Sunflower (6 page)

Obviously anxious to be on her way to Pella, no doubt to spread the tale of the stranger in Analisa Van Meeteren’s bed, Clara Heusinkveld hurriedly collected her reticule, straightened her hat, and rushed through the doorway without so much as a good day.

“Why do I have the feeling that Mrs. Heusinkveld isn’t going to waste time telling the town about the stranger you are harboring between your sheets?”

Analisa started visibly as Caleb spoke softly into her ear. As the door closed, hiding them from the older woman’s view, he had left the bed and crossed the cool, hard-packed dirt floor to stand unnoticed beside Analisa. Deep in thought, she had stood staring at the door until his words disturbed her. She turned abruptly, unable to hide her dismay at finding him so close beside her.

Her lips were level with his collarbone. Caleb briefly imagined the feel of those lips and her warm breath against his skin before he forced his mind back to reality. He guessed her to be close to five feet eight, but Caleb, at six foot three, didn’t feel intimidated by her height. Up close, he could see that her eyes were clear blue, the vivid blue of a cornflower, dusted with tiny slivers of silver. Thick honey-colored lashes hid her eyes when she blinked, almost as if they were trying to brush away his presence. She backed away from him quickly and tried to disguise her abrupt move by turning her back and attending to the stack of dishes.

“You should not be out of bed, Mr. Storm. Your fever may return.” She ignored his earlier question about Clara Heusinkveld.

“I’m sure it already has,” he quipped, referring to the heat stirring in his blood as he stood so near Analisa. “I do need to use the ... convenience,” he said. “I assume it’s out back?”

“Yes.”

She answered over her shoulder as she scraped the dishes clean, pushing the scraps into a bucket on the floor beneath the bench, and stacked the dishes in the enamel dishpan. To avoid facing Caleb, she reached for the teakettle and poured hot water over the dishes.

“I’ll need my boots.” He wished she’d turn around so that he could see her eyes once more, but she answered him without moving.

“They are at the end of the bed, near the door.”

“About my gun ...” While he was reclaiming his belongings, he decided it would be best to collect them all.

At last she turned around, a question in her eyes. “You need your gun to go to the outhouse?”

“No. I’d just like to know where it is.”

“It is in a safe place. When you leave, I’ll give it to you.”

“I see. You’ll toss it to me as I ride away?”

She turned her back on his teasing smile.

Caleb sat on the edge of the bed and put his boots on. The deep, soft mattress sank under his weight. Standing again, he walked to the door, feeling silly in the nightshirt, which hung down almost to the tops of his worn snakeskin boots. With a shrug he ran a hand through his tousled hair and across the stubble of beard. No wonder she wouldn’t turn around. He guessed his appearance left a lot to be desired.

Kase ran to join Caleb, volunteering to show him the way to the outhouse. When Analisa started to protest, Caleb dismissed her objections with a smile.

“He’s no bother.”

The bright sunlight outside the soddie hurt his eyes. Caleb stood for a moment allowing his sight to adjust and then moved away from the house, rounding the corner behind his small guide. Kase chatted happily as he pointed out the important objects within his small world. As the little boy darted back and forth from Caleb to items of interest, things he was proud to show, the man assessed his surroundings.

A poorly mended fence made of thin stakes, cotton wood branches, and pieces of dismantled furniture was held together by assorted scraps of wire. The slipshod affair marked the perimeter of the yard. A sow and her brood of piglets roamed freely inside the boundary, as did a few scraggly hens and a rooster, A pile of wood collected from various sources was stacked near the house.

Once they had rounded the soddie and were facing the side opposite the door, Kase pointed out the small lean-to that served as a stable for a milk cow and an ox. The, ox and cow had been set free to roam the yard, but Caleb found Scorpio still tethered in the shed. He untied the reins and removed the bridle and bit, slapping the horse on the rump and freeing it to roam at will and graze on the stubborn prairie grass growing in the yard. Caleb found his saddle and saddlebags on the floor of the shed, apparently too heavy for Analisa to move any farther. His rifle was hanging against the sod wall, well out of the boy’s reach.

