by Deborah Camp
“I’m okay, Suze.”
“Did you catch the bastard?” Erik asked without bothering to say Babbitt’s name.
“Sure did,” Max assured him. “Caught him with a flaming torch in his hands. He’s tied up around at the side of the barn. Thought I’d take him into the sheriff later.”
Erik rolled up his sleeves. “You keeping everything damp? Good idea.” He wrenched the bucket from Max’s hands. “You go take him now. Tell the sheriff what happened. I’ll be here when you get back.”
Max rested a hand on Erik’s shoulder. “Did you see the smoke?”
“I did. Smelled it first. I got up earlier than usual to check on our pregnant mare. She’s been off her feed lately. When I stepped outside, I smelled the fire. Then I saw the smudges of smoke in the west and I knew.” Sadness turned down the corners of his mouth. “I damn well knew. But I figured it was the barn he’d lit again.”
“Not this time.”
“Were you home?” Susan moved close to Augusta and placed her arm around Augusta’s sagging shoulders.
“No, we were visiting the Hoffmeisters in Altus,” Augusta said, her voice going hoarse on her. “When we got here, the fire was just getting going. We hadn’t even stopped the wagon when the roof went up. So fast!” She drew a trembling hand down her face. “It was all so fast. There was nothing we could do.”
Max wanted to hold her, protect her, turn back time and save the house and Augusta’s grief over it. Instead, he stood his ground, numb, like his insides had been scraped out and he was nothing but a husk except for the flame of rage burning in him. He couldn’t remember a time when Augusta’s shoulders weren’t braced, ready to carry whatever life dropped on them. Not now, though. Her small frame looked even smaller. The tremble of her lower lip foretold of her emotional state before tears built in her eyes and spilled onto her cheeks, washing away some of the soot and ashes.
“Oh, Gussie, dear!” It was Susan who embraced her, tried to protect her. “I’m so sorry this has happened to you.” Susan sobbed and kissed Augusta’s forehead. Her gaze drifted over to Max. “You, too, my brother. It’s just isn’t fair.”
Fair. He’d given up on life being fair a long time ago. Yet, lately, life had been better than fair. The farm. Pretty Augusta. A home of his own. He surveyed the carnage, saw ashes floating in the breeze, and wondered if they were taking his hard-won happiness with them.
Augusta turned her teary gaze on him and he cringed inside. Seeing her like this, defeated and forlorn, cut through him with the sharpness of a newly honed blade. She lifted one hand – a small, dirty hand, her nails ragged, her knuckles scraped.
“Lonestar . . . you sure you’re okay?” Her voice barely carried to him above the pop and snap of the dying fire. The flames had consumed the house and had shrunk to flicking tongues and a bed of orange, yellow, white, and gray.
He spun away, wanting to shout at her that he was anything but okay. He didn’t know what to do with the fury and despair rising in him. “I’ll take Babbitt in,” he said, the words snapped off, brittle and bitter, then he stalked away from them.
Babbitt was conscious, his dark eyes red-rimmed and brimming with hatred. His right one was swelling along with the right side of his jaw. Crimson stained his lips and teeth. He wiggled as much as he could in the binds, cussing and grunting.
“I know you woulda killed me if that bitch hadn’t been around to bear witness,” Babbitt snarled at him. “Like you did Hank Bishop!”
Lonestar ignored his stupid taunts. He shoved him onto his side, grabbed the ropes tied around him.
“I’ll give you a hand,” Erik said, coming to his side. “He weighs a ton.”
“He does.”
The two of them hoisted Babbitt to his feet and slung him into the wagon bed. Clover and Quick jostled the harnesses, anxious and nervous, having stood in their traces for hours while they smelled smoke and breathed in the hot air. Max’s mind went back to the beginning of this trip. The light-heartedness. The optimism. How quickly it had all fallen to ashes.
Babbitt kept up his barbed comments on the ride to Pear Orchard. Lonestar barely heard him. His hatred for Babbitt festered in him. If he let loose right now, he might just kill the fire-toting bastard.
