Dorothy Garlock (10 page)

It was almost dark. Ben came riding into the yard whistling a tune. He had a young deer thrown over his saddle and Charlie loped alongside him.

“What are you sitting out here for?” he asked when he saw his sisters sitting in the grass. “What . . .” He slowly dismounted, knowing something was wrong, instinctively knowing that something had happened that couldn’t be changed. “Rosalee . . . what’er you doin’ out here, and what’s . . . that?”

“Pa’s dead.” Rosalee reached for his hand and pulled him down beside her and Odell. “Pa’s dead, Ben.”

“He . . . can’t be . . . What happened?”

Rosalee put her arm around him and pulled his head to her shoulder. “He was kicked by a horse, honey. But there’s more to it than that. You’ve got to help me with him. Odell and I waited for you.” Sobs tore at Ben’s throat, but he was trying to be manly and hold them back. “Go ahead and cry, honey. Odell and I are all cried out for the time being.”

Ben let the tears flow, and after awhile, still in shock, he went to the shed and came back with a flat board. He and Rosalee rolled their father’s body onto it and carried him into the house.

“What’ll we do, Rosalee? Shall I ride over to the Haywards? They’ll come, and so will the Cranstons.”

“It’ll only take you an hour. Why don’t you wait and leave at first light? Oh, Ben! I don’t know if I . . . can take care of him like I should! His poor head! I don’t want to remember him like that.”

Ben came to her and put his arms around her. He was half a head shorter than his sister, but his young body was strong from hard work.

“I’ll help you. Pa wouldn’t want us to remember him . . . like that, either. I’ll get that good shirt of mine and we’ll wrap it about his head like a bandage. We’ll put his black pants on him and his good shirt. Just keep thinkin’ about what Pa would tell us to do. He’d say for us to hold up our heads and do the decent thing.”

They laid their father out on the bunk where a few nights ago Logan Horn’s mother had lain. They dressed him and set a candle on the bench beside him. Odell went to sleep, but Ben and Rosalee talked through the night. Ben was for riding over to the Clayhill ranch and reporting the men to Mr. Clayhill.

“Let it lie, Ben. He wouldn’t do anything to them. They would say it was an accident, which it was. But it was an accident they caused to happen.”

“I don’t think Clayhill knows or cares what his men do. I’ve met up with his foreman a time or two. He’s not like the hands. He ’pears to be a cut higher. He might do somethin’.”

“I wouldn’t count on it, Ben. We’ve got to think about what we’re going to do now.”

“We’ll stay on here. There’s nothing else we can do.”

“I know. But I worry about Odell. If Mrs. Hayward will take her home with her, I’m going to let her go and stay awhile. She gets so lonesome here, and now without Pa . . .”

“What about you, Rosalee? Don’t you get lonesome, too?”

“Of course I do. But without Pa and Odell to look after, I’ll ride out with you for awhile. Maybe together we can get a few more cattle and we’ll drive them to Junction City. We could use the cash money.”

Ben left to take the news to the neighbors as soon as dawn streaked the eastern sky. Rosalee went with him to the corral to get his horse. Logan Horn’s mare and foal came to meet her. During the long night she had thought of him once or twice and wondered what the future held for him as well as for Odell, Ben, and herself.

“I’ll be back as soon as I tell ’em about Pa. It’ll take awhile for ’em to load up.” The tragedy seemed to have steadied Ben. He went about what he had to do calmly. “I skinned out the deer I got yesterday. It’s a little ’un, so you might as well roast the whole thing. There might he nigh on to thirty people here if they bring all the kids. You and Odell put on your good dresses, Rosalee. As soon as I get back I’ll start to rig up a table in the yard. We’ll do this up right so Pa’d be proud.”

“Oh, Ben! Go on before I start bawling again. And Ben . . . when you come back you’d better tie Charlie up. He’s not used to being with so many kids and he might bite one of them.”

“I don’t think he’d do that, but he’d be grabbin’ off a hunk of that deer meat if he got a chance.”

The Haywards and the Cranstons arrived by mid-morning. They came in wagons loaded with food they had hastily gathered from their storehouses: smoked ham, hominy, dried beans, honey, freshly baked bread, and apple jelly. Shortly before noon Mr. Smithfield and two of his sons rode over on horseback carrying a basket of fried apple pies. His wife was ailing, he said, but she sent her condolences.

