Between Earth & Sky (5 page)

Clayton is gone at the mines three and four days at a time, so it is just me and Amy here. The quiet is a relief to me after the constant noise of the camps. I worry about Clayton crossing the desert alone, as there are plenty of Indians and Mexicans who will shoot a man for his horse, but I prefer being settled in a home far from the shoot-outs and fights. The week before we left, there were killings in the streets over gold nuggets. Clayton says that the mine had given out. He is at work on a new one now, which Mr. Stone has asked him to excavate. There is a lack of water in this region, which makes it difficult to separate the ore, but he is confident he will find a large vein.

Here, in our house of dirt, there is no one to bother us, there is no one at all to even talk with. Amy and I spend the day baking bread or sewing the clothes that got worn out on the trip. Already, she is good with a needle and thread. There is much to practice on.

It has been months since I have had a word from you. Give me news of everything. And please, now that we are settled, tell John he must set a date for when you will come and join us!

Your Loving Sister,

Abigail

November 20, 1868

Dearest Maggie,

It was a pleasure to read your letter, so full of the descriptions of your children and their small antics. I appreciate your offer to send a Christmas package. This year's holiday will not be any more bountiful than last year's. Please send some pecans, if you can, and persimmons. Amy is asking for pears. Any fruit would be most welcome. We have plenty of flour for salt-rising bread, a few dried apples, and a little coffee. I was able to purchase squash and dried corn.

Last week, when the weather turned quite cold, we woke to find frost on the bed covers and snowflakes on the table near the door. But today it is so warm I let the fire go out in the stove.

You said nothing in your letter about joining us, and I pray you are still considering making the trip. If you leave early enough in the spring, you can avoid some of the heat in Texas. It will have been two years by then since we have seen one another, too long for sisters like us to be apart. I cannot bear it.

Lovingly,

Abigail

February 2, 1869

Dear Maggie,

We were most grateful for the nuts and fruits, for the thread, lace, and notions you sent to us. There is such a lack here of everything but the basic necessities. You said nothing in your letter about joining us this spring, and instead you encouraged me to bring Amy and “come home” for a visit. I do not understand why you are so reluctant to discuss taking the trip here. I can only imagine that Mother has convinced you not to come or that John has found new business interests.

The land here is like no other in the country—the mountains are golden and the ground will be fertile when there is water. Winter is so mild we have used very little fuel. Clayton says to tell John that there are mines full of gold, silver, and copper. Clayton has bought a share in two of them and will purchase a share for you before you come if you send him the money. There is much opportunity to prosper. Several ranches south of here stretch for miles and include horses and sheep and fields planted in cotton, corn, and all kinds of fruits and vegetables. Some of the best families from Virginia and Georgia and Tennessee live in Mesilla. Clayton has promised me a trip there this summer.

Yesterday I hauled some sawdust, which we use to put up our own ice, and spent the rest of the afternoon scrubbing our clothing. Clayton needs new trousers but will get by for the present with the ones I have put a new seat on. Mending seems an endless chore. I have put new fronts on my aprons, hoping they will hide the wear my skirts have taken.

Last fall I traded some gold dust for a bag of turnips, which were such a treat that we ate them only a few at a time. They disappeared last month; then yesterday I found them, frozen hard in a nest some rats had made, nestled between a candle and a missing handkerchief of mine. The rats had made themselves quite comfortable, living off our “luxuries.”

I do hope all is well with you and the little ones. This spring we will plant the seeds for our first set of crops. And I hope we will see you here before summer.

Your Devoted Sister,

Abigail

April 21, 1869

Dearest Maggie,

Please write soon and say that you are planning your trip westward to join us in building a home in the desert. I stop at least once every day and wish you here with me. I hope it will not be long before we hold one another again.

Amy has learned to amuse herself playing with the horned toads and rabbits that she finds. Since we left the mining town, she seldom has another child to play with. I worry that she misses her brother, but she does not speak of him. We have a few hens and a whole brood of chicks, which she delights in feeding. We are planting corn and all sorts of vegetables. If you can, send me some snips of blackberries and grapes, and I will try them here. We have heard talk that there is not enough water to grow crops, but with the river near by and the long growing season, we are sure of success.

Clayton will be gone to the mines much of next week, where he has invested in a number of stakes. I do not know what I would do without Amy, for she helps me with the laundry, the cleaning, and the planting. This month I have spent at least two hours every morning cleaning the dust from our bedding and the pots and pans. It seems the wind will never stop blowing.

We have few visitors. Amy loves to sit by the road and watch the Mexicans who sometimes go by with their burros, and there was a Mexican woman who came to the door yesterday with some milk to sell. I am not much afraid, even on the nights when Clayton is away, but I keep a shotgun loaded and near the bed. All kinds of outlaws roam the desert, renegades, both white and Mexican.

There is little law here, and I don't believe many of the criminals ever get to court. If they are caught they might go straight to the end of the rope, but most of them head south into Mexico and are never apprehended.

I have letters from both Bea and Sally. They have settled in a valley near San Diego. The land is rich for farming, and there is a church and a school nearby. I envy them their companionship. If Clayton had been willing, we could have stayed with the wagon train and settled with them. But perhaps he is right in saying that the land here is just as fertile and the mining opportunities are abundant.

The longer we are here, the more variety I notice in the plant life: white and purple thistles, wild sunflowers, Spanish broom. Late in the day, when part of the earth is under shade, the sage brush turns deep blue-green without the sun to bleach it gray. I believe Clayton wants to stay in this remote place because he likes striking out on his own. Yesterday he told me that he will make his fortune in mining and build us a sprawling ranch house. He plans to turn our land into the most fertile farm in the territory!

