Maude (9 page)

“I told her he left without asking, so you couldn’t
have turned him down if you wanted. Bessie’s face
turned white. She’d talked to the other women and
knew what would happen if her brother left town
without marrying you. She said, ‘He didn’t even ask
her?’
“Not a word about it. Matter-of-fact, he told her
pretty-as-you-please that he was leaving tomorrow
and asked if he could call again should he ever get
back here.
“You should have seen her face! She looked like
she was about to bring down the wrath of God on
George’s head. I almost felt sorry for him. Her face
turned beet-red, and she pressed her lips together, put
her hands on her hips, and nodded her head up and
down while she glared out in the direction of the barn.
She said, ‘Don’t you worry about it, Sister Connor,
George isn’t leaving tomorrow. He’ll be back over to
see Maude in the morning.’
Mom Connor patted my hand. She told me, “You
rest easy, girl. Bessie and I will see to it that this turns
out the right way.”
I was surprised by the mean look on Mom’s face,
like one of those tigers in picture books, and at the
same time it made me feel better. If Mom said it would
be all right, it would be all right.

A few years later, George told me what happened that
night. I thought part of it was funny, and part of it was
sad how Bessie made him marry me.

As best I can remember it, this is what he said:
“When I came in the house that night, I was
whistling my favorite song, all relaxed. Bessie put
dinner on the table while John dried his hands on a
towel, ignorant of what’d been going on around him.
“I told John, ‘I’m going to miss seeing the two
of you when I leave tomorrow. It’s been a real nice
visit.’
“John’s mouth was open and his lips were
making an answer he never got to say. Bessie pulled
back her right arm and landed a tight-fisted punch on
my face. She was no little flower, and it knocked me
back against the wall. I managed to stay on my feet
and leaned there, rubbing my chin.
“John grabbed Bessie’s arm and pulled her away.
He said, ‘Lord Almighty, Bessie, what’re you doing?’
“Bessie ignored him. She kept her eyes on me.
She jerked free, ran over to me and began punching
my shoulder and trying to land another one on my jaw.
I held up my hands to push away her fists aimed at my
face.
“I was able to defend myself without hitting back.
I didn’t know at the time what I did that made her so
mad, but since I grew up with her temper, I wasn’t the
least bit surprised. John ran over and grabbed her in a
bear hug and lifted her off the floor so she couldn’t
break free. He said, ‘Stop it, Bessie, what in the world
has got into you?’
“Bessie kept staring holes through me. She
shouted, ‘Maude Connor was my best friend from the
day I got to this town, and if you think you’re going to
disgrace her by taking her out on a buggy ride with no
chaperone and then leaving her here without marrying
her, you got another think coming. I’ll cut your throat
in your sleep before I’ll let that happen, even if I have
to come all the way to Kennett, Missouri to find you.’
“I knew very well she meant it. I held up both
hands in front of me. ‘All right, Bessie, all right.’
“Bessie was on fire. ‘You get your pitiful self
over there in the morning and ask that girl to be your
wife.’ She jerked one arm free from John’s grip and
pointed her finger at me, wagging it so close to my
nose it almost touched me. ‘Or else.’
“I nodded and smiled to myself as if I found my
sister’s meanness to be funny, but I didn’t argue with
her. It doesn’t do to cross her when she’s like that.
Bessie glared at me awhile and, satisfied I’d follow her
orders, sat at her place at the table and held out her
hands on each side, calm as anything. ‘Now, let’s sit
down and give thanks for this meal.’
“John ate with his face down, like he was afraid
to speak. After we were through, he and I went outside
for a smoke while Bessie cleaned up the kitchen.
“John cleared his throat, like he was halfway
afraid to bring up the subject. ‘George, are you really
going to marry Maude?’
“’I have to. You heard what Bessie said.’
“’Well, yes, but you’re not afraid of Bessie, are
you, George? She loves you. She wouldn’t really hurt
you. She couldn’t anyway. She’s only a woman.’
“I looked at John for a minute and asked, ‘You
two never had a bad fight?’
“He shrugged. ‘We argue about this and that, just
like any married folk do.’
‘Well, if you ever see that look on her face she
had tonight, don’t argue, just do what she says.’
“’But, like I said, she’s only a woman, and either
one of us could knock her down without even working
hard at it.’
“’I don’t believe in a man hitting a woman, no
matter what she does, and besides, she’s not a regular
woman, John. There are times she’s going to be just
like our mother. You’ll live happier if you know when
that is.’
John laughed at me. ‘Come on, how bad could
they be?’
“Bad enough that I’m going to saddle up in the
morning and ask Maude to marry me. I been thinking
about it anyway. I like her. She’s got a way about her.’
“’Bessie behaves just like your mother, you
say?’
“’Almost, but not as mean.’
“’How did your father put up with it? Didn’t he
ever do anything to stop her? I don’t think I would
tolerate it if she hit me like she did you.’
“’Dad was afraid of her, just like I am.’
“’Right up until he passed away?’
“’I guess so.’
‘Guess so?’
“’We don’t know for sure what become of him.
One day, about ten years ago, he was there in the
evening when we went to bed, and the next day he was
gone.’
“’I’m not surprised. He probably ran off so he
wouldn’t have to live with her anymore.’
“’Maybe so, but he didn’t take any of his clothes,
and he didn’t take his horse.’”
After telling me this, George threw back his head
and laughed. He said, “We both know for a fact, John
never looked at Bessie in the same way again. As long
as they lived together, they got along just fine.”

