These Is My Words (39 page)

Mostly tonight I feel sort of lost and alone, like now I am up on a windy hill and looking toward a new direction where the wind never blew before. I am afraid to leave all that I know, nothing familiar will be nearby to keep me going. I will have to stand on the hill alone.

January 10, 1887

All is a flurry as we pack up and load crates. I don’t feel of much use and I am tending the baby and Little Bitty, and he has to do most of the work. It’s how it ought to be, Jack says. Then, about noon, he rode off to Albert’s house to ask for the loan of his wagon, because there is a train load of books here that must go.

The hands have loaded pretty much everything. Charlie is sleeping in my lap. In a little pile beside me is Jack’s saddle and outfit, which he is going to toss in the back with this rocking chair when we pull out. I picked up that old, old leather saddlebag and looked it over, wondering just why he never made a move without it. It was stiff with age and horse sweat, and it smelled bad. There was a big hole in it, too, and it was patched with clumsy stitches that looked like a child’s.

The more I felt of it, I saw the patch was thick and heavier on that side, and the leather tie was coming out. I squeezed it, and it had something sewed inside it. So I began to pull the thong out of the little holes and to unwind it, going around and around.

Finally the patch came off, and it had been sewed over a kind of pocket inside that was full of stuff. I reached in and pulled out a little raggedy book, and my mouth fell open. The Duchess of Warwick and Her Sorrows by the Sea. The gold edges were long ago worn to green and the cover was broken and creased, and just as he said, a bullet had pierced right through it. That man has had that book all along.

I opened the cover and found folded inside it each of the letters that I had sent to him asking for the return of it. Goodness, how bad my spelling and punctuation was! I thought, laughing at myself. Then I found there was another folded piece of paper, and I pressed open the creases and pushed the gunshot frayed place back together. It was a little letter all in Jack’s neat hand.

February 16, 1882

Dear Miss Prine
,

I cannot hope that you would understand my forwardness and my poor manners in writing this to you, as it is unforgivable to be so common with a lady as to tell her your feeling so abruptly. However, life is so uncertain in this ferritories that I hope you will forgive me this impropriety for the sake of what I am about to say
.

I lost my heart to you the moment you won that rifle from that blowhard and handed it back to him. Then I lost everything else to you when you stood up with a straight face and protected your family against what you thought would be a vision of horror. You have stolen my very heart away. I see your face, I hear your voice, I watch you walk, even in my sleep. You have my utmost admiration and fondest regards. If it were not for my own cowardice, I would have told you these things in person, and not given this letter in an Animal book, hoping you would turn the pages and find it some day
.

I know that you want your other book returned so badly that you just ache for it, and for that it sorrows me that I cannot return it, but you must understand it is a matter of life and death that I keep it with me at all times. For you see, you have taken all my heart with you, and there is nothing left for me but the little piece of your heart that longs for your other book. So I must have it to continue breathing at all
.

Please forgive the injustice of it all. I remain forever lost to you, and sustain myself only with a memory of one night when we shared a tenderness that went far beyond mortal bonds. You shared with me your fears, and most importantly, your trust as you slept quietly and safely in my arms. Unkind of you, to brutally expose a man to the sweetest thing a woman has to offer, her trust, and then to just slip away as if you cared
nothing for him at all. However, it matters not what unkindness you show me, I have no heart any longer to feel it anyway. My dear, if there is any chance that you could possibly find a sliver of compassion for me, please write me in return. I promise

The letter stopped, unfinished. He had not enclosed it in the Animals of Africa book he returned to me as he had planned. Fancy words, too, all educated and clever, and he doesn’t even talk that fancy.

It seems I am bound to love this character forever, soldier or no. I just hope and pray I can put up with him for the next fifty years or so.

Tears were pouring down my face but I managed to thread the stiff and cracked cord back into the patch before he got back with Albert’s wagon. Then he packed up my books and it seemed to take just ten minutes or so. In that short time, everyone came to wave us off, even the Maldonados’ whole family. Jack whistled to Toobuddy and that silly dog hopped up into Albert’s borrowed wagon.

We are driving away, and I look back over my shoulder with a strange feeling of parting. It is not a lonely feeling, but just as I am always sad to close the cover on a book, I feel I have finished with this part of my life and will have to begin a new book. The last thing I saw was Savannah waving her bonnet toward us. Albert had his arm around her waist. Then I looked at Jack for a long minute, then I looked toward the horizon.

Jack whistled a little song, kind of merry and happy. He turned to me as we rounded the first bend away from my ranch and said, Mrs. Elliot, what are you smiling at, are you happy to leave?

No, I said, I’m not so happy to leave. It isn’t that at all.

January 12, 1887

It is bitter cold here in Tucson, but this officer’s house is tightly built of adobe and wood. The morning came with a bugle call, and Jack was already gone before it sounded. The children didn’t wake because of it, though. It is a nice sound, and I expect it will start many a morning in my life from now on. The town has grown plenty but is still rough as a cob, although it feels safe here in the fort.

January 19, 1887

It seems this house is tightly built as long as the wind doesn’t blow or rain hit it. Rain started late last night. By mid morning the ceiling began to fall in. Water is running down every wall of this place. It turns out the whole roof is made of poles and sod, and there are even a couple of old army blankets up there with dirt packed on them. I feared all day the whole mess would fall in on the children in the big room, so we have stayed in the nursery room for safety. Someone had left curtains hanging in the windows, which I thought was because they were so soiled no one would bother taking them along. Now I see why they are streaked and stained, it has rained like this before and no one bothered to fix this blessed roof. Jack says that as soon as this wet spell lets up, he will get some men here to put on a real roof.

