To his surprise, nothing terrible happened. When she finally had the sheet under control, Mary took the bloomers from him as casually as if they were handkerchiefs or table napkins or something. To his vast surprise, she seemed to be rather amused at the sight of him standing there with a stream of water pouring off his hat and falling just in front of his nose.
“Pea, it’s a good thing you know how to keep your mouth shut,” she said. “If you opened it right now you’d probably drown. Many thanks for your help.”
She was the kind of forthright woman who called men by their first names, and she was known to salt her speech rather freely with criticism.
“We’ve the Lord to thank for this bath,” she said. “I personally didn’t need it, but I’m bound to say it might work an improvement where you’re concerned. You ain’t as bad-looking as I thought, now that you’re nearly clean.”
By the time she got to her back porch the rain was slackening and the sun was already striking little rainbows through the sparkle of drops that still fell. Pea had walked on home, the water dripping more slowly from his hat. He never mentioned the incident to anyone, knowing it would mean unmerciful teasing if it ever got out. But he remembered it. When he lay on the porch half drunk and it floated up in his mind, things got mixed into the memory that he hadn’t even known he was noticing, such as the smell of Mary’s wet flesh. He hadn’t meant to smell her, and hadn’t made any effort to, and yet the very night after it happened the first thing he remembered was that Mary had smelled different from any other wet thing he had ever smelled. He could not find a word for what was different about Mary’s smell—maybe it was just that, being a woman, she smelled cleaner than most of the wet creatures he came in contact with. It had been more than a year since the rainstorm, and yet Mary’s smell was still part of the memory of it. He also remembered how she seemed to bulge out of her corset at the top and the bottom both.
It was not every night that he remembered Mary, though. Much of the time he found himself wondering about the generalities of marriage. The principal aspect he worried over most was that marriage required men and women to live together. He had tried many times to envision how it would be to be alone at night under the same roof with a woman—or to have one there at breakfast and supper. What kind of talk would a woman expect? And what kind of behavior? It stumped him: he couldn’t even make a guess. Once in a while it occurred to him that he could tell Mary he would like to marry her but didn’t consider himself worthy to live under the same roof with her. If he put it right she might take a liberal attitude and allow him to continue to live down the street with the boys, that being what he was used to. He would plan, of course, to make himself available for chores when she required him—otherwise life could go on in its accustomed way.
He was even tempted to sound out Gus on the plan—Gus knew more about marriage than anyone else—but every time he planned to bring it up he either got sleepy first or decided at the last second he had better keep quiet. If the plan was ridiculous in the eyes of an expert, then Pea wouldn’t know what to think, and besides, Gus would never let up teasing.
• • •
They were all scattered around the table, finishing one of Bol’s greasy breakfasts, when they heard the sound of horses in the yard. The next minute Augustus trotted up and dismounted, with the two Irishmen just a few yards behind him. Instead of being bareback the Irishmen were riding big silver-studded Mexican saddles and driving eight or ten skinny horses before them. When they reached the porch they just sat on their horses, looking unhappy.
Dish Boggett had not really believed there were any Irishmen down in Mexico, and when he stepped out on the back porch and saw them he burst right out laughing.
Newt felt a little sorry for the two of them, but he had to admit they were a comical sight. The Mexican saddles were all clearly meant for men with longer legs. Their feet did not come anywhere near the stirrups. Even so, the Irishmen seemed disinclined to dismount.
Augustus jerked the saddle off his tired horse and turned him loose to graze.
“Get down, boys,” he said to the Irishmen. “You’re safe now, as long as you don’t eat the cooking. This is what we call home.”
Allen O’Brien had both hands around the big Mexican saddle horn. He had been holding it so tightly for the last two hours that he was not sure he could turn it loose. He looked down with apprehension.
“I’d not realized how much taller a horse is than a mule,” he said. “It seems a long ways down.”
