by Shirl Henke
In the midst of the excitement, Adam, Caleb, and Lenore burst into the melee from the courtyard, where they had been having a picnic breakfast. As soon as the adults induced Adam, at sixteen the eldest, to take the younger ones down to the corral to look at the new foals, Deborah, Rafe, and Charlee headed toward the kitchen.
“Have I got news for you! But first let me look at you,” Charlee said when they entered the sunny, spacious kitchen. She held Deborah at arm's length for an inspection. “Yep, you're definitely pregnant. Your last letter said the end of July, right?”
Laughing at her friend's rather indelicate tally of her due date, Deborah replied, “Yes, I think the end of July or the first of August. And as I wrote you, I'm feeling wonderful.”
“Reason I wanted to know,” Charlee began matter-of-factly, as she bit into a fluffy biscuit, “is that there's someone in San Antonio who's dying to see you. It's been, let's see, nearly eleven years, and in her words, 'Jeehosaphat! Scarce a letter a year gits through them damn-blasted mountains!’ ”
“Obedience is back!” Deborah's eyes widened with joy, then clouded over. “Oh, Charlee, Washington didn't—he isn't—”
Charlee laughed. “No, he wasn't so inconsiderate as to die like her first three husbands. He's with her. But you know Obedience. She took it into her head that eleven years was long enough being a fur trapper's wife in the Rockies, and she ‘plumb pined away fer a real city 'n' a soft bunk.’ So—”
“Her defenseless husband didn't have a chance,” Rafe said with a resigned expression. Both women burst into new peals of laughter.
“You never met her husband, obviously,” Charlee replied. “Wash Oakley would fill that door and could pull those cottonwoods out back from the ground like garden carrots! They've taken over the boardinghouse for me, and I have to say I'm relieved.”
“I thought Mrs. Raufîng was doing a splendid job with it,” Deborah responded.
Charlee let out a disgusted snort. “She was until old Cy Witherspoon up and married her and had the temerity to forbid his wife to work!”
“Imagine that,” Rafe said innocently.
Deborah fixed him with a mock glare. “Just so you remember, darling, the only reason I sold the boardinghouse to Charlee in the first place was that we live too far away for me to oversee it.”
Charlee added, “Bluebonnet was close enough for me to keep an eye on it when Gerta Raufing was managing it, but when she left I needed someone else. Who better than Obedience? After all, it was her place before you took it over, Deborah.”
“I can't wait to see her. Oh, Charlee, has she changed much? Oh, how silly of me—you never met her before she left San Antonio.”
“She and Wash are just settling in and have a lot of work to do fixing up the place. He's adding a whole new wing on to the east side—four more rooms. The city's grown so much since your last visit, Deborah, you'd scarcely recognize it. You can imagine how amazed Obedience and Wash are with its size. We have a new soap factory on Laredo Street and a Dr. Heusinger has opened an apothecary shop on Main. The new courthouse and jail are finished. Oh, and a fascinating old man named Clarence Pemberton has begun a new newspaper, the San Antonio Star. Tell me you'll go back with us for a visit with Obedience. She's so eager to see you!”
“Oh, I'm dying to see her, too,” Deborah said, looking over to Rafe.
Coming up behind her, he placed his arms around her slim shoulders. “Not until after the baby's born, Deborah. You're less than four months away from delivery. It's not safe to travel so far.”
“I went to Austin for the statehood ceremonies when I was six months pregnant with Sarah,” Charlee reminded him.
“Austin is only seventy miles from San Antonio and Jim was with you. We're nearly two hundred miles away. Quite a difference,” Rafe countered. “And Jim was right to assume I can't go with Deborah now because of spring roundup here. It's just too dangerous in her condition,” he said with finality.
Melanie had heard the squeals of the children and Deborah and Charlee's noisy reunion but was oddly hesitant about coming down. At times Charlee was shockingly outspoken, even what Grandpa's Boston friends would call vulgar, but Melanie liked that about her. However, Charlee had always been Leandro Velasquez's special friend. Melanie remembered that day in Austin at the statehood ceremony when she had watched Lee and Charlee together, almost like sister and brother. Charlee and Jim had named their youngest child after the outlaw.
