He let his eyes wander around the room, examining the ceiling and the beams that held up the roof, where the strain was. Above his head, just an arm's length away because of the slope, a beam ran the length of the room. He looked at it a while, seeing the grain sharpen and come into focus as the light from the window gradually brightened. He put out a hand and grasped it, firmly, and used it to slide up so that he was sitting without having jostled Mary. He considered a moment more and then pulled himself slowly to his feet. His cane, of course, was still lying where it had dropped some hours previous, in the middle of the attic floor, but the beam sufficed, and so he walked slowly along it to the far window, not wanting to try and step over the bed. He paused, then shifted into nothingness and caught the windowsill.
Below, in the back yard, the scene was quiet, still and grey. A few chickens were all that stirred, and he could hear faintly their occasional clucking from the old pigsty where pigs no longer lived. Beyond, the land sloped upward out into grazing fields, then down again and out of sight.
"Lovely, isn't it?"
Henry jerked, startled, and Mary caught his shoulder while he regained himself. "Sorry—" he blinked. "I didn't hear—"
She turned, and he moved over a little to allow her a view out the window. "Oughta see when it snows," she said. "Purtiest thing ever." After a moment she withdrew, and began to dress. "We better get downstairs. I smell Ma's eggs and toast."
"Or waffles and bacon."
She laughed. "Or waffles and bacon. You caught me." She glanced around. "We oughta look through some of these old boxes. I know there's some of Granma'n Granpa's old clothes we could dress in."
Henry eyed his own neatly folded pile of clothing. "I'd rather not," he said, uneasily.
She tossed him his shirt. "Oh, you're no fun." When they had dressed, Mary paused by the steps. "I'll go get Pa," she said.
"A—shoulder'll do," he said. "Down is easier than up."
"Is it? All right." She put an arm around his waist, and with a little bit of squeezing they made it down. They were halfway along the upstairs hall when Ma poked her head out of a doorway.
"Mary dear, is that you? Oh, thank goodness. Come here and help a minute, will you?"
Mary grinned apologetically. "I'll only be a minute," she said. "I hope." She left him and hurried through the door, shutting it behind herself.
Agreeable, Henry wandered towards the stairs, looking down over the railing. He stopped at the top, considering. The rail served nearly as well as a shoulder, and so he grasped it and started slowly down. He stopped two steps above halfway, however, his breath coming with difficulty, and wished for a landing, or at least somewhere to sit. He took another step down, and, nearly stumbling, stopped again. At that moment, Joey jogged past the bottom of the stairs, humming to himself.
"Joey—" he called.
There was nothing for a moment, and then the boy returned, brow furrowed. "Oh," he said, smiling, seeing at last where the voice had come from.
"Come help me a moment, will you?"
"Sure, Mr. Peterson." He jogged up the stairs.
"Thank you. No, this side—yes. Thank you." He rested his weight on Joey's broad shoulders; the boy was not yet a man, but he was no longer a child, and his frame seemed to show already that he would not be unlike his father in form. "Seems I forgot my limitations, for a while," he said. He did not start down the stairs again, but paused to rest, thankfully, while Joey waited.
"S'okay," said Joey, holding out one leg. It was scraped and scabbed from the knee down, all along his shin. "I done it on Fridee."
This made Henry smile. "Good boy," he said, and started down.
"Ma—she said Mary's gonna have a baby," Joey said, hesitant. He looked embarrassed, as if it were private, women's talk.
"That's right."
"Is it gonna be a boy or girl?"
"Don't know. Have to see when it comes."
"Oh." He sounded a little disappointed. "Can I watch?" he asked, suddenly. His face flushed red, but his curiosity demanded that he ask.
"I don't know. We'll see."
"Oh. All right." They reached the bottom of the stairs, and Joey waited while Henry removed his arm. "Well," he said, "I gotta go." He backed away a little, not quite sure what to do. He hated good-byes of any sort.
"All right. Thank you."
"Sure." He turned and hurried away.
