Lariats, Letters, and Lace

by Agnes Alexander

  “Thank you,” Mali said and stepped to the stove to pour the last of the coffee into a cup. “Which do you prefer? I know in Joshua’s letters, he called you Hal.”

  “I’d be pleased if you’d call me Hal.”

  “Then I’ll call you Hal.” Mali set the cup down in front of him. “Please, call me Mali, which is what my family and friends call me.” She waited until his eyes met hers before she smiled. Mali pulled out Joe’s chair and sat sideways in it, close enough to Hal that she could smell the wool of his jacket and the soap he had used that morning. She knew she was being forward. She could feel her mother’s eyes boring into her back, but she could contain her curiosity no longer. “Please tell me about this letter. When did Joshua write it and give it to you?”

  Malinda watched the pain of recall fill his eyes, but she refused to turn away. Her eyes intensely studied his, waiting for his answer.

  “Sometimes, I didn’t understand Josh.” Hal broke eye contact and shook his head. He then turned to stare at the wall on the far side of the room. “About six or seven months before the battle of Steven’s Creek, the one where he was wounded, he started talking about not surviving the war. He became obsessed with this belief. I don’t think he said much to our other messmates, but with me he grew intense each time he talked of his premonition. Of course, I tried to talk him out of this line of thinking, telling him it was only his fear worrying at him and that he had just as much chance as the rest of us. Unfortunately, he would not be deterred from his belief.”

  Hal turned back to study Mali’s face in an effort to see how well she was holding up emotionally to this revelation about Joshua’s premonition of death. He had no idea if Joshua had ever shared his fears with his fiancée.

  One thing Hal knew he would not share with this lovely woman sitting so close to him was how her beloved Joshua had used his belief of coming death to rationalize spending every leave he got that last winter in the arms of prostitutes. Hal had refused to go with Josh to those places. Even though his former betrothed, Roberta, had turned from him and wed another, he’d felt no desire to spend time with a woman who could never come close to comparing with her. He certainly would not have risked anything if he knew he had a beautiful, caring and trusting woman like Malinda Forsythe still waiting at home for him.

  Mali answered one of his concerns. “I never knew he thought he would die and never make it home. At least, not until his last letter, the one after the Johnny Rebs shot him and he didn’t think the surgeons could save him.”

  “Being shot isn’t necessarily a death sentence.” Hal shook his head. “Those Minié balls from the muskets are bad for shattering bone when they hit. If the surgeons got the limb off in time, a lot of men lived. It was only when infection set in that the chances increased they would die. Unfortunately, it wasn’t infection that got Josh. He died while the surgeons were still working on him—like it was a self-fulfilling prophecy.”

  Suddenly painfully aware that this young woman who cared for Joshua might be upset and offended by his direct speech about the death of her late fiancé, he jerked his head toward her, an apology on his lips.

  “No, please don’t apologize, Hal.” Mali reached her hand over to rest it on his arm in a gesture of comfort. At the last minute, she realized how forward such a gesture might be viewed by him and pulled her arm back to rest in her lap. “I would rather know the truth. You need to understand that, in addition to Joshua and I intending to wed, we have always been best friends from the time we were young school children. We have always been able to tell each other everything.”

  “Yes. Josh mentioned that.”

  “Our parents have always hoped we would marry, and I guess we fell into their plans for us. But it was willingly, because of the bond of friendship between us even before…before we had stronger feelings for each other.”

  Hal and Mali studied each other, each searching the eyes of the other as if seeking to empathize by plumbing the depths of each other’s soul. Hal was the first to take a deep breath and turn to once again stare at the wall.

  “Anyway, months before this happened, he handed me this letter and asked me to personally deliver it to you after he died, assuming I survived the war. I kept telling him he had no way of knowing he would get killed. But he grew so distraught over his premonition of his death. He insisted I swear an oath to personally hand the letter to you and not put it in the mail or pass it to you through someone else. I made him that promise in hopes he would settle down and be at peace.” Hal turned once more toward Malinda, intent on convincing her of the sincerity of his next words. “I am a man of my word, Mali. Due to my own injuries it took me months longer than I would have liked to deliver Joshua’s letter to you. I have finally recovered well enough to fulfill my promise to Josh.”