The next day, it was around nine in the morning when
George rode up. When I saw him, I felt like one of the
four horsemen of the apocalypse had come to call. He
tied Pawnee to the post and knocked on the cabin door.
I came out to meet him, with no smile and nothing to
say.

He said it right out. “Maude, I want you to be my
wife.”
I felt like I was falling in a deep pit and there
wasn’t one thing I could do to stop it. I looked away
and nodded. He leaned over and kissed me on my
cheek. I didn’t tilt it up to make it easier for him. He
said, “I know how you like your church, so if we can
get the preacher to say the vows tomorrow morning,
I’d like to get an early start home. I’m late for my job
already, or I’d stay a few days longer. John brought my
wagon here when he came home with Bessie, so we
can take it back to Missouri and carry what you want
with us.”
I looked up at him. “I was wondering if you
would think about staying here to live, George. You’d
be close to Bessie, and Lulu wouldn’t have to leave her
friends. Mom Connor said we could stay in the cabin
as long as we wanted.”
“That’s right nice of her, Maude, but I got a good
job at home. I got a house to take care of, and
livestock, and I have to see after my mother.”
It hurt my heart to hear that, but what could I
say? I nodded. “I’ll talk to the preacher about
tomorrow. I have a lot to do today. I’ll meet you at the
church in the morning. Ten o’clock ought to be all
right.”
I stood for a minute on the porch after he left.
When I turned around, Lulu was standing inside the
door, tears streaming down her face. I could feel my
heart breaking for both of us. I sat on the rocker and
pulled Lulu on my lap. I held and rocked her for a long
time. From time to time, I cried some, too.
I went to the parsonage and told Sister and
Brother Clark and he said he could perform the
ceremony the next morning. I cried on my way home.
Having the time set made it real to me. I went back to
my cabin to get ready to move to Missouri. While we
packed, Lulu sobbed off and on the whole afternoon.
We both wiped away tears as we folded our things.
I looked over my few dresses, thinking about
what I should wear for my wedding the next day. I ran
my fingertips over the dress with the embroidered
white flowers that I made for my wedding to James
and laid it out on the bed. There was no way I could
bring myself to wear that. It would be like committing
adultery on James.
I took James’s plaid shirt I’d worn the day he
died. I hadn’t washed it since. I held it up to my face
and breathed in deep, hoping to catch a trace of his
scent, but it had faded away. Then I folded it up inside
the wedding dress and packed them in the cedar chest
Tommy made me. They were the only parts left of the
dream James and I had lived. I finally chose an
everyday blue calico dress that I’d worn many times
for my second wedding.
I told Mom Connor about the wedding, and I
suppose Lulu told her friends. The Clarks might have
mentioned it to someone, and maybe Bessie said
something to a neighbor. The next day, there wasn’t an
empty pew in the Holiness Church when the preacher
gave George and me our vows. The gossipy women of
the town came early and sat right down front to make
sure George did the right thing. Even some of the
Baptists came to see.
The preacher used the opportunity to preach to all
the married couples in the church without the usual
sermon, just by reading the Bible. I’d taken him aside
and asked him to leave out the passage from Ruth that
I’d memorized for my wedding to James, so he quoted
from Ephesians 5, 22-33, about how husbands and
wives are supposed to act toward one another.
I did agree to love, honor and obey. George
promised the usual. I took my vows in my church in
front of God and we were man and wife. It was done
and done, no going back, ever. As we left the church,
the preacher handed me an envelope. “Here are the
letters of membership for you and Lulu to give to your
new church. We’re going to miss you, Maude.”
We had a quick meal with Mom Connor and
Helen’s family at Mom’s house, and George loaded
Lulu’s and my clothes and personal things on the
wagon. There wasn’t much room for anything else.
George told me his house was completely furnished,
so I left behind all the furniture except the little cradle
James made for Lulu. I expected I might need it again.
I hoped George would be the tender lover James had
been.
After hugs all around and promises from Helen
and Bessie that Kennett was only a few miles away
from home and they would visit back and forth every
chance they got, George helped Lulu and me up on the
wagon seat. Mom Connor handed us a picnic basket
she’d filled for our dinner.
As we drove away, I looked back and gave a little
wave to my family. All the girls and women cried. I
wrapped my arm around Lulu’s shoulders and patted
her back. Lulu’s tears let up a little, and after a few
hours on the road, she fell asleep leaning against my
side.
The only life I’d ever known faded in the
background, and I steeled myself to face my future. I’d
have to find my way in a strange place, with only Lulu,
my few belongings, and the stranger who sat next to
me on the wagon seat.

