The Unplowed Sky

by Jeanne Williams

She put out her hand. He ignored it and took her in his arms. He kissed her hard and hungrily, hurting her mouth, but so swiftly that by the time Hallie started to shove him away, he was already stepping back. “Remember that when you’re lonesome, Hallie,” he said beneath his breath. His blue eyes were somber and for a moment he looked like the man he would become in a few years. “Remember that I love you. I know that now for sure.”

  Then he was the old reckless teasing Rory, laughing as he climbed up on the tractor and sounded the whistle. Hallie caught a glimpse of Garth’s shocked face, saw it turn tight and grim as he put the truck in gear and steered around the engine. Shaft waved till the truck was out of sight, and Rory blew several short, jaunty toots but it was Garth’s closed face that stayed in Hallie’s mind as she helped Meg up the steps.

  Any hope she’d had that Meg wouldn’t think much about Rory’s kiss vanished when the girl almost jerked away from her at the top of the steps. “Are you Rory’s girl?”

  “No!”

  “Then why did he kiss you?”

  Hallie’s face burned and she knew she looked guilty as sin. “He was just kidding. And saying good-bye.”

  Meg scowled. “He said he loved you.”

  Her accusing tone exasperated Hallie. “I can’t help what he said, Meg. He’s never kissed me before. I’m his friend, but not his girlfriend.”

  “That’s not how it looked,” Meg said with a sniff. Then her frown eased. She said with malicious satisfaction, “I bet that’s not how it looked to Daddy, either.”

  Hallie was sure of that. After what he’d said about her hair, she’d hoped he was starting to be less wary. Now Rory’s prank—or deliberate action—would stir up all his older brother’s fears and suspicions.

  To add to the muddle, Rory was in love with her—or thought he was—probably just because she hadn’t fallen for him as most women did. Hallie could have wept. She wouldn’t put it past Rory to hint to Garth that there’d been more between them than lessons on the engine and a few trips to town shared with other crew members.

  Refusing to respond to Meg’s last dart, Hallie went upstairs and began to strip the beds where two strong young men had slept last night and that would now lay empty till Christmas, at least. Almost two months. It seemed forever, yet the hope of those few days with Garth and Shaft in the deepest part of winter were all that strengthened her now. She wished fervently that Rory would find a girl in Texas and spend the holidays with her.

  Garth’s pillows smelled of him. She drew his scent deep into her, closing her eyes. Her body still remembered Rory’s arms, her mouth his kiss. She made them into Garth’s instead, tried to pretend, but that didn’t work so she buried her face in the pillows. I love you, Garth. Know that. Don’t believe Rory.

  She changed his sheets, put the pillows she carried to her room, and put them on her bed. His scent would fade in time, but she could press her cheek where she thought his head had rested—and dream that someday, maybe, if she had the best luck in all the world, he would sleep beside her.

  To live with the one you loved! The immensity, the wonder of it overwhelmed her. How could anyone ask for more than that? But you had to ask and strive for that because without it, there would always be a cold place in your heart.

  XVI

  Mike and Mary Donnelly stopped off with Meg’s graded papers, her assignments, and the dismaying news that Raford had won a seat in the Kansas legislature, William Allen White had lost the governorship, and Coolidge had defeated Davis two-to-one.

  “Ugh!” Hallie said. “If I could have voted, it wouldn’t have been for any of the bunch who won! Rory’s going to be mighty disappointed with the first election where he could vote.”

  “Voting’s still real special to me,” said Mary. “I’ve voted for county and state officials before, but this was my first chance to vote for a president.” She grimaced. “I guess women just have to be glad we finally can vote.”

  She cast such a look at Mike that he grinned and shrugged his broad shoulders. With their red hair and freckles, the two looked enough alike to be brother and sister. “Now, darlin’, you know I voted for women to get the vote—and just remember while you’re snortin’ at me that if men hadn’t given you the vote, you still wouldn’t have it!”

  “Horsefeathers! We had the right to vote from God himself—”

  “Herself?” Mike teased.

  “But you rascals stole it from us!” Mary swept on, shaking a finger in his face. “And it took till four years ago for you to get enough ashamed of yourselves to make things the way they should have been to start with! Don’t expect me to thank you for my rights, Michael Terence Donnelly!”