He kept his mouth shut, although he wanted to cuss a blue streak, to howl at the injustice, to yell that he didn’t have the means to rebuild. No lumber. Not enough money to buy that much lumber. Their “home” was a barn now. And he sure as hell wouldn’t be asking Augusta to live in a barn with him this winter.
Babbitt cackled behind him like he’d read his mind. Max stared straight ahead, clutching his morose feelings to him and feeling at one with them.
By the time Max returned to the farm, the sun was high in the sky, clearly illuminating the ruination. The house was nothing but a broken chimney in a pile of smoking ashes. The barn stood pristine and untouched along with the other out buildings. Even the privy, closest to the house, was mostly unscathed except for the wooden front door was blackened by the intense heat.
Two of the six trees near the house had gone up with the blaze. Augusta, Susan, and the two children emerged from the barn. Lonestar could hardly bear to look at Augusta. The sight of the weariness stamped on her face and her dirty, bedraggled clothes wrenched his heart.
“You are barely able to stand on your feet, Gussie,” Erik observed. “You should come home with us. Take a long bath and then a long sleep. There is nothing to do here for now.”
“That sounds like heaven,” she said, managing a brief smile. “I am bone weary.” She looked past them. “We were able to contain the fire, though. That’s a blessing. This whole place could’ve gone up like tinder.”
“I hungry, Papa,” Brigit said.
“It’s a safe bet that we are all hungry, my little dumpling.” He picked her up and nuzzled her neck. She giggled and pushed his face away with a dimpled hand.
Susan looked up at Max, who hadn’t alighted from the wagon yet. “You ready to go?”
“I’m staying here.”
Augusta had started to heave herself up to sit beside him, but stopped at his announcement. She peered up at him. “Why?”
“To look after what’s left. The horses, goats, pigs, Buttons.” He shrugged, his gaze touching everything around him except for Augusta’s grime-smeared face.
“You need a bath, too.”
“I’ll wash off here.”
“Don’t be foolish. Your wounds need to be seen to. You’re all bloody and your eye is almost swollen shut. Let’s go to Susan and Erik’s and have a proper bath, meal, and rest. The animals will be okay. I’ve milked the goats and fed the chickens. We can turn the mules and Majesty out to graze with Buttons while we’re gone.”
“You go on. I’m staying.” He felt her eyes on him, drilling, seeking, questioning. He made a sweeping motion, a dismissive motion. “I’ll see you later.”
Susan laid a hand on Augusta’s shoulder and said quietly, “Leave him be for now and you come on with us.” Then she addressed Max. “I’ll expect you at supper, brother.” She didn’t wait for him to answer. Instead, she circled an arm around Augusta’s waist and guided her toward the other wagon.
Max sat for almost an hour in the wagon after they’d gone, not able to find the will to do much of anything. Finally, when the horses pawed and nickered, he slid from the seat and unhitched them, then led them into the barn where he set to work brushing them and feeding them. One by one, he brought in the others from the corral, working by rote as he relived the fire and aftermath. He tried not to think about Babbitt because thoughts of that man set him off, made him want to pound his fists into something.
After he’d seen to the horses and mules, he trudged to the well and filled the water troughs before pouring buckets of the cold water over his head and down his body. His shirt and trousers were filthy, turning the water dark gray and pale pink from his blood. He tugged off his boots and peeled off his clothes. He dunked the clothing in a bu
cket of water over and over before wringing them out and flinging them over the corral fence, so they’d dry in the sun and wind. Shivering, he sat in one of the troughs and used a horse chamois as a wash cloth to rub the soot and blood off him. His skin was red in patches where he’d been punched, and his ribs were powerfully sore. His teeth chattered when he was finally satisfied with the makeshift bath.
Drying himself with a horse blanket and then wrapping two more around him to warm up, he chastised himself for being a stubborn, dejected sourpuss. He could feel himself spiraling down to that dark, depressing place he’d inhabited while he’d been in prison. After serving out his sentence and finding himself again while working on the Bishop farm, he’d sworn that he’d never let his spirit drop so low again. But here he was, allowing it to happen, letting hopelessness and bitterness rule him, body and soul.
