Love on the Line (10 page)

The boys had lobbed two more pebbles, but Georgie’s statement captured their attention.

“The night was wrapped in a bitter chill, and Jesus had grown cold in that drafty stable. Mary called to Joseph, asking him to stoke their little fire, but it had been a long night and he slept deeply. So she caught the eye of a nearby oxen. ‘My son grows cold,’ she said. ‘Could you blow on the embers?’ But the ox was locked behind a stall and couldn’t stir from its place.”

A rock underneath Luke gouged into his leg. In an effort to ignore it, he concentrated on Georgie’s retelling of the old legend.

“Mary asked the donkey, but it was asleep and didn’t hear her call. Nor did the horse or the sheep.”

Cheerily, cheer up, cheer up, cheerily, cheer up.

They all looked toward the sound.

“There it is!” A redheaded boy pointed.

The children began talking at once. “I see it!”

“Where? Where is it?”

“There. Look there.”

Luke imagined the orange-breasted bird. Another early sign of spring. He had heard its song on many occasions, but he hadn’t realized it belonged to the robin.

The children quieted.

Georgie pressed her feet together, resting linked hands atop her knees. “A little brown bird in the rafters of the stable noticed the dwindling fire and Mary’s distress. It flew down and fluttered its wings, rekindling the ashes. Hopping about the stable, it gathered sticks and hay with its beak, then dropped them into the fire. Suddenly, a flame shot up, touching the little bird’s chest and turning it orange.”

The boys’ eyes grew wide.

“Did it hurt?” the blond girl asked.

“A little,” Georgie admitted. “But the robin continued to fan the flames with its wings. The blazes grew, the stable warmed, and Jesus slept soundly. Instead of returning to the rafters, the bird tended the fire all night long. At dawn, Mary lifted her hand. The tired but faithful robin landed on her fingers. ‘From this day forward,’ she said, ‘may your red breast be a blessed reminder of the great charity you have done for Baby Jesus.’ And as you can see, the robin’s orange underbelly still covers its noble heart.”

The children sat quietly, absorbing the tale.

Bettina scrunched up her nose. “Do ya think the robin knew who Jesus was?”

“Perhaps,” Georgie answered. “But because of the beauty of their orange chests, women want to use robins as decorations on their hats and cloaks.”

The black-haired boy scratched the back of his head. “But what if we only killed one? That won’t hurt none.”

“It seems that way, Eugene. But look what happened to our friendly beavers. We had millions and millions and millions of them until they were harvested for hats and coats. And the impossible happened. Animals which could not run out, ran out. We barely have a few thousand left in our entire country.”

Eugene rocked back and forth on his backside, eyeing Georgie with speculation.

“Deer, bison, pigeons, Carolina parakeets,” she continued. “All once numbered in the millions. And all have been hunted to near extinction.”

Luke wished he could see her face. Whatever shone on it had captivated her audience.

“Tomorrow, I want you to pay close attention every time you hear a bird,” she said. “Every time you see a hat or cloak or skirt with bird parts on it. For every bird part you see, some innocent mama or daddy bird had to die. Then, when you close your eyes tomorrow night, try to imagine a day without birdsong, without seeing a friendly winged creature out your back window, because that’s what it will be like when you are a grown-up if we don’t stop killing our birds.”

“What if it’s already dead?” A boy out of Luke’s line of vision asked the question.

“Then put it in a box and bring it to our next meeting and we will give it a burial.”

Eugene and his friend looked at each other. The thought of a bird funeral clearly captured their imagination.

“In the meanwhile, share your new knowledge about birds with your mothers and fathers.” She stood, dusting her hands together. “Next meeting, I will teach you a bird call. Listen.”

The piercing whistle he’d heard the first time he saw her rent the air. If she hadn’t won the boys over before, this wiped out all hesitation. Their faces lit with awe and excitement.

“That was a Northern Cardinal,” she said. “I learned it when I wasn’t much older than you. Would you like me to teach it to you?”