“And that's what he's become,” she sniffed, “an outlaw wanted for two grisly murders in a barroom brawl.” Still, in the quiet of the night Melanie had often tossed and turned in her solitary bed, recalling a handsome dark face with piercing jet eyes and a slashing white smile: her first girlhood crush. Though five years had passed, she could still remember the devastation she had felt in Austin when she found out he was married.
Banishing all the uneasy feelings about Lee Velasquez from her mind, Melanie headed downstairs to greet Charlee and her children. Just as she neared the kitchen door, Melanie overheard her father's pronouncement regarding Deborah's traveling while pregnant. Looking at her mother's swollen body, she thought angrily, No man will ever have that kind of hold on me—to make me a prisoner of my own body.
Charlee caught sight of Melanie in the doorway and turned to give her a hug. “At least one full-grown member of this family is only as big as I am,” she said, hugging Melanie.
Just as she had done with Deborah, Charlee inspected Melanie and puckered her freckled nose. “Ugh, your mama wrote me you'd gotten some weird notions in Boston, but I never thought it meant you'd dress to hide all those terrific curves. Hell, six months pregnant I never had breasts that size!”
Deborah's face crimsoned even as she laughed. “Charlee, you'll never change!”
Melanie blushed nervously, all too aware of how men looked at her lushly feminine body. She had never liked it. Except when Lee admired it, a voice from nowhere cut into her thoughts. Squelching it, she said, “How are things in San Antonio?”
Charlee launched into a lengthy discussion about the city and all the exciting events of the past months. When she mentioned that a newspaper was being printed in San Antonio again and the publisher was from Massachusetts, Melanie's eyes lit up.
“What kind of paper? I mean, do they print stories from back east? About abolition?”
“Not much about that,” Charlee replied dismissively, “but the editor is looking for someone to write a column about social events. San Antonio has fancy dances, teas, political dinners—all sorts of things. He needs a reporter. Say, didn't your mother say you wrote some things for newspapers back in Boston?” Charlee looked from Melanie to Deborah, then over to Rafe, who scowled silently.
“I wrote for The Liberator,” Melanie replied with pride in her voice.
“A scurrilous rag that excoriated President Tyler and Congress for admitting Texas to the Union. Called it a victory for the 'slavocracy,' ” Rafe said with rising ire.
“Oh, we had a real argument over that one,” Melanie said. “But Mr. Garrison's really a lamb. Only his rhetoric is fierce. I set him straight about all the Texians who don't believe in slavery.”
“I can imagine you made an impression on him,” Charlee replied gravely.
Rafe snorted and Deborah smiled quietly.
Melanie's gold eyes were glowing now. “I'm a trained reporter. I could work for that paper. I've even helped with presses. Do you think the editor might hire me?”
“Wait a minute,” Rafe said, but Deborah placed a restraining hand on his arm.
“Rafael, if she could be employed as a ladies'-page reporter...” Deborah said slowly, her mind working swiftly.
Charlee immediately picked up on the idea. “Yes, of course she could get the job. I'm sure of it. She's a fellow New Englander—even if by adoption. And Obedience's boardinghouse would be a perfectly suitable place for her to live. Jim and I are close by. Why not?”
Two small smiling faces turned eagerly toward Rafe
Fleming.
“Why go off to San Antonio? You just came home from four years in Boston. Your life is here, Melanie, with us,” Rafe said softly.
Melanie turned to her beloved father, then looked intuitively to her mother for support. “Papa, I've loved growing up on Renacimiento; but since I came home from school, I haven't fit in. I need to work—to do something with my life. I don't want to go back to Boston, even though I do love Grandpa and liked working for Mr. Garrison. But there are lots of things in need of attention right here in Texas—that is, if I was in a city, working for a newspaper where I could raise an audience!”
Deborah nodded. “Maybe this is the very thing we've been in need of, Rafael—a way for Melanie to strike out on her own and make new friends. After all, San Antonio is a large city, full of many interesting, educated...people.” And eligible men.
Rafe looked at his wife, then to Melanie and Charlee. Shrugging in defeat, he said, “If it'll make you happy, princess, I guess your mother and I—not to mention your sister and brothers—will just have to get along without you!” He grinned as Melanie rushed into his arms with a squeal of glee.