Lottie Hayward climbed down off the wagon seat holding her baby in her arms and the rest of the children spilled out the back of the wagon. She gave the oldest one a quilt to spread on the grass under a shade tree and cautioned each one to be quiet out of respect for the dead.

“I’d better not see a smile or hear a titter till we’re in the wagon ’n away from here,” she said sternly, and waited for a chorus of, “Yes, Maw.”

The children, all dressed in their best, obeyed and tried to conceal their excitement. Lottie left the sleeping baby in the care of Polly, the oldest child, and went to where Rosalee and Odell stood beside the door greeting their guests.

“Hit’s just about the awfulest thing I ever did hear of,” she said, shaking her head sadly. “Yo’re just little orphans, is what ya are!” A few tears squeezed from between her eyelids and she blinked them away. She hugged each of the girls. “Now tell me what to do. Where’ll I put the vittles I brought? I’ll swan to goodness, we’re agoin’ to have a bunch to feed!”

“You didn’t need to bring anything, Lottie,” Rosalee exclaimed.

“Why I did so! Landsakes! What’s neighbors fer?” Lottie Hayward was a big, square-built woman with large hands and feet. It was said she could plow as well as her husband. The lines of her homely, weathered face were arranged somberly to fit the occasion, and she talked in a muffled whisper as if she were afraid she would disturb the dead.

“Odell, why don’t you go sit on the quilt with Polly and Sudie May? Lottie will help me now. And so will Mrs. Cranston when she gets the baby to sleep.”

“No. I’ll help you, Rosalee. Pa’d . . . want me to help.”

“All right, honey. If you want to.”

The men fashioned a coffin for Grant from the planks that Ben and Rosalee had been accumulating to floor the cabin. It was a crude affair, but Rosalee lined the box with her mother’s best quilt. After her father was placed in it she put a faded pink cloth rose from one of her mother’s hats in his hand. Ben wanted to bury him on a knoll at the corner of their land and Rosalee agreed. They walked behind the wagon carrying the coffin with Odell between them and the neighbors walking quietly behind.

The burial ceremony was brief. Rosalee asked Mr. Hayward to read a scripture from her mother’s Bible, and they sang a chorus of “Rock of Ages.” When it was over, Ben stepped forward and used two of his precious supply of nails to nail the lid of the coffin in place. Odell started to sob when they lowered the coffin into the ground and the men began shoveling in the dirt.

Rosalee led the mourners back down the hill to the cabin. She thought about how comforting it was to be with people at this time. Then her thoughts turned to Logan Horn, and she remembered the sadness on his face the morning he lashed his mother’s body to the travois. He had gone through this alone except for the little help she had given to him. Where was he? she wondered. Why hadn’t he come back?

A burial or a wedding was almost the only occasion to bring neighbors together. It was a chance to visit and exchange news. The men were anxious to know about the handsome, blooded mare and the foal in the Spurlock corral. Rosalee left it up to Ben to tell about Logan Horn stopping at their place in the middle of the night with his dying mother. She could tell that Ben was enjoying having the men’s rapt attention and she was proud of him for stating so matter-of-factly that Logan’s mother was an Indian and that he had taken her body into the hills to build a scaffold according to the custom of her people.

She watched her neighbors for signs of prejudice, but if they had any they kept them concealed. She wondered what they would think if she told them Logan had gone to Junction City to buy the range Adam Clayhill had been using all these years. She hadn’t even told Ben that news. Her eyes strayed once again down the trail toward town. Something had gone wrong or Logan would have been back for his horses by now.

By the time the neighbors made ready to leave in order to be home before dark, Rosalee had told the circumstances leading to her father’s death a dozen times. She named the men from the Clayhill ranch.

“That there foreman, Case Malone, seemed like a good sort of a feller. He come by one time ’n said they had stock on the range ’n if’n we let ’em be, they’d let us be, ’n they have.”

“They ain’t bothered us none,” Mr. Cranston said. “I heard tell he ain’t been foreman but fer two, three years. Injuns killed the other’n. Guess he was meaner than a rattler. I don’t know where this ’un come from, but he ain’t no fool.”

“You plannin’ on astayin’ here, Miss Rosalee?” Mr. Hayward asked.

“Of course. Our land is paid for. This is our home and now our pa is . . . buried here.”

“Well now, you just be mighty careful of them fellers ’n any other drifter what comes by.” He shook his head. “My, my . . . it used to be a woman’s worry was the Injuns, ’n a man, even if he was at the bottom of the barrel, would die aprotectin’ ’er. Times is achangin’.”

