“Don’t think so,” Alec answered. “It’s a day getting here, with the wait at the airports and the drive, and a day getting back. I’ve only got a week this time, and I haven’t seen her in over a month.”
“Makes sense.” They stood side by side, looking out the window at the fields and forest, finishing their coffee. Using the tiniest dribble of water, Hanner rinsed his mug in the sink and hung it on the peg. “Queenie says it’s time to ride the fence. Better get to it.”
“Give me a second to put on my boots.” Baldwin had a pair of shit-kickers back in the closet. They were one of the first things he’d bought after purchasing the ranch…a stuntman he trusted had recommended them in specific and profane detail. “Good pair of boots will treat you better ’n a woman,” the stuntman had said through his chipped teeth. In too good a mood to render a judgment on the truth of that statement, Alec hurried back to the master bedroom. Thick pair of socks, flannel shirt, an old Levi’s jacket and that pair of well-broken-in Frye cowboy boots, and he was ready.
While Hanner saddled the horses, Alec took a baseball cap and leather gloves from a shelf inside the barn and beat them against his thigh to free them of accumulated dust and cobwebs. Then he reached over to hold the reins so Hanner could adjust the cinches.
Hanner’s horse, an older, deceptively placid mare pinto called Nan, stood quietly. Hanner eyed her for a moment, and then kneed her in the abdomen. When she sucked in her stomach, he tightened the cinch. The mare gave him a look that promised much unpleasantness if she ever caught Hanner between her back feet and a wall.
Alec’s horse, a three-year-old gelding he called Sport, was all prancing adolescent eagerness, glad for the opportunity to get out for a while. He paused his restless movement long enough for Hanner to check the saddle, then twitched his tail with impatience. Hanner dropped some saddlebags loaded with tools over the horse’s withers.
As Hanner threw a leg over his own mount, he called out to Alec, “Mind Sport this morning. He’ll run you to Canada if you let him.” Alec nodded his acknowledgement as he climbed up into the saddle. He wasn’t a natural horseman, by any means. He didn’t have a good “seat,” as the saying went. But he had enough years of athletics that he could handle himself fairly well. Nothing fancy, but he was rider enough to get the job done, as long as the job consisted of simply getting from point A to point B. Addie, now she could ride. She’d wanted horses ever since she was just a toddler. She could ride circles around her dad, and he was pretty sure that she’d done her share of racing hell for leather down the dirt roads when Alec wasn’t around. You could only keep a kid so safe…after that, your children were in God’s hands.
Baldwin flicked the reins and Sport obediently trotted out of the barn, turned left, gave a couple of head tosses of pure youthful eagerness, and high-stepped across the pasture. Alec settled into the rhythm of the horse and let Sport hurry across to the trail that followed the fence line.
Hanner didn’t talk much as they rode, but to Alec, that was a given. It was peaceful, nourishing, to be rocking along with the horse, feeling the rising sun on his face, and smelling…my God, smelling the world. The sweat from the horse, the flat, strange tingling scent from the dust, the blooming trees and their multitude of soft fragrances, even the grass that grew along the trail. As much time as he spent in artificial environments, either on stage with the sweetish odor of pancake makeup mingling with the rank sweat of costumes too long unwashed, or on a soundstage with the air conditioning laboring to overcome the heat from the Klieg lights…he grew too accustomed to not smelling anything natural at all. The barrage of sensation from the world around him was almost dizzying.
Ahead of him, Hanner reined to a halt, peered down. He didn’t say anything. Alec rode up beside him. Ah, a teaching moment. Hanner was as egalitarian a man as you might ever meet. His voice never had that trace of subservience that was the Hollywood regional accent. He’d never once asked Alec for gossip about “the business,” didn’t seem to care who was sleeping with whom, who was gay, who was an addict. He didn’t seem to much care that Alec was his boss either. He seemed to look on them all, Alec, Kim, and Addie, as his responsibility when they were at the ranch. Hanner and Kim seemed to understand each other right away. It made sense. Kim was really a country girl from Bees Knees, Georgia, and she and Hanner shared some cultural shorthand that escaped Baldwin. And Addie, well, Addie was just a force of nature. Alec sometimes thought that Hanner regarded him, not unkindly, as the least capable and least intelligent of the family. Maybe Hanner took pity on Alec because he was a city boy. Whatever the cause, Hanner was doing his best to teach Alec…maybe to make him worthy of the ranch, if nothing else.
