Backlands

by Michael McGarrity

  He smiled and took another sip. Nine months ago, Al Jr., who was a year younger than Matt, had severed his left thumb and forefinger in a roping contest with a half-wild stray bull. As a consequence, he’d been classified as physically unfit for military service by the draft board. Making no mention of those facts, Matt quickly proposed to hire Al Jr. as the 7-Bar-K ranch manager, effective the first of the year. He explained that he needed to give his full attention to the ponies and wanted to increase the herd in their cattle-raising partnership. With the grasses coming back, both spreads could put more land into use. That meant more time would be needed to throw cows onto fresh pastures. Also, he needed someone to take over most of Pa’s chores now that he was slowing down on a bad leg that would never get any better.

  “I want Al Jr. as my ranch manager above anyone else,” Matt said. “He knows horses, cattle, and how to run a spread. And I’ll pay a fair wage and provide housing.”

  He turned to Brenda. “The casita will be yours.” She’d swooned over it during a visit to the 7-Bar-K. “And you’ll earn housekeeper wages for looking after Patrick. He’s not that much of a bother.”

  Brenda beamed at Matt, grabbed Al Jr.’s hand, and squeezed it.

  “Do I get to manage the ranch as I see fit?” Al Jr. asked.

  “We’ll do it together when I’m there,” Matt replied. “When I’m away, you’ll have full authority over all ranch business.”

  Matt glanced at Al Sr. and Dolly. “Think of it as another partnership between our two families. Al Jr. can help out at the Rocking J as much as needed. We can share costs and cut our expenses. When necessary, we’ll hire hands to work both spreads during spring and fall works. If we do this together, we’ll be more efficient.”

  “And we’d be right next door,” Al Jr. said, looking directly at his ma. “One spread over.”

  “I know,” Dolly said with a sad, accepting smile.

  “Are you planning to go marching off to war when we get pulled into it?” Al Sr. asked Matt.

  “No, sir, at least not right away,” Matt replied solemnly. “But if I do, I know things will be taken care of and looked after.”

  “I’d go if I could,” Al Jr. said softly.

  “Thank God you don’t have to,” Brenda said.

  “Yes, thank God,” Dolly whispered.

  “Do we have an agreement?” Matt asked, directing the question to Al Sr.

  Al Sr. nodded his consent.

  “I’m obliged,” Matt said. “Let’s get started by the first of the year.”

  “That’s perfect,” Dolly said as she poured another round of coffee.

  ***

  Matt spent the next three weeks at the cabin, riding fence lines, tending to the dirt tanks, cutting firewood, and repairing the two windmills that supplied reliable water for livestock in the spring and summer and wildlife in the winter. He saw plenty of deer and coyote tracks and a few wolf prints, but no sign of bear. Some San Andres ranchers were of a mind to believe that all the black bears in the mountains had been wiped out. Al Jennings had heard the last bear had been taken by a hunter two years back. Matt had seen no fresh sign for more than a year and didn’t doubt it. But if the black bears were gone, it was a sad prospect.

  He left the cabin feeling peaceful, content, and eager for the future. Although he wasn’t sure how it had happened, his broken spirit had been mended.

  Back at the ranch, he sat Patrick down and told him what he’d done and why.

  “Now’s the time to throw more cattle on the land,” Patrick agreed. “Last Sunday’s newspaper had a story about rising cattle prices because of shortages and rationing in England. The same thing happened in the Great War.”

  “Al Jr. and Brenda will move over here the first of the year,” Matt said.

  “Are you gonna be bullheaded and join up?” Patrick asked, scowling.

  Matt shrugged. “I’m not sure.”

  “When are you gonna do it?” Patrick prodded.

  “I don’t know,” Matt replied pointedly.

  “I hate to think the day might come when there’s no Kerney living on the ranch.”

  “That day will come one way or another, I reckon,” Matt rebutted.

  “Not in my lifetime, I hope.”

  “Nor mine, if I can help it,” Matt added. “Al Jr. and Brenda will do right by us.”

  Pa nodded. “We couldn’t do better.” He handed Matt a letter from the side table. “This came while you were gone.”

  It was a letter from Anna Lynn asking him to visit her on his next trip to town.