They jumped to their feet, shouting their yeses with enthusiasm.

“Then you’d best not miss our next meeting. But it’s getting late; we need to head back.”

Groans of disappointment followed. Luke smiled. Nothing like leaving on a high note—literally. He watched the battalion of feet head back the way they’d come, some running ahead, some lagging behind, several hovering about Georgie. He stayed hidden until the sound of their voices and footfalls had long since passed.

Finally, he slithered out from under the shrub, wincing as he pushed himself to his feet. No sense in continuing his search for Comer. The day was almost over.

Returning to Honey Dew, he praised her for her patience, then swung atop her. He contemplated all he’d learned from listening to Georgie, admitting to himself she was right. Killing birds for no other reason than to decorate hats was not worth the price of depleting the species.

The question he didn’t want to face, but could not ignore, was if killing birds for sport was worth the price.

Now that the ladies of the newly formed Plumage League had voted in their officers, Georgie decided her first duty as president would be to disrupt the milliner’s contest.

Her gaze wandered about Mrs. Zach’s parlor. They’d moved their meetings to the mayor’s home since the Zachs not only had more space, but Mrs. Zach and her daughter, Rachel, were both members. The sitting room stretched almost the entire length of the house, opening onto a grand veranda outside.

Georgie rubbed a hand along the cheerful blue-and-apricot sofa with dolphin arms, its rich upholstery echoed in the wallpaper and drapes. The pièce de résistance, however, was a colorful needlework rug with bouquets of various flowers. She couldn’t imagine the patience it must have taken to stitch such a large and intricate piece. Seemed sacrilegious to set her boots on it.

Crossing her ankles so only her left toe touched the carpet, she made a mental note of the ladies assembled in a half dozen chairs, two easy chairs and two divans. They were a cross-section from the crème of society to the very humble. From the elderly to the young. From the doers to the followers.

Resting her cup and saucer on her knee, Georgie cleared her throat. “I was wondering, have any of you read about Mr. Ottfried’s Easter bonnet contest?”

The idle chatter fizzled as the ladies turned their attention to her.

“Read about it?” Vicki Lee asked. Her husband, Joe, was the local lawyer and a member of the Gun Club. His court performances were so theatrical, folks would drive from miles around to hear him argue a case. Much of his reflected glory fell onto his wife, making her as much a star as he. “That’s all anyone is talking about.”

“His motives were less than honorable, you know.” Mrs. Yoakum patted the corners of her mouth with a hanky. The judge’s wife had slicked her dark hair back into a topknot, accentuating her receding hairline. “Mrs. Oodson ran to him straightaway after your first meeting. If you ask me, his contest is nothing short of a call to arms.”

“Well, I say we answer with a battle cry so loud, that fella won’t know what hit him.” Kathy Patrick had a big smile, a big heart, and big ideas. There wasn’t a soul in town who didn’t love her. She chaired the Ladies’ Reading Circle and had taught Bettina to read.

“What did you have in mind?” Georgie asked her.

She scrunched up her mouth. “Well, he’s chosen his weapon—a contest. All we need to do is come up with one bigger, better, and more enticing.”

“What could possibly be more enticing than a new Easter bonnet?” Heather Martin was not native to Brenham but was well respected, having married the town’s banker. “And with Easter right around the corner, we don’t have time for a contest of our own.”

“What if we had ours during Maifest?” Miss Gladstone, her voice melodious even when she wasn’t singing, had been last year’s Maifest Queen.

Excited murmurs whisked through the group. The German tradition of celebrating spring’s arrival had been observed in Brenham since 1874, making this their twenty-ninth festival. Along with the usual eating, drinking, and singing, the fair offered a Maypole, a parade with elaborate floats, and the coronation of a Maifest Queen.

“Perhaps we could hold a hat-making contest,” Mrs. Zach suggested, refilling Georgie’s coffee.

Georgie held her cup steady, watching the rich dark liquid pour from the silver spout, its aroma filling the room. “We’d have to make a rule stating the hat can’t have any bird parts on it.”

