Miracle in a Dry Season

by Sarah Loudin Thomas

  Casewell smiled at the woman he loved and watched her put away the little bit. He spent time with Perla as he could, but he wanted to court her, and he wasn’t sure how to go about it. Every time he tried to get close, he felt her shy away. It was as though she had decided against him but didn’t have the heart to say so. As if she were being polite by having him around. Well, he wasn’t going to give up without a clearer sign than he’d gotten so far.

  Perla put away the last dish and turned to walk out onto the porch.

  “Perla.” Casewell said her name, surprised by how tender it sounded in his mouth. “Would you walk out with me?”

  “Oh, well, I’m pretty tired.”

  “Too tired to walk out in the cool of the evening and watch the stars come out one by one?” Again Casewell surprised himself. Where did that come from?

  Perla grinned. “When you put it that way . . .”

  Casewell hopped up from the table and moved to hold the screen door open for her. He wasn’t going to give her a chance to change her mind. She plucked a sweater from a coat-tree near the door and draped it around her shoulders.

  They set off down the lane, strolling along in no particular hurry. Casewell stuffed his hands into his pockets, and Perla clasped hers behind. Silence reigned. Casewell finally decided it was probably his job to say something.

  “I can’t get over how lush the fields have gotten,” he said at last. “George is cutting hay over on his place, and he’ll cut for Ma as soon as he’s done. It’ll still get lean this winter, but it’s surely more than we had.”

  “Will your mother keep farming?” There was a note of surprise in Perla’s voice.

  “No. We’ll sell off the cattle. Probably in the spring. Dad wanted to sell them last spring, but I dragged my feet, and it never got done. They’re still too puny to sell right now. We’ll see if we can get ’em through the winter and then go to market.”

  “So you don’t want to take over the farm, then.”

  Casewell scratched his chin. He heard the scrape of whiskers and stopped. “I thought about it. But what I love is making things with my hands—furniture, music. Farming is good work, but I don’t think it’s for me. Dad and I talked about selling the cattle off once he was gone. He just wanted Ma to be taken care of. I don’t think the herd meant much to him.”

  “And the land?” Perla seemed determined to follow this line of conversation.

  “Oh, well, the land. That’s our heritage, I guess. Been passed down through Phillips men for five generations. We’ll keep the land. Who knows,” Casewell grinned, “I might have a son who wants to farm it one of these days.”

  Perla had nothing to say to that.

  This time Casewell had to think harder to break the silence. “What about you? Now that your stint as town cook seems to be winding down, what will you do with yourself?”

  Perla looked up at a swallow flying home late. They could hear a whippoorwill call and another answer it somewhere beyond the tree line. “I’m going home,” she said.

  Casewell stumbled over nothing in particular and tried to recover without looking awkward. “Home?” he echoed.

  “Yes.” Perla slanted a look at Casewell and then turned her eyes back toward the dirt road they walked along. “I think it’s time. I came to Wise because I wanted to get away from all the talk. Seems like the talk here has been a thousand times worse, and I’ve survived. Running away didn’t do me any good. And it might even have done me harm. It’s time I took Sadie back to her grandmother.”

  Casewell found himself speechless. She couldn’t go now. Not when he was ready to win her. He swallowed hard and tried to think what to say. “Folks will miss you.”

  “Folks? Oh, I suppose Delilah and Robert have gotten used to having us around. Still, they must be ready to have their home their own again.”

  “Not just them.” The words burst from Casewell.

  Perla laughed. “Who else? I haven’t exactly been given a warm welcome around here. People ate my food, sure enough, and I suppose they’ve accepted me, but I’m not leaving any close friendships behind.”

  Casewell wanted to ask, What about me? more than anything, but he couldn’t do it. He ran the words around in his head until they sounded so awkward and strange that he wasn’t even sure they made sense anymore.

  Perla stopped and watched the moon where it seemed to tangle in the branches of a locust tree. “I am tired, Casewell,” she said. “Let’s head back.”