Throwing himself into a mound of clean hay at the back of the barn, he closed his burning eyes, planning to rest, but falling into a deep, dream-smothering sleep.
He awoke with a start, his body jerking all over and his eyes popping open. Erik’s face swam into view. His brother-in-law’s quizzical expression made him blink and then glance around him. It was dusk, barely light enough for him to see the horses and mules stamping in their stalls.
“What . . . I was asleep,” he mumbled, needlessly.
“So it seems. We waited supper for as long as we could, but we saved some vittles for you.” He held out one hand. “Up you come. I fetched your damp clothes off the fence, but I brought you some of mine. I figured you’d need them.” He indicated the stack of clothing next to Max. “And soap, a razor and hand mirror. A few other essentials.”
“I’m obliged.”
“No, you aren’t. You’re family. I had to sneak that stuff out because Susan insists you and Gussie will be staying at our place until you get your new home built. I figure you’ll be here most of the time, no matter what Susan thinks about it.”
Max took Erik’s hand and let him tug him up to his feet. He hugged the blankets about him, glad to be warm and no longer chilled to the bone. “You’re right. Here is where I need to be. I have work to do, no matter if there is a house here or not.”
“It’s good we got the barn finished when we did,” Erik noted. “You could muck out one of the stalls to the dirt floor and set up a little stove in there with a bunk. It would do for a few weeks until we can get a good start on another house for you. We can complete one or two rooms and you can move in while we work on the rest.”
Rubbing his forehead, he squeezed his eyes shut. He didn’t want to think about the lack of a house because that would make him dwell on his lack of money and lumber. There would be no building going on until he could get money from his cotton crop next summer. If he thought about that too much, he’d be even more discouraged and he was fighting against that like he would any other plague.
Dwell on where you’re lucky.
He resolved to take that excellent advice to see himself through the long months ahead. Like Erik had said, they’d finished the barn in the nick of time. He could make do in it. He knew that it wasn’t all that comfortable, but he’d slept in worse places. Like in prison where bedbugs and fleas had tried to eat him alive every night and day and mice and rats had nibbled on his toes and ears while he’d slept.
“Get dressed and then come have something to eat, Max. The women are fretting about you.”
Max heaved a sigh, weariness weighting his neck and shoulders. “Yes, I will.” He reached for the clothing as Erik turned on his heel and strode from the barn to give him privacy. The clothes were roomy, but fit okay. He stuffed his feet back into his boots, ran the comb Erik had brought him through his hair, and decided that was good enough. Erik was sitting in the wagon waiting for him. He motioned for him to join him.
“Let’s shake a leg, Max. You have to be hungry enough to eat a fresh killed crow by now.”
“I am, but I’m hoping for something better than that.”
Erik chuckled. “You know your sister. She has a meal ready for you fit for a small army.”
He smiled, but it felt odd and out-of-place on his lips. Maybe because there was no emotion behind it. No truth to the smile. Yes, he was hungry, but he was also without an appetite for much of anything. It was as if his feelings had fled and he was hollow.
“How’s Augusta doing?”
Erik speared him with a glance. “She’s a tough one. Nothing’s going to keep her down for long. She had herself a hot bath and a nap. Ate a good meal. Worried about you. She’s fine.”
She is fine, Max thought. Too fine for the miserable months ahead. Much too fine for that.
Chapter 18
Her worry was like a small drill, boring into her heart just enough to be concerning, but not enough to pain her.
Trying to ignore it, Gussie flicked the reins over Hank’s back, anxious to see the place again. Wouldn’t be any different or any better, she knew. The house – their house – would still be a pile of burnt timber and ashes and the ground around it would be black. But it was what was left and she wanted to be on the land again and make plans with Lonestar to get past this grievous time and get on with their lives. She wanted to check on the livestock, milk the goats, roughhouse with Buster, and collect the eggs and feed the chickens. She wanted to get on with it.
She wished she could say the same for Lonestar. He had insisted on spending the night in their barn, leaving her at Erik and Susan’s in his bed. She’d slept maybe an hour or two. Most of the night, she’d stared into the darkness and relived the horror of the hellish flames, the intense heat, and the engulfing fear. And she’d fretted about Lonestar. Something was eating at him. Something more than the fire’s aftermath or even his fight with Bob Babbitt.
