The Star Garden (40 page)

For days I have wandered through a dark world of shadows and voices, hearing Chess calling for me in the middle of the day, and wide awake, barely sleeping, unsure of leaving Gilbert alone for more than a couple hours at a time. If that old man walked into this kitchen this very minute, I’d give him the sharp side of a scolding, I swear it.

Now that her brother has recovered somewhat, April and Morris and their children are headed home. Harland and his boys have decided to stay awhile, but they are bunked at Albert and Savannah’s place. I don’t know exactly why, but we have houseful enough, and so I don’t mind at all.

Udell has stayed with us, afraid of Rudolfo returning to finish the job. He only goes home to tend his animals. I don’t think Rudolfo will return. He killed what he had come to take. Finally, Udell and I decided to have a closer look, a sneak-peak, at the hacienda. On foot, we edged closer and closer to Rudolfo’s house. When at last we came to the yard, an old man and a very fat young woman came out toward us. Using a few words of my broken-up Spanish, I found out Rudolfo had moved his family overnight down to his rancho in Cananea. They left many nice things behind, the woman said twice. She and her father were watching over the place until the train came through. She said she was going to have a cantina in Rudolfo’s front room. They must have been
peons
for Rudolfo. No more love for the man than any
hacendado,
they were proud now, elevated to running a cantina in his parlor and sleeping in his bed.

Udell gave me the merest wink of one eye.

As we turned our horses toward home, the plump woman called out, “
¡Vaya con Dios, amigos!”
I turned to see her and she wore an open smile, nothing but neighborly cheer on her face.

Mary Pearl has made a safe trip home and she’ll be here a month. Gilbert has gotten up and wanted some clothes on. Dr. Pardee called again and he said it was a true miracle that he has pulled through. He told me it must be from healthful food and clean living. I told that Dr. Pardee he was the genuine article, a caring and curious man with the grit to try to help and the knowledge to make a clever experiment. Heaven knows, we’ve lost plenty of family due to doctors who had neither. Rebeccah stays by his side. I do like the man.

Miss Charity—reckon I can’t get used to calling her “Mrs. James”—is sleeping, what little she sleeps, in my room, at my insistence, while I’ve taken a pallet behind a sheet in the parlor. But she works as if she’d come to be a housekeeper for us, so we have to tell her to quit and rest. Charity made a fine roast beef supper last evening. While the others were cooking, I went through my chests where we’d raided every scrap of cloth to make bandages for Gilbert.

This afternoon, Udell came to the house and asked me to walk a spell with him. Buttons tagged along at his side. “I got word the herd of sheep will be coming down by wagonloads, starting next week,” he said. “They’re bringing dogs, too. Don’t know if we could get Buttons to come back here again after all this time. He’ll have to learn about sheep if he stays with me. I kind of like the little feller. If you don’t mind me trying him out.”

The sound of hammering floated through the air. Charlie and Albert, along with Ezra and Zack, were fixing the door and taking out broken windows. Harland’s boys played in the yard. I said, “It’s all right. They’re due for some new puppies up at Savannah’s place.”

Quiet surrounded us for a moment. A quail, sitting perched on the edge of the roof where a chunk was missing, gouged out by a bullet, let out a soft call.

I said, “Still quiet from Rudolfo’s?”

“As a church. You doing all right?”

“I’m all right.”

“Really?”

“I miss Chess.”

“I do, too. Aubrey and Rachel are coming down today, but they’ll be staying with her folks for Christmas.”

“Mary Pearl told me that yesterday. She’s at my place. Helping Rebeccah and Miss Charity nurse after Gilbert.”

Then we said each other’s names at the same moment. We laughed and began again, and the same thing happened.

Finally, smiling, he nodded for me to speak.

I said, “I have something for you. I bought you this as a Christmas gift last year. Then you were gone, and I was in town so much.” I reached into my pocket and took hold of the spirit level. “I had it under some things in a chest, and I haven’t looked in there all this time. I’d never have found it if I hadn’t had to make so many bandages for Gilbert.” I pulled it forth, and shrugged, feeling silly. “I plum forgot I’d bought it to help you build your house. It’s to check levels of things. See? It’s held with a string so you can balance the bubble between the lines and make sure the walls are straight and the floor is flat.”

He took it and admired the little box. “Don’t know if anything is straight there, but nothing’s fallen down. Maybe we could have used this. Sure is a fine-looking instrument. Maybe they used the old-fashioned way. Just sightin’ it in.”

“Reckon it doesn’t matter so much if it’s not so level. Reckon a thing doesn’t have to be perfectly straight to do the job.”

“Maybe a man doesn’t have to be perfectly right, either.” He cradled the little thing in his hands, watching the liquid spirit slop back and forth in its tube.

“For what?” I said.

