by Deborah Camp
This time she didn’t give the bucket to Lonestar. Instead, she mirrored his earlier action and doused flame at the base of the wall. Lonestar continued to use the blankets to smother flames, stomping on them with his shoes. She dashed back to the trough. How many trips she made, she couldn’t count. Her legs trembled and her shoulder and arm muscles cramped as she toted another bucket full of water into the smoke-filled, hot as blazes barn. Sweat ran into her eyes and covered her body, making her nightdress stick to her. Lonestar’s body was painted with soot and sweat. He grabbed the bucket from her and flung the water high, up to the top of the wall board. The flames hissed and disappeared. Then part of the back wall caved outward, sending sparks and more flames shooting into the night air. She heard a sharp crack before Lonestar’s arm circled her waist and hauled her back, back, stumbling, falling onto the hard ground.
She would have screamed, if her lungs hadn’t been so charred. Instead, she grunted and moaned, her eyes taking in the collapse of part of the barn’s roof. Dirt clouds puffed up, adding more throat-clogging particles to the air. Lonestar sprang up, grabbed the bucket from the ground, and ran out. He was back in a flash, dumping water onto the rubble of blackened wood slats and shingles.
The haze lifted from her brain and she realized that the wall collapse had swung the battle in their favor. Pushing to her feet, Gussie snatched up a couple of the blankets and went to another trough. She dunked them, getting them good and wet, and then lugged them to where Lonestar was beating at the diminishing flames and stomping on embers. She flung the wet blankets onto the burning wood and grass and experienced a moment of joy when she heard the hissing and saw gray smoke rise into the night.
“Yes!” Lonestar barked at her. He reached down and grabbed the smoking blankets, shoving them at her. “Again!”
She repeated the dunking of them and gave one to Lonestar while she handled the other. They killed more flames, murdered more embers. Lonestar looked up, frowning at the glowing wood along the roofline.
“Wet two more,” he said, motioning her to get going.
With her breath soughing in her raw, aching throat, she obeyed. Back inside, she found that he’d scaled the ladder and was in the loft. Not a good place to be with half the roof above his head gone. He laid on his belly and reached down. She lifted the wet blankets up as high as she could. She knew her arms weren’t nearly long enough, so she hoisted the blankets over her shoulders and grunted her way up several rungs of the ladder until Lonestar could lift the heavy blankets off her.
Without thinking twice, she shimmied down the ladder, grabbed the bucket, and went to fill it again. The three troughs near the barn were empty, so she had to trudge out to the well. Slipping between the corral rails, she trotted across to the cistern for another bucket of water. Her legs felt like they were turning into jelly as she returned to the blackened barn. Using every ounce of her depleted strength, she hauled the bucket up the ladder with her.
“Lonestar!” she shouted, but only a harsh, hoarse sound emerged from her raw throat. Still, it got his attention. He turned toward her, his face blackened by soot, and reached out for the bucket.
He stood back a little, took aim at a few stubborn, orange flames, and let the water fly to do its job. The final, active flames disappeared, leaving trails of smoke in their wake.
They spent the next hours before dawn stomping out embers and dousing sudden licks of fire amid the black rubble of what was left of the back of the barn. Just before the sun broke free of the horizon, Erik came galloping to the corral astride either Lewis or Clark, his eyes wide with shock and concern.
“I smelled the smoke when I came outside to start on chores and then I saw it as the sky lightened. Saw it in this direction,” he said, running a hand through his white-blond hair as he surveyed the damage. “Thank God, you two are still standing.” He gazed up at the charred rafters and the hay piled at the other end of the loft. “Sounds stupid right now, but you were lucky, Max. Looks like you saved most of your feed and all of your livestock.”
Lonestar nodded along with Gussie. She figured he couldn’t talk any better than she could at the moment.
“Scared a year off me as I rode here,” Erik said on a sigh. “What in heaven’s name started it? No lightning. Did you leave a lantern lit?”
Lonestar shook his head, weariness making his eyes look sunken. His black hair was dusty with soot and dirt. His sweaty chest rose and fell with his labored breathing. He propped his hands on his knees and leaned forward as if his strength was running out of him so fast that he couldn’t support his own weight.