Chapter Seven
San Antonio, 1852
“It's been so long since we were in San Antonio for a visit, I'd scarcely recognize your place, Charlee,” Melanie said as the two women rode up to the boardinghouse.
“Well, it's not my place anymore. I'll be making the final arrangements to sell it to Obedience and Wash this week. All these years I kept it and had other people run it for me as...as sort of a symbol of self-reliance, I guess.” Charlee paused thoughtfully.
Melanie looked over at the spunky twenty-eight-year-old woman who had become her fast friend on the journey to Bluebonnet. “I think I understand.”
“Of course you do—Deborah raised you, didn't she?” Charlee shot back. “In a way, she raised me too, although we're much closer in age. I came to her boardinghouse a scared kid who'd just ended a disastrous relationship with a certain arrogant Tejano rancher.”
“Jim?” Melanie asked, although she was certain it must be Charlee’s husband.
“Yes, I was a scrawny, clumsy, Missouri hill girl hopelessly in love with this elegant ranchero who was engaged to a fancy Tejana. Deborah made me over into someone who can pass for a lady—when I want to.” She winked at Melanie, who emitted a burble of laughter. “Deborah also got me to thinking about what it meant to be a woman and stand on my own two feet, to be beholden to no man.”
“I know how you feel. Mama and I've had lots of long talks over the years since I came to live with her and Papa. You know, she gives Obedience lots of credit for helping her learn to stand on her ‘own two feet’ when she arrived in Texas back in ‘thirty-six. I've heard so many stories about Obedience that I can't wait to meet her.”
Charlee laughed. “Just wait, my formidable Boston abolitionist. You'll be overwhelmed. Even Hellfíre keeps a respectful eye on Obedience Oakley since the time she caught him stealing a pork chop from a platter by the stove while she was making supper.”
Knowing the scrofulous old orange tom to be a fiercely independent beast, Melanie cocked her head inquiringly. “What did Obedience do to him?” In Melanie's memory no one had ever crossed the huge battle-scarred cat and come off the better for it.
Charlee's green eyes danced. “I hate to tell and spoil his reputation. She grabbed him with both hands—one around his tail, the other in a choke hold—and pulled his head and neck back until he spit the pork chop out. His eyes practically popped from their sockets before he'd let go of his prize. Then, she plunked him into a vat of pickling vinegar 'ta cool down th' consarn thievin' varmint’!”
At the picture of a sodden pickled orange cat shaking mustard seeds and dill weed from his fur, Melanie burst out laughing. “I can't wait to meet her!”
“Jeehosaphat! ‘Bout time yew got back, Charlee. Where's Deborah?” A deep, braying voice boomed across the front porch of the large white frame boardinghouse, followed by the groaning of the wooden steps as Obedience came barreling down them. “Yew must be Deborah's daughter Melanie. She wrote yew took after yer daddy 'n' wuz a real beauty. Shore 'nough true, child.” The rawboned giantess practically lifted Melanie off the ground in a bear hug of welcome. As she struggled to regain her breath, Melanie said, “I'm so happy to meet you, Obedience. Mama's told me ever so much about you.”
“Where's your ma ‘n pa? I been hankerin' ta meet thet feller fer a pretty considerable o' years now,” Obedience replied.
It was difficult for Melanie to tell if Obedience's question about her father was merely curious or slightly hostile. “They're still back at Renacimiento, I'm afraid. You see, Mama's expecting again the end of July, and Papa wouldn't let her travel this far before the baby's born.”
“I tried to tell the overprotective fool it wouldn't hurt her, but you know men,” Charlee said with a patronizing air. “Jim is still convinced I shouldn't ride to town alone.”
“Jeehosaphat! I know yew set him straight, but I cain't figger my Deborah puttin' up with sech tomfoolery—unless she's doin' poorly.” Her brown eyes squinted in concern as she looked at Melanie for confirmation.
“Oh, no. Quite the opposite. She's been feeling wonderful; but with roundup going on, Papa couldn't get away and they agreed that she'd wait until fall, when they can all come as a family. No one—not even Papa—makes my mother do anything she doesn't agree to,” Melanie said staunchly.
