Opal (4 page)
‘‘You tend to your business there, you little scamp.’’ She dabbed at his mouth with her apron. ‘‘Don’t waste the good stuff. The cow hasn’t come in yet.’’ Not long after their wedding two springs ago, Rand had come home leading a milk cow.
‘‘Wouldn’t it be just as easy to tame one of the seven hundred cows you have?’’
‘‘No. Beef cows and milk cows are two different things.’’
‘‘Look mighty close to the same to me—four legs, four teats, a head, and a tail. Color’s different, is all.’’
Rand had assumed his patient look and tried to explain the difference. Finally he finished with, ‘‘You saw that long-horned mama take after me that day. You think she’d let me milk her? I’d get kicked clear to Dickinson if I tried.’’
‘‘If you say so.’’
‘‘Besides, milk cows give a lot more milk than range cows and for longer.’’
‘‘How do you know? Those calves out there look mighty fat.’’
That evening he had called, ‘‘Ruby, come on out here so I can teach you how to milk.’’
‘‘Me?’’
Ruby could still remember the shock she’d felt when she realized he was serious about her taking over milking Fawn, as they’d named her. Back at the hotel they’d bought milk and cream from their next-door neighbor. Learning to be a ranch wife took more training than running a hotel. She’d learned to milk but had drawn the line at butchering. At least so far. Between Rand and Beans, there was always someone around to dress out whatever game was brought in. The young chickens hadn’t grown big enough to eat, and all the hens were laying, so she’d managed to forestall that grisly job.
The first time she’d tried gutting one of the prairie hens, she turned away to heave up the meager contents of her meal. That was about the time she realized she was in the family way. Talk about joy-filled. That she’d been.
Good thing Opal didn’t mind doing the chores of milking, feeding the chickens, and gathering the eggs.
‘‘All right, young man, enough playing.’’ Ruby sat him on her lap, and while she fastened her buttons, he let out a burp worthy of comment. She chuckled. ‘‘Take after your father, don’t you?’’ She wiped his face with the skirt of her apron and settled him in the corner of the kitchen in the pen Rand and Beans had fashioned from willow branches. She handed him a teething ring of braided cowhide, a kettle, some pans, and a wooden spoon. Perhaps he’d be a musician someday, much as he liked to bang on things.
Ghost, the mottled cow dog snoozing by the front step, barked her ‘‘someone’s coming’’ announcement, and Ruby walked to the door in time to see Opal trot Bay up to the barn.
Right after the sigh of relief that her little, or rather younger, sister—Opal now equaled her five foot seven inches—was home safe, Ruby wanted to go out and shake her. How many times had she reminded her to come straight home from school?
‘‘Come on, young man, you can help me get my point across.’’ She hoisted Per to her hip and headed out, thunder on her brow and gratitude in her heart. As soon as she saw Opal, she had an inkling something had happened. ‘‘Your hair is wet. How could you fall in the river from the road?’’
Opal turned from unleashing the cinch. ‘‘I didn’t fall in. I went to wade and then couldn’t resist the water, so I went swimming.’’
‘‘That river’s still cold as ice. You’re going to catch your death swimming this early in the season.’’
Per leaned toward Opal, arms outstretched, jabbering his plea.
‘‘Not all I almost caught,’’ Opal mumbled under her breath as she took her nephew in her arms. ‘‘You want to ride, big boy?’’ She set him in the saddle and held him there.
‘‘Don’t let Bay walk off with him.’’
‘‘Bay is ground tied. She won’t leave.’’ Opal motioned to the reins that reached from bit to ground. She grinned up at the baby now flapping his arms and his jaws at the horse. ‘‘He sure isn’t afraid of anything.’’
‘‘I think boys out here are born wanting to ride.’’ Ruby lifted her face to the sun. ‘‘Soon as you get unsaddled, you can help me bring the clothes in off the line and explain this adventure to me.’’
Opal made a face, which made Per chortle with glee. Of course, just about anything made him laugh. A happier baby would be hard to find anywhere. ‘‘Here, you hold him up there a minute.’’ She glanced at Ruby over her shoulder. ‘‘I know. I’ll help right away, but I can give him a ride around the barn and the corrals.’’ While Ruby held Per in the saddle Opal tightened the cinch instead of releasing it and swung up behind Per, her arms circling him safe in the saddle in front of her.
‘‘You be careful now.’’
‘‘Ru-by.’’ The drawn out word adequately conveyed Opal’s long-term patience with her sister’s worriment.
