. But listen here, Hightower," she said, pointing her finger at him. "If you're coming on Fridays and Saturdays, I don't want to see you around this place any other time. Sunday through Thursday you find yourself elsewhere!"

"Yes ma'am!" The man flashed her a dazzling smile of compliance, and Esme wondered if she'd lost this round after all.

Armon took his leave shortly after supper, much to the whining dismay of the twins. Esme was grateful for the respite. She couldn't imagine how she was going to handle a man like Armon Hightower if he didn't choose to cooperate with her wishes.

As she cleaned up the supper dishes, Esme again thought about the big white (soon to be blue, she hoped) house with the wraparound porch. This morning in church she'd have sworn that she'd never be able to face Cleavis Rhy again. But she really had no choice. She had come to like Cleavis Rhy, maybe even want him for herself, but she
needed
Cleavis Rhy for her family.

The girls were sorting through the charity basket with excited laughter as Esme dried her hands on the dishcloth.

"I'm not going to be around much next week," she announced suddenly to the family. "I'll be spending my time down mountain."

The other three occupants of the room looked at her curiously.

"Agrippa, you're the best cook, so I'll expect you to do your best here in the kitchen. Adelaide, you'll need to go ahead and get that garden turned. Pa, you're going to have to help her."

All three immediately began to protest, but Esme continued. "Starting tomorrow I'm going to be helping Cleavis Rhy in his store, so I'll be leaving before sunup and returning after dark."

"Rhy's hired you to work in his store?" Pa looked nearly stunned with disbelief.

"Well, not exactly," Esme admitted. "But it amounts to that just the same."

"Is this more of your crazed notions about courting a man?'' her father asked with a wry grin.

"I'm going to show him what a good helpmate I can be, Pa," Esme explained calmly. "There ain't nothing wrong with that."

"Esme-girl," Yo explained with a sigh of infinite patience. "If he's looking for a good helpmate, I suspect he's found it in little Miss Sophrona. She seems a fine Christian woman and more than fair looking in the bargain."

Esme felt as if he'd slapped her.

"You think she'd make a better wife than me?"

"It ain't a question of better, girlie," he answered softly. "It's a question of more likely. I love you, honey. I wouldn't see you hurt for the world." Reaching across the table, he took his daughter's hand and squeezed it. "I see what you're doing, Esme-girl. You're trying to get a better life. And I'm all for that."

"Not just for me, Pa," Esme hastened to explain. "For all of us."

"All of us are fine, girlie. It's you that cain't be content. You're like your mama, and I loved her, too." He gave her hand a warm, affectionate pat. "This Rhy fellow, he ain't for you. He's so citied, he don't know 'come here' from 'sic 'em.' He'd need to take a compass and a shovel to find his own hind end."

"No, Pa," Esme protested. "He's not like that at all. He's a gentleman and all, that's for sure. But he's got good sense. You know what he's doing in them ponds he built behind the store? He's raising fish. Raising 'em, just like theys chickens or something. He's got fish like setting hens and others like roosters, and a whole pond full of little brooder chicks no bigger than a finger."

Yohan watched his daughter's eyes as she talked. The spark of curiosity and intellect burned so brightly there.

"Trout in the river are getting overfished," Esme explained, "and the temperature of the water ain't always right for 'em. Cleav is growing more to make sure they don't give out completely."

"Cleav, is it?" Her father raised an eyebrow.

"Mr. Rhy, that is." Esme hurriedly corrected herself.

Pa gave her a long, hard look. "You hankering after this Cleavis Rhy, you think?"

Esme felt her cheeks burn with embarrassment. "Yes, Pa," she admitted in a quiet whisper.

"Hallelujah!" Adelaide shouted. Both she and Agrippa came running over to hug their little sister.

Accepting her sisters' affection, Esme still looked back to her father, hoping for approval, help, or hope. Pa only smiled and raised his fiddle to his chin and began plucking out a lively tune.

"She gets the dress," Agrippa said with certainty.

Adelaide nodded with agreement.

"What dress?" Esme asked.

"The prettiest dress you've ever seen in your life," Adelaide told her.

"It was the best thing in the whole basket,'' Agrippa said.

Pulling out the snowy bundle of white lawn, Agrippa shook the gown out before her. The light summer material was sewn in neat pleats across the bodice and the long skirt billowed to the floor.

"Try it on, Esme," Adelaide insisted. "Try it on right now!"

With more force than help the sisters had quickly dispensed with Esme's worn old serge, and she stood momentarily in the middle of the room, shivering in her threadbare shimmy.

Up and over her head the beautiful gown of store-bought lawn was draped over Esme. Immediately she was uncomfortable.

"What's wrong with this?" she asked her sisters in unpleasant surprise.

Agrippa surveyed her critically.

"Well, it doesn't fit," she told her simply.

The dress was several inches too short, that was clear. But there were other more serious problems.

"It's too tight in the waist," Adelaide said.

"I'm aware of that," Esme replied with a self-deprecating grin. "I can hardly breathe."

"I think we can take it out," Agrippa told her, grasping the rather voluminous folds of material that hung down past the sash.

"Look at all this wasted fabric in the bodice!" she exclaimed to Esme. "With all this a man couldn't tell if you have bosoms or you're hiding a polecat!"

Adelaide laughed along with her sister. "The gal who gave this away must have weaned the triplets."

"It looks awful," Esme stated fatalistically.

"But it's going to look wonderful," Agrippa promised her. "All this extra material means we'll be able to let out the waist and have plenty left to retrim the hemline."

"You're right. I can make it fit me." Esme's voice was hopeful.

"Of course you could," Agrippa agreed. "But you ain't going to."

"What?"

"Adelaide and I sew better than you and you know it. We just don't care for mending much." She glanced toward her twin and met a nod of agreement.

"You go on down to the General Merchandise and help Mr. Rhy," Adelaide told her. "Between chores we'll get this dress fixed up for you."

"That's not fair," Esme protested.

The fiddle playing in the corner stopped abruptly, and Pa's voice was warm but firm. "It's the fairest thing that's happened around here in a good long while."