The Secret Bliss of Calliope Ipswich (17 page)

“Well,” Rowdy began as he dismounted his horse and secured the reins to a nearby tree trunk
, “here. Let me show you.”

Calliope watched as the ruggedly handsome man reached into one saddlebag, retrieving a small pad of paper. Next, he reached into one back pocket of his blue jeans and produced a small pocketknife. Tucking the pad of paper under one arm, Rowdy then used the knife to cut a few long strands of hair from his horse’s tail.

“You hold onto these a minute,” he said, offering the hairs to Shay.

Shay giggled
, and Calliope smiled, curious as to what the man was up to.

“Now then,” he said, closing the pocketknife and returning it to his pocket
, “give me just a minute or two here.”

As Rowdy sat down in the grass on the bank of the stream, Calliope and Shay sat down as well.

“When I was a boy,” Rowdy began, “we used to head down to the crick in the summers and do this all the time.”

Calliope watched
, entirely intrigued as Rowdy tore a page from the back of the small pad of paper and proceeded to fold it into the shape of a small boat. She glanced at his face a moment—his handsome, handsome face. She realized that she adored the cleft in his chin. She was glad Doctor Gregory had had to shave Rowdy. Of course, the still stitched and healing wound on his cheek caused her heart to plummet to the pit of her stomach with guilt. Yet as she continued to look at him—to stare at him in studying every detail of him—the smile returned to her face, for she did love him so thoroughly. Inexplicable as it was, she did love him!

As Rowdy tore a second page from the pad, he nodded to Shay and then the bucket she’d brought along when she and Calliope had decided to walk to the stream. “Give them horsehairs to your sister here
, and then take your bucket and see how many baby frogs you can catch real quick for me, will you, darlin’?”

Again Shay’s eyes lit up with wild anticipation. “You bet, Mr. Gates!” she giggled, handing the horsetail hairs to Calliope. Hopping to her feet, Shay snatched up her bucket and headed to the grove of cattails nearby.

“Do you have a hairpin I could borrow here for a minute, Miss Calliope?” Rowdy asked.

“Of course,” Calliope answered. Quickly she removed one of her hairpins
, careless of the long, flaxen curl it released to cascade down her back.

She handed the hairpin to Rowdy. She watched him use it to poke a hole in the back of each of the three little boats he’d created by folding pieces of paper.

As he handed the hairpin back to her, he instructed, “Now give me one of them horsehairs, Calliope.”

Calliope’s heart leapt inside her at the sound of her name on his lips—the marvelous way his deep voice made it echo through her mind as if it were the most beautiful name in all the world. She felt butterflies fluttering in her stomach—and simply because he’d said her name without a “
Miss” preceding it!

Rowdy looked up to her
, for she’d quite forgotten to hand him a horsehair, being that she was so mesmerized by the way he’d addressed her by her first name.

“A horsehair, if you please,” he repeated, grinning at her.

With a rather trembling hand, Calliope separated one of Rowdy’s horse’s tail hairs from the rest, holding it toward him.

“Thank you,” he said.

She watched then as Rowdy carefully threaded one end of the horse’s long, black tail hair through the small hole he’d made in the back of the paper boat using Calliope’s hairpin. He then knotted the hair several times.

“There we go,” he said, smiling as he studied the small paper boat with the length of horsehair tied to it. “Go on and give me another hair,” he said.

Realization washed over Calliope as she handed him another hair and watched him repeat the same process of tying it to a small paper boat.

“You’re gonna sail frogs down the stream!” she giggled with delight.

Rowdy’s smile broadened. “
We’re
gonna sail frogs down the stream,” he playfully corrected. “The horsehairs will keep them from gettin’ away from us. Well, they’ll keep the boats from gettin’ away from us. I can’t make any promises about the frogs.”

Calliope laughed and exclaimed, “How charming you are!”

“Charmin’?” Rowdy asked, quirking one eyebrow.

Calliope’s smile broadened. “Clever then…if charming offends you.”

“Oh, charmin’ is fine. I’ve just never been called charmin’ before now,” he said, winking at her.

