Healing Montana Sky

by Debra Holland

  Antonia wondered if the mules were as unsettled by their new home as she was or if they enjoyed their new quarters. She lifted Camilla to her shoulder, pressed a kiss to the baby’s downy head, and rubbed her back.

  A fat tabby sat on a straw bale, watching them with alert green eyes.

  Erik walked over to the cat and rubbed her head. “Eh, Delilah. Catch anything for me today?”

  The cat tilted her head.

  He scratched under her chin. “I think we’ll have kittens, although we have to wait a bit. You’ll like that, eh, Henri?”

  The boy shrugged.

  “Henri’s never seen a barn cat,” Antonia explained. “He only knows the big mountain cats—dangerous they be. But I recall kittens. Sweet little ’uns.”

  “They are. And plenty of folks looking for one. The kittens will go fast.” Erik took them around, pointing out everything in great detail. He showed obvious pride in his barn and livestock. While he talked, he seemed to forget his sadness. His shoulders straightened, he gestured with his hands as he spoke, and his expression grew more enlivened.

  Antonia studied him, seeing Erik as a man, not as a grieving widower, new father, or unwanted second husband. She saw the strength in his large frame, the light in his blue eyes when he discussed his plans for a dairy herd, and remembered the gentle way his work-worn hands had earlier cradled his daughter.

  How would I be feelin’ about Erik if I met him before Jean-Claude? Would I be drawn to him? Antonia thought perhaps she might have and, for a moment, wondered what their life together would have been like if they’d met and married when they were young.

  Feeling disloyal, she turned away from the sight of him. With all the agony she was now experiencing, Antonia wouldn’t trade the years with Jean-Claude, even if the price for the joy of that time was living in pain for the rest of her days.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  For a few minutes, Erik had forgotten. His barn—only a year old—and the livestock within were his pride and joy. Seldom did he have visitors to show around the place. Antonia and Henri made the perfect audience, looking about with curious golden eyes and taking in everything. Their obvious awe of the place gave him a warm feeling of satisfaction.

  They stopped at the stalls where the mules poked their heads over the doors.

  With a flash of animation, Henri hurried over to the nearest mule, rubbing the nose, and murmuring what sounded like French.

  The boy looks like he knows what he’s doing, Erik thought in approval. He’s certainly old enough to have chores. At about half his age, Erik and his brothers had started helping their father. “I’ve fed and watered the horses and mules but haven’t had a chance to muck out the stalls yet.”

  Guilt stabbed him. He’d never neglected his livestock before. “It’s been several days for the horses, actually. Perhaps you can help me with that, Henri?” He made his voice sound hearty. “Truth be told, I could use another hand around here.”

  The boy gave him a sideways glance but didn’t answer.

  Antonia briefly touched her son’s shoulder before returning to rubbing Camilla’s back. “Of course. He be a good worker.” Although Antonia said the words to Erik, her gaze rested on her son. “Eh, Henri?”

  “Oui, Maman.”

  “Then we’ll begin after I finish showing you around.” Erik pointed toward a smaller door on the backside of the barn. “The pigsty is out there. And I want you to meet the cows in the pasture. I have twin calves. Born. . .born—”

  The memory of that morning hit him like a mule kick to his gut. Walking to the house, feeling elated about the birth of the calves, not knowing that his wife had gone into labor. If I’d been there when her pains first started, I could have bundled her into the wagon and rushed her to the doctor. My pride, my selfish neglect, caused her death. The image of her laboring to push out the baby came to him, of the unstoppable blood, the light fading from her eyes. . .

  His chest tightened until he couldn’t breathe. I need to get some air.

  “Erik?” Antonia shifted Camilla into the crook of one arm, stepped forward, and touched his shoulder.

  Unable to bear any comfort, he pushed away her hand, turned, and jogged down the aisle, bursting out of the open doors. The bright sunshine was a shock to his watering eyes, and he had to blink back moisture to see. A wrenching ache clutched his gut, and all he could do was run from the pain.