Alec was humbled by the older man’s gift of knowledge and training, and he worked hard to absorb the lessons so freely given. He guided Sport up beside Nan, and focused his attention on the fence post. While the two men pondered the five-foot log, Sport nuzzled Nan, who snapped at him grumpily.
This was an older section of the fence, put up not long after the ranch house had been completed back in the early twenties. There was nothing obviously wrong with the post, besides being so sun bleached it was gray. Alec notice it swayed a little in the breeze. But it swayed from the bottom. “The base is rotted, huh?”
Hanner nodded, pointed to a small gully that ran at right angles to the fence, out from Alec’s ranch to the National Forest beyond. “Runoff has either undercut it, or just rotted it.” Both men climbed off their horses to take a closer look. The gray wood was flaking and crumbling just below the surface of the dirt.
There was a small stand of scrub trees, a couple of hundred yards from the fence. Hanner led their horses to a small area of shade, tied the reins loosely to one of the trees. Alec checked inside the saddlebags, found a small hand axe. From the other saddlebag, Hanner extracted a hammer, over-sized pliers, and an old Army entrenching tool. “I’ll get the post dug out,” he said.
The replacement post was up to Alec. He wandered among the stand of trees with a critical eye. Twisted by the winter winds and summer droughts, most of the trees were closer to pretzels in shape than pencils, but he found a likely candidate toward the center of the stand. It was a Jack Pine, about eight feet tall. Real pretty tree. It probably had been protected by the gnarled guards on the outer edges. Alec almost hated to cut it down, but if the fence went down, no telling what would wander onto the ranch. There were bison over in the deeps of the National Forest. A barbed wire fence wouldn’t stop a determined buffalo, but it might annoy them enough to make them go somewhere else.
It took Alec the rest of the morning to hack through the four-inch trunk of the tree, whittle the base to a point, and strip off the limbs and small branches. Hanner walked back once carrying a canteen, which he hung from a nearby tree. He glanced at Baldwin’s work in progress and mentioned, “You’ll want to cut her off to about seven feet.”
It was nearing noon when Alec walked out of the stand of trees, the canteen dangling from one shoulder, the trimmed tree trunk balanced on the other. Hanner had unsaddled the horses and was brushing them down. He grunted in approval when he saw Baldwin. “Almost lunch time,” he commented. “Let’s eat before we set the post.”
Alec leaned the post against a tree, wiped the sweat from his forehead. “Only if you’ve got a salad in the bags there.”
Hanner gave a kind of grin. “Nope. Got some trail mix, couple of bananas.”
“That’ll do.”
Alec brushed the ground clear of burrs and pebbles and sat down beside his saddle, leaning back against it. He peeled a banana, dipped it in the Ziploc bag of trail mix (chocolate chips, he was livin’ large!), and took a bite. It tasted damned good after his morning of work. He knew his forearms would be burning tomorrow. He welcomed the thought.
Hanner took a bite of a roast beef sandwich, washed it down with a slug from his own canteen. “Those bastards in Iraq…they just blew up a Pet Market.”
“You’re kidding.”
“Heard it on the radio coming in.” Hanner shook his head. “It’s not enough to blow up innocent folks just out doing their errands…but to blow up kids and helpless critters in cages. Takes a special kind of evil to do that.”
Baldwin shook his head in disgust. What kind of twisted s.o.b. would think it was a good move to slaughter children who were in a market, looking at the hopeful puppies, kittens, and canaries? That transcended politics and religion.
Around a mouthful of his lunch, Alec said, “That insurgency. They’ve got to be really angry to do that.”
Hanner spat in the dirt. “Insurgency, hell. Most of those bastards come from outside the country. They aren’t even Iraqis.”
“Really?” Alec asked mildly. So, here it was, pretty much as he’d guessed. Conservative, for sure, Republican, probably.