As butterflies again caused her stomach to feel dizzy, she said, “Well
, I can’t imagine why not. I find you very charming.” Blushing with a sudden bashfulness for having spoken so freely, Calliope hurried on. “And these little boats are just so adorable. Shay is going to love them!”

“I’ve got six so far, Mr. Gates,” Shay announced as
she plopped down beside Rowdy in the grass. “Is that enough?”

“Are they tiny?” Rowdy asked.

“Very tiny,” Shay responded.

“Then they oughta give us a good start,” he assured her.

Though she didn’t think it possible, Calliope fell even more in love with Rowdy Gates when he smiled and offered one of the small paper boats to Shay.

“Mr. Gates!” Shay exclaimed. “It’s…it’s just the perfect size for a baby frog!” Her sweet, pretty brows furrowed into a frown then. “But won’t a frog hop out the moment we try to put him in the boat? And why is this horsetail hair tied to the boat?”

Rowdy nodded. “Oh, the frogs will hop out eventually, but for some reason, it takes them a while. You’ll be surprised how long they’ll sit on a paper boat. And the horsehairs…well, that’s so we can hang onto the boats as long as we can.”

Shay squealed and threw her arms around Rowdy’s neck in an affectionate hug. Calliope laughed, wishing all the while she could throw her arms around the man’s neck and hug
him with appreciation as well. She remembered how wonderful he’d smelled the day before when she’d dared to kiss him on the cheek. Rowdy Gates smelled just as a man should—of grain and grass, ham, potatoes, and leather. She wondered if Shay would notice the way Rowdy smelled, and she wished again that she could hug him.

“You are so smart, Mr. Gates!” Shay giggled as she released him and reached into her bucket to retrieve a baby frog. “Show me how
. Show me how to sail him in this boat you made.”

“All right,” Rowdy agreed. “Let’s go over by them cattails where the water is calmer.”

Calliope gathered up the remaining paper boats as Rowdy took hold of the bucket handle. And before long, Shay was holding tight to the free end of the horsetail hair while a tiny frog sat perched on the bow of a small paper boat as it floated on the surface of the water.

“Keep him movin’,” Rowdy explained. “If you let him sit still in one spot too long, he’ll jump out quicker.”

Shay nodded and manipulated the horsetail hair so that the little sailboat bobbed back and forth and back and forth.

Shay’s giggles were like the chimes of heaven, and Calliope could no longer remain a spectator.

“May I try?” she asked Rowdy.

“Of course,” Rowdy said. “Pick yourself a frog outta the bucket
, and go to it.”

Calliope reached into Shay’s bucket and retrieved a very small frog. “Oh
, look how cute he is! Isn’t he just the cutest little thing?”

Rowdy laughed. “Why do you girls keep referring to these frogs as hims? There’s girl frogs in there too, I’m sure.”

Calliope smiled and explained, “Because I think we assume that all frogs are really handsome princes that have been turned into frogs by some wicked witch or fairy,” she explained. “Haven’t you been reading your fairy tales, Mr. Gates?”

“I guess not,” Rowdy answered, smiling at her.

Carefully Calliope placed her little frog in one of the tiny boats and cast it adrift. The excitement that traveled through her as the horsetail hair almost slipped through her fingers was startling, but she held tight and sailed her frog the way Rowdy had instructed Shay to do.

“You’re gonna sail a frog too
, aren’t you, Mr. Gates?” Shay asked.

“You bet,” Rowdy assured her.

Calliope watched as he reached into the bucket, retrieved a frog, and very adeptly set it to sailing.

He chuckled. “Me and my brothers used to spend hours sailin’ frogs,” he remarked.

“So you have brothers?” Calliope asked.

But Rowdy’s smile faded. “I did…when I was boy,” came his rather unhappy sounding answer.

“I don’t have any brothers,” Shay sighed. “At least yet. But maybe the baby Mama has in her tummy right now will turn out to be a brother.”

Calliope exchanged expressions of surprise with Rowdy.

“What do you mean, Shay?” Calliope asked. “Did Kizzy tell you she’s going to have a baby?”