A large vegetable garden, meticulously weeded and neatly laid out in rows, occupied the southwest corner of the yard. He guessed that Analisa spent many hours, dressed in her strange ragged pants, suspenders, and faded bonnet, tending the garden. Good, he thought, smiling to himself. That meant he would have the pleasure of seeing her in those trousers again.

Caleb was somewhat surprised but also pleased to see that the Van Meeterens had the convenient luxury of a windmill in the yard. It would ensure them of a water supply when the dry season parched the land. Many settlers relied solely on rain barrels or nearby watering holes or creeks, which served only as long as there was rain. As he had traveled west, he’d been surprised at first to see windmills dotting the prairie landscape, but he had soon learned that the much needed devices could be purchased through farm journal advertisements and assembled at the site. Those farmers who could not afford to buy such luxuries sometimes built their own mills for a fraction of the cost by following instructions printed in the publications.

A splash of gold against the sky caught Caleb’s attention. He lifted his gaze skyward and shielded his eyes against the sun’s glare as he stared at the roof of the sod house. Sunflowers stood at various heights above the building, growing out of the roof. It was a sight the likes of which he had never seen, and as he took notice, Caleb saw that flowers surrounded the ground near the walls of the house as well. He had a sudden recollection of having seen the house covered with sunflowers before, and realized it must have been the night he arrived.

Kase called to him, impatient to resume his guided tour, and Caleb responded to his shout. After visiting the wooden water closet, Caleb stood near the fence at the south end of the yard while he waited for Kase. About a half-mile across the vast open grassland beyond the fence, he could see a stand of cotton woods, and he assumed they were growing along a stream. At the thought of the clear, fresh running water, Caleb became aware of the uncomfortable itching of his skin and his scalp. He raked his fingers through the tangled mass of black hair, then rubbed the back of his neck with the palm of his hand.

“Kase?” He called the boy’s name over his shoulder, and within seconds, Kase appeared eagerly at his side.

“What do you say we go for a swim in that creek over there?”

The boy looked up at him earnestly, his eyes wide. “I can’t swim.”

“Well, I need a bath in the worst way, so maybe you’d like to come along and make sure no one steals my boots.”
They’re welcome to the nightshirt,
he thought.

“Should I go and tell Mama?”

“No, you don’t need to. We’ll be back in a few minutes. Besides, I have a feeling she would object to my getting wet. Women have some strange ideas, Kase.” Caleb opened the back gate and carefully looped the wire catch behind them. “Some of them are convinced that if you have any sort of sickness at all; a little water will put you right into your grave.”

“We never bathe in the creek. We fish there, though.”

“Where do you bathe?”

“I get into the big wooden tub behind the house, in the summer. In the winter I wash by the stove. Mama and Opa, too. But they never get in the big tub outside.”

While the boy chatted, Caleb glanced across the prairie, surveying every direction for signs of riders. The area had been settled for nearly twenty years, but away from the small prairie towns, homesteads were miles apart. Roving bands of renegades from the reservations were not unheard of.
And here you are, Storm,
he thought,
ambling through the buffalo grass, hatless, gunless, and dressed in a damned nightshirt.
He decided his bath would be brief.

Large pieces of fabric, bits of knotted string, and odd-shaped papers littered the top of the table. Mevrou Heusinkveld’s dress was beginning to take shape. Just as Analisa took precious time away from her task to wonder why Kase and Caleb Storm had failed to return, the boy ran into the house. She smiled at his urgency as he tried to explain his mission. His English was rapidly improving, now that he had a reason to use it, but he stumbled over unfamiliar words.

“Mr. Storm need a ... a
vatenwasbak.”
He pointed to the dishpan hanging near his head.

“Dishpan.”