  “From that woman?” Pa asked harshly.

  Matt nodded. “She wants me to stop by and see her.”

  “What for?”

  “She doesn’t say.”

  “Are you gonna do it?”

  Matt tapped the letter against his lips. In one way he was over her; in another way, not. When he thought about her now, it was more a vague, pleasant memory. “I just might,” he mused.

  “A smart critter doesn’t put his paw in the same trap twice,” Pa philosophized.

  “That wasn’t quite what I was thinking,” Matt replied.

  ***

  Matt debated hard if it would be wise to visit Anna Lynn. He kept putting off a decision. Two weeks before Christmas, on his way to Alamogordo, he impulsively turned onto the Cloudcroft Road and pulled to a stop in front of Anna Lynn’s Mountain Park farmhouse. It was shirtsleeve weather, with a bright sun and calm winds. On the front porch a little girl no more than two looked at him from the back of a small wooden rocking horse and called out for her ma. Anna Lynn appeared, stepped off the porch, and greeted him with a smile.

  “I didn’t think you’d come to see me.” She’d aged some, but she was still mighty handsome, and the spark in her eye looked as fiery as ever.

  “I almost didn’t.” Matt studied the little girl from the cab of his truck, unsure if he should stay or drive away. “What’s her name?”

  “Virginia, but I call her Ginny,” Anna Lynn said as she stepped to the open truck window. “She’s just now eighteen months old.”

  He killed the engine. “Are you married?”

  Anna Lynn laughed and leaned against the truck door. “Heavens no.”

  “Where’s her father?”

  “He’s a lieutenant in the army on active duty now.”

  “Is he the guy who ran the High Rolls Camp?”

  Anna Lynn nodded.

  “He didn’t want to marry you?”

  “He was already married. Does that shock you?”

  “Nope.”

  “Come in for coffee.”

  “I’d like that.”

  Anna Lynn’s kitchen looked the same, everything clean and tidy, without a lot of frill. A shelf over the counter was crammed with bottles and canisters of spices and herbs from her garden. The shelf above held her home-harvested honey in quart jars.

  Little Ginny was a charmer. Before the coffee was served, she’d crawled onto Matt’s lap clutching paper and crayons, asking him to draw a picture for her. He did a stick-figure cowboy twirling a lasso and sitting on a silly-looking pony. It met with her approval, although she added a sun with rays shooting out of it for a finishing touch. She had the same inquisitive, intelligent look about her as her ma, right down to tilting her head the same way when she asked a question.

  Coffee segued into a tasty supper of chicken potpie topped with enjoyable conversation. Afterward, with the dirty dishes stacked in the sink, he had a pleasant time helping Anna Lynn get Ginny ready for bed. When she was all tucked in, they returned to the kitchen and sat quietly in soft lamplight, Matt remembering other nights after dinner with Anna Lynn begun the same way.

  “You’d make a fine father,” Anna Lynn announced.

  “Are you looking to recruit one?”

  She s
miled sweetly. “No, thank you.”

  “I didn’t think so. Do you like being a mother?”

  Anna Lynn sighed contentedly. “Oh, yes, I was made for it. I should have found my calling sooner and had six more.”

  “Ah, so it’s potential sires you’re looking for,” Matt proposed.

  Anna Lynn shook her head. “No, at my age you need have no fear of that. I was lucky to have had my beautiful little girl.”

  Matt pushed back from the table. “I best be on my way.”

  Anna Lynn reached for his hand. “Stay the night.”

  “Doesn’t that violate your one-lover-at-a-time rule?”

  “I’ll never break that rule. Will you stay?”

  “Only on one condition.”

  “Which is?”

  “I want you to promise to give me more notice the next time you plan to throw me over for someone else.”

  “Hm,” Anna Lynn said, her hand caressing his chest. “I agree to your terms, but I may not ever want to do that again.”

  It wasn’t until late afternoon the next day that Matthew Kerney left Anna Lynn’s house, with a promise to return the next weekend. Never had he felt better, leastways not in a very long time. It was as though cobwebs had been dusted from his head. He decided making love to a beautiful woman who truly enjoyed it was about the best experience a man could ever have. And it sure had a positive effect on one’s outlook.

