Man Camp (19 page)

From there, with Cooper’s okay, the men agree to launch into an intensive fact-finding mission and question every standard operating procedure in effect at Tuckington Farm. They work all evening and through much of the night, and do the same the next day. Cooper has his regular farmhands resume their duties so that the campers can spend their time studying milking charts, checking out competing processing plants and dairy co-ops, going online to research feed.

The men calculate the advantage of different land uses, consider cash crops, explore other breeds, and examine each phase of production. They find that over the past five years, Tuckington Farm’s milk production has dropped from an average of sixty-four pounds of milk per cow per day to sixty, with Simon reporting that the region’s average is sixty-eight. They learn that milk prices are highest in the fall and winter, coinciding with school lunches, indicating that Cooper should reverse his breeding schedule. Simon is especially pleased to have discovered the U.S. Geological Survey site, which color-codes land-use maps from satellites, providing detailed information on the chemical composition of soil to help determine where to plant which crops. They locate a dairy co-op that pays significantly more for raw milk than the dairy processor that Cooper’s family has worked with for generations.

“There’s one more thing I’d like you to consider,” Kurt says. “Agricultural software.”

“Sounds expensive,” Cooper says.

“It’ll be worth it,” explains Kurt, who called his company earlier and put a team of employees on the project. “The latest dairy software programs can streamline your operations in ways you can’t imagine. Picture each cow at Tuckington Farm having a transponder that keeps tabs on how much food she eats, how much milk she produces, the butterfat content of the milk, and so on. It’ll enable you to track breeding history, semen inventory, the whole shebang.”

Cooper still looks overwhelmed, but grateful.

“And if it’s all the same to you,” Kurt says, “I’d like to stick around for a couple of weeks and help you set up the system.” Before Cooper has a chance to object, Kurt says, “I’ve already cleared my work schedule and it would be my pleasure.”

CHAPTER 12

“Men marry women hoping they won’t change. Women marry men hoping they will.”

Anonymous

IT IS PAST MIDNIGHT when Martha sneaks down to the liquor cabinet, pours herself a rocks glass full of whiskey, and tiptoes back upstairs to her room. She brushes her hair and belts back enough of the drink to feel fortified, then opens the bedroom door and eases down the hallway, sliding along in stocking feet, a full moon illuminating her way. She passes the campers’ bedrooms, the loveseat where she and Cooper kissed, the hall bathroom with its dripping faucet, and stops in front of her destination: Cooper’s bedroom.

There she hesitates and has to remind herself that she’s going home in two days and needs to know where things stand. She empties the glass of whiskey, leaving the tumbler on the windowsill, and, without giving herself time to reconsider, grabs hold of the doorknob and slips silently into Cooper’s dark room, pulling the door shut behind her.

For several seconds, Martha stands perfectly still, allowing her eyes to adjust to the darkness. Then, with one hand on the wall and the other waving back and forth in front of her to fend off furniture, she feels her way toward Cooper’s bed, progressing only a short distance when the top of her head bangs into something large and hard, jutting out above her. Startled, her first thought (albeit irrational) is that Beatrice has set a trap for her. She reaches up and runs her fingers through what feels like the coarse, dry hair of a man’s beard.

In her pocket she finds a book of matches and strikes one to discover that what she’s bumped into is the hardened muzzle of some oversize member of the deer family: a moose? an elk? She’s not sure which. Out of her peripheral vision, she sees that the entire wall is covered in hunting trophies—heads, antlers, an occasional whole animal—all casting gothic shadows of fairy-tale monsters, their lifeless glass eyes fixed on her.

It’s not until the match goes out on its fall to the floor that Martha realizes she has dropped it. Suddenly, she can’t reach Cooper fast enough and shuffles quickly toward him until her shins meet the side of his bed. There, her hands find space for her body to fit around his, and she climbs in, snuggling against his broad back. A subtle shift in his breathing indicates he’s awake.

“Just in case you’re used to buxom dairymaids climbing into bed with you,” she whispers, “it’s
Martha.
”

Cooper exhales relief and laughs. “I thought I was in the middle of some fantastic dream and all I could think was, ‘Don’t wake up!’ ” He turns over to face her. “Hello, Martha.”

“What’s with the Museum of Natural History overhead?”

“Got you into my bed lickety-split, didn’t it?”

“Hmm.”

Cooper wraps his arms around her. “I’m happy you’re here. I’ve been hoping something like this would happen.”

“Why haven’t you done anything about it, then?”