  Casewell nodded and pushed his hands deep into his pockets again. He was a fool, and he didn’t know what to do about it.

  21

  I HEAR PERLA’S GOING HOME.” Casewell’s mother pulled a pan of biscuits out of the oven and placed them on a trivet on the kitchen table. Casewell planned to spend the day checking over his parents’ cattle. Normally, he and his father would be administering a dewormer around this time of year, but with the drought, any parasites should be long dead by now. While Casewell was glad he wouldn’t have to round up helpers to administer medicine to uncooperative cattle, he found himself wishing his father were there to be glad with him.

  “That’s what she says.” Casewell split a hot biscuit, slid a generous pat of butter inside, and put it on his plate next to several fried eggs.

  “Seems a shame, though it might be for the best. She’s been so important to us, what with feeding the whole community and all. Even so, it seems right for that child to be with family, especially since—well, it just seems right.” Mom settled into a chair and spread her biscuit with last year’s grape jelly.

  “I’m not sure she feels she’s been important.” Casewell searched for the right words. “I think folks made her feel like an outcast when she got here, and once they found out about her cooking, no one knew how to talk to her.”

  “I should have done better by her, but with John . . .” Emily set her half-eaten biscuit down. “I’m going to call Delilah right this minute and invite her and Perla over for cake and coffee.” She made her way to the phone mounted on the wall in the hallway. Casewell heard his mother’s side of the conversation. The invitation seemed to be met with enthusiasm. Emily returned to the kitchen.

  “There. It’s probably too little too late, but at the very least, Perla will know she’s meant something to this family.” Tears welled in her eyes. “Not to mention Sadie. I never knew your father to be sentimental, but that child meant the world to him. I’m so glad they got to know each other.”

  She gave herself a shake and dabbed at her eyes with her napkin. “Enough of that. I’d better get to making a cake. No, I think I’ll make tea cakes.”

  Casewell watched his mother as she began to gather ingredients and set the oven to heat. She had her moments of melancholy, but she also seemed to be getting on with life.

  “Ma,” Casewell spoke spontaneously, “do you mind living here with Dad gone?”

  His mother stopped with eggs in her hands and turned to look at Casewell. “You know, I thought I would, but somehow I can’t imagine living anywhere else. He’s here.” She waved the eggs around. “In the chair he always sat in, in the hint of cigarette smoke when I walk out on the porch, in his tools out in the building. I guess it’s what I have left of him.”

  She put the eggs down and dusted her hands before setting them on her hips. “Now,” she said with a smile, “get on out there and check on those cows while I get ready for my hen party.”

  Casewell spent a couple of hours counting the cattle and checking each one for any problems. He cleaned out the water trough and replaced the salt block. The herd seemed generally healthy, though still on the thin side from lack of good feed over the summer. The survival of the herd, small as it was, made for another miracle. Though they’d survived the drought, Casewell expected to lose a few after the rains started. Cattle were prone to fog fever when going from poor forage to rich pasturage. As quickly as the fields recovered, Casewell had felt certain some of the cattle would get sick, but not a single one had.

/>   Because of the drought, his father had decided to put off breeding the cows over the summer. He liked to breed in late June or July for spring calves. But a cow stressed by drought was likely to abort or fail to conceive altogether. Casewell wondered if he should bring a bull in now. He decided against it. The cows still might not take, and he’d be selling them before they calved anyway. He slapped a particularly docile heifer on the rump. She rolled an eye at him and went back to cropping the new grass. Casewell realized he would miss having cattle. Maybe he’d get a Guernsey milk cow and keep it at the house. If he ever did marry and have children, it would be good to have fresh milk.

  Still pondering the ins and outs of animal husbandry, Casewell headed back to the house, forgetting his mother would likely have company by now.

  As he stepped into the side yard, Sadie called out to him from the back porch. “Mr. Casewell, we’re having tea and cookies. Real tea and cookies.” Her eyes shone and he felt a stab of joy to see her.

  “I heard. Is your mama inside?” Casewell felt oddly shy and wasn’t sure he should go in with the ladies.