Hanner looked abashed, like he’d revealed more of himself than he’d planned. Alec wasn’t sure if it was the revelation of his politics, or the revelation of his feelings. “Yeah,” Hanner said after a moment. “They are.”
Baldwin let it pass. It was too pretty a day to argue politics, and besides, what difference would it make out here? The man had been thoughtful enough to bring lunch for the Hollywood vegetarian. Why spoil a beautiful day over a difference of opinion? I’m not an asshole, Alec reminded himself, I just play one in the movies. He took another drink of the warm, flat water in the canteen. “Better get that post set.”
Hanner wiped his hands together and climbed to his feet. “Better.”
The older man had already dug out the rotted base of the old post and pried the staples loose from the barbed wire. Alec walked up to the fence with the stripped log on his shoulder. He paused a moment, checking the lay of the fence. Each post was offset from the other…every other one was on the inside of the wire. This post would need to be set on the outside of the fence. When Alec turned, he thought he caught a trace of approval in Hanner’s eyes, but it was gone so fast he couldn’t be sure it was ever there.
He dropped the post over the wires and into the hole. Hanner took the post in both hands. Alec was taller, the obvious choice to take the entrenching tool and pound the post into the ground, which he did.
Hanner kicked some rocks into the hole, scuffed some dirt over the rocks, and then unzipped his fly. As he urinated into the post hole he said, “The scent makes the wolves more cautious, for a while.” When he finished, he scuffed more dirt over the mud and stomped it down.
Alec braced the post with his hip while Hanner affixed the barbed wire with the metal staples and a hammer. Their heads were close together. “You still planning on leaving the country?” Hanner asked him.
“That was just a rumor,” Alec replied acidly. He’d never said that. Kim had said he’d said it. Well, maybe he did mention it in passing when he was unholy pissed about the direction of the country. He’d thought about it. He’d been disillusioned. He’d even, in an angry moment, moved a lot of assets to Switzerland. He hated the idea of paying taxes to support this administration and their wars. He’d liked knowing he had some “Go to Hell” money stashed somewhere.
Hanner nodded, pounded another staple home. “Just checkin’. I don’t like to wonder when I’m gonna come out to the ranch and find a letter tellin’ me you’ve sold the place.”
“I thought about it,” Alec admitted. “I’ve been so mad about the war and about the court fight and everything, I could just spit. Times like that, I just wanted to get out. Leave it all behind.” He pushed down on the dirt around the post with his boot. “But I’m staying put. This is my country. Leaving won’t make it any better. Besides, I wouldn’t take Addie away from Kim. A kid needs her mom. And Addie loves this place.”
Hanner nodded, not in agreement, just letting him know he’d been heard. Alec looked away for a moment. What the hell was he doing confessing to this old right-wing cowboy? It took him most of the ride back to the ranch house that day to tease the answer out of himself. It was trust. One of the few people outside of his blood kin, including his brothers (even though one of them was certifiably batshit crazy), that he could trust was his ranch foreman.
Hanner stepped back, held the strands of barbed wire so Alec could crawl through. Alec looked dubiously at the metal wire. It was rusty. “Think we should replace the wire?”
“Fix what you can, plan for the rest,” Hanner said, turning his head to trace the line of the fence running off in the distance. Later, after everything had changed, Baldwin would remember the older man’s words. He’d cling to them; make them the foundation of his shattered life and the sword he’d use to avenge the death of his dreams.
Baldwin had only a small travel bag on the front porch when Hanner arrived about noon two days later. Filling his mug in the kitchen, the foreman raised his eyebrows at the dearth of luggage. “Traveling light this time?”
“Don’t need much.” Alec grinned, as excited as a kid the day before Christmas. “I’m bringing Addie back.”
“Good.”
Alec washed his own cup, hung it on a peg. He’d decided last night, just before he fell asleep. He felt better after the three days of working the ranch. They’d ridden most of the fence line, done some repair on the barn, mucked out the stables, and dug a French drain around the back of the guest house. Every night, Alec had slept dreamlessly. He was sore, but it was a pleasant soreness, and he already sensed a new tautness in his gut. It was a feeling he liked.