“But what would the prize be?” Miss Rachel asked, her wavy hair tucked up with fancy combs. The mayor’s daughter had been voted secretary of the Plumage League and held her pencil in readiness.

Mrs. Patrick straightened. “What if the new Maifest Queen is crowned with the winning hat?”

“That’s a marvelous idea,” Georgie exclaimed. “Mrs. Abney? Would you mind asking the fire department if we could do that?”

Mrs. Abney wore her Sunday best, though the blue woolsey had faded from multiple washings. Her husband was a member of the fire brigade, and since Maifest was put on by them, she’d have a good chance of smoothing their way.

“I’m sure they won’t mind,” she said. “With businesses squawking about the cost of sponsorship this year, I know the boys could use a show of support.”

“We should also have a float.” The doctor’s wife sat tall and elegant in a cutaway bodice fitted over a beaded blouse. “I’ll ask Friedrich if we can use the basket phaeton.”

Exclaiming, the ladies applauded with gloved hands. The basket phaeton was a sleek carriage used mostly for parks and beaches. The doctor was the only man in town who owned one, and Georgie could hardly contain her excitement.

“Let’s decorate it to look like a bird,” Mrs. Patrick suggested. “It could have wings and everything.”

Georgie couldn’t imagine how to turn a basket phaeton into a bird, but if anyone could do it, Mrs. Patrick could.

“Do I have a motion for Mrs. Patrick to be float chair?” Georgie asked.

“I so move.”

“I second.”

“All in favor?” Georgie asked.

The vote was unanimous. Smiling, Mrs. Patrick ran the rest of the meeting, forming committees, assigning jobs, and setting deadlines.

“We need someplace to hide all the hat entries,” Mrs. Lee said. “Someplace which doesn’t have children.”

“Georgie?” Mrs. Patrick asked. “Your cottage would be perfect, with you all by yourself over there.”

Though Georgie’s home was tiny, it was the envy of many in town. A woman with a job and her own place was as rare as hen’s teeth.

“Of course,” she heard herself saying. “I’ll store them in my bedroom where none can see.”

Miss Rachel recorded their decisions along with the rest of the minutes. Sitting back, Georgie sipped the last of her coffee, pleased with the afternoon’s work.

The only signs of life at the run-down, board-and-batten farmhouse were chickens strutting about a fenced-in hen yard. No smoke drifted from the chimney, no woman washed linen in a cauldron, not even a dog barked in greeting.

The von Wredes were first in a long line of families Luke planned to visit over the next several weeks. He’d pored over Georgie’s ledgers and the county’s land registration books in an effort to familiarize himself with all outlying farms.

Tying Honey Dew to a tree, he surveyed the pared-down array of outbuildings. The barn looked more like a child’s playhouse than a structure for housing animals. Four hogs slept soundly in a mule pen. And a once cone-shaped potato bank sat deflated beneath a giant elm.

Testing each board before putting his weight on it, Luke climbed the steps to the porch and front door. “Hello? Anybody home?”

Nothing stirred. The place didn’t look like anything a train robber would own, nor a place which could afford phone service. And deserted as it was, he figured the entire family, including women and children, were in the field weeding and cultivating as much corn as possible before cotton planting began.

Returning to his horse, Luke decided to cross the von Wredes from his list. The men he was looking for would be living higher on the hog. He couldn’t help but wonder, though, how many von Wrede children were in the fields and how old they were.

His uncle’s farmhouse had looked a lot like this one. When they’d moved to Rusk County, Luke had been ten, with Alec only eleven months behind him in age, but a foot behind him in size. Their uncle made a special cut-down hoe for Alec and demanded a man’s work from them both. The dawn-to-dusk, backbreaking labor was a far cry from the hunting, shooting, fishing, and swimming they’d done with their father.

