Miss Katie's Rosewood (28 page)
Read Miss Katie's Rosewood Online
Authors: Michael Phillips
Tags: #FIC042030, #FIC042000, #FIC026000
“I don't know, Katie. I would never like to take you away from your family. At the same time, I would do everything in my power to protect you from danger. How Rosewood and our own future fit into that . . . I can't say. And whether I could be content being a cotton plantation husband,” he added with a smile, “âI suppose that's something I'm going to have to think about too! What if after this harvest, I hate the whole thing!”
Katie laughed. “You won't, Rob,” she said. “I promise. You will love it. There is nothing so satisfying as getting in a harvest! I mean, you
will
hate it. We all hate it. You sweat and your muscles ache and it seems like the rows will never end. It is
so
boring and tedious! And every little ball of cotton seems so insignificant. Yet all taken together, pretty soon you've picked a whole pound . . . and then the individual
pounds become a hundred pounds . . . and then a whole wagon is full . . . and gradually the field is finished and you move on and start in on the next . . . and it seems like it will never end. Yet when it is all done, you've got such a feeling of happiness and contentment and satisfaction to have planted something and watched it grow and mature and then bear fruit. And that's when you say, I love this place, I love this life!”
Rob turned and gazed at Katie's face beaming in the moonlight.
“Wow,” he said, “you
are
a plantation owner! You do love this, don't you?”
“I do, Rob. And you will too. Earning your life, producing your own bread and cheese and vegetables straight out of God's earth . . . it must be how God intended man to live. It's such a pure life.”
“Then perhaps, Miss Clairborne, the important thing now is the harvest. I'll get my hands rough like yours, and I'll learn to hate it, and maybe love it too . . . and
then
we'll worry about our future.”
He bent down and kissed her tenderly.
“I love you, Katie. You have made me a happy man tonight.”
“How could anyone be happier than I am at this moment?” sighed Katie. “I love you too, Rob.”
C
OTTON AND
O
MENS
46
I
t was probably after eleven when Katie burst into the house, and Rob walked in the moonlight back toward Jeremiah's cabin
.
We were all in bed and the lights were out. Whether anyone else was asleep I don't know. I wasn't. And once Katie dashed up the stairs and into my room yelling excitedly that Rob had proposed to her, lanterns went back on all through the house and whoever was asleep wasn't anymore!
Five minutes later Katie and I were in Aunt Nelda's room sitting on her bed and Katie was telling us all about it. Aunt Nelda was just as excited as we were. We were like three girls chattering away together. A few minutes later we heard footsteps in the hall, and then Papa and Uncle Ward knocked and popped their heads in and that's how they got the news
.
Papa came over to where we sat on the bed and congratulated Katie and gave her a kiss, then turned to go downstairs
.
“This is news that can't keep,” he said. “I'm going down to Henry and Josepha's.”
“But, Templeton,” said Aunt Nelda, “it's the middle of the night!”
“If we don't tell them now, Nelda,” he said, “even if I have to wake them up to do it, we'll get a dreadful scolding from Josepha at breakfast.”
Katie and Uncle Ward and I laughed so hard. We knew he was right!
“Hold on, brother Templeton!” said Uncle Ward. “I'll join you.”
A few minutes later we heard a few hoots and laughs and Praise da Lawds! from off in the distance, and we laughed again. When we finally got sleepy, Katie asked me to come sleep with her and I did. We talked quietly in her bed for another hour. That's when I first told her that Jeremiah and I had been talking about possibly marrying after the harvest
.
“Oh, Mayme . . . that's wonderful!” she exclaimed. “You've waited so long and patiently.”
But then gradually I could tell the news began to work on Katie in another way too. Funny as it seems to say it, telling her what I did made us both sad in a way. We both realized that the time of our special friendship, when we could be together completely and didn't have to share each other with anyone, was coming to an end. We both wanted to be married. But we didn't want to lose this part of our lives either. It was a consequence of falling in love neither of us had anticipated
.
And then I told Katie that Jeremiah and I had talked about staying in Jeremiah's cabin and fixing it up. I thought it would make her glad that we would be staying so close and wouldn't be leaving Rosewood. And I think that part of it did make her glad at first
.
But then she got quiet. She was realizing for the first time, I guess you'd say, that there weren't enough houses at Rosewood to go around. Henry and Josepha
now had their place. Jeremiah and I would fix up Jeremiah's cabin. That left only the big house and it was only right that Papa and Uncle Ward keep living there. At least that's how I knew Katie would think. There would be no place left for her and Rob!
They could build a new house, of course. But right now there wasn't money enough, and that's when the idea came into Katie's head that maybe she was going to be the one to leave Rosewood, and how could that not make her sad, even if she would be with Rob? She didn't want to leave here and go to some little town in Pennsylvania and sit at home all by herself with nothing to do and be the wife of a sheriff's deputy. She didn't tell me all this that night, but over the next few days, from things she said, I figured out what was worrying her
.
That didn't keep her from being happy. Part of her was ecstatic about really belonging to Rob. But being spoken for suddenly makes you start thinking about things in a whole new way, and some of those new things you have to think about can be a little fearsome. Being engaged means change. And sometimes change is hard
.