‘‘Drop him off at the clothesline.’’ Ruby smiled at the laughter floating back from the two on the horse. Opal and Rand both had been taking Per on the horses since he could crawl, and now that he could walk around furniture, she’d have to bar the door to keep him safe. Mrs. Robertson had told her to tie him on a long line to the clothesline. That would give him some freedom, yet he wouldn’t get away. Knowing Per, he’d go from two steps to a dead run, anything to keep up with his father and Opal.
Thinking on these things, Ruby grabbed a clothes basket off the porch and ambled on back to the clothesline behind the house. Ankle-high grass, grazed once by the riding horses, made her think of the weekly mown grass back at the Brandons’. The backyard had been like a park, with roses, flower beds, a kitchen garden, and both fruit and nut trees. No fruit-bearing trees here yet, but Rand had brought her two apple saplings from his last trip to Dickinson. The two starts could hardly be seen from the rail fence they’d put up to keep cows and deer out. Heard tell, Marquis de Mores had a fruit orchard well started, but she hadn’t gone to see it.
She removed the clothespins, dropping them in the bag hanging on the line for just that purpose, and buried her face in the fragrance of sun-and-wind-dried sheets. They had used an abundance of lavender sachets in the linen closet in New York, but nothing smelled better than those dried by prairie sun and wind.
‘‘Here he is.’’ Opal stopped at the west post. ‘‘You’re acting a bit strange.’’
‘‘After this last winter I am intoxicated on the smells of spring.’’ Ruby crossed and took Per from Opal’s hands. When he looked over his shoulder and chattered at Opal, they both laughed. The frown on his wide forehead meant he’d rather ride.
‘‘Where’s Rand?’’
‘‘No, Opal, you’re not going to find him. I have need of you here.’’
‘‘All right. But if I headed out with the rifle, I could maybe find a nice buck. We’re a bit low on meat.’’
Ruby shook her head and sat Per in the basket. With a giggle he set it to rocking. Everything moved when around that busy little body. Ghost wandered over and greeted him with a quick tongue swipe, then stood patiently while Per entwined his fingers in her hair. He pulled himself up, wobbling a bit and setting the basket to the same dance. His shout of glee made her laugh too.
‘‘You did it, son. Ghost, you are the best dog any little boy could have.’’ Ever since Per had been crawling, if the dog was in the house, he made a beeline for her. And even when he pulled her ears, she never growled or even moved away.
Ruby had folded the sheets and towels and was beginning on the underthings when Opal returned. ‘‘You start with the socks, and put the ones that need mending off to the side. Those men go through more socks than I’d ever dreamed. I need Cimarron and her nimble needle to catch up on the mending.’’
When Opal failed to respond, Ruby paused. ‘‘All right. What is it you need to tell me?’’
‘‘Nothing.’’
‘‘Opal, how many years have I been your older sister?’’
‘‘Going on fifteen.’’
‘‘Right. So what is bothering you?’’
‘‘Well, I told Mr. Finch that I felt sick, and I did. My head hurt so bad my eyes were crossing, so I left school early. But when I saw the river, I thought maybe that would make my headache go away, so I was just going to wade, but then it felt so good I went swimming.’’
‘‘Opal.’’
‘‘Oh, I had my drawers and camisole on. I wasn’t indecent or anything.’’
‘‘And. . . ?’’
‘‘This drifter found me, and . . .’’ Her words picked up speed like a cow running from the lasso. ‘‘And he was coming after me but his horse refused to go into the water and Atticus got in a fight with him and we left him strung up on a tree branch.’’
‘‘You hung him?’’ Ruby dropped the pants she was folding.
‘‘No. We wrapped the rope around his arms and left him just high enough his feet didn’t touch the ground. He was hollering something awful. Then I gave Atticus a ride back to town and came on home. I wasn’t going to tell you, but . . . well, someone most likely should go let him down, and if I tell Rand or the guys the whole story, they’ll probably shoot him or really string him up.’’
Ruby closed her eyes, the scene painted all too clearly on the back of her eyelids. ‘‘Opal, you could have been—’’ ‘‘I know. It was dumb of me. But no one ever comes by that bend in the river unless it’s roundup time.’’
‘‘You don’t know who he was?’’
‘‘Never saw him before, but he wears his hat some funny. His horse ran off, so I suppose someone should go let him down. He probably stinks pretty raw by now. We scared him pretty bad.’’