"Joey—" He waited for the boy to turn. "I'd be proud—to have a son like you." Joey flushed again, glanced up, and was gone. Henry turned to look where the boy's eyes had been, knowing he'd find Mary coming down the stairs.
"Now you've gone and made him mortified for the next month," she said, laughing. She put a hand on his face and kissed him. "And happy as an angel for twice that."
"I—I meant it," he said, a slight hint of desperation in his voice.
"I know you did. Thank you, Hen."
After breakfast and nearing noon, Pa hitched up their wagon and they set off. A few clouds had rolled in and it was a little cooler, if humid. Before they could get through the huge wooden frame that crossed the packed dirt road leading up to the house, Brian came barreling down the hill. Mary touched Henry's shoulder, saying something into his ear, and he reined in the horses.
Brian plowed into the side of the wagon, knocking the wind out of himself. He gasped for a moment, then regained his breath and looked up at Henry. "Did—" he panted, "did King Henry really win?" He eyed his sister, as though he were anticipating catching her in a lie.
Henry looked at him a moment. "Well, yes, he did," he told the boy.
"Oh," said Brian, sounding deflated. He took a couple of stumbling backward steps away from the wagon as it rolled forward. He started to turn, then, on a second thought, looked back. "In a pig's eye!" he yelled, triumphant.
Chapter Ten
"I'm glad we came to town."
Henry blinked. "I'm sorry—" he said.
"What?"
"What?"
Mary giggled. "Okay, start over—I'm glad we came to town."
"Oh." He paused. "Yes. Shall we have lunch?" It was getting towards late afternoon, and they hadn't eaten since breakfast.
Mary looked around, back down the street. "That's right, we didn't bring any." She put a hand up to shade her eyes and looked the other way. Her other hand went without thought to her stomach, pressing out roundly now, and smoothed down her dress a little.
Henry watched her, pleased, seeing the hint of a smile light her face, just that little bit making her glow. A few men, passing by, looked and then looked away, embarrassed, but he didn't notice and wouldn't have cared. For all the years they had been together, Mary was just the same as she had been the first day he had seen her, coming home, her secret little smile taunting him inside. "I still love you," he said, and that gathered a few glances from passing women.
She looked at him a moment, oddly, and laughed. "Well, I hope you do," she said, "seeing as this here is yours." She put rested both hands on her stomach for a moment, then reached up and mussed his hair.
He put a hand to his head and combed it back into place, turning a little pale. In this way he knew that he had changed, if she had not, because five years ago such a return from her would have made him burn with shame for his poorly phrased words; now he was amused and only a little conscious that they were acting as perhaps they should not in public. "Here," he said, gesturing briefly to a pair of saloon doors. Unfortunately, besides the other saloon in town or a can of beans from the grocer, it was the only place in town with a noontime meal available. Though the Dry Water was a saloon, it functioned mostly as a place of business, where ranchers congregated to negotiate with one another or buyers from out of town, and was not unseemly. Because of this, it wasn't entirely improper to bring a woman in.
Of course Mary didn’t mind. She went through first, blinking to let her eyes adjust and smiling out of habit. "Afternoon, Joshua," she said pleasantly, and a young man of about sixteen in the corner blushed and
muttered a greeting, then quickly ducked his head to Henry. For a moment the noise in the room lulled, then rose again as folks went back to their conversations.
A woman in a red dress approached. "In for a meal?" she asked, her voice quick. Henry nodded and she turned. "All right. This way." They followed her to the back of the room, past the card tables to the area where men sat around tables, talking quietly and some smoking cigars. A few looked up and nodded at Henry, and he returned the gesture.
The waitress sat them down and was about to discuss the meal when a man across the room, playing cards, held up a finger. "Hold on a minute, folks," she said.
"All right." Mary looked across the table at her husband as the woman walked quickly away and smiled. "Feel kinda—risky, bein' in here," she said, grinning.