January 21, 1887

Jack said the post commander will not approve of spending money to fix the officers’ housing. I said to him I have no intention of staying in a place like this where mud drips on my babies and into the food while I cook. I can imagine in the summer it will be scorpions and spiders falling from that nasty ceiling. I’ve been saving soap money for a long time, and I just told him you hire some men to fix this here, and it will get paid for, and I don’t care what the commander says.

But Jack says you can’t just go building on some Army fort yourself, there’s something called protocol that is rules of order and command. Well, I gave him a look from the corner of my eye, and just like I’d asked it to make my argument for me, a chunk of wet dirt and grass slopped onto the Franklin stove and splashed on his uniform. Then a centipede crawled out of the slop, running from the heat, and he stomped the thing dead real quick.

While the mud dripped down the side of the stove, hissing like it was cooking, Jack looked at me and made a determined face. General Elliot, Ma’am, he says. You are about to get a new roof. Then he snapped to attention and saluted me and went off to find the commander.

February 3, 1887

It appears some of the other officers’ wives are real perturbed that our family has a new roof and they have all been putting up with the mud and grass ones for years. Well, I just think that is the problem, you put up with it instead of speaking your mind.

Baby Charlie is good natured and calm, not nearly as nervous and fretful as April was. When he wants to be heard, though, he can certainly make himself known. And I declare but he goes through diapers twice as fast as April. There is always a stack to be washed and a stack to be folded. It seems my whole time right now is spent keeping this baby dry.

May 5, 1887

As soon as there was dry weather, the Army started to drill their men in the fort walls here. What a dust they raise every day. I have hired an Apache lady who comes and helps me clean and keep up with the laundry, or I would do nothing but those two things every minute of every day. Her name is Juana, she says. There is a feeling of mystery around her, and I feel like something in her ways is not as straightforward as I would like. Her eyes never look at me when she talks, but Jack said that some Indians are like that, they must know you a long time and trust you for sure, before they will let you look into their eyes.

I have been so busy with children and cleaning, some days I feel worn out before I get out of bed. Juana helps a lot, and sometimes I even take a nap when the children do. Mama visited two weeks ago and said she wouldn’t know what to do, having an Apache in the house and talking about the weather with her and such. I said, Times are surely changing. It was so good to have her here for a while and hear about everyone at Cienega Creek. How I miss that place and all my dear family and friends.

Jack is leaving in two days and will be gone most of a month. I am taking the children and going back to the ranch for that time. The roundup will be starting soon, and I am excited to get to that work. If ever I have a spare minute or two between chores and making soap, I practice lassoing the rain barrel by the house. I’m not very good at it and miss more often than not. I have hired five more fellows to help with the roundup, and Jack laughs when he sees the list of things I want packed in a wagon to go on this visit.

May 31, 1887

If tiredness could be measured in buckets I am a deep well of tiredness. But it is good to see so much work being done and count all the new calves as they get their rumps branded. They didn’t like it at all, and a couple of the mama cows got mean hearing their babies holler, and one of the hands got horn-hooked real bad. He will live through it, but we were a man short and glad of the extras I hired, although only four of the five showed up. My roping skill, meager as it is, was not needed at all, because those fellows could throw and tie a calf faster than I could swing a loop. Still it was weeks of hard, dirty work, and I don’t think I have ever seen such filthy children as mine. They were browner than the dirt they were covered with. On top of everything, April caught a cold so she was miserable and cried during the night for our first two days. After that, though, it felt good to be outdoors all day and doing something besides sweeping and washing. My hands are toughened even with the leather gloves I’ve had on. My blouses are faded from the sun and my face is brown and freckled, too.

Heading back to town brought almost as much commotion as going to the ranch. Harland and Melissa wanted to come to Tucson and stay with us for a spell, and it was decided that little Clover will come along, since he is six now and big enough to be out on his own a bit. Harland is to take a commencement test at the schoolhouse, and if he passes it he will be able to continue his studies at a college. He is nervous and has been studying hard, but I think it did him some good to help with the branding and get a few calluses on his hands instead of his head.

He laughed and said did I think studying things made his head thicker and harder? So we all teased him some but we are proud.

On the way, Harland and Melissa both rode next to the wagon, and we had a fine time singing and remembering things from long ago. Melissa was on Rose, who is getting old now and has given us five beautiful foals. Melissa held April on her saddle and April was happy as a little bird to be sitting up there trotting along. As we came to the last long climb, we stopped to rest the horses and give them drinks, and we spread a blanket on the ground and sat ourselves in the shade of some cottonwood trees. In the spring this place runs with water, but now it is just low and shady, and will have to do.

Once we started up the rise, Harland noticed a rider following us. The man on a horse came a little closer after a time, as if he was not in a hurry. Pretty soon, he disappeared but then I spotted a rider off to the east. I don’t know if it was the same man or not, but where he was riding made me anxious, because I knew anyone simply headed north would sooner ride on this road than through the cholla and prickly pear. As our horses put their heads down into the last climb, we met up with the man right in front of us in the road. He didn’t move when he saw us, and was standing still with his horse reined in hard.

Good morning, I called out. Would you let my horses pass so they can make the top of this hill before they give out?

He just stood there. It is a habit I have never shed, carrying my little hunting rifle under the wagon seat and my kitchen pistol in my apron. The little pearl handled two-shooter, I keep in my bag with my hanky and some spare diaper pins, so it was not handy. My horses were stomping, trying to keep the load from rolling backward, so I slacked the reins and pulled back on the brake so they wouldn’t have to work so hard. I said louder, Sir, we’d like to pass by, if you’ll just take one side or the other. My horses are about to give out under this load. Again, the man stood there.