Dish regarded the remark as the most comical he had ever heard. It had never occurred to him that there could be such a thing as a grown man who didn’t know how to dismount from a horse. The sight of the two Irishmen stuck with their short legs dangling down the sides of the horses struck him as so funny that he doubled over with laughter.
“I guess we’ll have to build ’em a ladder, by God,” he said, when he could catch his breath.
Augustus too was mildly amused by the Irishmen’s ignorance. “Why, boys, you just have to flop over and drop,” he said.
Allen O’Brien accomplished the dismounting with no real trouble, but Sean was reluctant to drop once he flopped over. He hung from the saddle horn for several seconds, which puzzled the horse, so that it began to try and buck a little. It was too thin and too tired to do much, but Sean did get jerked around a little, a sight so funny that even Call laughed. Allen O’Brien, once safe on the ground, immediately joined in the laughter out of relief. Sean finally dropped and stood glaring at his brother.
“Well, I don’t see Jake—that figures,” Augustus said, taking himself a big dipper of water and squishing a few mouthfuls around and spitting them out, to clear the dust from his throat. He then offered the dipper to Allen O’Brien, who imitated the squishing and spitting, thinking it must be a custom of the new country he found himself in.
“You took your time, I see,” Call said. “I was about to start back with a burial party.”
“Shucks,” Augustus said. “Bringing these boys in was such a light task that I went over to Sabinas and stopped off at the whorehouse.”
“That explains the saddles,” Call said.
“Yes, and the horses too,” Augustus said. “All the bandits was dead drunk by the time we got there. These Irish boys can’t maintain much of a pace riding bareback so we helped ourselves to a few saddles and the best of the nags.”
“Them horses wouldn’t make good soap,” Dish said, looking at the horses Augustus had brought back.
“If I wasn’t so hungry I’d argue the point,” Augustus said. “Bile them horses for a week or two and they’d produce a fine soap.”
Young Sean O’Brien could not conceal his disappointment with America.
“If this is America, where’s the snow?” he asked, to everyone’s surprise. His image of the new country had been strongly influenced by a scene of Boston Harbor in winter that he had seen in an old magazine. There had been lots of snow, and the hot backyard he found himself in was nothing like what he had expected. Instead of ships with tall masts there was just a low adobe house, with lots of old saddles and pieces of rotting harness piled under a little shed at one corner. Worse still, he could not see a spot of green anywhere. The bushes were gray and thorny, and there were no trees at all.
“No, son, you’ve overshot the snow,” Augustus said. “What we have down here is sand.”
Call felt his impatience rising. The night had been far more successful than he could have hoped. They could keep the best horses and sell the rest—the profits would easily enable them to hire a crew and outfit a wagon for the trip north. Then all they would have to do would be gather the cattle and brand them. If everyone would work like they should, it could all be accomplished in three weeks, and they could be on the trail by the first of April—none too soon, considering the distance they had to go. The problem would be getting everyone to work like they should. Jake was already off with his whore, and Augustus hadn’t had breakfast.
Allen O’Brien was looking dejectedly at the few buildings that made up Lonesome Dove. “Is this all there is to the town?” he asked.
“Yes, and it’s worse than it looks,” Augustus said.
To the embarrassment of everyone, Sean O’Brien began to cry. It had been an extremely tense night, and he hadn’t expected to survive it. All during the ride he had expected to fall off his horse and become paralyzed. He associated paralysis with falls because a cousin of his had fallen off a cottage he was thatching and had been paralyzed ever since. The horse Sean had been given seemed to him at least as tall as a cottage, and he felt he had good reason to worry. He had spent a long boat ride growing more and more homesick for the green land he had left. When they were put ashore at Vera Cruz he had not been too disappointed; it was only Mexico they were in, and no one had ever told him Mexico was green.
But now they were in America, and all he could see was dust and low bushes with thorns, and almost no grass at all. He had expected coolness and dew and green grass on which to stretch out for a long nap. The bare hot yard was a cruel letdown, and besides, Sean was an easy weeper. Tears ran out of his eyes whenever he thought of anything sad.