It was late afternoon when we stopped on the banks of
the Mississippi to spend the night across the river from
Caruthersville, Missouri. We could see the Powell
Ferry on the other side. It would take us across in the
morning. I’d lived all my life only a few miles from
the river, but had never seen it before. It was a
wonderful and frightening thing to me. I learned in
school that it stretched all the way to the south end of
the United States. I watched the boats with their cargo
pass by and thought about the places they would stop
before they found New Orleans. I daydreamed a little
about what it would be like to get on one of the boats
with Lulu and sail away from the life that faced me.

We ate our dinner from the picnic basket and
rested for a while. George unhitched Pawnee to let him
drink from the stream and nibble at the long grass.
“Aren’t you going to hobble him?” I asked.
“I don’t have to hobble him. He always stays

within forty or fifty feet of me. I brought him into the
world. I raised him as much as his mother did. When
he was only a few hours old I started handling him and
brushing him every day. I put a halter on him right off
and trained him gentle. I had him following a lead
when he was still a baby.”

“How many horses do you have?” I asked.
“He’s the only one now. We used to keep four or
five, his daddy, Rascal, and some mares. When Rascal
died, we sold the mares to save on feed. I don’t need
them now, so it’s only him. Someday, I’m going to buy
another mare and put him to stud, but he’s young, and
there’s plenty of time for that.”
“He’s so good. How do you train a horse like
that?”
“Like I said, I brushed and handled him from the
day he was born. When he was a few months old, I
started out by tying a loose rope around his middle.
After he got used to that, I put a blanket under the rope.
You can see he loves being brushed, so I would brush
him and lean some weight on his back each time.
When he was old enough, I put a saddle on him. When
he got used to that, I put more of my weight on him
until he was three years old. Then I got up on his
back.”
“And he just let you ride him?”
George laughed. “No, he threw me off every day
for three weeks. I’d leave the saddle on him for a few
hours before I took it off, and I tried again the next
day.”
“And he finally let you ride?”
“One day he threw me, and I landed flat on my
back. It took all the wind out of me, and I had to lay
there for a while until I could breathe again. He got all
worried and came over and tried to get me up. He kept
pushing at me with his nose and whuffing in my face.
If it’s possible for a horse to get a guilty look, he had
one. The next day he didn’t buck when I got on him.
He stood stock-still. I finally got him to walk and then
every day I took him out a little farther down the road.
After a week or so, I got him to canter. He’s been goodas-gold ever since. He does anything I ask. A lot of
saddle horses would never pull a wagon, but look at
him. He’s just fine with it.”
Pawnee chewed on the long grass for a while and
then acted as if he wanted to play. He came up behind
George and bumped his nose against George’s back
several times, harder each time, until George finally
stood and paid him some attention. He took a brush out
of his bag and brushed Pawnee’s long, bushy mane and
the tail that almost reached the ground.
This inspired Lulu, and she found a bag of hair
ribbons in her things and began sectioning off the
mane and braiding it. She tied a different color ribbon
to the end of each braids. Pawnee stood perfectly still,
closing his eyes while she worked. When she finished,
she patted him on the neck and said, “There, now
you’re beautiful.” Pawnee turned his head, and that big
powerful stallion nuzzled the girl with his nose and
nickered to her. She wrapped her arms around his neck
and hugged him.
George built a fire to keep the snakes and animals