Shaking off the memories, he guided Honey Dew toward the next farm. A hint of breeze teased the leaves on the trees like an invisible finger running along a line of fringe. A woodpecker
rat-a-tat-tatted
in the distance. Luke scanned the area, spotting the bird at the top of a dead tree hammering the final touches on its oval nest. He hoped the woodpecker’s chicks could fly on their first try. Otherwise, it would be an awfully big drop.

He studied the bird’s markings: black-and-white body with a brilliant scarlet head. He’d seen plenty of them over his lifetime but never gave them much more than a glance. He took note now, though, of both the bird and where he was so he could tell Georgie in case she wanted to bring out her students.

Much as he hated to admit it, the lesson she’d given the children had fascinated him and made him more sympathetic to the birds’ plight. That didn’t make hunting a sin, though. Especially if he ate what he killed.

Even for next week’s tournament, the local restaurants would pick up the shot-down birds and serve them to the spectators. Either way, he didn’t think God would be too upset. The Bible said He’d caused so many quail to fall dead from the sky, the Israelites ate them until they literally came out their noses. And even then, they couldn’t finish them all.

No, there was no sin in shooting a few birds. And the tournament would bring enthusiasts from all over the state. He’d bet money every one of Comer’s gang would be there. Maybe even Frank Comer himself.

Problem was, Luke didn’t know what they looked like. Between the neckerchiefs they covered their faces with and the citizens unwilling to point fingers, the gang remained unidentified. But he knew they could shoot. Especially Comer. Surely the hundreds of dollars worth of cash prizes would be more than they could resist.

Winding his way between two fields, he couldn’t help but be impressed with von Wrede’s work. The farmer might only have seventy-five acres, but all Luke had passed had been plowed and planted with corn. Nary an acre was left open for cotton. He must have grown cotton last year and was rotating out. That would explain, to some extent, the disrepair of his house and outbuildings. The year 1902 had not been a good one for cotton.

Finally, he crossed into Peter Finkel’s land. Unlike von Wrede, Finkel had close to four hundred acres, yet field after field lay fallow. No cornfields. No plowing or preparation for cotton planting. Just neglected, overgrown ground.

Honey Dew gave a long, blustery exhale, as if disgusted by the waste of fertile soil. Luke had to agree and began to despair of finding any cultivated fields. But a few acres from the farmhouse a good amount of redtop cane had been planted for feed, along with several rows of molasses cane, a half-acre potato patch, and a full-acre garden.

He smelled the cow pasture before he saw it, then rounded the corner to find a giant, fenced-in grazing area. Even though there was room a’plenty to spread out, the black cows plastered themselves shoulder to shoulder in tight clusters beneath a smattering of shade trees.

At the top of the rise a typical one-story house with a front porch faced southward. A flock of guineas in his path scattered, squawking an alarm and pumping their heads like rocker arms on a locomotive wheel.

A young girl in braids and calico scattered shelled corn from her hand to a gaggle of turkeys, chickens, and geese gathering about her feet. She paused and looked his way, shading her eyes from the bright sun. “
Mutti,
somebody’s coming.”

A boy in a straw hat and overalls churned butter on the porch, his eyes tracking Luke all the way to the yard. The old hound at his feet lifted its head, then thought better of it and lowered it back down.

Pulling Honey Dew to a stop, Luke touched his hat. “Howdy.”

The boy switched hands, then continued churning, the
swish, swish, swish
letting Luke know he hadn’t been at it very long.

The girl smiled, her two front teeth missing. “I’m Dewiller.”

“Pleased to meet you, Miss Dewiller. I’m Mr. Palmer. Your ma or pa around?”

A woman in a brown dress stepped onto the porch, drying her hands with the serviceable black apron about her waist. Though her face still hinted of youth and her eyes sparked with interest, her posture was bent and her blond hair didn’t have near the luster Georgie’s did.

“
Hallo.
” She scanned the area behind him. “Vhere’s
der Wagen
?”

Dismounting, he touched his hat. “Mrs. Finkel?”

She nodded.

“I’m Luke Palmer, the troubleman for Southwestern Telegraph and Telephone.”