There was nothing in L.A. he had to do. His next movie was lined up, and he calculated that trying to go somewhere with Addie where they wouldn’t be harassed by the public (or the suck-ups) would require as many hours in traffic as it would take to dash back to the ranch. He’d already made the reservations. Yeah, he’d be the one spending twenty or so hours in airports and on airplanes over the next day and a half, but it was worth it to be with his daughter. He’d take the hit on time and comfort. That was what the father did: take the hit for the kids. If you didn’t take the hit, you weren’t worthy of the name “Dad.”
It was Monday. He’d be in L.A. late, but would pick up Addie first thing in the morning at Kim’s house, and they’d be off. It’d be a hell of a surprise for his daughter, and probably he’d receive another expensive beatdown from his wife’s lawyer for showing up like that, but so be it. “I’ll leave the Jeep at the airfield,” Alec told Hanner.
“I’ll drive you over,” Hanner offered. “’Bout due for an oil change and tune-up, anyway.”
Baldwin checked his watch. Hanner caught the glance, emptied and rinsed his mug. “Burnin’ daylight,” he said.
“The Duke,” Alec replied with a grin. One of the only references Hanner ever made to Hollywood was testing Baldwin’s knowledge of movie trivia, especially old movie trivia. Alec had learned a few interesting tidbits about actors and directors he’d either dismissed or taken for granted. Like Eddie Albert, the old guy who’d been in the television show Green Acres. From Hanner, Baldwin had learned the man was a successful actor before the Second World War, who’d volunteered for service. He was a decorated combat veteran, a Marine officer who’d refused orders to evacuate a Japanese-held island in the Pacific, and had repeatedly waded ashore to carry his wounded men to safety. Alec used information like that to remind himself that you could never judge people simply by what they were doing or what you knew they’d done, but that everyone had another life, one that had been lived out of your sight and beyond your knowledge.
As he walked over to the garage, the beauty of the day struck Alec. The air was clear and cool, a scud of dark thunderclouds far off to the east. There might be a storm coming, but he imagined it would blow over by the time he returned from California. Hanner helped Alec fold back the soft-top on the Jeep. They removed the doors and put them in the back of the garage. Alec climbed into the driver’s seat; he liked driving out here. In L.A., he’d pay someone else to deal with the jams and the stop and go.
The drive to the airfield took almost forty-five minutes. The damn thing
was too small to really call an “airport,” although it took that name. First they took a fire road from the ranch to the state highway. As they bounced over the rutted road, Hanner said, “I’ll have Jamal grade the road before this storm comes in.” Alec nodded. They paused at the edge of the pavement, gave cursory glances left and right. Nobody coming for at least fifteen miles in either direction.
Once on the highway, a paved single-lane road through the National Forest, the ride was smoother. This far out, they only saw a few truckers, hauling beef from the working ranches farther out toward the stockyards in Bruneau. Hawks circled on the thermals rising from empty river beds and a few jackrabbits sat by the side of the road, pondering what to do with the rest of their day, perhaps hoping it wouldn’t include a closer encounter with one of the circling hawks.
Alec dropped his speed to sixty as he passed the Chevron station. The package store came up on his right. He eased the pressure off the accelerator, slowing to a careful twenty-five when he approached the elementary school. Parents, mostly mothers, were walking their kids to class. The sight of the children made Baldwin ache for Addie. It was a feeling he’d never had when he was single, before he was a father. He didn’t hate kids back then, it was just that he could take them or leave them. Now, seeing families inevitably brought his mind around to his family. His family: he and Addie. Maybe there would be another wife in his future, but no matter what, Addie was the core of him now. You could find another wife, he thought, but you could never replace your daughter.
The airfield was on the other side of town, a taxing five minutes away. You could see the weather tower first, air sock fluttering. Then the chain link fence, put up mostly to capture drifting tumbleweeds, Baldwin was convinced. Then the small terminal building that was only staffed about six hours a day, four days a week. Beyond that was the expanse of runways where the puddle jumpers sat, the kind of plane where the pilots walked up between the rows of seats to get to the cockpit.
The Big Bang Page 9