Gussie used her wrist to push sticky strands of hair out of her eyes and off her damp cheeks. She didn’t bother to try to speak. Instead, she walked slowly, forcing one foot in front of the other, toward the front of the barn. She grabbed a bucket on her way and went to the cistern again, this time for some water for herself and Lonestar. Plunging her hands in, she splashed her face and then tipped the bucket up and drank from it. The water put out the fire in her throat and cooled her insides. She topped it off and stumbled across the yard to the barn again, wondering if the weight of the bucket could pull her arm completely out of its socket. Felt like it could.
Noticing one of the blankets lying at her feet, she stopped long enough to drape it over her shoulders and around her body for modesty’s sake. The water and perspiration had her nightdress clinging to her like a second skin, leaving very little to anyone’s imagination.
Back in the barn, Erik surveyed the charred remains closely. Lonestar hadn’t moved. Gussie set the bucket at his feet. He needed no instructions. Crouching beside it, he lifted it and drank deeply. His throat flexed as he continued to slurp up the cool liquid. Then he dunked his face into the bucket, sat back on his butt, and let the water pour out and over his head and shoulders. When he looked up at her, pinpoints of light had found his eyes again.
“You okay?” he asked, his voice graveled.
She nodded. “You?”
He nodded. “Tired.”
“You two get into the house and get yourselves sorted out,” Erik said. “I’ll stay here to be sure nothing flares up again.” He held out his hand to Lonestar, who took it, allowing his brother-in-law to haul him back up to his feet. “Go on with you.”
Lonestar draped his arm across Gussie’s shoulders and she slipped hers around his waist. Together, they walked slowly, achingly to the house, putting the ruined barn behind them until they were strong enough to face it again.
Four days later, Gussie sat on the front porch with Susan and her children. She rocked back and forth in her chair and glanced toward the ruined barn where Erik and Lonestar stood and talked. The rumble of their voices drifted to her, and she could make out a word or two every so often. Enough that she knew they were discussing the fire. Erik had worked with Lonestar all day yesterday to clear away the charred wood and begin replacing it with new lumber.
Being Sunday, Erik and Susan had come by after church to work some more on the rebuild and see how Gussie and Lonestar were faring.
“So, Max has been sleeping in the barn?” Susan asked. She held a drowsy Elias in her arms. Brigit played in the yard, running circles around her father and uncle with Buster on her heels.
“Yes,” Gussie said on a long sigh. “He’s worried that foxes or coyotes might sneak up and go after the goats in the barn.”
“Well, he and Erik have solved that problem, I hope.”
Gussie nodded. Lonestar and Erik had piled hay as high as their shoulders along the back of the barn as a makeshift wall until they could finish erecting a real one. Whether that would be enough for Lonestar to come inside and sleep beside her again, was another worry. This morning she’d awakened after a dream of him undressing her and covering her body with his. She’d groaned in frustration and had done such a foolish thing. She’d rolled onto the side where he usually slept and rubbed her face in the sheet, breathing in his lingering scent. Oh, she’d missed him! Missed having that
solid, strong, warm body beside her.
During the day, they’d gone about their chores. At meal time, they’d spoken of their work, weather, how long it might take to get the barn finished. Nothing about the real reason Lonestar was sleeping in the barn.
“Erik says the barn work will be done within a few weeks,” Susan said. “That’s good, isn’t it? And no animals were harmed. Could have been much, much worse, you know.”
“Yes. It was a miracle that Lonestar noticed the flames right before he . . . uh, turned in.” She averted her face from Susan, feeling warm color creep up her neck as she remembered Lonestar’s tender kisses and the small fire he’d started inside her.
“Must have just ignited.” Susan furrowed her brow and shifted her sleeping son to a more comfortable place on her lap. “Do you know what started it? Maybe a lit lantern fell?”
“No. Lonestar hasn’t said as much, but I think he’s of a mind that the fire was lit on purpose.”
Susan’s eyes rounded and her mouth slackened in surprise. “On purpose? Who would do that?”
“I have my ideas.”
“Tell me.”
Gussie angled up her chin. “Bob Babbitt.”