  The Bill Mauldin sketch of Matt still hung in Anna Lynn’s bedroom; she’d never taken it down. He drove the highway with a smile on his face, vowing to simply enjoy Anna Lynn’s company for however long it lasted.

  38

  The following Sunday morning, Matt looked out the window of Anna Lynn’s bedroom and saw a brilliant sunrise. It looked like they were in for a mild, sunny day. He turned back over in bed toward Anna Lynn, who regarded him with a thoughtful smile.

  Matt smiled back at her and said, “How about we have an early breakfast and take Ginny for a picnic at White Sands?”

  “That’s a wonderful idea,” Anna Lynn said. “But let’s not rush ourselves.” She reached over, cupped her hand behind Matt’s neck, and pulled him to her for a kiss.

  After what was still an early breakfast, all things considered, they packed a light lunch, got in Matt’s truck, Ginny sitting on Anna Lynn’s lap, and headed down to the basin.

  For many years the old wagon road between Tularosa and Las Cruces skirted the untouched gypsum sand dunes that stretched deep into the basin. Now a modern highway ran from Alamogordo past the dunes all the way to the Arizona state line. Where once there had been nothing more than a sign announcing that motorists were entering White Sands National Monument, now there was a modern pueblo-style National Park Service headquarters building at the entrance.

  After they’d toured the small museum in the building, Matt drove the loop road into the heart of the monument. Huge, crescent-shaped dunes, some forty feet high, drifted slowly northeast, pushed along by prevailing winds.

  As soon as he stopped the truck, Ginny was out in a flash, running up the nearest dune, with Matt and Anna Lynn on her heels. Halfway to the top, her little legs churning in the soft sand, Ginny lifted her arms in a signal to be carried. Matt hoisted her on his shoulders and waded to the crest. They looked out on a sea of sand rolling to a distant ridgeline of serrated dunes that edged against the Alkali Flats.

  “Isn’t this marvelous?” Anna Lynn said. “How beautiful.”

  “Put me down,” Ginny commanded, unimpressed with the view. As soon as her feet touched the sand, she plopped on her tummy and rolled down the back side of the dune, giggling all the way.

  Matt pointed at the San Andres Mountains, which dominated the western horizon, bleak and foreboding to the naked eye. “You can almost see the 7-Bar-K from here.”

  “I would love to see it up close,” Anna Lynn replied.

  “You would?” It had never entered Matt’s mind that she would want to visit the ranch.

  “Yes, I would, very much.”

  “Well, sure you can,” he said, pleased by the notion, wondering why it hadn’t occurred to him.

  “When?” Anna Lynn asked.

  “Whenever you want.”

  Ginny crawled back up the dune to where they stood, her face a mask of powdery, glistening sand. Anna Lynn knelt to brush the gypsum from her face and hands. “You’re a mess, young lady.”

  “Am not.” Ginny pushed Anna Lynn’s hand away and rolled down the dune again.

  “Today,” Anna Lynn said, rising.

  “What?”

  “I’d like to visit your ranch today.”

  “It’s a far piece to travel, and I haven’t laid in any supplies for company.”

  “Can we go? Yes or no?” Anna Lynn asked.

  “Can you be gone from your place overnight?” Matt countered.

  Anna Lynn nodded. “The Forest Service has moved their ponies to Deming for the winter, my hives are dormant, and my garden is fallow. Yes or no?”

  “Yes.”

  Anna Lynn clapped her hands. “Goody. We’ll buy groceries in town, pack what Ginny and I need at home, and be on our way,” she said in a rush. “How long can we stay?”

  “As long as you like.”

  “Don’t tempt me,” Anna Lynn said jokingly. She jumped feet-first off the crest of the dune and rolled to where Ginny waited, half buried, pouring sand through her fingers into her hair. She pulled Ginny onto her lap and blew Matt a kiss. “This is so much fun. Let’s eat and go for a short hike. There are some plants in the dunes I’ve never seen before.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Matt said, marveling at how she seemed to have shed twenty years.

