Katherine

by S. A. Glenn

  His mother ran toward him, holding onto her pink-rose white-decorated hat. “SAMUEL! SAMUEL!” she cried. Coming to a halt at his side she gazed upon the fiery, collapsing barn. Out of breath, she implored him with great concern in a long-winded wandering fashion. “What on Earth happened?! Where’s Art?! Is he in the barn?”

  Samuel shook his head yes.

  “Oh, my god, Samuel! I heard Beth screaming like a banshee, saying she heard you tell Art you’ll kill him; that she saw you stab him with a knife. What is going on?”

  He sat for a moment, crouched, his mouth hanging wide open, trying to process the harsh, cold reality of what just took place. The words that passed through his mother’s uneasy lips were not the true story—or so he believed—he was not quite sure what had happened, now. Pulling himself up and out of his hellish abyss, he sat straight, looked down at his mother and stared into her eyes. “It ’twas an accident, Ma,” he explained, pulling his coat tighter around himself. “Art was gonna hurt me somethin’ bad. He was real drunk . . . didn’t look right. I was mindin’ my own business when he came at me, ready to wrap his hands ’round my throat. He was too big for me to fight, Ma. I grabbed my knife to scare him away—he fell on me. Maybe he was too drunk to stand no more . . . I don’t know . . . but we crashed to the ground. I saw my knife sticking in his chest, blood everywhere—he wouldn’t move, just laid there, starin’ up at me,” he told her, tears falling. “The lantern fell over ’n’ caught fire. I tried real hard to get him to safety. But he just kept layin’ there. I couldn’t move him—then his head fell to one side, his eyes got all spooky lookin’. He was dead, Ma! Dead! I pulled out my knife cuz it didn’t look right, bein’ in his chest ’n’ all . . . and cuz I was scared, didn’t want folks thinkin’ I meant for this to happen. I stood up, and Beth was there. She started screamin’, tellin’ me she heard me threatenin’ Art, saying I’d killed him; that she was gonna round up the marshal. Whaddam I gonna do, Ma? The marshal ain’t gonna believe it was an accident this time. They’ll hang me dead for sure! You believe me, don’tcha, Ma? That is was an accident? I’m so sorry!” he cried out.

  “It’s okay, Samuel. And of course I believe you,” she assured him, placing her hand upon his thigh, smiling up at him—her face turned serious. “There’s no time to waste. You must leave now! It’s time for you to be a man, okay?”

  “Yes, Ma.” He wiped his eyes with his sleeve.

  “Good! Now head out west and hide in the mountains.” She pulled out a bill from her purse. “Here’s ten dollars, it’s all I got. Write to me, let me know you’re well. Use the name I used to call you.”

  “Li’le Carver?” he asked with a quick grin, recalling simpler times.

  “Yes. That way nobody’ll know you’re writing to me. I love you, Samuel. Take care of yourself,” she smiled as she hid the tears running down her cheeks.

  “I love you too, Ma.” Fresh tears fell. He cleared them away with his fingers as he smiled back with pouting lips. “I’m gonna miss you somethin’ awful, Ma.”

  “Be brave, my dear, Samuel.” She kissed his hand. “Now get! Get out of here as fast as lightning! Don’t look back! Yaaahhh!” she yelled, slapping the horse’s rear.

  Samuel hurried off into the cold, lonely, moonless night, weeping in misery, knowing that he may never see his dearly loved mother again.

  THE LAKE

  1869

  Thousands of twinkling stars vanished as the full moon rose. Magnified by the atmosphere and glowing bright orange, the magnificent disk illuminated the land, showing the grief upon Samuel’s stubby-haired face. He sat silently after telling Katherine his dreadful history, gazing at her expressionless look, wondering if she was fearful of him.

  She ran her hand down her face, took a deep breath and exhaled. With her mouth gaping, she shook her head in bitterness, staring hard into Samuel’s passive, dark blue eyes. “That is nightmarish!” she stated. “I cannot believe that he did that to you with his cigar. That’s what that scar on the back of your neck is from, isn’t it?” She took his hand and placed her other hand onto his cheek. “I’m so sorry that you had to go through that.”

  “You’re not disappointed in me, Kat?”