“Oh, I was just thinking.”

“Well, I was thinking I don’t like being so far away from you all the time, Udell.”

He stopped walking and turned to face me. “I’d be always good to you, Sarah.”

I knew he would, too. That was the thing. I knew him now. Knew just what he was made of. I swallowed, hard. “I’d be always good to you, too. If you’d let me. I’m not soft and womanly.”

“You are, more than you want to admit.”

“You’re a fine man, Udell Hanna.”

“I’ve got a lot to live up to. You set the marker high. I’d be pleased ever to have the pleasure again of calling on you.”

“I’d be pleased ever to have a chance again to be your wife.”

He moved his head, slowly, back and forth, while his eyes
watered up and his lips, though they smiled, turned inward against his teeth. When at last he spoke, his voice was but a whisper. “There’s nothing in the world I’d like better. We could do a Quaker wedding, like Aubrey and Rachel. Just invite the folks out to the place and raise a cheer.”

“Even after I turned you away, you’d still do that?”

“I knew you had your reasons.”

“And now?”

“I haven’t changed my mind. Just quit asking you.”

I reached for his hand. We held tightly to each other and went to tell the family.

This Christmas Day was a quiet one. We had no gifts to exchange. We had decorated no cholla skeleton. Nevertheless, plans had to be made and so this morning, right after breakfast, wagon after wagon took beds and blankets, crates and chests of drawers from my old house to Udell’s stony fortress. The place wasn’t homely, it was a monument. And it was ours.

Soon as her quilt and dresser arrived, Granny got up a fire in her little room and took a snooze, just happy as a cat. We made Gilbert sit and rest while the others scurried like ants, making the place up. Charity called out with delight, “A piano!” and sat before it, coaxing some little song from its soured old keys before she left to unload another box.

Udell took the box from her and placed the crate on the piano. It held my brush and comb, my carved box full of years of diaries, the picture of Jack and me from long ago, even April’s old doll, the one she called “Mrs. Lady.” He placed Jack’s daguerreotype on the mantel, next to a similar one of Frances, then set the diary box beside the two, next to a lamp. He fished in his pocket and took out the spirit level. When he placed it on the mantel, the liquid settled and the bubble came near to one line and crossed the other one just a tiny bit. It wasn’t truly perfect. We smiled at each other. Then I took the box upstairs to set out the last few things.

Albert had set up my bedstead against the outside wall, but I dragged it over in under the window. I pulled the mattress on, and went to tighten the ropes. Though we each had our rooms, I set it a little loose. A bit of sagging meant two would slide together.

April helped me fix my hair into a nice, stylish roll in the front. Mary Pearl had gotten a photographing box with a hood and a whole crate of silverplates, and she set them up and took a picture of me sitting in front of Udell. Then Udell said he had found the perfect spot for the wedding, and the weather was just fine for it, so he led the way and off we walked down the hill from the house. He must have worked many long days and nights to make this special place, for we were all amazed and said so, with each step we took.

Udell had cut a pathway and carefully placed stone steps, all lined and mortared in, right down the slope to where we’d sat and admired his house long ago. Each step was chiseled square and flat, laid in level as if he’d had the use of the spirit level all along. At the bottom next to the gurgling Cienega, where in another month the bank would overflow with wild purple irises that looked so like stars in the grass, he’d set bricks and wide beams to make permanent benches in a circle under a tall cottonwood tree. Stones had been set into the creek bed enough to build up a little pool and cause a waterfall that sounded like a music box to me. A nice ramada was set to one side, and streamers of red and white papers were nailed to its posts, while hanging from the inside beams of it were dozens of white-painted wooden stars. To save the grass and the flowers, the only places where the ground had been cleared were under the benches themselves, likely so a snake wouldn’t be waiting there under a person’s feet.

I could see betwixt the dry clumps of grass the shoots of irises already wakening. A fringe of green surrounded the dry grasses, promising to replenish the beauty of the spot.

Savannah came to me and hugged me then took my hand, saying, “This is sure a pretty place he’s made. A sweet little garden for picnicking or reading a book or sewing. I don’t doubt you’ll have plenty of fine times here.”

I felt the heat of a deep blush on my face. No one here except Udell and me could know what this spot meant to the two of us. I smiled then said, “It’s mighty pretty when the flowers bloom between the grasses. A regular star garden.”

“Sarah, you look as fresh as a daisy,” she whispered. “Why you’re blushing no end!”

I lowered my face. “I’m just happy, I suppose.”

“When Udell told me he was building this place, I planted some daffodil bulbs here, too, for you. And look, nothing has dug them up at all. Maybe they’ll bloom alongside the iris under the shade here. It’ll be so beautiful.”