Shay rolled her eyes with exasperation. “Goodness sakes, no, Calliope!” the little girl exclaimed. “She hasn’t even told Daddy yet. Why do you think she would’ve told me?”

Rowdy Gates smiled a smile of amusement at understanding mischief. “You did know that your little sister here is a gypsy, didn’t you, Miss Calliope? The child claims to know things others don’t.”

“I
do
know things other don’t,” Shay corrected Rowdy emphatically but kindly. “And I know my Mama is gonna have a baby. She’ll tell Daddy and the rest of us when she’s ready.” Turning to Calliope, she wagged a small, scolding index finger at her. “Now don’t you go tellin’ Mama that I told you, Calliope. There are some secrets sisters have to keep. Aren’t there?”

Calliope blushed when Shay nodded toward Rowdy
, implying that she knew Calliope’s secret concerning her feelings for him. It was an unspoken reminder that some secrets needed to be kept.

“And don’t you tell nobody either, Mr. Gates,” Shay said, returning her attention to her sailing frog. “This is a family matter
, so keep it to yourself.”

Rowdy frowned with confusion for a second
but eventually agreed, “Yes, ma’am, little miss.”

There was the sound of a tiny splash
, and then Calliope gasped, “Oh no! My frog jumped out!”

Shay put a hand on her sister’s knee as a gesture of reassurance. “That’s all right, Calliope,” she soothed. “We have more in the bucket.”

“Whoops…and there goes mine,” Rowdy chuckled.

Shay smiled. “Mine is still on my boat! I’m a good frog sailer, ain’t I, Mr. Gates?”

“The best I’ve seen in many a year, Miss Shay,” Rowdy assured her.

Calliope sighed with contentment as she watched Rowdy take another frog out of the bucket and send it sailing. She watched as he laughed and talked with Shay—thinking of what a good father he would make to his own children.

Naturally she started to inwardly scold herself for thinking of Rowdy Gates having children—of she and Rowdy having children together. But then Calliope glanced around her, noting the loveliness of the day, the warmth of it, and the matchlessness of the moment in which she was lingering. She figured it was almost expected to daydream ridiculous things on such a wonderful day.

And so
, for an instant, she let herself imagine that she and Rowdy were married, that Shay was one of their own children, and that they’d be sailing frogs on paper boats together every summer forever.

*

Rowdy sat down next to Dodger. He exhaled a heavy sigh of worry. Closing his eyes for a moment, he thought back on the pretty parts of the day—the fact that Fox Montrose wasn’t going to have Calliope Ipswich for his own anytime soon, as well as the hour or so he’d spent with Calliope and her little sister sailing frogs in the stream.

Still, no matter how hard he tried not to think of it—to push it from the forefront of his thoughts and into the corner of his mind—he couldn’t.

Opening his eyes once more, he stared up into the starry sky. “It’s Pronto, Dodger. I’m sure of it,” he said. “A man doesn’t forget a horse like that, and I saw it outside the diner again tonight.” He nodded with determination. “In the mornin’, I’ll ask Lou Smith if he caught the owner’s name this time. But even if he didn’t…I know that’s Arness’s horse. I know it is!” He exhaled another heavy sigh. “And I know why it’s here.”

He glanced over to the grave of his faithful friend. The sight of the fresh flowers sticking out of an old medicine bottle filled with water at the head of it made him grin.

“She told me her little sister would worry over you all the time now, Dodger,” he said. “I suppose it’s nice for you to have someone besides me to come visitin’, hmm?”

Rowdy la
y back in the grass under the old willow, tucked his hands under his head, and continued to gaze up into the night sky.

“What do you think, boy?” he asked. “You think Judge Ipswich would turn me down cold too? That is
, if I ever got up the gumption to ask him for a chance at his daughter.” He frowned again. “I suppose I best talk to the sheriff tomorrow…maybe the judge too. It’ll put the nail in my coffin where Calliope’s concerned, of course. But it has to be done…because I know that’s Arness’s horse, and there’s no way I can let that go.”