“That’s a good question,” he says, caught off guard. “I guess I was taught that a proper Southern gentleman shouldn’t crawl into his guest’s bed.”

“I suppose I have your mother to thank for that,” Martha says.
Fucking Beatrice.
“You know, this Southern-gentleman thing is starting to get on my nerves.”

“A gentleman is really just a patient wolf.”

“It happens to be a full moon tonight, wolfie.”

Cooper howls softly.

“I imagine your mother wouldn’t think much of a woman sneaking in here,” Martha says. She listens for the sound of slippered feet in the hallway.

“Can’t argue with you there,” Cooper says. “Being direct is not part of her repertoire. To her, the art of being feminine is knowing how to make a man think that doing things
her
way was
his
idea.”

Martha is impressed that Cooper understands this about his mother.

“There’s a lot of craftiness with Southern women,” he continues. “It’s why I happen to be head over heels for a Yankee myself.”

Martha smiles in the darkness.

“Remember what I told you at the Guggenheim? That I love how you always say exactly what’s on your mind?”

“No,” Martha lies.

“It’s true. You are fearless!”

They kiss.

“Cooper?”

“Yes?”

Martha rolls onto her back. “If you had any idea how much whiskey it took to get me in here, you’d know I’m not fearless.” Her eyes have finally adjusted to the darkness and she stares at a barely visible constellation of glow-in-the-dark planet stickers that must have been affixed to his ceiling when he was a child. She tries to summon up the little speech she prepared earlier in the day. “I think the only way to be fearless in love is to have total trust. I’ve spent the whole week making excuses for your behavior, but now I just want to know: Have you changed your mind about me?”

“Oh, Martha, it’s not that,” Cooper says, pulling her closer still. He kisses the side of her forehead. “You
are
fearless and I’m a complete idiot.”

They lie silently in the darkness for a long while; Martha focuses on the jutting chin of a black bear above her and Cooper struggles to find the right words.

“I’m not the kind of man who asks for help or talks things out,” he finally says. “I wasn’t brought up that way and it doesn’t come naturally to me.”

“Well, sneaking into your room in the middle of the night wasn’t exactly natural for me, either,” Martha says. “Now it’s your turn to go out on a limb.” She waits a beat. “I’ll get you some whiskey if you want.”

Cooper takes a deep breath. “I guess what you need to know is that I haven’t been totally up front with you.”

Martha stiffens, bracing herself for mention of Jolene.

“My farm’s in trouble,” he blurts out. “Very serious trouble.”

Oh, that,
Martha thinks. “I don’t want to sound insensitive, but I don’t understand why that should affect how you feel about me.”

“Well, it doesn’t affect how I
feel,
but at the risk of sounding sexist, I am a man. I can’t very well pursue you if I can’t provide for you, let alone myself.”

There’s something that no New York man would give a second thought
to,
Martha thinks. “So your solution is to dump me?”

“Of course not! Though, now that you put it that way, I can see how you might have misunderstood. The truth is it never occurred to me that I had the right to court you while my livelihood was falling apart. I was thinking of a postponement more than anything else . . . until I landed on my feet again.”

“When were you going to let me in on this little romantic postponement? I think I had a right to know.” Martha flips back on her side, so that their faces are just a few inches apart. “It’s ironic, isn’t it? I’ve brought all these men here to learn from you, and you stand to learn just as much from them.” She puts a hand on his cheek. “I have news for you: I didn’t fall for you because I thought you were a great dairy farmer.”

“I know you didn’t. But as crazy as it sounds, it matters to me that you do.” Cooper considers all that he has learned from the campers in the past two days. “Look, Martha, it’s becoming painfully clear to me that my way of doing things isn’t working, but I’m trying to figure it out.” He takes both her hands in his. “Will you please give me another chance?”

“I think that can be arranged,” Martha says, smiling, “under certain conditions.”

“Shoot,” Cooper says. “Though I’m hoping it doesn’t involve yoga or facials.”

“Number one: Call off your mother. Number two: Don’t shut me out again. And three”—here Martha pauses to work up her courage—“leave all that Southern-gentleman crap at the bedroom door.”

“Done, done, and most especially done!”

They stay awake until dawn, until the sun comes up over the hills, until Cooper, exhausted and happy, announces that he has cows to milk.

He gets dressed and sits on the edge of the bed, fingering one of Martha’s dark curls, a long tendril that’s splashed across the pillow, and tells her the whole story of how the campers came to his rescue. “I’m not exaggerating when I say that if it weren’t for you and your nutty Man Camp idea, I might be well on my way to losing my family’s farm.”

