One for the Blackbird, One for the Crow: A Novel

by Olivia Hawker

  And it’s for Clyde’s sake I do this now. I mustn’t forget that. No matter how I may hate this woman, I love my son far more.

  For Clyde’s sake—for the sake of the small and fragile harmony Nettie Mae knew she must construct if they were all to survive the winter under one roof—she said, “I must tell you, in fact, your children are quite good and well behaved. They seem sensible, considering their ages.”

  “Thank you.” Cora sounded relieved, almost giddy with surprise at Nettie Mae’s kindness.

  “All except Beulah. She’s . . .” Nettie Mae shook her head, scowling past Cora to a deep-blue slash of low-hanging cloud. It blanketed the southern horizon—more rain on the way. “Beulah is strange. Unnatural.”

  “She’s only dreamy,” Cora said. “Many girls of Beulah’s age prove distractible. She’ll grow out of those habits with time.”

  I’ve seen her take a rooster’s life before the bird was even dead. Nettie Mae didn’t dare speak those words aloud. She feared that if she did, the image would come crowding back into her mind—the bird’s dark wings sagging in submission, the ease with which it had laid itself on the altar of death. She would never sleep again if those pictures took root and blossomed behind closed eyes. The clucking of her hens among the tall grasses seemed intrusive to Nettie Mae now. She folded her arms tightly across her middle and forbade herself from shrinking away from the sound.

  Nettie Mae thumped a crate with the toe of her boot. “We had best get these roots cleaned off and stored.”

  Cora nodded eagerly. “Yes; you’re right, of course. I’ll fetch some rags, and together we can—”

  “Together? No. You may brush them clean and take them to the root cellar. I’ve other work I must see to now.”

  “Very well,” Cora said softly.

  Nettie Mae opened the door, and the warmth of her house rushed out to meet her. The smells of woodsmoke and lanolin surrounded her, as they always did when she came in from the cold. For one heartbeat, one flash, she remembered the sound of Luther’s voice. She had no recollection of the words he was speaking, but she could remember the tones, the sound of him, high and gentle and trusting, still years short of manhood. The memory came upon her so abruptly that Nettie Mae drew a sharp breath. It was almost a gasp of pain.

  On the threshold, she turned back and fixed Cora with another stare.

  Cora waited, trembling, for Nettie Mae to speak.

  “If your children are hungry,” Nettie Mae said, “you’ll find some good potted meat in the pantry. In the far corner behind the big alderwood salt box. Only leave a little for me, will you?”

  She stepped inside and shut the door firmly behind her.

  CORA

  There’s not a thing you can do about it. Nettie Mae will never forgive you, and why ought she? If it were Nettie Mae who had lain with Ernest, you wouldn’t forgive her.

  Left alone on the bare, unsheltered stoop of the Webber house, Cora raised her eyes from the ground at last. She rolled her head carefully, sighing with relief as the bones of her neck shifted and popped. No one could know what a strain it was, to hold oneself in submission. To debase oneself before the fury of another. Only the knowledge that Nettie Mae was righteous in her wrath kept Cora fixed to her purpose, committed to this meek abasement.

  Months. There are months yet to go. I’ve only lived a few days under Nettie Mae’s roof—not even a week. How will I survive until spring? A dull ache had settled into her neck and back, the cost of hanging her head in shame day in and day out. Cora repeated the litany of her distraction, the words she clung to during moments like these to keep her wits about her, to keep her will strong enough to last through the barren season that stretched ahead. I have the president’s china, and time enough to find a buyer. When the thaw arrives, I’ll have train fare in my hand. We’ll be in Carbon as soon as the mud is hard enough for driving, and Saint Louis only days later. You’ve survived eight years in this place, Cora Bemis. You can last a few months longer.

  Cora settled on the stoop and pulled a rag from the pocket of her apron. She took a parsnip from the crate and cleaned its tender ivory skin, beating at the caked red soil with the cloth as if she were whisking away flies, and the soil fell away in damp crumbs. Cora tossed the first parsnip into a nearby basket, which someone had forgotten in the shadow of the stoop. She cleaned another, and another, grateful for the easy work, allowing her thoughts to roam.