We didn't make it out into the fields quite so early the next morning! But the whole place was abuzz and excited over the news about Katie and Rob. I don't know if anyone else besides Katie was wondering what it might mean, and whether it meant that Katie would leave Rosewood. If so, no one mentioned it. I suppose it was something we would have to think about sometime, just like Rob and Katie would have to think about it. Katie was the life and soul of Rosewood. How could there even be a Rosewood without Katie? No one wanted to think about such things now
.
Katie didn't get much cotton picked that day. She
was too busy looking at Rob and the two of them talking and smiling. It was only Rob's second day and Katie was supposed to be teaching him, yet she was distracted as she could be! But the next day they did a little more, and by then the rest of us were going pretty good, and Henry was whizzing up and down the rows as if the rest of us were standing still
.
The days passed and the piles of cotton mounted
.
The conversations shifted as we moved along and passed each other in our rows. One day Katie and I found ourselves together again and were talking away like we always did. We looked up and saw Rob and Jeremiah in the distance also working together and laughing and talking. They spent the rest of the day working together and soon were becoming the best of friends. By then Rob could just about keep up with Jeremiah too
.
Aunt Nelda was so funny, all dressed up in one of Katie's mama's work dresses and sun hats. She had been a city girl all her life, and now there she was with her brothers, the three of them, going a little slower than the rest of us, looking like they were having so much fun. I found myself wondering what it had been like when they were children playing together. Did Papa and Uncle Ward play boy stuff together while Aunt Nelda and Katie's mother played dolls and house, or did all four romp about outside and play and get into mischief together? To see them now, you'd think they'd been friends all their lives. And to be able to work side by side on something so important, that draws people together all the more
.
No one had been into town from Rosewood in a couple of weeks.
“We's be needin' coffee an' salt an' a few other things, Mister Templeton,” Josepha announced at breakfast. “Somebody's gots ter be goin' inter town one er dese days.”
Templeton glanced around the table, not particularly anxious to lose any of the work crew for half a day.
“How about Jeremiah and I going in for it?” said Rob. “I haven't seen much of your town, nor met the famous Mrs. Hammond I've heard so much about. We'll be back within a couple of hoursâwhat do you say, Jeremiah?”
“Fine by me,” said Jeremiah, nodding. “What does you think, Mister Templeton?”
None of the blacks had gone to town in probably two months. But there had been no trouble for a long time and everyone hoped that the worst was behind them.
“Sure,” said Templeton, “I suppose there's no harm in it. But just go into the store and do your business and come home. Jeremiah, I know you'd probably like to see how things are going at Watson's . . . but don't. When he's ready to hire you back, he'll let us know.”
“All right, Mister Templeton. I understand.”
As soon as breakfast was over, they saddled two horses and galloped off. They arrived at Greens Crossing about half past eight, soon after Mrs. Hammond had opened her doors.
“Mo'nin' ter you, Miz Hammond,” said Jeremiah as they walked in.
“Hello, Jeremiah,” replied Mrs. Hammond, glancing toward the young man with him.
“Rob, dis is Miz Hammond, she's a good frien' ter my stepmama . . . well, I reckon you's a frien' ter all ob us, ain't you, Miz Hammond?”
“I hope so, Jeremiah.”
“Miz Hammond, dis here's Rob Paxton. He's from up norf by Baltimore. Lives in Pennsylvania nowadays.”
“I am pleased to meet you, ma'am,” said Rob with a smile and shaking her hand.
“Likewise, Mr. Paxton. Are you, uh . . . visiting here?”
“You'll neber believe it, Miz Hammond,” said Jeremiah, “but you's lookin' at da man dat jes' proposed ter Miz Katie.”
“Well . . . my goodness! That is wonderful news!” said Mrs. Hammond. “Congratulations, Mr. Paxton. And now I recall your nameâyou must be the young man who has been writing to Kathleen.”
“Yes, ma'am,” laughed Rob. “I suppose that would be me. I came down to help out with the cotton harvest and . . . well, as Jeremiah said, to ask Katie to marry me. I am happy to say that she consented.”
“I am happy for you both. Have you set a date yet for the wedding?”
“No, ma'am. It has all happened rather recently.”
“Well, that is one wedding I do not want to miss.”
“I will make sure you receive the first invitation to be sent out,” said Rob.
Mrs. Hammond smiled, clearly pleased. “Now, Miz Hammond,” said Jeremiah, “we's be needin' a few things an' we gots ter be gettin' back right soon. Here's a list from Josepha. She sends you her regards.”
Mrs. Hammond took the list and within five minutes Jeremiah and Rob were leaving the store with several sacks under their arms.
As they turned up the boardwalk where their horses were tied, they saw three white boys approaching from the other direction.
“Uh-oh . . .” said Jeremiah.
“What is it?” said Rob.
“It's Deke Steeves,” whispered Jeremiah. “Jes' don't say nuthin'.”
Steeves and his two cohorts paused beside the horses and waited.
Rob and Jeremiah walked off the boardwalk into the dirt street and to the backs of their two horses, where they loaded the goods and mail into their saddlebags. Then they went to their horses' heads to loosen the reins from the rail.