‘‘Leave him there for the crows to pick on.’’ Ruby pinched the bridge of her nose between thumb and finger to ease the dull throbbing that had started behind her eyes.
‘‘Ruby!’’ Shock saucered Opal’s eyes.
‘‘I know that’s not very Christian, but so many men out here are lower than the animals. Whatever happened to common decency?’’ Ruby picked up her son, who’d just thumped on his rear when Ghost barked and headed for the field. ‘‘I don’t know what to do, Opal. Why do you get in such scrapes? If you’d just come directly home, this wouldn’t be a problem.’’
‘‘We could leave him there and hope someone finds him in the next day or two.’’ She looked up in time to see Rand leading a saddled but riderless horse. ‘‘Uh-oh.’’
Ruby shook her head. ‘‘You got yourself into this one, dear sister, and you are going to have to get yourself out. And I wouldn’t suggest playing dumb. Rand knows you far too well for that.’’ Ruby laid the folded clothes in the basket, pulled a stalk of grass from her son’s mouth, and with Per on her hip and the bag of clothespins in her other hand, motioned toward the high-piled basket. ‘‘You can bring that in after you go talk with Rand.’’
‘‘You could come with me, you know?’’
‘‘Nope, not this time.’’ Ruby ignored the look of pleading and continued on to the log house that looked as if it had sprouted years earlier right there out of the meadow instead of having been built only two years before.
Standing down by the barn and the strange horse, Opal told Rand her story as simply as possible. When she could see his jaw whitening, she finished with, ‘‘But, Rand, I didn’t do anything wrong.’’
‘‘Specifically, no, but without thinking ahead, you put yourself in harm’s way, and it’s come out wrong all over the place.’’ Rand tipped his broad-brimmed hat back with one finger. He shook his head as he studied Opal’s face. ‘‘That man blabs around town, and you’ll never live it down. He’ll be the laughingstock, but it’s your reputation that is on the line.’’ He shook his head. ‘‘Ruby’s right.’’
‘‘What do you mean by that?’’
‘‘Opal, no matter how hard you try, you just can’t be one of the men. You’re female, and that puts you in a different place.’’
‘‘I can outshoot most of them, rope and ride as well as any, and put in as long a day as anyone we know.’’ She wasn’t boasting, just stating facts. She’d worked harder than anyone could know to learn the ranching skills that were needed. ‘‘And I’m better at breaking horses too, thanks to Linc.’’ Linc, short for Lincoln, and his Souix Indian wife, Little Squirrel, had ridden up one day and asked if Rand had work for them. Hard workers both, everyone was glad they’d come.
‘‘All that is true, but what are we going to do with that drifter?’’
‘‘Dig a hole and bury the skunk.’’
‘‘Opal, this is no joke.’’
‘‘Hogtie him and throw him in one of the freight cars going west? Tell someone to let him loose on the other end of Montana?’’ She banged her fist on the top rail of the corral. ‘‘He made me so mad I could have shot him right then and sent his body floating down the river.’’
‘‘Killing a man is far different than killing a deer.’’
‘‘Yeah, in this case the deer is nicer.’’
Rand sighed. ‘‘Well, I’ll take a couple of the guys along, and we’ll go let him loose. About all we can do is threaten that we’ll come after him if he talks around here. Go on up to the house and get some food we can put in a sack. That will take away one reason for him to go on into town.’’
‘‘I’d really like my rope back.’’
Rand gave her a look that made her hang her head. She had a feeling she hadn’t heard the last of this yet.
We s t e r n Pennsylvania
Sunday morning arrived, and his stomach hadn’t bothered to take a rest.
Jacob looked out over his woodpiles to the maple and beech grove that angled up the hill. He’d heard a coyote singing during the night, along with an owl that kept the rodent population under control in the small meadow off to the west of his plot. Usually Sunday morning wore a mantle of peace, and he looked forward to the service with joy. Jacob Chandler loved and honored his calling—until this last week. How could he preach on this text when he failed to live it? Why hadn’t he just chosen an alternate text?
Because God told me not to. That’s why
. But that didn’t make it any easier.
Memories of Melody’s eyes seemed to sour the cream in his coffee. He tossed the dregs against one of the unsplit butts and rose to return to the house. It wasn’t as if he’d never tried to plead her forgiveness, but when he’d gone to her father’s house, the man had met him with clenched fists and threats. Melody had left home, and it was all his fault. And no, he’d never find out where she’d gone, so leave well enough alone and don’t show his face around there again.
He’d gone intending to ask for her hand in marriage.