Charlee laughed and started up the steps. “Let's go in and we'll tell you about Melanie's plans here in San Antonio....”
* * * *
“Yew think yew kin git thet prissy-ass Pemberton ta give yew a job writin’ fer his newspaper?” Obedience asked. Then, observing the determined set of Melanie's jaw, she answered her own question. “Yep, mebee yew will, at thet.”
“I'm a fellow New Englander, at least by adoption, and I've worked on newspapers in Boston,” Melanie replied.
“We persuaded Rafe that you and Wash will be ideal chaperons for his eldest daughter,” Charlee added puckishly.
“An’ why not? I got me three granddaughters now, back in Tennessee. I reckon I kin take on a fourth one right here in Santone!”
“I know I'm leaving you in capable hands, Melanie. Not that you need any help, mind,” Charlee added quickly. “If I'm to get home before one foul-tempered, yellow-haired Texian stomps in, demanding dinner, I've got to head back to Bluebonnet.”
Melanie couldn't resist a laugh. Having met the fearsome Jim Slade on numerous occasions, she was not deceived. Neither was Obedience. “Yew git on ‘n I'll bring them papers out from thet lawyer feller soon's he's got 'em writ up. Feels real good bein' a woman o' property agin after trapsin' clear ta th' Canady border ‘n back a half-dozen times in 'leven years.” She paused to consider as they walked toward the front door of the big house. “Reckon ever’ woman does a fool thang er two fer a man—onliest thang is ta be shore it's fer the right man!”
The older women laughed, but Melanie said with the certainty of untried youth, “You speak for yourselves. I don't ever plan to do anything foolish for any man.”
“I reckon I'll wait on thet one,” Obedience said with a slow wink at Charlee.
* * * *
The newspaper office was a small cluttered place of roughly hewn whitewashed wood, squeezed between two large store buildings of Spanish style in the older part of town. The large glass window on the front door was neatly lettered San Antonio Star.
Melanie peered inside the grimy window and could see the familiar outline of a Washington Hand Press through the dusty gloom. It was early, scarcely eight a.m., but what good newspaperman wouldn't be busy at work by now? Straightening her unadorned straw bonnet and smoothing her businesslike gray suit jacket and skirt, Melanie knocked firmly on the door.
From behind the metal labyrinth of the press, an old man moved to open the door. He bobbed his head in a polite greeting. “Mornin', ma'am. Mr. Pemberton's not here yet. I'm Amos Johnston, his
assistant.”
Melanie smiled and offered her hand to the startled black man, who quickly wiped the ink from his fingers onto a rag he pulled from his pocket and then gingerly returned her salutation. She loved the familiar smells of linseed oil and carbon black. “I'm Melanie Fleming and I'm here to see Mr. Pemberton about a job.”
Amos Johnston's wizened face took on a puzzled expression. “A job, ma'am?”
“Yes. As a reporter. My friends, the Slades from Bluebonnet, told me he was looking for someone to cover local stories.”
“Oh, er, well, I don't rightly know. If you'd care to come back this afternoon, I expect he'll be back by then. He went out to try and get an interview with a fellow born and raised here who ran off and became a scalper down in Chihuahua. Just came back last week, or so Mr. Pemberton heard. He lives outside town, but if I know the boss, he'll track him down and get his story.”
“So he's doing his own reporting as well as editorials and advertising. Are you his only employee?” Melanie asked as she drew a copy of last night's Star from beneath her arm.
“Yes, ma'am—er Miss Fleming. I came west with Mr. Pemberton all the way from Massachusetts. He's a good man with high standards. Guess that's why he hasn't hired a reporter yet,” Amos said uneasily. And he'll never hire a woman!
“I can see that he's good—strong editorials, good bold headlines, clear type style. You're a fine printer, Mr. Johnston, but I still can plainly see the two of you need help. Mr. Pemberton's using the pieces submitted by the city council and the ladies' guild without editing or checking them, isn't he?” At a nod from his grizzled head, Melanie added, “I know. I'm sure he hasn't time to rewrite, but the style is clumsy, and the news can be repetitious and slanted when he just takes whatever is offered and runs it. I could cover council meetings, the court, even the ladies' circles and social events,” she added with a hint of martyrdom in her voice.