  “Sit down and have some cocoa and cookies,” Hallie invited.

  While Kathleen showed off her schoolwork to Meg, Jackie, and her small sister, Bridgie, Hallie made cocoa and set out crispy oatmeal cookies she had baked that morning.

  “White ran only so’s he could show up the Klan for what it is,” said Mike. “He did that. So you could say that in a way, he won.”

  “But Raford’s winning is dangerous,” Mary worried. “We’ve heard his bank’s foreclosing on any loans to Catholics and foreign-born people even if they’re citizens.”

  “I guess the Mennonites don’t owe him money,” Mike said. “And there aren’t any Jews or Negroes or Indians in the county, so far as I know. But he’s makin’ do with what’s he got.”

  The Donnellys had to get home to do their chores, but they promised to stop for a grocery list the next time they went to town. Mary bent to give Meg a hug. “Your teacher hopes it won’t be too long till you can start back to school, honey. But she says you’re keeping up with your class, so not to worry.”

  When the flame-haired Donnellys were gone, the kitchen seemed lonelier and even colder, despite the warmth thrown out by the range. Thank goodness, Meg didn’t seem to feel it. She was going through her returned assignments and proudly showing Jackie her good marks. “A-pluses, Jackie! That’s the best grade you can get. I only got one B.”

  Jackie admired the red letters. “Do you think I can make big red A-pluses when I go to school next year?”

  “Of course you will. I’ll help you.” Meg patted the seat. “Come on and I’ll read you my history lesson.”

  He got up beside her. Laird lay near her chair, and Smoky was curled up in her basket in its cozy place behind the range. Feeling closed out, Hallie stirred the potato soup they would have for supper and went upstairs with a load of socks and underwear that she had washed and mended after the men left.

  Rory’s drawers were a mess. She fished out odd socks, most with holes, buttonless union suits, and tattered bandannas. Sorting these into piles of unredeemable rags and things that could be rescued with thread and needle, she organized the wearable clothing and opened the first of Garth’s drawers.

  A few pair of socks were matched and folded neatly. Except for what Hallie had just brought up, he must have taken all his underwear with him. A sweater knitted of heathery blue wool filled one corner. She was sure his mother or grandmother had made it. How soft the wool was, how springy and resilient!

  Hallie picked it up to better admire it. Something dropped from its folds to the bottom of the drawer. A lock of long black hair!

  Could it be his wife’s? Hallie scarcely dared believe her eyes, but she had to trust her fingers as she smoothed the tress and then felt her own hair. It was the same. The same color, the same texture.

  Somehow he had filched this strand when Shaft cut her hair. He must have kept it hidden through the threshing and then tucked it away in this garment made by other women who loved him, women he had loved.

  Hallie’s heart swelled. She pressed the sweater against her, praying for a blessing from the ones who had made it. I love him, too. I’ll take care of him just as you did. Please help him realize that.

  She folded the sweater the way it had been and slipped the lock inside. Descending with Rory’s dilapidated things and her sewing
basket, she sat near the window to work. And dream.

  Postcards from Garth came every few days, postmarked from little western Kansas towns. Then, as the men headed south across the Oklahoma Panhandle, almost as bare of people as it was of trees, there was nothing for four days and then, postmarked Borger, Texas, half a dozen cards came in the same mail. Apparently Garth scrawled one every day whether or not he could mail it.

  These were addressed to Meg. When Jackie came trundling back from the mailbox with his wagon, Meg was waiting on the porch and took possession of the cards immediately. She read them to Jackie so Hallie learned that the engine had got stuck in sand and had to be pulled out by horses. “Didn’t that old farmer laugh! He charged us enough to feed his horses for a month, but we were glad to pay it.” Shaft was keeping them well fed, except for pies. How was the homework going? Was Laird staying husky on rabbits?

  Garth always concluded with “Tell Jackie ‘Hi!’ My regards to Hallie and love to you.” Meg emphasized the “regards” and “love.” She didn’t leave the cards lying around, so Hallie never got to hold one and study the slant of the bold handwriting. Still, it was heartening to know he was well, and Hallie comforted herself with the secret of that lock of hair folded into his Island sweater.