Martha smiles.

“I happen to be falling in love with you, Martha McKenna,” he says.

“Say that again,” she whispers.

A few hours later, Martha sneaks out of Cooper’s room and creeps back down the hall, scarcely able to believe she’s gotten away with it. She gets dressed and skips downstairs, singing out, “Good morning,” to Lucy and Beatrice, who are puttering in the kitchen.

“Good afternoon,” Beatrice says pointedly.

Martha looks at the wall clock: twelve-twenty. “So it is! Sorry I overslept. Did I miss anything?”

“Not a thing,” Lucy says, detecting the tremor of a secret in her friend’s voice. She hands Martha a mug of coffee and mouths,
Did
I
miss anything?

Before Martha can respond, Beatrice hands her the rocks glass she left on the windowsill outside Cooper’s bedroom. It is freshly washed, warm in her hands. “Would you be a dear, Martha, and put this back where it belongs?”

THE CAMPERS SPEND the day hard at work trying to save Tuckington Farm. Walter reconfigures Cooper’s computer with a wireless Internet connection and adds enough memory to accommodate the agricultural software program that Kurt’s New York team has acquired and is modifying for the farm. Simon continues to pursue his soil research, color-coding a map of the farm, field by field, based on chemical composition. Bryce sketches logos and designs labels, and Adam tests algorithms to measure production. Kurt and Cooper spend the day in town, negotiating with local bankers to lift the lien on Tuckington Farm now that they’ve secured promissory letters from New York financiers, friends of Kurt’s who are willing to invest.

Not far away, Lucy and Martha cart party supplies to the old barn and, under Beatrice’s watchful eye, begin decorating for their bash. The girls are impatient for Beatrice to leave so they can talk about Martha’s night with Cooper, but she doesn’t. Instead, she lingers over the arrangement of the flowers, supervises the folding of napkins, and straightens the tablecloths Lucy and Martha have placed on the serving table and bar. In the end, however, the barn looks perfect: romantic and festive, with wooden boxes of red geraniums on the windowsills, strings of white lights hanging from the rafters, and jugs overflowing with tall sunflowers scattered about.

Not until late in the afternoon, when Lucy and Martha have returned to the house to get dressed for the party, do they finally have a moment out of Beatrice’s earshot. Martha is trying on her barn-dance outfit bought at Barneys two days before leaving New York City: a big swishy skirt and a narrow white top that scoops low over her décolletage, while Lucy’s ear is pressed against the door, listening for creaking floorboards. When she’s finally satisfied that they’re alone, Lucy flops down on the bed. “Out with it!” she demands, and Martha, in a twangy country accent, sings,
“I’m just a girl who can’t say no!”
Swooshing her skirt back and forth, she dances around the room and divulges every detail of her night of lovemaking. Between talking about Cooper and putting on the ensemble, Martha is on top of the world. “I could be the lead in
Oklahoma!
Isn’t this skirt fun?”

“Yes, fun, very fun,” Lucy says, more interested in Martha’s romance with Cooper than her outfit. Not much of a shopper herself, Lucy’s wearing a dress she’s had for nearly a decade, a simple blue sheath that falls just above her knees and has a square neckline that’s bordered by tiny daisies. “Tell me how great it is to finally be with a man like Cooper.”

“You know, nothing is ever as you think it’s going to be,” Martha says, making a face in the mirror as she puts on mascara. “Cooper doesn’t have the weaknesses we’re used to in men, but he doesn’t have the strengths, either.”

“What strengths?”

“Well, for one thing, our city boys know how to talk about feelings.”

“Um. A week ago you would have called that whining, Martha.”

“Well, try doing without it altogether and you have Cooper. Of course, he excels at being masculine and chivalrous, but he’s not so hot when it comes to emotional stuff,” she says, explaining how he was willing to risk their budding relationship rather than discuss his failures.

“Is it really too much to ask for both?” Lucy groans.

“Apparently so! Now, are you ready yet?” Martha asks, grabbing her friend’s hand and pulling her off the bed.

Downstairs, they find Beatrice gazing out the kitchen window watching thunderheads roll in and settle over nearby hills. “Don’t you just love a storm?” she asks. The skies seem to darken as she speaks, turning a fantastic purple-gray.

“I know I do,” Martha says, imagining the tempest to come when Beatrice learns that she and Cooper are in love.

“Well, that one’s headed due east,” Lucy says. “See how the anvil top is facing us? It indicates the direction the storm will travel.”

“My God, the things you know,” Martha says, impressed, scouring her brain for a single useful weather fact.