  Unthinking of where he was going, Erik hurried past the springhouse. He picked up speed, blindly racing along the pasture fence. He gulped for breath, trying to force air into his constricted lungs. But something else took up the space in his chest—something dark and heavy.

  Without conscious volition, he moved toward Daisy’s grave. In the distance, he saw the cross like a beacon and headed toward it.

  At the edge of the mound, Erik’s knees crumpled, and he threw himself down. A heavy sob broke through the constriction of his body and burst from his mouth. Sprawled across the grave, he dropped his head into the crook of his arm. Inhaling the smell of the newly dug earth, he wept.

  Her hand still outstretched, Antonia watched Erik flee.

  The cat leaped off the straw bale and followed him outside.

  Camilla made a noise, as if sensing her father’s obvious distress.

  Her stomach tight, she lowered her arm to cradle the baby and rocked her, trying to recover from Erik’s rebuff. His rejection of her attempt to comfort him stung, making Antonia wish she’d never reached out in the first place. I already have enough pain, without feeling hurt by him, too.

  At the same time, Antonia was distressed by her strong reaction—so unlike her, especially when she knew all too well how grief grabbed one at the oddest moments. And married or not, I’m a stranger to him.

  “Where be he going?” Henri asked.

  Antonia stared after Erik. “I don’t be knowin’.” She thought through what had happened. Although she didn’t know why the mention of the twin calves had caused him to become upset, she’d become familiar with how waves of sorrow crashed down without warning.

  I probably be doin’ the same thing, if he be tryin’ to comfort me. But the matter-of-fact words didn’t make her feel better.

  “Maman?”

  How to be explainin’? “Mr. Muth. . .ah, your new pa be sad. Camilla’s mama—his wife, Daisy—died like Père did.”

  “We done bury her like you done with Père in the garden.”

  “Yes. Just as we be sad about Père, he be sad about Daisy.”

  “Will he cry?”

  “Maybe. Or maybe he be trying not to cry.”

  “I be tryin’ not to cry.”

  Antonia shifted Camilla, so she could rub Henri’s head. “So do I. But maybe sometimes we be needin’ to.”

  Henri glanced around the barn. “We could be muckin’ up.”

  He’s so thoughtful. Tears pricked Antonia’s eyes. “You be a good boy, mon fils. You be doing Père credit.” She stooped to kiss his forehead.

  From his expression, Henri seemed pleased, but he squirmed away.

  Straightening, she stood and looked around. Although in some ways the barn was an even greater contrast to the shed she’d left behind, Antonia felt more at home here than she did in Daisy’s kitchen. Mucking up after animals was pretty much the same, no matter how fancy the surroundings.

  Erik had stacked the small pile of possessions they hadn’t brought into the house in the corner by the door. She’d left their homemade rake behind but brought Jean-Claude’s store-bought shovel. She pointed to their things. “Find our shovel, and then be startin’ with our mules. I be doin’ the horses.”

  He retrieved the shovel.

  “I be fetchin’ the cradle for Camilla and bringin’ Jacques and his rocks near. Then we start mucking up for your new pa.” Just the thought of tackling the chores—something she could do for Erik—released the tightness in her chest.

  Henri opened the stall door and propped the shovel in the corner. The mule nudged him.
Although he felt a little guilty about having favorites, he loved Kenny better than Rocky and knew the mule loved him back. Père always said Rocky was as stubborn as a rock.

  Feeling sad at the thought of Père, Henri hugged Kenny’s neck as high as he could reach, inhaling the comforting smell of the mule’s hide.

  Kenny snuffled Henri’s shoulder.

  Feeling a little better, he led the mule out of the stall and tied him up in the aisle.

  A shovel and rake hung on the wall, and Maman took them down, walked over to the nearest horse stall, and set the tools against the door. She checked on Camilla in her cradle, and then glanced through the door to where Jacques played with his rocks.

  I be explorin’ later and bringin’ Jacques some more.

  Henri glanced at the back door, remembering the muckheap he’d seen outside. At home, they’d just shoveled and raked everything out of the shed and around the corner to pile near the garden. He looked at the clean concrete floor of the center aisle. Seemed like a long way.