Your Sister,

Abigail

July 8, 1869

Dearest Maggie,

What news! If you are able to come join us next spring, perhaps Clayton will have expanded the house and you can stay with us as long as you like. I have made a rocking chair out of a barrel which I covered and a bedstead of white pine boards. The mines are doing well, but the spring rains were really quite sparse and summer is a dry, hot season here. We get our water from a pump in the yard, but Clayton says there is not enough to try to water the crops. On hot evenings, when Amy cries from the heat, I let her run out to the pump and splash water on herself. Some evenings she plays like that for nearly an hour. Clayton got a small goat from a Mexican in town, and we tied it in the shade near the house. It has become Amy's pet, and she carries it water and a little feed. It is too small for her to ride, but she does try!

I was much relieved to get the news that Mother has sold the land and moved in with Aunt Celia. I don't agree with you that father's grief over seeing our land in the possession of Yankees would have killed him if a bullet had not. Father fought in the war nearly to its end and saw the changes that were sure to follow. “Survival,” he told me before he left for Richmond that last time. “That is what matters most, when the rest is stripped away.” He would accept the necessary sale of the land better than Mother has. If he had returned from the war a young man, as Clayton did, I feel certain he too would have journeyed west.

It will be wonderful to greet you next spring. Tell John, if he can, to send us the money soon, and Clayton will get him a share in one of the mines. We will make our fortunes together!

Your Loving Sister,

Abigail

October 14, 1869

Dear Maggie,

I dread to tell you all that has happened. Clayton has lost the money he invested in the mines—all of our savings and the two hundred John sent not more than one month ago. The mines Clayton bought stakes in did not have enough gold in them to return the investment. He says he is finished with those mines and will move on to another, but he hasn't the money to buy any more stakes.

To make things worse, we have seen the largest part of our crops lost. I kept a small garden of the grape cuttings you sent and a little lettuce, onions, beans, and squash near the house, but the pump went dry in August and we had to haul our water from the river. It did not rain for more than seven weeks, and the river itself nearly dried up. Soon it will be winter, and we have nothing saved but a few dried beans.

Last night, after I put Amy in her bed, I found Clayton outside, sitting on the dirt beside the house, staring into the near dark.

“What are you doing out here?” I asked him.

“Studying,” he said, not moving from where he was sitting, not changing his eyes. “Studying the land I brought you to.”

“Look at the sky,” I told him. “Now
that
is something to study.” Every night it is thick with tiny pin holes of light. There are places that look like a bowl of glittering milk got turned over, pooled, and spread across the night.

“It is something,” he said, looking up. Already there were a few stars, the bright north star and three pale ones. Some nights after Amy is asleep, I spread a blanket out in the yard, and we lie there watching how many of them fall. I can get dizzy from all that light and forget where I am.

“Are you sorry you came?” he asked me.

I sat down in the dirt next to him, took his hand, and told him I didn't care about losing the money and that next year we could find a way to get water for the crops. The only thing I regret is losing Josh.

Clayton kept looking out into the night that pressed against us. “I thought I lost you,” he said. “I thought you would never come back to me after I got done burying him.”

I am sorry about the money John sent. Clayton has promised he will earn it back and invest it in a more certain mine, although I do not know that any of them are too sure.

Your Sister,

Abigail

January 20, 1870

Dearest Maggie,

I must thank you for the kind gifts. The apples and persimmons tasted better than anything we have here, and Amy was so pleased to have a new dress. I cannot thank you enough for the cloth and pattern. I spent all of yesterday evening cutting out my calico dress. The ones I brought from Virginia are mostly in rags.

I sent you a package by stage coach of some of the stones we have here, a small cactus I dug up for you, and a rug I bought last spring from the Indians. The baby was a boy, like yours, and we call him George Michael. He is a sweet baby and looks more like Clayton, with his dark hair, than Josh did.

Your Sister,

Abigail

April 30, 1870

Dear Maggie,

Clayton has been gone five days now, working in a new mine. This one, he assures me, will yield plenty of ore. Amy and I spend the mornings planting corn, squash, and beans, with me hoeing the long rows and Amy following behind dropping the seeds. There is a man near here with a ranch who says he can help us to get water this summer. The public acequia, a large ditch dug from the river, is not far from our land. We must dig a smaller ditch and get the water commission's order to raise the gate to let in the water. The ditches must be dug along two sides of the field and through its center. Such a lot of digging! Also, we are told we must buy a windmill and water wheel, and they are more than one hundred dollars.

I keep the baby inside, in a dark, cool corner of the house, where I made a bed for him. He is a good baby and sleeps much of the time. Last week when Clayton got back from the mines, he kissed both me and Amy, then gave a long, narrow-eyed look around the room. “Where is baby George?” he said finally.

I had laid him in his bed in a cool dark corner and stretched a piece of cloth over him to keep out the scorpions. “There,” and I pointed. “Well, I will say one thing,” Clayton told me. “I never have to worry that he'll be snatched up by an Indian or Mexican while I'm gone.” And had to use both hands to scoop George Michael up, he has grown so.

I would spend the evenings painting the sky, which streaks with gold and every shade of purple and pink, but I have used up most of my meager supply of materials, and even if we had the money to spare, there is nowhere for me to purchase more. Instead I sit beneath all that color, mending and patching our clothing.