  “Thank you,” Malinda whispered. She squeezed her eyes shut in an attempt to hold back her tears. She smiled to reassure him how grateful she felt. Although she still did not understand yet why Joshua wrote the letter so long before he died, she felt grateful to learn the history behind why Hal brought it to her now. As much as it pained her to learn Joshua lived for months with the belief he would not survive the war, knowing the truth was better than if Hal had sugar-coated the situation for her.

  Mali once again opened her eyes to find Hal studying her face. She felt jolted by the realization of the depth of longing she felt for the man sitting next to her. She desired to draw closer to him and learn more about him. How different it was from how she had felt about Joshua. Perhaps the difference was because she had known Joshua for as long as she could remember.

  The door opened and slammed shut.

  “I unhitched and watered your horses, Hal, and put them out in the pasture. Mali, you’re sitting in my chair.”

  “Sorry, Joe.” Mali rose and stepped away. “Hal and I were talking briefly about this letter.” She pulled the letter out of her pocket. “Now that you’re here, perhaps you can entertain Hal for a minute. I’ll be right back to help, Mama, but if you’ll allow it, I’d appreciate it if I could step into the next room for a moment to read Joshua’s letter.”

  “That will be fine, Mali. In a few minutes Joe can show Mr. Avery where to wash up while we get dinner on the table.”

  Without another word, Mali entered the bedroom and quietly closed the door. She carefully pried open the flap on what now promised to be the final word she would receive from Joshua. The revelation that it had been written months before his death promised that there might be another assurance of his love and affection for her.

  The letter proved to be short, only about a paragraph long. It started with the sentiment that Mali had heard for the first time only moments before from Hal’s lips.

  Dearest Mali. I love you, but I am not going to survive this war. If you are reading this, it means I am already gone…

  Tears welled up in Mali’s eyes. She read the date Joshua had written at the top. Hal had been right. Joshua truly had believed he would die and never return home to her. She swallowed and fought to control her emotions. As she considered these first few sentences, she realized she mourned more for Joshua having lived with a premonition of his coming death than over the knowledge that he had indeed died.

  The next part of the letter first struck her as a puzzle. During her first reading, his words made no sense to her. Why would he go out of the way to make the requests he had and insist that his good friend go to such great trouble to bring such a message to her? Why not just ask him to mail the letter like he had asked Hal to mail the one he wrote just before he died?

  Then, with an understanding born of years of friendship with Joshua, Mali realized what his words meant. She thought of his final message in his last letter to her, and the sentence that had left her puzzled all these months. A sense of peace flowed over her as understanding filled her mind and her heart. With a smile on her face, she carefully refolded the letter and returned it to its envelope before she slid it back into her pocket. It was time t
o help her mother get dinner on the table.

  Chapter 4

  Mali returned to the main room to discover Hal and Joe laughing as they talked. Truth be told, she quickly realized it was more of a case of Joe telling family stories in his usual outrageous manner, hamming it up to get a reaction from Hal, while at the same time Hal laughed at his antics and egged him on. Mali smiled at the scene. It was good to witness Hal Avery’s pleasant smile and to see he could laugh at another’s humorous stories in spite of his injury and all of the loss and suffering he had witnessed during the war.

  Mali wondered if the time would come that he would turn his smile on her—not because of some ridiculousness on her part, but because being with her caused him to feel happiness.

  “Mali, will you please slice half of this loaf of bread and then bring in the milk from the springhouse?” Nancy’s request brought Mali back to the present and the practical tasks to be done to get the big noonday meal on the table. “Joe, will you please show Mr. Avery where he may wash up?”