“Don’t worry, Mr. Hayward. I’m going to keep the rifle handy from now on. I appreciate you and Lottie taking Odell home with you for awhile. You make her mind and help with the work. She needs children to play with. It’ll help keep this off her mind for awhile.”

“We’re jest proud to have her. If’n ya’ll need any help you jest holler. It ain’t but a hour’s ride over here.”

The children were in the wagons. Odell sat between Sudie May and Polly. She tried not to smile, to show her excitement, but her eyes gleamed. Ben and Rosalee kissed her good-bye.

“Mind Lottie and help with the baby. Ben and I will ride over next week and see if you want to come home.”

Lottie set a basket in the wagon. “You keep the rest of the honey, Rosalee. I see ya’ve et all yores . . . No, I don’t want the rest of that ham. Keep it fer yoreself ’n Ben. I’ll take a hunk a that deer meat, if’n yore sure ya can spare it. Silas can’t make the time to hunt like he ort to.”

“Keep the bread ’n the hominy, Rosalee,” Mrs. Cranston insisted. “I got aplenty at home.”

“Thank you all. I don’t know what we’d have done without you.”

The women hugged Rosalee. The men, after they shook hands with her and Ben, climbed up on the wagon seats and put the teams in motion.

“Bye, Rosalee. Bye, Ben,” Odell called.

“Don’t ya worry ’bout ’er none. We’d jest be proud fer ’er to stay fer quite a spell. I forgot to ask ya, Rosalee, if’n ya want some tater eyes to plant. If’n ya do, send Ben over.” Lottie turned around to wave.

“We’ve got plenty, Lottie, but thanks.” Rosalee and Ben waved at Odell until the trail turned and the wagon was out of sight.

“It’ll be more lonesome than ever without Odell and . . . Pa,” Rosalee murmured.

“I’ll turn Charlie loose.” With his hands in his pockets and his head bowed, Ben walked toward the cowshed.

After the chores were done, Ben lay down on the bunk and went to sleep. Rosalee covered him with a quilt because the night was cool. She flung her shawl around her shoulders and went out to sit on the step. So much had happened since Logan Horn had pounded on their door in the middle of the night.

Charlie came to lie down at her feet and she stroked his shaggy head. Rosalee sat, not moving, her jumbled thoughts twisting and turning like a tumbleweed driven by a brisk wind. Pa was gone . . . poor Pa. He’d not been the same after Mama died. He’d loved her so much.

Rosalee watched the break in the trees leading to the trail to town and a thought came to her mind that made her heart freeze: The Clayhill riders! Had they met up with Logan and killed him?

*  *  *

The Clayhill ranch house was ablaze with light as it was every evening at this time when Della Clayhill was at home. It was a big, square, two-storied, white frame house with a wide, railed veranda on three sides, surrounded by a white picket fence that no ranch hand dared to step within without being invited. The long, narrow windows on both the upper and lower floors were decorated with elaborately carved woodwork. Stained glass panes adorned the upper part of the windows as well as the double doors that opened onto the veranda. It was said to be one of the most elegant houses in the Colorado Territory.

Della loved the house with its Persian rugs, voluptuous, velvet draperies and ornate Victorian furniture, but hated its location. Since her mother had died five years before, she had spent as little time here as possible. It was a boring, savage land, and the people here were equally boring. But if she was going to stay in the good graces of her stepfather, she had to divide her time between the ranch and Denver.

Lately Della had begun to worry that Adam might marry again. He had made several trips to Denver to visit a widow not much older than herself. The thought of sharing her inheritance with another woman was not something Della liked to think about, and she had given considerable thought to the idea of getting Adam to marry her. He was still a vigorous man and the thought of sleeping with her stepfather was rather intriguing. She had often wondered why her mother had detested the physical side of her marriage to Adam. He was big, strong, demanding, had an explosive temper, and could be exceedingly cruel at times.

Della had been eleven years old when her mother married Adam ten years before. Even then she had adored him and spent as much time with him as possible. She was not an outdoor type of girl. She hated the smelly outbuildings on the ranch, the wind blowing her hair, the hot sun making her sweat. Being inside the lovely house was more to her liking. She became adept at bossing the servants, which irritated her mother but amused Adam. Some days she would spend hours standing at the window waiting for him to come in. She loved to sit on his lap and wiggle until his
thing
got hard and he would lift her off and take her mother up to the bedroom.