  “Yup. She cries at night. She tries to be very, very quiet, but I hear her. I think it’s because we have to go home now. I don’t want to go, but Mama says we have to.” Sadie heaved an overly dramatic sigh and hugged her doll tighter in the crook of her arm. “She says God will take care of us wherever we go. I don’t see why He can’t take care of us here.”

  Casewell felt something like anger roll over in his belly. Why did Perla insist on being obstinate? There was no reason for her to leave, and here she was dragging this poor child off. He had an urge to go inside and give that woman a talking to. Casewell felt the anger drain away as quickly as it had come. What would he say? That he loved her and wanted to marry her? Would that be a good enough reason for her to stay? It would if she loved him in return. But he had no reason to think she did.

  His mother’s voice floated out through the screen door. “Casewell? Is that you? Bring Sadie in here for some cookies.”

  Casewell summoned a smile and took Sadie’s hand. Her fingers were so tiny. She gripped Casewell’s ring and middle fingers, which fit her palm like they’d been shaped for just such a reason. He remembered she’d done the same thing at his father’s funeral. Tears pricked the backs of his eyes and he blinked rapidly. He didn’t know which female had him more tied up in knots—the mother or the child.

  Inside, his mother sat at the kitchen table with Perla and Delilah. The table was covered by a linen cloth with scalloped edges. Casewell knew his grandmother had made it, and his mother saved it for only the most special occasions. She was also using his grandmother’s china—some fussy pattern with pink and blue flowers. He guessed it was pretty, but he’d rather drink coffee from a stout mug any day.

  “Won’t you join us?” Delilah asked. “I expect we can talk cattle almost as well as any man.”

  Casewell grinned and sat in the empty chair that had always been his father’s. Sadie climbed on his knee and reached for a teacup.

  “No, that’s easy to break.” Casewell reached out a hand to stop the child. Her lower lip protruded.

  Emily intervened. “Of course she can have her own cup. Sadie is a careful child, and even if she breaks every single cup and plate, she’s worth more than any set of china.”

  Casewell studied his mother. She never would have allowed him to handle her china when he was small. He hardly dared attempt it now. This woman at the table, pressing a fragile cup into a chubby little hand, seemed different.

  And witnessing that one small act, Casewell felt the magnetic north of his whole life shift. What, after all, was important? Being a fine musician? A skilled carpenter? A good son? Casewell turned his head and saw that Perla was watching him. He met her eyes and smiled from the bottom of his soul. He felt an almost overwhelming urge to clasp Sadie to his chest, to hold her tight and refuse to let her go. And he saw that Perla understood. He saw that Perla had been holding this precious child close since the day she first knew she would be a mother. Perla knew what mattered, and Casewell hoped she could see in his eyes that he did, too.

  “Tea cake?” His mother’s voice broke over Casewell like cool water after a hot day working in the hayfields.

  “Yes,” he said, taking one for himself and putting a second in front of Sadie. “I’d enjoy a tea cake.”

  Perla tucked Sadie in that night, then slipped outside to enjoy the October bite in the air. What had she seen in Casewell’s eyes? It had been . . . breathtaking. She thought she might have gasped when he looked at her and smiled. The light, the depth. It had been like looking into a murky pool of water that suddenly cleared so that she could see the shape and size of every stone on the bottom. She’d noticed his honey eyes the first time she saw him, but this time the color was, well, liquid and sweet. She wanted to gather more of that honey.

  Perla squeezed her arms harder. What was happening to her? She felt . . . beloved. But how could that be? She had been beloved only once before, and it had been a mistake. A sweet, tender mistake that had brought her the greatest sorrow and the greatest joy of her life. She shivered.

  She could not hope. She dared not hope. Her plans to return home were final. Her mother was expecting her, though she hadn’t sounded happy about it. Perla supposed she would need to find another place to disappear. This time she’d look for somewhere no one knew her. Maybe this time she could escape the gossip. And live a lie.