She knew that he didn’t want to use his fists on anyone, and that when he did, it sent him back to that fateful saloon when a brawl had turned into a tragedy. No. It was beyond even that. He hadn’t looked her in the eye last night as she’d sat at the table with him while he’d eaten. Not once. A few furtive glances and that was all he’d afforded her. When he’d left, he hadn’t even touched her. Just gave a nod and out the door he’d gone.
Susan had noticed because she’d placed a comforting arm around Gussie’s shoulders and whispered, “Give him some time to lick his wounds. Men are funny creatures.”
Lick wounds. Fine. But what about her wounds? Their wounds. The fire hadn’t taken Lonestar’s house, hadn’t sent his plans up in smoke. It had done that to her house and plans, too. But she wasn’t shuffling around, pouting like a child, and avoiding him.
The buggy rounded the bend and Gussie’s gaze automatically swept to the place where the house had stood. She winced as she took in the empty spot on the horizon. As she drew closer, the broken chimney came into view, making the landscape look even more forlorn. Her throat thickened and she swallowed the ball of tears as she pulled on the reins to stop the horse and buggy. The stench of smoke lay heavy in the air. Her eyes and nose stung from it. She didn’t see Lonestar about, so she climbed down from the vehicle and went toward the barn to roust him. The mules came toward the corral fence and chortled and shrieked at her.
“Oh, hush, you crazy critters,” she said, but with a smile because she appreciated General and Sarge and got a kick out of their clownish personalities.
Clover, Quick, and Majesty were inside the barn, standing outside their stalls eating strewn grain and alfalfa off the ground. Lonestar wielded a rake inside the stalls, flinging and spreading fresh hay. Gussie grabbed the broom resting against the stall wall and went to work sweeping the soiled bedding into a bundle. Sensing her behind him, Lonestar pivoted to face her. She lifted her brows, waiting for him to say something, but he didn’t. Instead, he turned back to his work. She made an ugly face at his back and resisted the urge to give him a swift kick.
“What’s got you acting like you were raised on sour milk?” she asked when the silence jangled her nerves.
; His shoulders straightened and he paused in his work before resuming. “I’m just going about my chores. You don’t have to do that. I can do it.”
“I know that.” She rested her chin on the top of the broom handle and watched his jerky, almost angry movements for a few minutes. Erik’s clothes were a mite too big in some places on him and too snug in others. Same as the clothes Susan had loaned her. The bodice smashed her breasts and the waist sagged around her middle. “Lonestar, put down that rake and talk to me. Why are you angry at me? What’d I do?”
“Nothing. I’m not angry . . .” He bit off the rest and flung aside the rake. He looked at her side-eyed, his lips forming a straight, imposing line. “You should stay at Susan and Erik’s.”
“Why, when there is work to be done here? Are you going to tell me what’s on your mind or are we going to act plumb silly all day long?”
He puffed out a long breath before exiting the stall. Moving two barrels closer together near the open barn door, he motioned for her to sit on one. After she did, he took the other. He said nothing for a full minute. Just stared out at the mules in the corral. Clover moved closer and nudged his shoulder, snuffled the back of his neck. Gussie rolled her eyes with the realization that she was jealous of the forward animal. He waved the horse away from him and Gussie felt that the rejection was partly aimed at her, too.
“Augusta, the thing is, this barn is going to be home for quite a spell. There’s not enough money to buy lumber and nails. Once the supplies are bought, then it’s going to take months to build even a small house with just me and Erik working on it when we can free up the time.”
“I understand that.”
He frowned. “So, it’s probably wise if I keep to our bargain and give you money to start up somewhere new.” He turned his palms up and stared at them as if he were reading his future there. “Our deal was that I’d give you half of what I paid for this land. I can’t do that because I’ve spent most of the money I had left. But I can give you enough for you to go somewhere else and set yourself up there. I’ll send you money every few months until the cotton crop comes in and then I’ll pay what’s left of what I owe you. That’s the best I can do for now.”