  She must get a message to Ernest at the jailhouse up in Paintrock. She had packed her letter box with its ink and blotter, its carved bone pen, and a few remaining pieces of paper. The box was hidden under the children’s clothes in the largest reed basket, which Beulah had already carried upstairs. Nettie Mae knew nothing of its existence.

  Would she have refused me the letter box, too, if she had known I would try to bring it?

  She would tell Ernest everything: That she and the children would spend the winter with Mrs. Webber, so he mustn’t fear for their well-being. That she would take them back home, to the city, come spring. She would tell Ernest that if he didn’t hate her too much, if he still felt any affection for his wife—any duty toward her and the children—they would reunite in Saint Louis and go on living there. But once the winter had passed, Cora could no longer remain in the cold shadow of the Bighorns. Let Ernest make of that revelation whatever he would.

  Cora lifted her eyes from the parsnips in her lap and stared south, to where the last shallow slope of the foothills leveled into the eternal flatness of the prairie. It stretched forever, an unrelenting emptiness of grass and scrub, gray beneath a heavy gray sky.

  It was the openness of the prairie that had always upset Cora the most. In a land so flat and unvaried, there was nowhere one might hide, no shelter from the storms of life nor from the beasts that came hunting by night. Whenever she stepped outside her house, whenever she looked out a window, there was the great expanse of the untamed world. How heartless it was, had ever been, from that day long ago when she and Ernest left Carbon in their wagon. It was too open to the sky above, a disorienting vastness of sky that arched overhead like the cupped palm of some unfathomable giant, a vast hand descending to trap a scuttling insect. The relentless heat of the sun by day, the violence of the storms that broke against the Bighorns—the prairie offered no shelter, no respite. It gave nothing but hardship. Each day was a battle, forcing the wilderness to yield a paltry sustenance. And well did Cora know that life was only possible here, where the two isolated homesteads crouched at the base of the foothills, because of the proximity of reliable water. Beyond the dark line of the cottonwoods, the only visible trees for miles in any direction, ran the Nowood River and its tributary creek, a rocky, red-silted tumble of water the Indians called Tensleep, or so Ernest had once told Cora. She shuddered to imagine what their lives would be like without the blessing of year-round water.

  Such dark musings never entirely left Cora in peace, but now, in the silence of the afternoon, in the muggy warmth that plagued autumn just before evening fell, her own thoughts were too much to bear. She turned her face away from the southern prairie and concentrated on her work. It went quickly enough, once she quieted the fearful voice inside. The basket was half-full of cleaned roots and the cloth was smudged red by her efforts. By and by, Cora filled the basket to its brim, but the crate of freshly dug parsnips still held at least three-quarters of the harvest. She must take the roots to Nettie Mae’s cellar and store them well against rot.

  Cora stood, stretched her legs and back, then lifted the heavy basket and propped it on a hip. She carried it around the house and made for the earthen mound that served as the Webber cellar. Tassels of grass, their heads shaggy with seed, waved along the cellar’s upper curve. On the eastern face of the mound, a small door of thick wooden planks and iron straps sealed shut the man-made cavern.

  Cora set her basket beside the door and reached for its handle, but Beulah’s voice caught her attention. She looked up and found her daughter emerging from the
sheepfold. Clyde held the gate, and Beulah passed him with that familiar, drifting stride—how Cora envied the ease, the confidence with which her daughter moved through a hostile world. How proud it made her, to know that Beulah was a creature set apart from fear.

  She never learned that courage from me.

  Cora straightened in surprise when the sheep followed Beulah through the gate. There were seven of them, lambs grown just to the verge of maturity, and they moved with docility in single file. As the last sheep cleared the gate, Clyde swung it closed and tied it securely, then jogged to catch up with Beulah. They spoke as they walked together, heading for the big barn and, Cora now understood, the small round slaughter pen that stood beside it. Cora couldn’t make out the words they exchanged, but the two young people were calm, glad in one another’s company. No fear shadowed the space between them, no resentment, though they were Webber and Bemis, the scions of enemy clans. Their conversation made a muted sort of music, and Cora shut her eyes for a moment, savoring the rare sound.

  “That girl of yours is trouble.”