away, rolled out some blankets in a grassy spot, and
we slept on the ground. The next morning, after we ate,
George hitched Pawnee back to the wagon and drove
it on the ferry. Blocks were put under the wheels to
keep it from rolling around during the trip across the
water. The driver seemed to know George right well.
He pointed to Pawnee’s braids. “Got him all dressed
up for church, George?” he laughed.
Lulu and I stood next to the wagon and held on
the side rail, and Lulu held onto my waist with her
other arm. George stood next to the driver, telling
stories and making him laugh. The river pushed the
ferry this way and that, and I held on so tight that after
a while my hands went numb. The helmsman
struggled to steer as best he could to get us across the
river without going too far downstream. It seemed to
me that we would never reach the other side, but we
finally did. George drove the wagon onshore, and we
waved goodbye.
George’s horse perked up his ears like it knew
where it was going by then. We rode all morning and
afternoon and only stopped once to let the horse eat a
little while we finished up what was left in the picnic
basket.
As night set in, Lulu fell asleep with her head in
my lap and George and I leaned against one another
and dozed off and on for the rest of the trip. I was jolted
awake when the wagon came to a stop in front of a
large, two-story house. Several dogs began barking. It
was very early in the morning. There was no moon,
and the sun hadn’t begun to rise. The sky was so dark
it was hard to make out what the house looked like.
“Here we are, Maude,” George said, climbing
down from the buggy. He walked around to my side
and took the sound-asleep Lulu in his arms. I climbed
down and followed George up the path to the front
door.
As we reached the top step, the door opened, and
a scowling old woman stood there in the glow of an oil
lamp. She held out the light, and I could see she had a
large dog on each side of her, baring its teeth and
rattling a growl.
George took a deep breath. “Ma, this is my wife,
Maude.” He nodded down at the sleeping Lulu, “and
this is her daughter, Lulu.”
The old woman’s mouth fell open. She stepped
right in front of me and stared hard at my face. She
was almost as tall as I was, even with a bent back. Her
stringy gray hair hung over her shoulders.
I almost cringed at how she glared at me. Then
George’s mother turned her attention to Lulu. She
looked down at my child asleep in George’s arms and
reached out a hand. My motherly instinct made me
take a step forward, but the old woman just ran a finger
down Lulu’s cheek and smiled sweet as anything. “Put
her in Bessie’s room,” she said.
She held the door open for George so he could
carry Lulu inside, then slammed it shut. That left me
standing on the porch with the two dogs, which still
showed their teeth and growled even louder. It hurt my
feelings and made me mad at the same time. I thought,
“So, that’s how it’s going to be.”
I pushed the door open, stepped inside, and
kicked it shut before the dogs had a chance to get in
behind me. I followed George and his mother up the
stairs. He carried Lulu in one of the bedrooms. His
mother pulled the covers down on the bed, and he laid
Lulu down.
“I’ll get the rest of the things out of the buggy
and bed down Pawnee,” he said and left.
The old woman stood in the corner without
saying anything. She watched as I took off Lulu’s
shoes and socks and undressed her down to her
underwear. I pulled the covers up, kissed her cheek,
and turned around.
“I’ll show you George’s room,” the old woman
said with a sharp voice.
She led me to the large corner bedroom, stepped
aside for me to go in, and slammed the door shut as
she left. She took the lamp with her. I stood there in
gloom, barely able to make out the shapes of the
furniture.
One window faced the back yard, and one was to
the side. As my eyes got used to the dark, I looked