  ***

  The few ranches Anna Lynn had seen on the Tularosa were bitter, lonely places, tenuous and grim at best. On their drive to the 7-Bar-K, she questioned Matt about the ranch. He spoke of it proudly but without much detail, saying it sat on a nice slice of land with some pretty high-country pastures and views. His comments made her worry about what to expect. Perhaps the whole idea of visiting the ranch had been a big mistake. The fact that Matt was different—in some ways sweeter, in some ways smarter—from any other man she’d allowed into her life didn’t necessarily mean he gave a thought to how he lived. Not many bachelors did. She hoped she wouldn’t take one look at the ranch and immediately want to be driven home.

  Upon their arrival, she almost sighed aloud in relief. Matt’s description didn’t do the ranch justice. Anna Lynn marveled at how the ranch house was perched on a ledge, perfectly positioned with the broad shoulders of guardian foothills as a backdrop, looking out on a landlocked expanse of desert. The view was splashed in snowy white, ebony black, and gunmetal gray under wispy tendril clouds floating in an azure sky. The land was veined by wide arroyos ringed by massive island mountains springing up to the heavens. Anna Lynn doubted a lovelier, more picture-perfect location existed on the Tularosa.

  She spun around slowly to take it all in. The ranch house with its wide veranda, the casita with its thick adobe walls, the sturdy, weathered barn, the windmill and stock tank, were all in scale and harmonious. The large corral with the pasture beyond where a herd of pretty horses idled looked idyllic. She wondered how many men’s and women’s hands had shaped the 7-Bar-K over the years.

  “It’s heavenly,” she said, her arms cradling Ginny, who wiggled to get down.

  Matt unloaded her bags from the bed of the Chevy. “You’ve hardly seen the place yet.”

  “Ponies,” Ginny screeched, pointing.

  Anna Lynn released her and she raced to the fence for a closer look at the faraway ponies. “I should have known it would be this lovely.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  She rested her head on his chest. “Because of who you are.”

  Matt wrapped an arm around her. “I’ve never heard yo
u gush like this before.”

  Anna Lynn laughed. “True, you’ve caught me fair and square. Unhand me and show me to our quarters.”

  She ran to Ginny, caught her up, and followed Matt to the casita. She laughed with delight when he opened the door and sunlight cascaded on a parlor wall filled with Billy Mauldin’s sketches.

  “You’ve kept them all,” she said, delighted.

  “I thought you knew I was a connoisseur of fine art,” Matt said as he put the luggage on the floor. “Make yourself at home while I unload the victuals. Tonight, I’m doing the cooking. Over supper, I’ll tell you the story of Ignacio Chávez from the village of Tularosa, a wounded veteran of the Apache Wars, who built this casita for his bride-to-be with only one good arm.”

  “It’s a love story?”

  Matt grinned. “Sí, of the very best kind.”

  “I can’t wait to hear it.” Anna Lynn looked through the open bedroom door. “Where will you be sleeping?”

  “Here, with you. I’ll fashion a bed for Ginny in the parlor and we’ll leave the bedroom door open.”

  Anna Lynn smiled. “Oh, you do know how to please a lady.”

  Ginny tugged hard at her mother’s hand. “Ponies,” she cooed. “Let’s go see the ponies.”

  “Give me a minute and I’ll get old Stony from the barn and we’ll give you a ride on him.”

  Ginny stomped her feet in glee.

  ***

  Anna Lynn and Ginny stayed at the 7-Bar-K Ranch for five glorious days. Every day, either by truck or on horseback, Matt showed them his ranch and the rugged San Andres Mountains. They traveled hidden canyons, high pasturelands, wide mesas, and forested mountaintops. He took them to the malpais, into the secluded Oscura Mountains, to the secret springs in Hembrillo Canyon, where the Apache chief Victorio and his braves gave a big shellacking to the horse soldiers during the Indian Wars. They spent two nights in the remote cabin on the 7-Bar-K high pasture, snug and warm on their last night after a surprise snowstorm draped a pristine white blanket over the highest peaks.

  Matt’s warning to Anna Lynn that his father would probably be grumpy and reclusive didn’t hold true. For some unknown and unexplainable reason, little Ginny took to Patrick Kerney the instant they met. She pestered him endlessly while in his company, wanting to sit on his lap, asking him to pick her up, following him around the ranch house and the barn, and begging him over and over to let her ride Stony.