  “Whatever for, Sam? It was an unfortunate event. He came at you, threatening you. You defended yourself. He caused his own death, that’s the way I see it.” She crossed her arms, then stared blankly out to the lake.

  “What’s this about the marshal not believing it was an accident this time. What else happened?”

  Samuel recollected Oconnestoto’s words: tell no one of past, except entity who is ‘one’ with you. Samuel now trusted Katherine explicitly with all his secrets, believing she was the ‘one’. “When I was nine, me and my friend, Tommy Smith was playin’ at the well at the ol’ Crawley’s place, spittin’ in the hole and messin’ ’round—can’t remember too much of it—but all I know is that it was an accident. I bumped him and he fell in. I killed him! My best friend, deader than a box of rocks, layin’ there.”

  Katherine held his hands.

  “The marshal was really mad at me ’n’ wanted to lock me up. But Ma begged him to let me be, said I was too young. Some girls lied and said I pushed him on purpose. I never… but couldn’t… I mean it was nothin’ like they said, Kat. He was my best friend!”

  “It was just a mishap. I’m here for you.”

  “But now I’m on the run cuz of Art—a five-hundred dollar bounty hangin’ over my head. Other than you, only Ma, an Injun in the hills, and Ruff here know ’bout that stuff.”

  “And we’ll keep it that way, Sam. I promise!” She crossed her heart.

  “Kat, I love you so much!” he declared, kissing her forehead. He recalled the time when Tom and Mary expressed their love, and when his feelings of isolation tormented him, and how he wished he had love like theirs to share with someone special. Katherine’s brought him this happiness and integration, granting his desires. With a mountain lifted off his shoulders, he gazed into her charitable eyes. “You’re more than I could’ve ever dreamed of, Kat.”

  “You’re sweet. We’re fortunate to have found each other, Sam. I love you more and more as time goes by.”

  They embraced for a precious moment.

  Samuel stopped, yearning to gaze upon the majestic moon rising above the apparent junction of earth and sky. “Look, Kat. Look how big and bright the moon is. It must be real close to us. I’ll betcha it’s less than a thousand miles away.”

  “I think it’s further than that, Sam; nevertheless, it’s quite romantic. You know, Sam, some people believe when the moon is full, it’s a good time to rid oneself of negative energy. I’m proposing that we do a little ritual to cast out all undesirable powers. It’ll be fun. You want to?”

  “Okay. Whaddawe do?”

  “Fabulous!” she stated. Rummaging through the dirt, she located two twigs. She gave one to Samuel, kept the other one and reached for her wine glass. She removed a sheet of paper from the picnic basket, ripped it in two and gave him half of it. “Okay, Sam. What we’ve got to do is write on the paper with the twig and wine the negative things we want to rid ourselves of, okay?”

  “Okay, but I don’t write to good, Kat.”

  “That’s fine, it doesn’t matter. What matters is that you know what you mean.”

  “Got it, Kat.”

  They spent a few minutes writing down their negative thoughts. Once they were done, they folded their papers, holding them with excitement.

  “Now we use a formula of words. Repeat them after me, Sam: I abolish the aforementioned.”

  “I ’bolish the ‘forementioned,” he repeated the best he could.

  “I consecrate thee, that what I visualize, it shall be done.”

  “I ‘secrate thee, that what I visualize, it shall be done.”

  “That this is for
my greatest good… positive energy, I have won.”

  “That this is for my greatest good… positive energy, I have won.”

  Katherine threw the paper into the fire pit and watched it smolder then burst into flames. “Good riddance!” she declared, wiping her hands clean.

  Samuel took out his tobacco pouch, tossed it and the paper onto the coals and watched them ignite. “I ain’t smokin’ no more neither—good riddance!” he stated, wiping his hands clean.

  Sitting snugly, they comforted each other, wrapping their arms around their partner’s receptive body, cherishing the picturesque orangish-turning-to-blue moon, transforming into oneness.

  Samuel turned to his sweetheart with a frisky plan, pointing in another direction. “What was that?” he asked with a sober look.

  “What was what?” She turned to gaze over her shoulder. “I don’t see anything, Sam. What did it look like?” she inquired, shifting back to her devotee.