  Meg wrote to him every day at Borger in care of the contractor building the railroad and invited Jackie to send Shaft drawings of Smoky and anything else he wanted to draw. She never asked Hallie whether she wanted to send a note or a message, and though Hallie longed to write to Garth, she felt that he should show he wanted to correspond by writing to her first or at least tucking a note into Meg’s letters. Now the men were working dawn to dark, the cards stopped, but Garth wrote a fat letter every Sunday.

  Hallie had to content herself with writing to Shaft now and then. To her surprise, his written English was better than his spoken. His handwriting was round and careful, like a child’s. Luke wrote every few weeks and composing an answer occupied Meg and Jackie for several days. Meg gave Jackie a sketch of himself with Laird; the rest of Luke’s art was tacked to her bedroom walls. Except for that drawing of Hallie on the engine which Hallie had put away in her dresser.

  One afternoon Jackie brought in the day’s mail importantly and identified the letters by their penmanship. “Here’s one from Garth.” He handed it to Meg. “One from Shaft.” That went to Hallie. “One from Luke!” He held on to that himself, since Luke addressed letters to both him and Meg and she let him open them. “And here’s a newspaper.”

  Garth didn’t subscribe to any, though he got Capper’s Weekly, The Saturday Evening Post, and The American Thresherman. With a condescending glance at Hallie, Meg opened her father’s letter and began: “My dearest daughter—”

  Hallie listened avidly, but to disguise her hunger for Garth’s news, she opened the newspaper. Quentin Raford, fist upraised, laughed triumphantly from a photo that took up a quarter of the front page of what was called The American Patriot. It was published in Topeka, the state capital. A box in the center of the front page proclaimed in bold letters:

  THE PATRIOT’S GOALS

  PROTECT THE RIGHTS OF 100% REAL AMERICANS

  LIMIT FOREIGN IMMIGRATION

  GUARANTEE THE SOVEREIGNTY OF STATES’ RIGHTS

  PROTECT PURE WOMANHOOD

  COMPEL MORAL BEHAVIOR

  SUPPORT THE ORDAINED SUPREMACY OF THE WHITE RACE

  STRIP OF CITIZENSHIP ALL WHO REFUSE TO SERVE IN OUR

  ARMED FORCES

  The headline screamed: POPE TO EXCOMMUNICATE SOLDIERS! The story said that the pope was expected to issue an encyclical that would threaten with excommunication any Catholic who bore arms outside of his own country. “We are not against Catholics who do their American duty,” the article ran. “But no man can serve two masters. We demand that anyone enjoying the blessings of this country put America first, above the commands of a foreign churchman.”

  There was more in this vein, with half the page given over to Raford’s election and what he meant to accomplish in the legislature. Hallie opened the paper and looked for the name of the editor. He was a stranger. The address for subscriptions was Topeka, but the publisher was Quentin A. Raford.

  She crumpled the paper and stuffed it into the stove. It blazed up, almost singeing her hair, but collapsed to fluttering bits of ash. She could only hope that Raford’s influence would do the same.

  The only good thing about his election was that once the legislature convened next year, he would spend most of his time in Topeka. Hallie hoped devoutly that he would move there and take Cotton with him. For the first week or so after the men left, she kept the doors locked even in the day and was unutterably grateful for the heavy curtains. When it began to seem that Raford was going to leave her in peace, she locked only the kitchen door at night, though if she heard a vehicle turn down the lane, she hurried to turn the key and didn’t unlock it till Donnelly’s flivver rattled into the yard, as it did several times a week.

  Mary and Mike brought Meg news of her schoolmates and visited with Hallie, letting their girls play with Jackie for a while. When they stopped on the way to town for Hallie’s grocery list, they always brought a jug of milk and some butter, a wonderful change from evaporated milk and margarine. Apart from mail, these drop-ins were almost the only contact the strange little household had with the outside world. Hallie always had gingerbread, cookies, or some other treat on hand.