Arm in arm, she and I sat upon the large stone where I’d once gotten a good look at the house. I said, “Reckon that house isn’t too ugly anymore. From that watchtower, we can see your place along with my old house and the graveyard. All the way down to the new railroad tracks, too.” After a bit, I said, “Never thought I’d marry again, after Jack.”

“Well, I think Udell will take good care of you. Much as you’ll let him, of course.”

“I’m sure sorry about Aubrey and the way he broke Mary Pearl’s heart. Udell tried to have a talk with him, too, but it did no good. Look at her there. Isn’t she a vision?”

Savannah nodded. “Oh, me. She’s made photographs of the whole family with that thing. Just look at her. She’s taken on a whole new life. I wanted to keep her by my side, make sure she did things my way. Now I can see she’d never have been happily married to him the way Rachel is. Maybe it was meant to be.”

“Our children are all fine folks, Savannah, every one of them.”

She shook my arm and looked deep into my eyes for a moment, as her own filled with tears. “I’ll tell Albert it’s time to get this wedding going,” she said. “Promise me you won’t stay too many days away from my kitchen table, though.”

“I promise, honey.”

When we got everyone sat down for the wedding, Savannah and Albert sat by Dr. Pardee who sat next to Rebeccah. Granny and Savannah kissed my cheek and Albert gave my hand to Udell. Gilbert held hands with Charity. Harland’s boys and April’s children rolled about the place like tumbleweeds. Then, back at the house, while Zack and Ezra discovered the dumbwaiter was big enough to ride in, we dished up pies and roast goose and potatoes to serve an army. Then everyone sang and we had a fine time until late in the evening.

When all our guests had gone and Granny was tucked in bed, I went up and combed out my hair. I tiptoed to his room and found Udell on his knees before his bed. His voice said softly, “Thank you, sir. Amen.”

“Udell?”

“Yes, Mrs. Hanna?”

“It’s chill up here, Mr. Hanna. I was wondering if you’d mind to keep me warm?”

“Why, no, Mrs. Hanna. I—I don’t mind.”

“I’ll just change, then. Won’t take a minute.”

He nodded again with a look as if he were about to weep with joy.

Gilbert told me this morning that he and Charity will wed next week, just before Mary Pearl returns to Wheaton. Gil and Charity plan to live at the adobe house and work on patching the rest of the holes and the glass. Rebeccah has asked her parents to invite Dr. Pardee, too, though it will hardly be a change for him since he has come to the house twice a week and not charged for the visit. Whether he’s calling on his patient or Rebeccah Prine, it would be hard to say.

Charlie goes to the station to look for mail every day. He has written a dozen letters, and heard back from all, even got a letter from the territorial governor. After him explaining to colonels and commanders, politicians and lawmen alike that his brother is no longer able to take the commission, and him sending his own recommendations from Burt Mossman and even John Slaughter himself, the Army has settled that Charlie will take his brother’s place at the West Point Military Academy. All his experience and knowing all those fellows stood him in good stead, I reckon. It’s hard for me to look in his face and see the boy I raised replaced with an iron-boned man. There’s a deep crease, just like his father’s, between his eyebrows that wasn’t there when he came home with his bride last year.

Charlie will leave tomorrow for his new life. He put on his cadet’s uniform for me, and though another mother might have fought back tears, all I felt was pride in him. He promised me he will stop in town and have a daguerreotype done and sent home to me. A person could ride the length and breadth of this country and not find a better man than Charlie Elliot.

We read in the
Daily Star
and
Citizen
papers that Mexico is headed for all-out war. It will be no small wonder to me if the resistance will be long and bloody, for old Don Porfirio has more enemies than friends, Rudolfo Maldonado among them, and surely the blood spilled will reach from Mexico City to Cananea.

For us, many miles north of the fracas, here in Arizona Territory, we have fought and won a hard battle. Peace reigns through our days now. Someday, softer women like my April will be more common than my kind. One day, too, the far-off sound of a locomotive will remind us of what it took to own this peace, the lives lost, the dreams spent and gained. No one made a life here without backbone and perseverence. It’s a place with no forgiveness, this Territory, this land that I love.

Though tonight I lie here alone, I hear my husband breathing hard from the other room after a long day spent penning his sheep. The critters mumble and nag each other constantly, but we are secure in the two good dogs that guard them. As I lie here in bed, I am alone but not lonely. When I pressed Udell to tell me why he created my own room, he told me it was simply because I was a lady, and ladies just needed such things. If that doesn’t beat all. A lady at last.

I see from this high window, Udell Hanna has given me a sky full of glittering diamonds. Walls tall and secure as only a castle may be. I can hear the nighthawks trill a lullaby. A little bat is bouncing through the air, taking bugs for his supper. Downstairs, Buttons lies curled at the front door, king of his domain. From the front porch, a single road leads straight to the people I love, and brings them straight to me.