His brother Allen was so embarrassed by the sight of Sean’s tears that he walked straight into the house and sat down at the table. They had been asked to eat—if Sean preferred to stand in the yard crying, that was his problem.
Dish concluded that the young Irishman was probably crazy. Only someone crazy would break out crying in front of several grown men.
Augustus saved the day by going over and taking Sean by the arm. He spoke kindly to him and led him toward the house. “Let’s go eat, son,” he said. “It won’t look quite so ugly on a full stomach.”
“But where’s the grass?” Sean asked, snuffling.
Dish Boggett let out a whoop. “I guess he was meaning to graze,” he said.
“Why, no, Dish,” Augustus said. “He was just reared in a place where the grass covers the ground—not in no desert, like you.”
“I was reared on the Matagorda,” Dish said. “We got grass knee-high over there.”
“Gus, we need to talk a minute,” Call said.
But Augustus had already led the boy through the door, and Call had to follow him in.
A surprised Bolivar watched the Irishmen put away sowbelly and beans. He was so startled by their appearance that he picked up a shotgun that he kept by the cookstove and put it across his lap. It was his goat-gun, a rusty .10 gauge, and he liked to have it handy if anything unusual happened.
“I hope you don’t decide to shoot that thing off in here,” Augustus said. “It’d take a wall out if you did—not to mention us.”
“I don’t shoot yet,” Bol said sullenly, keeping his options open.
Call waited until Augustus filled his plate, since there would be no getting his attention until he had food before him. The young Irish boy had stopped crying and was putting away beans faster even than Augustus—starvation was probably all that was wrong with him.
“I’m going to go see if I can hire some hands,” Call said. “You better move them horses this afternoon.”
“Move ’em where?” Augustus asked.
“Upriver, as far as you want,” Call said.
“These Irishmen have fine voices,” Augustus remarked. “It’s a pity there ain’t two more of ’em—we’d have a barbershop quartet.”
“It would be a pity if you lost them horses while I’m off hiring the hands, too,” Call pointed out.
“Oh, you mean you want me to sleep out on the ground for several nights just to keep Pedro from stealing these horses back?” Gus asked. “I’m out of practice sleeping on the ground.”
“What was you planning to sleep on on the way to Montana?” Call asked in turn. “We can’t take the house with us, and there ain’t many hotels between here and there.”
“I hadn’t been planning on going to Montana,” Augustus said. “That’s your plan. I may come if I feel like it. Or you may change your mind. I know you never have changed your mind about anything yet, but there’s a first time for everything.”
“You’d argue with a stump,” Call said. “Just watch them horses. We may never get that lucky again.”
Call saw there was no point in losing any more time. If Augustus was not of a mind to be serious, nothing could move him.
“Jake did come back, didn’t he?” Augustus asked.
“His horse is here,” Call said. “I guess he probably come with it. Do you think he’ll work, once we start?”
“No, and I won’t, either,” Augustus said. “You better hire these Irish boys while you got the chance.”
“It’s work we’re looking for,” Allen said. “What we don’t know we’ll gladly learn.”
Call refrained from comment. Men who didn’t know how to get on and off a horse would not be much use around a cow outfit.
“Where you goin’ hiring?” Augustus asked.
“I might go to the Raineys’,” Call said. “As many boys as they got they ought to be able to spare a few.”
“I sparked Maude Rainey once upon a time,” Augustus said, tilting back his chair. “If we hadn’t had the Comanches to worry with, I expect I’d have married her. Her name was Grove before she married. She lays them boys like hens lay eggs, don’t she?”
Call left, to keep from having to talk all day. Deets was catching a short nap on the back porch, but he sat up when Call came out. Dish Boggett and the boy were roping low bushes, Dish teaching the boy a thing or two about the craft of roping. That was good, since nobody around the Hat Creek outfit could rope well enough to teach him anything. Call himself could rope in an emergency, and so could Pea, but neither of them were ropers of the first class.