  Cora started—she nearly screamed. She hadn’t heard the kitchen door open, hadn’t heard Nettie Mae striding across the yard toward the cellar. Yet there Nettie Mae stood, stiff with the fury that never left her, as close beside Cora as she ever deigned to come.

  Nettie Mae was holding an old hemp sack in her hands, empty. She jerked her head toward the cellar door. “I’ve come for a few roots and things for the stew pot. Time to get supper cooking.”

  “Of course.”

  Cora seized the iron handle and pulled hard. The door opened slowly, grudging every inch. Cool air rushed across her forehead and cheeks, easing for a moment the thick and oppressive atmosphere of afternoon. The cellar smelled of damp earth, the spice and tang of harvest.

  “Would you like me to—” Cora reached for the hemp sack, but Nettie Mae jerked it away. She brushed past Cora and vanished into the darkness below the mound.

  Cora heard the bump of onions or rutabagas against some wood-sided crate, the rustle of Nettie Mae’s hands sifting impatiently through straw. A moment later, she emerged with a scowl and a sack full of roots.

  Nettie Mae’s hard stare slid past Cora toward the barn. The skin below her dark eyes tensed, a sign of extreme displeasure, which Cora had already come to recognize in her neighbor turned reluctant savior. She turned to see what Nettie Mae had seen—to find out what had redoubled her anger.

  Clyde and Beulah were leaning on the rail of the slaughter pen, side by side, talking as they watched the chosen lambs. Cora shook her head slowly, uncertain why the scene upset Nettie Mae.

  “That girl of yours is trouble,” Nettie Mae said again. “Trouble. You mark my words.”

  “Beulah isn’t a bad girl,” Cora said, almost pleading. “She works hard.”

  “She most certainly does not. If you call her shameful lollygagging ‘hard work,’ then I suppose it’s no mystery why you ended up here, seeking refuge under my roof.”

  Cora held her tongue, waiting for Nettie Mae to say more. There certainly were more words coming, more accusations. Cora could sense them.

  “You had best teach that daughter of yours how to be a proper woman—assuming you still have any inkling of propriety—and do it now, while you still can.”

  Silence fell between them, stretched on the pegs of Cora’s sins. She didn’t know whether Nettie Mae expected a response.

  “What . . . what do you mean?” Cora ventured.

  “You know what I mean. And heed what I say, Cora Bemis: If your daughter gets herself into trouble, you’ll get no help from me. You’ll have reached the end of my charity, and no mistake. I’ll see to it that Clyde never claims the baby as his own. You must make up your mind to break the pattern of your family’s iniquities, for if you don’t, you’ll only compound your miseries and destroy the lives of all who come after you. Clyde isn’t the president, Cora. There will be no fancy tableware to buy the complacency and silence of a bastard child.”

  Nettie Mae spun on her heel and marched away before Cora could frame some hopeless answer. She swallowed hard, willing herself not to cry. She bent to pick up her basket again and carry it inside the cellar. Instead, she took a single parsnip and held it in her hands, turning it over, feeling the smoothness of its skin, the tiny hairs of its roots, the faint grainy texture of what little soil remained.

  Then, for no reason she could name, Cora lifted the parsnip to her lips and bit off the thin, pointed tip. An acrid pungency filled her mouth, the flavor so powerful it made her want to spit. It was the bitterest thing Cora had ever tasted.

  7

  WHEN WE HEARD THE THUNDER

  I felt winter drawing closer, coming faster than it had ever come before. We who had gathered in the sod-brick house worked against time, and the hours seemed to regard us with calculation, a swift and predatory intent. But before the harshest weather set in, we stripped our two farms of every stalk and grain. Whatever this menacing, early winter might bring, at least we could be certain none of us would go hungry.

  Everyone, even the smallest, helped bring in the final harvest. On days when no rain fell, Benjamin and Charles climbed up into the Webber apple trees and picked the remaining fruit from the boughs. The shadowed interior of the barn was sweet—a bright, fresh scent of ripened apples. Nettie Mae and my mother took turns with bushels of fruit, cooking down sauce flavored with dark molasses sugar, pressing cider, and stringing up slices of apple, cheery as springtime flowers, on twine above the kitchen hearth, where the heat shrank the slices down to leather.