“Did you and Max see him do it?”
“No, but I feel it in my gut.” She pressed a fist to her midsection. “He was here a few days ago, spouting off about how we wronged him and we owed him money. All kinds of gibberish. He’s angry about not getting this land. I sure wouldn’t put it past him to do something like this.” She frowned, anger building in her as she thought of Babbitt seeking revenge on them.
“A woman’s intuition is a powerful tool, but we shouldn’t point fingers unless we have solid proof, Gussie.” Susan rocked back and forth, worry marring her lovely features. “Accusations like that can get around and cause you even more trouble.”
“That, we don’t need. We have more than enough to do before winter sets in. Now we have to see about shoring up the barn.”
“We’ll help you,” Susan said. “Erik is a master carpenter. Don’t fret about it, Gussie. Erik and Max can do anything they set their minds to.”
Gussie looked at the two men, both powerfully built. Erik was broader across the chest, but Lonestar had an inch or more on him in height. Erik lifted one hand and clasped Lonestar’s shoulder, giving him a good-natured shake as if he were punctuating a point he was making, and Lonestar smiled and nodded.
“How’s married life, Gussie?”
Giving a little start, Gussie glanced at Susan, caught her sly smile, and then looked away again. “Fine, I suppose. I’ve no real complaints.”
Susan tipped back her blond head and laughed. “That’s hardly high praise. You’ve at least grown fonder of each other, I hope.”
Gussie bobbed her shoulders. “He’s a good man.”
“That, he is,” Susan agreed. “A much better man than Bob Babbitt will ever be.”
“For sure.” Gussie wrinkled her nose. “That was the first time I’d seen Babbitt. He came riding up here, puffed up like a stepped-on toad, and said I should pay him back for the train ticket he sent to me.”
“He did?” Susan made a disparaging sound. “The nerve of him, after leaving you stranded.”
“That’s what I told him, too. Him and Lonestar exchanged words. I could tell that he harbors a keen hatred for Lonestar.”
“They’ve grown up together, but Bob has always been one of those fellows who feels slighted and is owed something by everyone. It galls him, I’m sure, that Max married you and was able to buy this land. I’ve no doubt that he feels cheated. I do so hope that he gets over his hurt feelings soon and finds himself a nice, young lady to wed.”
“He’s not a bad looking man,” Gussie mused. “But no match for Lonestar.” She felt Susan’s regard and saw her beaming smile from the corner of her eye.
“My brother is a handsome man, isn’t he?”
Gussie’s gaze drifted to Lonestar. He stood with one hip cocked, his long-fingered hands propped at his lean waist, his face shadowed by the brim of his hat. But she knew that face. The straight bridge of his nose, the slight flare of his nostrils when his emotions were stirred. The shape and depth of his dark eyes. Yes. She had memorized that striking face.
“Gussie?”
She shifted her attention back to Susan.
“Don’t you think your husband is handsome?”
Gussie rolled her eyes, making Susan’s smile grow. “Of course. Any female with eyes in her head would think the same.”
“I was wondering. Why do you still call him by his last name?”
A smile teetered on her lips. “I like it. It’s a beautiful name.”
Susan sighed. “I keep waiting for you to radiate happiness. I want you to be as contented as I am. You’ve had a hard life, it seems, and you’re certainly in your rights to be wary and jaded. But that can all change, Gussie! This farm and my brother could – no, should lift the dark clouds from you. I want the same for Max. He has a good and tender heart. He should have never gone to prison. It took some of the life and joy out of him. But I know he can regain it all with time. And the right woman at his side.”
“He killed a man. From what he said, he believes he should have been in that prison.”
“That’s because he’s too stubborn and too honorable for his own good. All he had to do was follow the instructions given by the lawyer Mama hired for him. He was supposed to plead ‘not guilty’ and the lawyer had witnesses who would tell the judge how the death had been accidental and not by my brother’s hand. But what did Max do? He stood up and pled guilty! So, no witnesses were called, and the judge had to sentence Max to prison.”
Gussie stared at her, aghast. “Why did he do that when he could have walked free?”