  Both Forsythe siblings turned to their tasks. Out of the corner of her eye, careful not to give any indication she watched him, Mali saw Hal reach for his cane and then, bracing himself using both the cane and the edge of the table, he pushed his body to an upright position. From the grimace on his face, Mali deduced that his injured hip was more than weak. It still pained him to move, especially shifting from a sitting to a standing position.

  As soon as both of the men were outside and well out of earshot, Nancy turned to her daughter. “What did Joshua have to say in the letter Mr. Avery brought? Or is it private?”

  “I’ll tell you later, Mama. I’m still trying to absorb it myself. I will tell you one thing Joshua wrote of was the same thing Hal told us. He was convinced he was going to die in the war. He was worried about me, and how my life will turn out without him.”

  “I see,” Nancy said as she spooned pickled beets into a dish. Her expression of consternation spoke of not fully understanding. “I just hope Joshua’s belief that he would be killed did not lead him to behave in a foolhardy manner that put him more fully into the path of danger.”

  “I do too, Mama. But Hal seems level-headed. I think he would have done all he could to keep Joshua from taking unnecessary chances. I suppose we will never really know what was going on with Joshua.”

  “It’s already Hal, is it?” Nancy teased her daughter good-naturedly.

  “He did ask us to call him Hal, Mama. I didn’t think I was being improper.”

  “No, that’s fine. As soon as we finish eating, Mali, I would appreciate it if you would churn up the last of that cream while I make crusts for the turnover pies. We’ll take some with us so we have enough for all of us when we get to Lizzie’s, plus I want to leave several here for Joe to eat while we’re gone.”

  “Do we know for sure when Mr. Penrose plans to come for us?”

  “No. He only told me he would take us when he can get away for several hours. It is frustrating not knowing, but considering we no longer have the horses, I tell myself I must be grateful we have a good neighbor who is willing to transport us.”

  “That was part of his agreement with Papa, wasn’t it? If Papa would be the one to join the Column, he would stay and see we were taken care of?”

  “Yes, even though he still had Jeremy and Joshua at home. With Jeremy being newly married and you and Joshua engaged to be wed shortly, we expected Joshua to be able to come here to keep the place going. They both felt the best choice between them to volunteer for the California Column was your father. Of course, none of us had any idea that Joshua would run off and enlist to go back east and get killed.”

  Mali guessed by her mother’s tone, which unsuccessfully disguised her disgruntlement, she had not agreed with the decision between David Penrose and Charles Forsythe that it would be her husband to go, leaving her home with no man about the ranch. He had enlisted with the intent to quell the Confederate sympathies in southern California and then to drive the rebel army from Texas out of New Mexico Territory. Instead, he met his end while fighting Apaches.

  Mali set the bowl of bread slices on the table. She spoke so softly Nancy barely heard her. “No, we had no idea Joshua would go off like that.” Then louder, “Mama, Joshua never even asked me what I thought about him joining. He never said a word until he had already enlisted. Do you think it would have always been that way if we had married—him going off and doing things without me knowing ahead of time or having a say?”

  “I don’t know, child. Joshua cared for you, but he could be impetuous.” After several minutes of silence, Nancy turned to her daughter. “I’m sorry, Mali. I didn’t mean to sound so cold. I know Joshua meant well when he joined up to help preserve the Union.”

  “It’s all right, Mama,” Mali said quietly. “I know you miss Papa, and I know it is very frustrating for you, trying to keep the ranch going with only me and Joe to help until Joe is old enough to take over by himself. I know it grates to have to rely on Mr. Penrose, especially since Papa took the one horse and Blackie up and died on us two years ago.”

  The conversation between the two women ended as they both heard footsteps on the wood porch. Mali set the remnants of a round of butter on the table. She found it impossible to hold back her grin as her eyes met Hal’s. She felt pleased that his gray eyes, rimmed with dark brown lashes, crinkled with a friendly smile. Mali next moved to lift the pot of beans onto the trivet her mother had placed in the center of the table. They all settled in their seats, with Charles Forsythe’s empty chair at the head of the table and Mali sitting across from her brother and Hal.

