Cherokee Rose

by Judy Alter

  "Bo, what's the matter?"

  "We can't act like that," he said softly, looking away from me. "We aren't married, and you don't want to marry me, and we... well, we just can't put temptation in our way. I mean it. I won't be helpin' you ride anymore."

  "Bo..." But I didn't know what I wanted to say. Part of me was tempted to tell him I'd probably never get a chance to ride in a show and it was a moot point anyway. But I was smart enough, even then, to know that I couldn't settle down and marry Bo Johnson just because I wasn't sure I'd ever get a better offer. That wouldn't have been fair to him. And in the back of my mind, I think I believed that Bo would follow me wherever I wanted to go, in spite of what he said.

  "Come on," he said too heartily, "let's race."

  We arrived at Louise's panting and breathless and pretending to be in good spirits from our race.

  "There's a letter for you from Colonel Miller," she said.

  Excitement making me blind and thoughtless, I grabbed the letter from the stand in the hall and ripped it open. " 'Dear Tommy Jo,' " I read, " 'I have finally made plans to take the Miller 101 Wild West Exhibition on the road. I would very much like you to be part of the show. We will meet at the 101 on Sunday, April 25, to discuss the tour. Please let me know if you will join us.' It's signed Colonel Zack Miller. April 25—that's two weeks from now!" Hardly able to contain my excitement, I turned to wave the letter at Bo.

  He was gone.

  "He just turned around and left," Louise said, her voice level and without any sign of how she felt about what had transpired.

  "Left?" My stomach tied itself into a knot so tight that I winced.

  "Left. Shrugged his shoulders and left."

  A great wail escaped from my mouth, almost as though it came from another being, and I ran to my room, sobs beating me to the door and echoing after me as I slammed it.

  Later, Louise and I talked, though she mostly listened, and asked only one question: "What are you going to do?"

  Astounded, I looked at her. "Go to the Miller 101," I said. I may have been heartbroken about Bo, but there was never any choice in my mind.

  * * *

  I left for the 101 ten days later. This time, though, I'd been to the ranch to see Mama and Papa, and I'd been to the corral to talk to Bo. Neither visit was pleasant.

  At first, Mama seemed herself. "Thomasina! I'm so glad to see you. I've just baked a pound cake—your favorite—I must have known you were coming." Her face was lit by a wide smile, and I walked into a welcoming hug.

  "Tommy Jo," Papa said, standing behind her, "what brings you here?"

  I could have read anger or hostility into his words, but I didn't. And I didn't bristle. I simply said, "I came to say good-bye for a while. The 101's going to take a show on the road, and they've asked me to go with them."

  Mama frowned. "A show on the road? You mean you won't be in Guthrie? You'll be traveling, unsupervised... like a hoyden...."

  I wasn't sure what hoyden meant, but I could tell from Mama's expression that it wasn't good. Behind her, Papa rolled his eyes heavenward.

  "Mama, Colonel Zack will look after me, strict as Papa would." Well, it was probably the truth. "You won't have to worry 'bout me doing anything you wouldn't approve of. You raised me right."

  She looked at me with a blank expression, as though she were suddenly trying to figure out who I was.

  "Tommy Jo," Papa said with real regret in his voice, "there's no way I can go with you." He nodded toward Mama and put a protective arm around her.

  Did my relief show? "Papa, thank you, but I don't need you. You need to tend to your work at Luckett's and take care of Mama. I'm eighteen now, and I can take care of myself." I paused a minute and grinned at him. "Or at least, I darn sure better learn pretty quick."

  Papa held out his arms, and I didn't back away, as I would have a few months earlier. Instead, I went to him and hugged him hard.

  But then he said, "I'll write Zack Miller tonight, tell him my concerns."

  "Papa!" I wailed, but he just turned away.

  I stayed for supper, which was roast that Mama had put in the oven, and potatoes and greens that Papa and I fixed while Mama sat in the rocking chair, smiling a little, knitting furiously, and speaking only when spoken to.

  "What? Oh yes, that's lovely, James," she said when asked if the roast was done, and "You shouldn't stay up past your bedtime," to me when the subject of my traveling came up.