  A silly grin on his mug, he joined her soothing lips with his.

  “You tricked me!” she declared with an impediment as their lips locked.

  They laid back and spread out onto the blanket under the moon and shooting stars. The chatter of the night’s joined-life diminished as the wee hours of the morning came about. They rolled back and forth, kissing and caressing each other, exploring the other’s sexually excited body without limits. He nibbled on her earlobe then worked his way down her neck to her nape. She forced him flat onto his back, sitting on him, holding him so that he was unable to escape. Rashly, she unbuttoned his shirt, popping off two of the metal fasteners in her impatience, freeing his unshorn chest and slightly defined abs. She unbuttoned the front of her blouse then freed her arms from the sleeves. She revealed her healthily breasts. He took notice of his girlfriend’s enticing pair of heavenly delight. Never before touching such an arousing part of a woman, he broke the barrier and cupped her warm, soft-skinned firmness in his hands. She moaned with pleasure, biting her lower lip as she tilted back her head. She leaned forward, pressing her hot, moist lips against his, curiously sliding her sexually impulsive-driven tongue into his orifice and searching for his fleshy movable organ. Once she found it, she sucked on it like is a strawberry lollipop—but she craved more. Her strong, desirous needs cried out for all he could physically deliver. She reached down to his trousers, unbuttoned them, and desperately tried yanking them down. But he stopped her, overwhelmed by her excessive eagerness.

  She became moodily silent as she peered down at him. She covered her breasts in shame. “What’s wrong, Sam? Don’t you want me?”

  “Of course I do, Kat,” he assured her with a warm smile. He removed her hands from her breasts.

  “Then why did you stop me?” she pouted.

  “I don’t know for sure. Maybe cuz I’m scared.”

  “Of what?”

  “What if what we do tonight makes you with child? I don’t know if I’m ready for that, Kat. Anyway, I don’t know if I’ll be a good father for it.”

  “You’ll be the best father a child could ask for, Sam. Why would you think otherwise?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe cuz of the way my step pa treated me. What if I do horrible things like he did, to our youngin’. Maybe he taught me those things.”

  “Never, Samuel! You don’t have it in you.”

  “I reckon,” he agreed, helping her back into her blouse. “But, also, we don’t got our own home, neither, for him to…”

  “Or her…” she interrupted, buttoning her clothes.

  “Or her…”—he confirmed, then resumed—“. . . to grow up in. And on top of it all, we’re not even married! I guess all this’s going kinda fast for me, Kat. I figure I just need to take things slow. Please, understand.”

  “I do, Sam. We’ll take things slow.”

  With the early morning bringing a series of musical tones from the cheerful songbirds, Samuel and Katherine arose, discovering the positive energy of the new day. Their love for each other was stronger than ever before. Smiling endlessly as they gazed into each other’s eyes, they kissed, still under the spell each had cast upon the other.

  “Kat, I’m starvin’. Whatcha got in the basket for breakfast?”

  She reached over to it and pulled it to her side. Flipping over one of the lids, she stuck her hand inside and extracted two small boxes. “I’ve got strawberries and walnuts.”

  “Nice. Strawberries first, please, my lady.”

  “Allow me, my handsome man,” she replied, feeding him one.

  “And allow me, my beautiful woman.” He reached into the box then served her a juicy, tart fruit.

  After catering one another until satisfied, Samuel filled the glasses with tea and they quenched their thirst.

  Katherine crawled out from under the covers, led Samuel outside of the tent and stood face-to-face with him, smiling. “What a marvelous morning. One can tell it is going to be a scorcher.” With a devilish grin she untied her nightgown.

  “What’re you doin’, Katherine? You know this’s illegal in twelve states!”

  “Then this’ll be illegal in the rest of them.” She allowed the nightgown to fall down over her perky breasts to the ground. Stepping out of it, she peered at him with that naughty grin of hers.

  Charmed by her gorgeous body, he couldn’t help but to inspect every inch of it. Starting with her perfectly pedicured feet, he scanned up her well-proportioned feminine figure, stopping at her enchanting, light-blue eyes. He fixated his sight on her face, knowing it would be a long, hard journey in order to keep himself from devouring her with an unbounded sexual appetite. Forcing his focus on her full lips, weak in his self-restraint, he asked, “Kat, why’re you standin’ there in your birthday suit?”