around. There was a good-size bed against one wall,
with a small table and lamp next to it, and a chest of
drawers on the opposite wall. I looked around the table
for matches to light the lamp, but here weren’t any. A
chair sat by the window facing the back yard. There
were no curtains. I walked to the window and looked
out. I could see the outline of a few small buildings.
One, I recognized as the outhouse. Another looked like
the chicken coop, and one more towards the back of
the property with a chimney that I figured was a
smokehouse. A row of trees looked like an orchard.
In the light coming from the open door of the
barn, I saw the dogs walking around and the shadow
of George moving about. After a minute, he came out
carrying my cedar chest and brought it as far as the
back porch, then returned to the barn, fetched the oil
lamp, and headed for the house. The dogs followed his
every step. He stopped to stroke some cats that
gathered around his legs and rubbed against him. I
watched as he made his way to the outhouse. I knew I
would need to do that before I went to bed. After a few
minutes, George came in the room with the lamp. He
set it on the table and then went back to bring the chest.
He said, “The wagon is in the barn. I’ll get the rest of
your things tomorrow.”
I stammered. “I, ah, I need to--go before I go to
bed.” I could feel myself blushing.
“Do you want to go to the outhouse? You can use
the slop jar. It’s right under the bed there.”
I couldn’t bring myself to do that right there in
front of him. “I think I want to go out.”
I picked up the lamp, went downstairs, and found
my way to the kitchen and the back door. The dogs
were lying on the porch. As soon as I stepped outside
they ran up to me, heads lowered, ears back, and
started snarling. My stomach turned over with fear.
Then I was angry again. I was so worn out, I was ready
to fall over, and I’d taken about as much as I could
stand.
I glared at them, pulled back my lips, and
showed my own teeth. “Sit yourselves down, and be
quiet, or I’m going to kick you both ‘til you can’t
walk.” The dogs sat right down and were quiet.
I made my way down the path singing and
stomping my feet a little to run off any snakes. The
dogs followed me and sat outside the door when I went
in. The lighting was dim. I wasn’t pleased by what I
smelled. What little I could see in the dark, it looked
clean enough, but my family and the Connors had kept
a fresh outhouse, moving it to a new spot from timeto-time, and dumping lime in the pit often enough to
kill any odor. I thought, “I’ll have to talk to George
about this in the morning.”
The dogs followed me back to the house, and
when I opened the door, they started to go inside. I
shooed them back. “No dogs!” They lay down on the
porch, one with his head across the other’s back, and
settled in for the night.
I went back upstairs to the bedroom, dreading
what was coming. I thought about what Helen said to
me the morning I married James, “You’re his wife, and
whatever he wants to do to you, you have to let him do
it.” I hoped that my relations with George would work
out as well as it had with James, but I’d known James
all my life before we married. I’d only known George
for five days.
George was already in bed, his clothes lying in a
heap on the floor. “Everything all right?” he asked.
“Fine,” I said. I opened the cedar trunk and took
out a nightgown, slipped it over my head, and
undressed under it. George watched me without saying
anything. I walked around the bed and slid in next to
him. He leaned over and gave me a quick kiss on the
cheek. I couldn’t help it. I went stiff as a tree from head
to foot.
He said, “Maude, it’s been a long day. Let’s get
some rest,” and he turned his back to me. Within a
minute, his breathing told me he was fast asleep. I lay
next to him for a while before I relaxed and drifted off
to sleep, wondering what manner of man I’d married.