"Not—too dangerous." He watched the woman in the red dress, saw her stop a few feet away from the man, saw him motion her closer. It wasn't conscious, but he noticed it like he habitually noticed everything about him; the table next to them, larger, circled by perhaps six brawny men, one of them the blacksmith; further, a group of three quieter men, not worn, but trim and business-like.
"Hen—" she put her hand across the table. "Hen."
He blinked and she came into focus.
"Somethin's on your mind—what is it?"
"Sorry," he apologized. "Just—business."
"Well—maybe I won't understand, but tell it anyway."
The man who had called the woman in red reached his arm around her and she stepped back, swatting him away. She backed off some from the table, then turned on a heel and went into the back, where the kitchen was.
"Covey's in trouble," he said, shaking his head slightly. "He's got a gully straight through his property, and every time he moves cattle or even has to get supplies, he's gotta go at least a day's time to get to a shallow cross."
Mary stuck out her bottom lip, thoughtfully. "We-ell, hasn't it always been like that?"
"Sure, but he started up in a boom year. Since then his profits have been fallin' every season. Next year he'll wind up with nothin' at all, unless he gets a bridge." He turned a knife, from the table, over and over in his fingers, watching the light reflected on it.
"And there's a reason he can't build one?"
"It's a wide gully; he needs money, and the bank won't loan."
Mary waited, watching him worry the knife. She felt someone come near and looked up to see the waitress. "Oh," she said. "Um... I guess we'll both have whatever's—on the grill?" She glanced at Henry. "That all right with you?"
"Fine."
"All right," said the woman, half-sighing. "Won't be but a few minutes."
Mary turned back to Henry, allowing a moment of silence as they returned to the subject at hand. "But you have an idea—am I right?"
He looked uncertain. "Yes—well—we have the money. We could loan for interest, or maybe a share of profits. It would be tight, though—for a while."
She shrugged. "That's all right. Sounds like we both come out good in the end. I think you oughta do it."
The knife turned over again. "The only thing is, he needs to do it now. There's always a chance it won't turn out, and with the baby—I don't know..." Out of the corner of his eye, he watched the woman pass by the table across the room, and as she did the man caught her hand. She tried to pull away, but his grip tightened. She wrenched her arm, and it came away, tumbling her back a few steps.
"But you thought enough of it to consider," she pointed out.
"Mary—" Henry said softly, urgent, "get out of—" but it was too late. The man across the room was standing, his face twisted in fury. The woman stepped back, her hands flying up. His hand reached down—and Henry pushed to his feet, reached for the gun at the hip of the man at the table next to him, and shot. There were three screams, together; from the woman in red, Mary, and the man whose gun had just dropped to the floor, red.
Careful now, Henry set down the gun on the table in front of him and fumbled for his cane. Across the room, the woman in the dress had burst into tears, and another woman, shorter and a little overweight, had come out of the kitchen and put her arms around her. The man sank to the floor, holding his shooting arm tightly with his other hand, just above the elbow. He moaned, in pain.
For a moment, Mary, who had jumped to her feet and out of the way, stood, stunned. Then she let out a choking gasp and threw her arms around Henry, tight. "I'm—sorry for the scare," he said, stroking her hair.
"Don't bother," she said, quick, "don't bother. You all right?"
"Yes." He loosened his grasp a little and she parted. "Is the woman all right?" he asked.
"She'll be fine, sir, thankya," returned the lady who was comforting her. "Ain't hurt 'cept inside." There was silence in the room. Everyone was listening, and a few got up and left in a hurry.
"This'll have to go to the judge in Hickory," Henry said aloud, mostly to Mary, apologetic. His eyes were far away, kind of sorrowful.
One of the men who had been sitting around the table with the wounded man stood up. "For my part," he said, "I ain't seen nothin'." He looked at his companions pointedly. "And neither've these here. He earned it straight through."
A hand reached out and took back the gun Henry had laid on the table. "Me neither," he said. He popped open the chamber and reloaded a bullet to replace the one that had been used.
"Get-- th-th—Doc," whined the man on the floor.
"He's been sent for," someone said. The sound was hollow in the room.