  “I cannot bathe very well with my clothes on, now can I?” Without another word, she darted off for the water, running through the shallows, diving into the depths, Ruff following her in. Katherine popped her head out of the cool water and gave out a shivering holler. “Aaah! It’s quite invigorating. Come, Sam, join us.”

  But he was bashful, afraid of her thinking his thingamagigger was small. Standing where she had left him, he weighed the pros and cons of the situation. “The water looks mighty refreshing, bein’ it’s already a hot day,” he uttered to himself. “But I don’t want Kat maybe laughin’ at my lack of manliness.” Finding a reasonable medium, he yelled to her, “I ain’t wantin’ you seein’ me without my undergarments on.”

  “Very well, my shy man,” she answered with a smirk as she rolled her eyes. She covered her peepers with one hand. “There! I can’t see you. Now, please, come out with us, Sam.”

  “Hold on.” He removed his clothes then stood at the bank, repeating under his breath. “This’s crazy. This’s crazy.”

  “What, Sam?”

  “I said make sure your eyes are covered.” Wading into the bracing water, he panicked as it got to his neck.

  “You don’t know how to swim, do you, Sam?”

  “No.” He ejected water from his mouth.

  “I’ll teach you.”

  “Thanks, Kat. Nobody ever showed me how. Pa was gonna, but he was always busy—then he died.”

  “Well, I’m not busy, and I’m not going to die… at least not today.”

  “I hope not, Kat… how would I get along without you?”

  She smiled and gave him a peck on his lips. “Okay, you’ve got to trust me. I’m taking you out to deeper water.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Move your legs and hands back and forth,” she instructed, forcing water down with her hands. “Now you try it.”

  He let go of her and did as instructed. He stayed afloat, a big grin on his face. “Look, Kat, I’m not sinking.”

  Ruff paddled a couple laps around them, a laborious look in his eyes as he headed
back to shore.

  “It’s not hard to do, Sam. I knew you could do it!”

  “I could do this all day, Kat.”

  “And I also… . Except that we’ll miss Monday morning’s special church services—I just remembered.”

  “Awww, shucks! I plumb forgot ’bout that, too. I guess we best head back to shore.”

  “We’ll come out again and I’ll show you other techniques. But for now, one last one: lean forward, move your hands back around you and kick your legs. You’ll move ahead.”

  “Like this?”

  “Like that! Now come on, I’ll race you back to land.”

  They swam out of the deep water; she appeared to allow him to win the race. Without thinking, he hurried out from the water’s cover, revealing his stark nakedness.

  She whistled at him. “Nice tushy… and package.”

  “Kat! You weren’t s’posed to look!”

  “You didn’t say I couldn’t look this time. That gets me off on a technicality,” she exclaimed as she walked toward him, dripping wet, her head tilted to one side, clearing the water from her ear.

  “I don’t know what that word means, but I s’pose I didn’t tell you no different.” Feeling confident about his appearance, he nonchalantly dressed, flexing his muscles. “Oh, and by the way: ‘nice tushy’ to you too, Kat.”

  CHAPTER 18

  The early July heat was smothering, only a casual muggy waft entered Katherine’s bedroom window. It had poured rain the night before, and the intense sunshine of the afternoon had created an uncomfortable stickiness. Katherine was sitting upon her bed, under the weather from bad news she had received. There was a knock on the door, she stood and opened it.

  It was Samuel. He was in a bad mood on this heated Saturday as he entered. He walked over to the window, parting the decorative white-laced curtains and viewed the distant sawmill visible over the roof of the saloon. “Damn it! Damn it, all to hell!” he yelled, removing his hat and wiping his forehead.

  “What’s wrong Sam?”

  He turned, his eyes swept over her. “The blasted waterwheel broke ’n’ I don’t know what’s wrong with it! But what I do know is that I can’t get it fixed till at least Wednesday! I’m already behind with the orders, the customers are getting impatient. I’ve got my hands tied!” Looking directly at Katherine, trying to be polite but not managing a good job of it, he asked, “Why aren’t you at the school?”