“Because he’s as stubborn as a mule!” Susan huffed out a breath. “He felt that he’d been partly responsible, that he’d drunk too much and shouldn’t have fought with Hank.” Her eyes watered. “To watch him handcuffed and in leg irons, led away . . .” She shook her head and swallowed. “I thought Mama might succumb on the spot. I know I almost did. I’ve never cried so much in my life! And Mama . . . well, she was inconsolable. She and Max had a special bond. I think that when she looked at him, she remembered her wild, rebellious, headstrong youth. Of marrying someone ‘forbidden’ and not caring what anyone thought of it – even her parents. I think she missed being that person. She wanted Max to be proud of who he is, where he came from, and of the Osage blood running through his veins. And he is. Sometimes, too proud.” She arched her brows, looking past Gussie. “Here they come.”
Brigit hit the porch first and scampered to her mother, babbling about baby chicks that had just hatched. Her enthusiasm and high-pitched voice awakened her brother, who fussed and wailed in Susan’s lap.
“Erik, we should be getting back home so that I can put these wild ones down for naps.” She leaned forward and placed a hand on Gussie’s arm. “Won’t y’all come for Sunday supper later? It’ll do you good to get away from here for a few hours. And I’m baking a hen with all the trimmings.” Her gaze lifted to her brother. “Please, Max?”
Lonestar arched a brow at Gussie. “Be foolish to turn down such an invitation, wouldn’t it, Augusta?”
“If you’re sure it won’t be extra trouble for you . . .”
“Trouble? We’ll be happy to have you two at our table again.” She motioned for Erik to take Elias from her and he did, lifting the tired, sobbing boy into his arms. “Supper will be on the table by four. Brigit, grab Helga and say goodbye to your Uncle Max and Aunt Gussie.”
Aunt Gussie. Drawing in a quick breath, Gussie smiled as Brigit picked up her rag doll before bussing Gussie’s cheek and hugging Lonestar’s leg.
“Bye-bye, Aunt Gussie and Uncle Max,” she sang out before scampering toward the horses and wagon parked in the shade of a tree.
Aunt Gussie. She’d never thought of herself that way, but the sound of it on the child’s lips gladdened her. She was
truly family. She had a nephew and niece! And a sister-in-law and brother-in-law. Funny, how it just now hit her. She’d been so preoccupied with being a wife, of having a husband, she hadn’t dwelled much beyond that. Her gaze moved up to Lonestar. Uncle Max. She was barely able to suppress a giggle. He noticed her smile and tipped his head to one side to study her.
“What? Why are you grinning at me like that?”
“Uncle Max.”
He nodded. “Yes, Aunt Gussie?”
Her lips stretched into a bigger grin. “Just never thought of us like that until now.”
He sat in the rocker Susan had vacated and stretched out his long legs, crossing them at the ankles. “I’ve been Uncle Max for a few years. You’ll get used to it. But it does come with some strings attached.”
“Such as?”
“You have to love the little imps with your whole heart, let them ride piggyback, tickle them whenever possible, and accept their smacking, wet, and sometimes sticky kisses.”
Her heart melted a little. “I kinda like those strings.”
“So do I.” His smile made his eyes shine, but diminished when his gaze moved from her to the barn. “Erik thinks we can erect a new wall on the barn in a few weeks. He has some lumber we can use. I insist that we pay him for it, though.”
Gussie nodded.
“It’ll take time away from our work. Erik wanted to come here for half a day, every day until the barn’s repaired. But I can’t have that. It will put both of us too far behind the work we need to get done before the first snow flies.” He removed his hat and ran his hand roughly through his hair. “I say we work on it Saturday and some Sunday afternoons. It’ll take longer, of course, but I can’t see any other way.”
“Bob Babbitt had a hand in this, don’t you reckon?”
His gaze bounced to her and he narrowed his eyes. “Why’d you say that?”
“Because he made it clear that he’s out for revenge. Who else would set our barn ablaze?”
“Who said anyone did?”
She stared hard at him, wondering why he denied what he darned well knew. “You didn’t leave any lit lanterns in the barn. We both know that, for certain. And there was no lightning, no rain clouds. Someone struck a match. You know it. I know it. What’s the use pretending otherwise?”