Henry looked back at Mary. "I guess I'm not too hungry," he said.
"No," she returned, quiet. "I guess I'm not either."
He put an arm around her waist. "Let's go." The only exit was the doorway they had come through, and that was past the wounded man. They walked by slow, Henry nearest, limping a little more than when they had come in. "I guess," he said, "maybe you won't be so quick to shoot a woman again."
The man looked up at him. "Damn you," he said, and then shrilly, "damn you!" Blood was pooling around him on the floor, and he turned back to gaze again at his mangled hand.
They rode home in silence, Mary's arms tight around him.
"Hen," she said, when they were inside, "are you all right? Here, sit." He sat on the edge of the bed, and she took his jacket and hung it over the back of a chair.
"There was murder in his eyes," he said.
"I know." She sat next to him.
"I've—done something to a man that he will carry all his life." His voice was calm, toneless. He took a deep breath, weighing the thought, the action. "But he had murder in his eyes."
Her voice was a whisper. "I know." She looked up at him, pained. "Hen—do you need anything?"
He shook his head, closing his eyes for a moment, and took her hand. "I—I know what you think—" he said, hesitant to impose thoughts upon her. She nodded slightly. "You think it's odd I don't go weak," he said. He held out a hand, to show her. "I'm steady, and I'm not—that way." He swallowed. "Now you know what I got in me. I—would've killed him, if I had to, and still been no more shook up."
Mary looked at him. "Oh," she said.
"Are you afraid?"
She shook her head and frowned. "A—a little," she admitted. "But I guess I knew."
"Did you?"
"You do what's gotta be done. That frightens, a little, sometimes, no matter what. But that don't mean it's not a good thing, you doin' it." She understood that he was only frightened to do unnecessary things—like love. It made her smile, a little.
"Guess we oughta go on to bed, now," she said, after a time. Out the window, the sky was darkening. She stood. "You want some water?"
"All right."
When she came back from the kitchen, he had his shirt off, and she put down both glasses a moment to help him with his pants. He slid into bed and she handed him one of the glasses, taking the other herself and sipping carefully. She walked to the window and looked out, feeling her belly absently. For a moment she closed he
r eyes, humming.
"Come here," said Henry, at length. He put aside his glass, empty now. "I want to feel the baby."
She turned, a smile spreading across her face, and hurried to the bed. "It's not moving much tonight," she said. "Just kind of... bubbling now an then."
"It bubbles?" he raised an eyebrow, slightly.
She tilted her head and half-closed her eyes, setting her jaw. "Well, maybe. You don't know!" Shifting, she rolled onto her back and pressed his hand to her abdomen. "Now you gotta wait a minute. Close your eyes." He did so, and she smiled again because she had said it mainly so she could watch him without making him embarrassed. She breathed deeply, waiting, feeling his hand on her skin. "Mm—there," she said after a minute, and moved his hand down a little. "Feel? –Eyes closed."
He smiled, widely. "I feel it," he said. "What—what is it like?"
Mary closed her eyes. "It's like—havin' God Himself come down and sleep inside you. Like—sometimes wakin' up in the night and feelin' like maybe you'll just start laughing and never stop. I don't know how to say it so you'll understand."
Henry felt at once privileged and overwhelmed that he, he, spent every day with a thing, a woman, who could make life. "I've never felt like that," he said, softly. "No—" he corrected suddenly, "no, I have. I have. With you."
In the morning when Mary woke, Henry was sitting up next to her in bed, reading. He looked up. "Good morning," he said.
She rolled over, groaning.
"What is it?"
"I feel—terrible."
Henry closed his book and threw aside the blankets. "I'll get the doctor," he said.
But she caught hold of his wrist. "No, Hen—it's just morning sickness. It'll pass." She smiled, and it was a grimace at the same time. "Anyway, how were you going to get the horses hitched?"
"I'd do it," he said, sober.
She patted his hand. "I know you would." She sighed. Slowly, she rolled back the other way, to get out of bed.
When Henry Came Home Page 23