  Miranda had the task of picking dried pods from the skeletal wisps of bean plants, saving those that had been left on the vine to mature into next year’s seed. Miranda was small, but she did her work well, presenting me with baskets and bowls brimming over with the split brown pods and rattling with the seeds that had already dropped from their husks. I showed my little sister how to shake the beans free and lay them out on old rags in the cool solitude of the barn, where the memory of recent rains could dry from their plump, shiny skins. Then I helped her pack the seeds she had gathered into little clay jars, which we set high upon a shelf beside stores of corn, wheat, and barley, peas and squash and beet seeds. There the seeds would dream through winter till the season of sowing came again.

  The root cellar was fragrant with the earthy bite of turnips and the sharp richness of onions and dried braids of meadow garlic. The smokehouse exhaled a constant blue breath through cracks in its plank sides and around the edges of its roof. A few late-ripening pumpkins, the last fruits of the vine, stood proudly on Nettie Mae’s oaken mantel, orange skins plump and glistening with the vinegar bath that would drive away the rot. Even with winter’s rapid advance, we had managed to bring in the whole harvest, right down to the cull of the spring lambs. If you considered only our food stores, you’d have thought us well prepared for whatever the harsh and eager season thought to bring.

  But if you observed my ma and Nettie Mae together—the few times when their work forced them into one another’s company—you would have shaken your head in dire prediction and prayed for peace between our families, without real hope of your prayer being answered. Whenever Ma and Nettie Mae crossed paths, the air around them seemed full of yellow jackets, buzzing and angry, bristling with venomous stings. They never shouted at each other nor exchanged any insults that I ever heard. But all the same, there was no mistaking their ire. It lived in both their hearts.

  Ma hid her bitterness with unthinking ease—the cultured city woman, the president’s niece, too proud and refined to lash out in anger. Nettie Mae had always been a woman of half-wild places, and she saw no purpose in tempering her rage. She never spared a word of thanks for my mother’s help nor wasted breath on encouragement. Nor did she miss a chance to scowl when the opportunity came along. Her dislike for my ma was naked and unashamed, but Cora’s distaste for Nettie Mae was at least as great as the guilt that still shrouded her heart a month after Su
bstance’s death. My ma had a natural talent for disguising her feelings.

  But she had never been able to hide her feelings from me. Few people could, who I ever met. That was my talent, I guess you could say—my purpose in the world—to see and know. To see and know, even when everyone else had blinded themselves to the truth.

  Ma had never loved life on the prairie. She couldn’t help feeling fragile and bare whenever she looked upon the greatness of the world, for then she knew herself to be a small and helpless thing, and the blunt fact of her weakness couldn’t be ignored. Before the power of Nature, its inescapable presence and fixed dominion, all men and women are as mice in the talons of the hawk. In a city, I could well imagine—surrounded by streets and commerce and carriages, everyone dressed Sunday-fine, with the forests and fields only a thin shadow on a distant horizon—a body might trick itself into believing that mankind held the world in its white-knuckled hand. But on our homestead, the wilderness ran right up to the front door. A few steps from the threshold and the prairie had you, stripping away the power of man, caging you under the dome of an endless sky.

  A woman like my ma couldn’t do a thing save cower before the inescapable vastness of the plains. That flat solitude of weak light and blue shadow, of grass and sage and cicada’s hum, went on and on to every horizon, to every eternity that had turned its ceaseless cycles below the sun, back to the time before mankind existed. And the wilderness would go on existing long after mankind had fallen to dust and blown away on a rain-scented wind. That was why my ma refused to love the land on which she depended for her very survival: because the land never allowed my ma to deny her insignificance. The buffalo moved in far-off herds, darkening the distant plain, and she knew the great majestic animals had no care for her, a woman left to her own devices. The pronghorns ran before the wind, heads up and free, and Ma knew she didn’t frighten them. She was nothing, in their estimation. The hawks dove into the tall grass and lumbered back to the air, dangling their prey. Ma watched the jackrabbits kick and scream as they were torn from the earth and carried into the sky. She knew that she would die someday, that mankind itself wouldn’t last forever. She feared and hated the greatest truth, the greatest beauty Nature had to offer.