  “I can’t tell you how much I appreciate your coming by,” she told Mary one afternoon while Mike was playing bear with the shrieking children. “It would get so lonesome—”

  Mary squeezed her hand. “You don’t have to tell me, dear. We got hailed out two years in a row, and Mike had to work the broomcorn harvest to keep us from going broke. I was alone with the babies. One fall they got whooping cough. Next fall it was measles. Mike didn’t get home till Christmas. You bet I understand.”

  It must have been scary with the babies sick, Hallie thought. I guess I’d better be grateful—and I am—that Jackie and Meg have kept well. But Mike was yours; you knew he’d come back and someday, with luck, he’d never have to be away from you another night. If Garth were my husband, or if I knew he would be someday, I think I could stand this better.

  The Halsteads stopped once to leave some apples from their small orchard, and Mr. Crutchfield dropped off a stack of old National Geographics for Meg, but the Donnellys were Hallie’s salvation as autumn faded into winter and Thanksgiving loomed.

  “I can’t be very thankful when I still can’t walk and with Daddy away,” Meg grumbled one day as Hallie massaged her legs. “You might as well quit this—”

  “I won’t,” said Hallie. “It’s all we know to do. So we’ll do it.”

  The glumness lifted at a proposal of the Donnellys. “Why don’t we have Thanksgiving here?” Mary suggested. “We’ll bring a stuffed chicken and cranberry sauce and—”

  “That’ll be plenty.” Hallie glowed. A festive holiday for the children after all—and for her, too. “I’ll make pumpkin and mince pies and rolls and an applesauce spice cake.”

  “And I’ll bring piccalilli, and chowchow, and some of my sweet pickled peaches, and green tomato relish,” Mary added. “And some thick cream to whip, and fresh butter.”

  It was agreed that the Donnellys would come before noon; so, deep in her baking, when Hallie heard a motor approaching, she thought they were arriving a little early. She hurried to finish the lattice crust of the second mince pie, popped it in the oven, and wiped her hands on her apron as she went out on the porch to greet them.

  Instead of the Donnelly’s old Model T, an elegant silver Cadillac was parked near the house. And instead of laughing red-haired Donnellys, a woman in a sealskin coat and matching cloche and muff was coming up the steps.

  “Felicity!”

  “Aren’t you going to ask me in?” asked the woman who had been Hallie’s stepmother. Blond bangs curved artfully from beneath the cloche. Her eyebrows were slim, surprised pencil
lines, and her eyelashes were thick with mascara. “Don’t just stand there with that stupid look on your face, Hallie. Where’s Jackie?”

  Hallie stayed in the door. “You haven’t seemed to care about that these past six months!”

  “Things are different now.” A tear caught on a painted lower lash and made a black runnel down the powdered cheek. “After all the years he waited, poor sweet Harry only had a few months with me. He died last month of heart failure.” She dabbed at her eyes. “At least he died in my arms. I tell myself that was a comfort to him.”

  “I’m sorry. But I still don’t see why you’ve come.”

  Felicity stared. “I’ve come for Jackie, of course. Come for my baby.”

  “He’s not a baby.” Hallie’s rising, smoldering anger erupted. “I can’t believe you have so much nerve, Felicity! You threw him away. How do I know you won’t do it again if you meet some man who doesn’t want a child around?”

  “Oh, that’s all taken care of,” Felicity said eagerly. “Milford thinks it’ll be wonderful to have a son who’s already out of diapers and through the messy baby stage.”

  “Who is Milford?” Hallie wondered whether she could believe her ears.

  “Harry’s cousin and business partner. The dearest, kindest man! Utterly devoted. All he wants to do is take care of me.”

  “Has he waited for years, too?”

  Felicity looked reproachful. “Of course not. I didn’t meet him till after I married Harry.”

  “I see. He waited a few months.”

  Felicity crimsoned. “Shame on your nasty spiteful tongue, Hallie Meredith! Milford never said a word till on the way home from the funeral. He was trying to comfort me, and it all came out. He’s never loved anyone before and had thought he would just suffer along, watching our happiness—”

  “It’s convenient. He won’t have to hunt a new partner.”

  “If you’re implying—”

  “I’m not implying anything.” Hallie pondered. “I really don’t want to let you see Jackie at all, but in case he still loves you in spite of everything—”