“Ja.
A dishpan. He wants to make a soapy water for taking the hair off his face.”

“To shave.”

“Ja.
He wants to shave, and so told me to get the pan, please. You should see, Mama, he has everything he needs in the bags in the shed, the ones that were strapped to his horse. What are they called? Can I take the pan?”

“Yes, you
may
take the pan, and I don’t know what to call the bags. Ask Mr. Storm.”

“Mama, do you know that Mr. Storm goes into the creek naked? I got to watch his boots for him while he washed himself.”

The door closed on the image of her son struggling with the dishpan nearly as large as he was. Intent once more, Analisa carefully slid the scissors along the paper outline as she cut out the emerald cloth. Suddenly, she slammed her scissors down on the table and stared at the closed door. Just what had the boy been talking about? Caleb Storm had a problem keeping his clothes on, it seemed, and Analisa decided she need not put up with it any longer.

Furious, she charged out of the soddie and across the yard, dust flying up from beneath her pounding
klompen.
Chickens squawked and ran out of the way as her skirts swished around her ankles. She stopped short when she nearly collided with Caleb, who stood near the back wall of the house. He had balanced a small round mirror on the edge of an uneven sod block, and he was expertly plying a long, lethal straight-edge razor over the planes of his face, half of which was well lathered with soap.

“Analisa. Is something the matter?”

Her stormy expression told Caleb she was angry, but for the life of him, he couldn’t figure out why she stood glaring at him, hands on hips, her eyes shooting sparks of blue fire,

“Don’t call me that, Mr. Storm.”

“What?”

“Analisa!” The order sounded ridiculous, even to her ears, and yet she could not seem to check her anger. The man had provoked her ever since he had fallen at her feet.

“Pardon me. I didn’t realize it offended you,
Miss
Van Meeteren.”

“It is bad enough that you sit naked and embarrass me this morning, but I want to know what gives you the right to expose yourself to my son and to take him to the creep without my permission.”

“Creek.”
He tried to sort out her jumbled accusations. Had Analisa known Caleb Storm well, she would have noticed the tightening of his lips and the slight stiffening of his spine, but she did not know him at all and so provoked his rage.

“Listen here, Miss Van Meeteren, I’m sorry to have upset your tender sensibilities, but I don’t like what you’re hinting at. I needed to bathe. That’s it. This kid’s been my shadow since I woke up, so I let him tag after me. If you’ve got something against him seeing a man’s body, then that boy is gonna have big problems later on.” His eyes narrowed to slits as he leaned nearer to Analisa, his soft voice pressing the point home. She was reminded of a wild animal hunting down its prey. “Now I know why you’ve been avoiding me since I woke up. It must have set you off when
you
burst in on
me
this morning. Don’t tell me you’ve never seen a man naked before, Miss Van Meeteren. This boy didn’t just spring up out of the ground.” He flung a hand toward Kase, who gawked at the pair as they faced each other down.

Analisa stood as if turned to stone while Caleb railed on, unaware that his words fell like a blacksmith’s hammer against the fragile wall she’d erected around her emotions.

“You might be able to push an old man and a little boy around this place, lady, but don’t try it on me.”

Run,
Analisa’s mind commanded, but her will won out over emotion. She faced him squarely, unaware of how ridiculous they appeared. Caleb, almost a head taller, wearing the baggy nightshirt and boots, half of his face caked with drying soap while the other was smooth-shaven, stared at Analisa. She in turn refused to back down. With that lock of loose hair brushing against her cheek, her hands clenched defiantly against her sides, she reminded Caleb of a ruffled mother hen.

“I want you out of here.” She tried to match his tone, low and calm, not wild and angry as her own had been earlier. What was it he had said? “I never yell.” She realized he didn’t have to. His words were like sharp, silent knives. They cut deep, without a sound. Analisa spared him not a glance but turned, head held high. With determination in her stride, she left Caleb staring after her.