  Why would it be so hard to lie? Why did that thought make her feel shriveled and small inside? Surely it would be a relief to live in a place where people respected her, maybe even pitied her a little, if they believed she was a young widow trying to get by. And she would cook only for Sadie and herself. No one ever again need know what she could do with a handful of beans.

  Perla realized that tears coursed down her cheeks. She tasted the salt and wondered that she could have so thoroughly wet her cheeks without realizing it. She inhaled deeply, letting the air out quietly so as not to disturb the night. She loved Casewell Phillips with all her heart. For just a moment, she allowed herself the luxury of believing that he loved her and somehow it would all work out. Then she went inside to lie down beside her slumbering child and cried herself to sleep.

  22

  CASEWELL KNEW WHAT TO DO. It was up to him to court and win Perla Long. He had been tentative to this point, waiting for a sign that she would welcome his advances. No longer. God had filled his heart with love for a woman with a child, and he would move forward in the knowledge that God had already blessed them.

  He walked into the living room and picked up his Bible from the coffee table. He flipped to the first chapter of Matthew and read the account of the angel visiting Joseph. Casewell felt for the first time that he could begin to understand how Joseph felt. The woman he loved was pregnant and would give birth to a child not his own. Casewell smiled. Perla was no Mary, but he supposed that she, like everyone else, was ultimately from God. And whether God had blessed Perla with a child or simply took her sin and used it for good, Sadie was clearly a gift. A gift he would be only too glad to claim as his own, just as Joseph had claimed Jesus. The only question now was how to go about it.

  Casewell drove down to the Thorntons’ store. He knew Perla had been spending less time there now that her cooking was no longer in demand, and he hoped to find Delilah alone. Robert was behind the counter, and Delilah was reading at the end of the row that now served as a lending library. Casewell nodded to Robert and began thumbing through the books as though looking for something of interest.

  “Can I help you, Casewell?” Delilah asked.

  “Oh, just browsing. Though if you had a book about how to court a woman, I guess I’d take it.” He snuck a look at Delilah out of the corner of his eye. She closed her book and moved toward him.

  “Really? Well, I’m pretty sure Frank never did collect anything like that, but there’s better ways to find out than books.”

  Casewell turned
toward her with raised eyebrows, hoping he wouldn’t need to say anything else.

  “As a matter of fact, depending on the woman, I might be able to help.”

  “Now, that would be fine. Books probably wouldn’t apply to our country ways, anyhow. What would you suggest for courting a woman who is, well, reluctant to be courted?”

  “Do you know why she’s reluctant?” Delilah stuck the book in her hand onto the shelf at random and turned her full attention on Casewell.

  “I think it might have to do with the fact that she’s . . .” Casewell looked up and scratched his chin. “Well, this might not be her first go-round.”

  “A widow?”

  Casewell suspected Delilah was playing with him, but he could play, too. “Not exactly, but let’s make that assumption for the sake of discussion.”

  Delilah beamed and then recovered herself and looked serious again. “Well, then, she’s no blushing maiden to be tiptoed around. I reckon you can go straight to the heart of the matter.” Delilah held up a finger. “Though every woman, no matter how experienced, likes a little romance. I’d venture you could tell her straight out how you’re feeling, but just the same she might appreciate some flowers or candy along with sweet words. Even us old married ladies like sweet talk.” Delilah showed dimples that Casewell had never seen before. “And if, say, there were a child in the mix, a gift for the little one would go a long way toward winning the mama, I suspect.”

  “So bring her some flowers and candy, a gift for her child—if she has one—and just tell her straight out?”

  “I think that will get you pretty far along, Casewell. Women are less complicated than you think.” Delilah dimpled at him again and pulled a book off the shelf—not the one she’d been reading before—and headed back to her chair, where she buried her nose between the pages.

  Casewell strongly suspected that Delilah wasn’t very interested in South Sea Tales by Jack London, but he’d been wrong before. He laughed. He’d been very wrong before. But Delilah had given him an idea, and he was looking forward to carrying it out.