  He looked up at Maman and waved from the door to the floor of the stall. “How we be gittin’ this out?”

  Maman pursed her lips in the way that mean she was thinking. She walked down the aisle, her head turning back and forth, obviously looking for something.

  Curious, he followed her.

  “There.” She pointed to a single-wheeled wooden cart, shaped like an arrowhead, tilted into the corner at the back of the barn. “A wheelbarrow.”

  Henri had never seen anything like it. At home, they’d heaped the droppings onto pine boughs and dragged them to the dung heap.

  Maman walked over and stepped between wooden poles attached to the back, grasping them and lifting. She turned the wheelbarrow in his direction and pushed it toward him.

  Fascinated, he watched the wheelbarrow come toward him, feeling some excitement break through the heaviness that had weighed in his chest since Père died.

  The cart wobbled at first until Maman figured out how to balance properly. She set the back end down in front of Henri. “This we be usin’.”

  “Can I be tryin’?”

  She nodded and moved to let him pass, and then tapped the poles. “Grab both these shafts and be liftin’ ’em at the same time. Then be holdin’ steady.”

  Henri stepped between the shafts and hefted the handles. The wheelbarrow was heavier than Maman made it look, and he could barely lift the back legs. He staggered several steps and the wheelbarrow wobbled.

  With a clutch of fear, he wondered if it would tip to the side. He tried to compensate and the other side dipped. His arms grew tired, but, determined to make the wheelbarrow move where he wanted it to go, he didn’t want to stop.

  “Take’s a mite of practice, it do,” Maman said.

  His muscles aching, breathing heavy, Henri pushed the wheelbarrow down the aisle, dropping it to a stop in the doorway of the barn. Triumph filled him. He glanced up at Maman and saw pride shining in her eyes.

  “Well done.”

  Her expression and quiet words made him feel good, like he’d accomplished something for both of them.

  Jacques, apparently entranced by the sight of the wheelbarrow, abandoned his rocks and crawled toward it.

  In one of her gestures of affection, Maman rubbed the back of her hand against Henri’s cheek. “The wheelbarrow be too heavy when it be full. So I be wheelin’ out, and then you be drivin’ back, oui?”

  Jacques reached up for the edge of the wheelbarrow.

  Maman made a grab for the handles so the baby could pull himself up without toppling the thing over on him.

  Once Jacques reached his feet, he flashed them his grenouille grin and banged on the side of the wheelbarrow.

  “Jacques be wantin’ a ride.”

  “We start, he won’t want to be stoppin’,” Maman warned. “We be finishin’ the work first. Then we can be puttin’ some straw inside and givin’ him a ride.”

  Henri hurried back to the stall, anxious to get finished so he and his brother could play.

  Erik trudged back to the barn, fighting the compulsion to turn and head in the other direction. He’d treated Antonia rudely—run out on her, allowed his emotions to rule him and make him weak.

  A mourning dove perched on the barbed wire fence, the soft ooo-ahhh croo-ooo-oo sound so familiar he rarely paid attention. But today he glanced at the gray bird, fancying the mournful coo was a tribute to his grief for Daisy—even though he knew the bird was probably just calling to its mate.

  He stopped and eyed the prairie—not his fenced-in pasture or the planted acreage, but the other direction—at the vast emptiness of the undulating grasslands, green with spring. He usually liked to think in terms of conquering this land—building a homestead that would last for generations. Someday, he hoped his great-grandson would walk in his footsteps and feel a similar connection with this patch of earth.

  But today, the wind rippling through the grass made him think of the ocean—the endless body of water that he would never see. Cast adrift. The nautical term came to his mind. He couldn’t remember from where he knew it. Moby-Dick, perhaps? Or maybe Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea? The library in his hometown had been quite extensive. Having plenty of books was one of the things he missed about living alone on the prairie. Not that Sweetwater Springs had a library, anyway.

  The two words suited his mood, and he repeated them. Cast adrift.

  Erik turned and looked toward his barn and his house—once his stalwart anchor—or so he’d assumed. Prior to Daisy’s death, he’d always approached his home with a sense of wellbeing. He’d taken pride in his accomplishments—of carving a farm out of the raw prairie with his own back and hands.