“Practice up, boys,” he said. “As soon as we gather some cattle there’s gonna be a pile of roping to do.”
Then he caught his second-best horse, a sorrel gelding they called Sunup, and headed northeast toward the brush country.
13.
LORENA HAD STOPPED expecting ever to be surprised, least of all by a man, and then Jake Spoon walked in the door and surprised her. The surprise started the minute before he even spoke to her. Partly it was that he seemed to know her the minute he saw her.
She had been sitting at a table expecting Dish Boggett to come back with another two dollars he had borrowed somewhere. It was an expectation that brought her no pleasure. It was clear Dish expected something altogether different from what the two dollars would buy him. That was why, in general, she preferred older men to young ones. The older ones were more likely to be content with what they paid for; the young ones almost always got in love with her, and expected it to make a difference. It got so she never said a word to the young men, thinking that the less she said the less they would expect. Of course they went right on expecting, but at least it saved her having to talk. She could tell Dish Boggett was going to pester her as long as he could afford to, and when she heard boot heels and the jingle of spurs on the porch she assumed it was him, coming back for a second round.
Instead, Jake had walked in. Lippy gave a whoop, and Xavier was excited enough that he came out from behind the bar and shook Jake’s hand. Jake was polite and glad to see them, and took the trouble to ask their health and make a few jokes, but even before he had drunk the free drink Xavier offered him he had begun to make a difference in the way she felt. He had big muddy brown eyes and a neat mustache that turned down at the corners, but of course she had seen big eyes and mustaches before. What made the difference was that Jake was so at home and relaxed even after he saw her sitting there. Most men got nervous when they saw her, aware that their wives wouldn’t like them being in the same room with her, or else made nervous by the thought of what they wanted from her, which they couldn’t get without some awkward formalities of a sort that few of them could handle smo
othly.
But Jake was the opposite of nervous. Before he even spoke to her he smiled at her several times in the most relaxed way—not in the bragging way Tinkersley had when he smiled. Tinkersley’s smile had said plainly enough that he felt she ought to be grateful for the chance to do whatever he wanted her to do. Of course she was grateful to him for taking her away from Mosby and the smoke pots, but once she had been away for a while she came to hate Tinkersley’s smile.
Lorena felt puzzled for a moment. She didn’t ignore the men who walked through the door of the Dry Bean. It didn’t do to ignore men. The majority of them were harmless, with nothing worse than a low capacity to irritate—they were worse than chiggers but not as bad as bedbugs, in her view. Still, there was no doubt that there were some mean ones who plain had it in for women, and it was best to try and spot those and take precautions. But as far as trusting the general run of men, there was no need, since she had no intention of ever expecting anything from one of them again. She didn’t object to sitting in on a card game once in a while—she even enjoyed it, since making money at cards was considerably easier and more fun than doing it the other way—but a good game of cards once in a while was about as far as her expectations went.
Immediately Jake Spoon began to change the way her thinking worked. Before he even brought his bottle to the table to sit with her, she began to want him to. If he had taken the bottle and gone to sit by himself, she would have felt disappointed, but of course he didn’t. He sat down, asked her if she’d like some refreshments and looked her right in the face for a while in a friendly, easygoing way.
“My goodness,” he said, “I never expected to find nobody like you here. We didn’t see much beauty when I lived in these parts. Now if this was San Francisco, I wouldn’t be so surprised. I reckon that’s where you really belong.”
It seemed a miracle to Lorie that a man had walked in who could figure that out so quick. In the last year she had begun to doubt her own ability to get to San Francisco and even to doubt that it was as cool and nice as she had been imagining it to be, and yet she didn’t want to give up the notion, because she had no other notion to put in its place. It might be silly to even think about it, but it was the best she had.
The Lonesome Dove Chronicles (1-4) Page 142