  I left the ranch in the late afternoon, tears welling in my eyes for the life that Mama could have had and didn't. When I reached Louise's, I barged through the kitchen and up to my room without a word to anyone—especially Louise, who was doing dishes and gave me a long hard look—and hid myself. I was going to be a great roper, but my mother and father weren't going to enjoy it, for various reasons. It was enough to make anyone cry, and I did.

  Louise came to my room later. "You all right?" she asked softly, opening the door just a crack.

  I still sat in the chair next to the bed, wearing the rumpled clothes I'd worn all day. Without looking, I knew that my eyes were red and my hair wild. "I guess so," I said. "It's just not fair—and don't tell me that life is never fair. Papa used to tell me that."

  "It's fair," she said, shrugging. "We get what we want. That's why we have to watch out, or we'll end up where we're headed. Your mama didn't want to deal with reality anymore, so she's gotten what she wants. It's hard on you, but—"

  "It's hard on Papa," I said, though my voice held a question.

  "He's probably gotten what he wants, too," she said. "He can protect your mama, without worrying about making her happy because now that's impossible. And he'll probably feel less guilty about coming to see me, or going to St. Louis, or—"

  "You'll still let him come?"

  She bit her lip. "I probably will. I don't owe your mama anything. But in truth, I doubt he'll come anymore. I think his energy is all taken up with your mama. She's gotten one of the things she wanted when it's too late to enjoy it."

  "You'll miss him?"

  "Some," she said, shrugging, "but not too much. There are other fish in the sea, as you'll soon find out, Tommy Jo."

  Louise left, and I sat in front of the mirror at my dressing table for a long time, brushing my hair and staring at myself. What did the future hold? What was going to happen to me? Would I be all right without my mother and father?

  My meeting with Bo did little to reassure me and created new complications in my world. He was sitting at the shabby desk in the corner of the barn he called an office, dusty papers piled around him, straw sticking out between them. Bo's attention was concentrated on a ledger open before him, and he grasped a pencil tightly in his hand, as though it would fly away if he relaxed for a moment.

  "Bo?"

  He threw the pencil down as he would a burning-hot branding iron. "Damn accounts. Never can figure who owes me what, but it doesn't look like enough to buy feed for the next week," he said, his voice unusually loud and angry.

  Impulsively, I said, "Come with me to the 101. They probably need help." I guess I was thinking I could have my cake and eat it, too, go with the show and not give up Bo. But the minute I said anything, I knew it was wrong. Still, Bo's answer surprised me.

  He stood up and brushed a hand through his hair. "I am going with you," he said. "Louise and I talked about it. Can't let you ride up there alone again." Was that a slight grin?

  If it was, he turned solemn immediately. "But I ain't stayin', Tommy Jo. I ain't running along behind you."

  "I never meant—"

  He shook his head. "Naw, you didn't mean, but that's what it'd be. I'd be the man that followed Tommy Jo Burns, and if you get to be as famous as you think you will—and I don't doubt it'll happen—things'd get worse and worse." He paced behind that small desk, and then turned to slap the wall behind him in frustration.

  "I could have made a life for you here—a life with horses, and babies, of course"—that slight grin came again and fade
d at once—"but that's all I can offer. I love you, Tommy Jo Burns, but I won't ruin my life for you."

  I stood stock still, my mouth open in speechless amazement. No man had ever told me he loved me, and it gave me great pause. I walked through the barn, rubbing the nose of this horse and then that as they stuck their heads out the half doors in curiosity. Bo simply stayed behind his desk, framed against a wall that held harnesses and bridles and all manner of tack hung on random nails.

  When I walked back to him, I was crying, not the loud sobs of recent days but tears that wet my cheeks, no matter how insistently I wiped them away. "It's—it's what I've wanted all my life," I said. "I can't... if I backed away now, I'd never know."

  He wrapped his arms around me, comforting, warm, and secure. "I know that, Tommy Jo. I know you can't ever take the life I'm offering you. It's just the way things happen sometimes. I'm not angry, just sad."

  I held on for dear life and wondered once again if I was being the world's dumbest fame-seeker. In my mind for just a second I saw a headline that read "World's Greatest Lady Roper" and below it an article that began, "The lonely figure of Tommy Jo Burns, never married, estranged from her parents..."I shivered.

  "What's the matter?" Bo asked, releasing his hold on me. "Ghost walk over your grave?"