  But now, the dreams he’d woven about the place had turned to ashes. For he suspected, his wife, not his farm, had been his anchor.

  Weeping at Daisy’s gravesite had relaxed the tight band of sorrow around his chest. He took a deep breath, needing air in his lungs before he could once again begin to journey the rest of the way home.

  As Erik walked, his legs felt wooden. Guilt alone spurred him on. He’d run out on Antonia and Henri, leaving them to think who-knows-what about him. He’d left the work undone. . . .

  The press of his responsibilities weighed on him. For the first time in his life, Erik wanted to turn and run away—just head out toward the horizon and never look back.

  Just thinking such thoughts made him feel more guilt. He was a father, a husband, a farmer. His new family and his livestock depended on him. The usual routine of farm life, as backbreaking as the work could be, had always brought him a sense of stolid comfort. I’ve certainly been a man who liked his routine.

  I wonder if I’ll ever feel that way again.

  Stopping by the springhouse, he crouched to splash water over his face and rinse his hands at the tiny stream rather than bothering with the pump at the well. He took the dipper from the hook on the wall and scooped up a long drink. Standing, he drank. Then he flung the rest of the water on the rosebush and rehung the dipper on the hook.

  With a heavy breath, Erik headed to the barn. I still have a lot of mucking out to do. The thought made him tired. Seemed as if he’d been up for days, not only a few hours.

  Just outside the door, the sound of clapping and a peal of laughter stopped him in his tracks. What in tarnation? He plunged into the gloom of the interior, and his eyes took a minute to adjust.

  With a bent-kneed walk, Antonia headed down the aisle, pushing his wheelbarrow.

  Jacques sat in the front on a pile of straw, holding on to each side, a wide smile on his face. He chortled, and then let out another gleeful shriek.

  His mother kept the handles of wheelbarrow low, so the baby wouldn’t tip, even though that angle must be punishing on her muscles.

  Henri, too, looked almost happy. He bobbed up and down and clapped his hands.

  Erik couldn’t help feeling a flicker of their pleasure. Immediately, he chastised himself. How could I possibly have
any good feelings when Daisy lies cold in her grave?

  Antonia headed the wheelbarrow toward Erik.

  For the first time, he saw her with a wide smile and a light in her golden eyes and was struck by the realization that another woman existed within her—different from the grief-stricken one he’d briefly gotten to know. This Antonia, although not classically beautiful, had a vibrancy and strength that was almost more appealing than beauty.

  Feeling guilty, Erik suppressed the thought. Guilt, guilt, guilt. Everywhere I turn, I feel guilty!

  When Antonia caught sight of him, she gasped and halted, setting down the wheelbarrow. She straightened, her shoulders stiffening, as if expecting a reprimand.

  Instead, the reprimand came from her youngest son. “Maa!” Jacques protested. “Maa!” He banged on the side of the wheelbarrow.

  Watching the light drain from their faces made Erik feel like an ogre. Do they see me as a somber authority figure? He didn’t like the idea. Of course, he thought of himself as a serious-minded man. But he liked a laugh as much as anyone. He tried to remember the last time he’d laughed but failed. But I smile a lot. Surely, I must.

  Antonia gestured to an open stall. “Camilla’s in there in her cradle.”

  Erik made himself smile. “I’ll bet my daughter wishes she were old enough to ride with Jacques,” he said, striving for a joking tone.

  Her shoulders relaxed. “You don’t be mindin’?”

  He rubbed a hand through his hair, vaguely wondering where his hat was. Did I even put it on today? “They are only boys. They need to have fun. Especially now.”

  “Thank you.” The words sounded heartfelt.

  “Felt good to see you all happier, even if just for a moment.”

  She let out a sigh. “Hard for them, this be. Yet, to laugh when their father be dead feels wrong.” Her voice dropped. “Jean-Claude be always laughin’. Tellin’ stories and makin’ us laugh.”

  Envy stabbed him. His reaction took him by surprise. Am I jealous of a dead man? Of a man who made his family happy?