  Mali did not realize she was watching Hal until he looked up and met her gaze. His smile sent shivers of delight through her. Suddenly embarrassed because she had been caught staring at him, she looked down at her plate.

  “Mr. Avery, would you be so kind as to offer grace today?” Nancy asked.

  Hal nodded his agreement and they all bowed their heads. His voice spoke a blessing on the Forsythe home, the food, and the hands that prepared it in a manner that told Mali he was a praying man, comfortable with talking to God.

  Conversation was minimal as those around the table dished up food and began to eat. It was Joe who blurted out the family’s plans for the next several weeks, proud that he would be home by himself for several days to take care of the chores and the animals without his mother’s supervision.

  Hal turned to address Mali. “It appears that I was fortunate to catch you home. If I had waited another day or so longer, you probably would have been gone.”

  “Yes. Mama and I are all packed and ready to go. All we are waiting on is for Mr. Penrose to let us know he has the time to take us. He and his oldest son, Jeremy, have been checking on the cattle and finishing the pruning of their orchards.”

  “Do you also have cattle and orchards?”

  “Not as much as the Penroses,” Mali answered. “We run our beeves with theirs. Joe helps Mr. Penrose and Jeremy, but until he is older and we get in a position to hire help, we keep our herd small.”

  “Mali and I finished pruning our apricots yesterday,” Joe volunteered. “Glad that’s done. We’ll maybe want to expand our orchard in a few years when prices pick up, but until I finish at the school this year. I’m glad we don’t have as many trees as the Penroses to take care of.”

  Hal turned away from Joe to face Malinda. “You prune trees? From what I could see, that requires you to climb up and down ladders.”

  Mali shrugged. “Somebody has to help Joe, and it is better I do it than Mama. Since our older brother died when I was too young to remember him, all Papa had to work with for many years until Joe was old enough was Lizzie and me. I’ve done a lot of the farm chores around here, including helping to move our cattle before Joe took that over.”

  Unable to suppress a grin, Hal raised an eyebrow. “What did Joshua think of that?”

  “Oh, he thought it was the bee’s knees. His brother Jeremy used to carry on t
hat I had no business doing a man’s work while riding astride a horse wearing a pair of men’s britches under my skirt instead of petticoats. Joshua just laughed and told him to be quiet about it, that as long as it was okay with my papa, it was none of his business.” Malinda clamped her lips shut and looked away for a few seconds before she continued. “The last time I helped with the herd was while Papa was still here. Once he left with the Column, Mr. Penrose decided Joe was old enough to take over, and I should stay at the house and help Mama.”

  “The Column. Yes, I recall now Josh told me your father marched with the California Column. So, he saw action against the Rebs in Arizona and New Mexico, then?”

  Mali inhaled deeply and shook her head. “No, that battle at Glorietta Pass with the Colorado militia drove them back to Texas. Papa ended up fighting Apaches in Arizona. He died there of some illness. We aren’t sure where they buried him. All we know is, he never made it back to California. “

  Hal sucked in his breath and grimaced. “I sincerely apologize to you all, especially to you, Mrs. Forsythe. I should not have pursued this course of conversation, especially at the dinner table.”

  “You didn’t know. We’ve had time to get used to his being gone,” Mali said, glancing at her mother to see how she was holding up. Nancy had stopped eating, and had folded her hands in her lap. She stared at her plate, but remained dry-eyed. “All they wrote to Mama was that he had been an asset to the unit in fighting the hostiles and had served his country honorably and would be missed. And his commanding officer sent his condolences, of course. The Column spent only a short time being part of a show of force in southern California to dissuade the Southern sympathizers from traveling to Texas to join the Confederacy. We could have used him more at home rather than send him off to die fighting Apaches.”

  Mali regretted her direct speech. The silence at the table hung so thick she felt it could have been cut with a knife. She glanced over to Joe who, instead of making one of his usual smart remarks, drummed his fingers on the table while he worked his jaw to keep from being overcome with emotion.