  "Not funny, Bo," I said.

  * * *

  At least my parting with Louise was less emotional. "I'll come see you when you're famous," she said, and then let loose with that deep laughter. "Meantime, you're always welcome here." She stood at the back door, a clean white apron over her cotton dress, her hair neatly swept up on her head. She looked to be maybe ten years older than me, no more, a friend but certainly not another mother to me. Or was she?

  "I'll write," I promised. And then, jumping out of the buckboard for one last hug, I said, "Thank you. I—I don't know that I could be doing this if I still lived with Papa."

  "We'll never know that," she answered, "but I'm truly glad for you, Tommy Jo. Go show 'em what a Cherokee Strip girl can do!"

  Bo drove the buckboard from the stable, a roomy and sturdy vehicle but not one built for comfort. "Best bring a pillow," he'd warned me, and we hadn't gone very far before I was grateful for the pillow that cushioned my seat. Still, Louise's little carriage wouldn't have held my belongings—"You're not just going for one show this time," she warned me, as we sewed and put together a hasty wardrobe for me. Sam was tied on behind the buckboard, and I could have sworn the look in his eye was "Oh, oh, here we go again!"

  Excitement won out over doubt, and my spirits were high that morning as we started out. Bo, bless him, matched me in mood, and we chattered about the weather, how high the bluestem grass was for April, how the horses looked this spring, whether or not we'd had enough rain—anything but the Miller 101 Wild West Show and my future. It was a pleasant ride, and I loved Bo for not making me confront my decision head-on. He'd said his piece, and he said no more.

  As we approached the ranch, Bo saw the same fields I had—wheat, milo, alfalfa, onions—and the apple orchards. "Apples!" he'd said to me. "They grow those up north, Michigan and all those cold places. Who owns all this?"

  "The Millers," I said, a bit impatiently. "You know, the three brothers and their mother."

  He looked sideways at me with a grin. "Any of those brothers single? You could do worse than to marry into this ranch. You'd get your show and everything else beside."

  "Not funny, Bo."

  Colonel Zack greeted us at the ranch. When I introduced Bo, he said as casually as he could, "Sure some spread you got here, Colonel."

  Colonel Zack beamed. "Glad you like it. My father, he built this place. But he never thought about a Wild West show." Pride was evident in his grin. Then he added ruefully, "My brothers aren't too sure, either."

  Bo ducked his head a little and muttered, "I bet not." But then he said heartily, "Must make a man proud to look out over this place." Bo was easily impressed, obvious in his amazement.

  The colonel took a liking to him. "Tommy Jo, you go on up to the house and say hello to Mama. She'll be glad to see you. I'll take Bo here and show him around. We'll bring your stuff up later."

  "Sure," I said, somewhat put out that the two of them were going to go off and leave me behind. Bo knew—I could tell by his look and the slight shrug of his shoulders—but he followed the colonel without hesitation.

  Mrs. Miller greeted me like I was the daughter she'd never had, what with all those boys, and showed me to the same room I'd shared with Prairie Rose before. "Prairie Rose ought to be here tonight," she said. "Zack's had a letter saying she'll come, if he'll let her trick ride. And I 'bout beat him into agreeing, though he insists this is a ranch exhibition and nobody really trick rides on a ranch."

  I grinned happily. "Prairie Rose's coming? I haven't heard from her in months." I might almost forget about letting Bo go, if I had Prairie Rose for company—but as soon as that thought crossed my mind, I dismissed it as unworthy.

  Prairie Rose arrived in a flurry, like she always did, and we barely had time to whisper "Hello, how are you?" and "What's new?" before we were called to dinner. Bo waited in the parlor with Colonel Zack, and when he was introduced to Prairie Rose, he made so much over her that I wanted to kick him.

  "Prairie Rose! Tommy Jo's sure talked a lot about you," Bo said, holding her hand and looking straight into her eyes. "She admires you, and if Tommy Jo says that, then I do, too."

  I wanted to lurch across the room and break that handhold. More than that, I wanted to change my name to something terribly feminine, like Prairie Rose, and learn to charm men, the way Rose did. Bo was positively ignoring me. At dinner, he asked Rose about her riding—"Tommy Jo's told me all about your tricks, and she had me helping her practice all this winter."

  Bo Johnson, I thought, why must you blabber so?

  Colonel Zack gave me a sharp look. "Rose will be doing a little trick riding," he said sternly, "but you'll be roping, Tommy Jo. This ain't a circus. It's a ranch exhibition."

  "Yes, sir," I murmured, "I know that."

  He settled back to his pork chops and potatoes, contentedly, as though he'd made his point. I picked at my food, angry at Bo, the colonel, even Rose. Somehow this wasn't going the way I wanted. I'd practiced almost a year so that I could be a trick rider in someone's show, and here I was at last in a show—ordered to rope and do no more.

  After dinner, the men retired to the parlor for cigars, and though Rose and I offered to help with the dishes, Mama Miller sent us packing. We didn't repeat our offer, and soon we were in our room.

  "Wow!" Rose said, pulling off the high-top shoes she'd donned just for dinner and rubbing her feet as if they ached badly. "He's great! Where'd you find him, Tommy Jo?"

  "Bo?" I asked stupidly. "He has a stable in Guthrie. Louise arranged for him to help me practice."

  "And what did you practice?" she asked with a mischievous grin.

  "You know. The tricks you told me—I can pretty much stand in the saddle and pick something off the ground, and—"

  "I'd have sure practiced something else," Rose said, "with a man like that."

  She made me feel inadequate and stupid, and I resented it. "He wants me to stay in Guthrie," I said shortly, "and I can't do that."

  Rose, by now parading in front of the mirror and examining her figure—she was wearing a corduroy skirt with a high tight waist and a sharply pleated white shirt—turned to look at me. "You mean, live in Guthrie and not ever join a show, not ever rope professionally?"

  I nodded my head unhappily.

  She was next to me on the bed, her arms around me, in an instant. "You can't do that, Tommy Jo! You've got to do what you do best."

  "I know. I tried to get Bo to see if the colonel didn't have work for him, but he won't do that. Says he won't follow me around."

  "Well," she said huffily, rising again to parade before the mirror, "it's his loss."

  And mine, I thought miserably.

  Next morning a
t breakfast, Colonel Zack said in a hearty tone, "I've tried to tempt this man, Tommy Jo, offered him job after job, but he says he has a stable in Guthrie, and that's where he wants to be."

  Bo stared at me, but I managed to answer lightly, "That's right, Colonel. It's a fine stable, and Bo's happy there."

  Bo hitched up the team and prepared to leave right after breakfast, and after he'd said his good-byes to everyone at the White House, I walked out with him to the buckboard.

  "It's a whole new world you're moving into, Tommy Jo," he said, "and I wish you well in it."

  "You could be part of it," I said, almost pouting.

  "We talked about that, and I can't do it. You know that. If it goes sour for you, I'll be in Guthrie waiting. But I hope that don't happen. I hope you're a triumph, and if you ride in Madison Square Garden in New York, I'll come cheer for you."

  "Promise?"

  "I promise," he said, and kissed me softly on the forehead. Then he added, "You keep in touch," which almost sounded as though I were a stranger, and he was into the buckboard and urging the horses down the road. When he was a good ways beyond me, he turned to lift his hat and wave. I waved back and ran into the house.

  "Honey," Rose said from her wicker seat on the veranda, "there's lots more men in this world. He's wonderful, but he's not irreplaceable."

  I wasn't sure, right then, that I believed her. It was scary to send Bo off, like sending off my last link with home and a past that, however unsatisfactory, was familiar. Whether I recognized it or not, my old life was behind me, and I was beginning a new adventure. I was both scared and excited.

  Chapter 6

  Life has its disappointments for everyone, I guess, but it was a big disappointment to me, years later, that I'd never been a trick rider. Bo left me at the 101 in full faith that next time he saw me I'd be a famous trick rider, and I, young and ignorant of life's catastrophes, thought so, too. It didn't work out that way at all, though. First it was the colonel who kept me from trick riding, and then it was Rose herself, though she didn't know it.

  "There'll be no trick riding in this show," the colonel announced firmly at our first rehearsal. "It isn't part of ordinary ranch work, and this is an exhibition. Tommy Jo, you'll rope and ride broncs. Prairie Rose, you'll ride broncs, except for the grand entry. You can do that trick business then." He turned on his heel and left us.