Lonesome Dove, Page 73

  The ladies' magazines had stories and parts of novels in them, in many of which were ladies who led lives so different from hers that she felt she might as well be on another planet. She liked Thackeray's ladies better than Dickens's, and George Eliot's best of all — but it was a frustration that the mail came so seldom. Sometimes she would have to wait for two or three months for her Blackwoods, wondering all the time what was happening to the people in the stories. Reading stories by all the women, not only George Eliot, but Mrs. Gore and Mrs. Gaskell and Charlotte Yonge, she sometimes had a longing to do what those women did — write stories. But those women lived in cities or towns and had many friends and relatives nearby. It discouraged her to look out the window at the empty plains and reflect that even if she had the eloquence to write, and the time, she had nothing to write about. With Maude Jones dead, she seldom saw another woman, and had no relatives near except her husband and her children. There was an aunt in Cincinnati, but they only exchanged letters once or twice a year. Her characters would have to be the horses and the hens, if she ever wrote, for the menfolk that came by weren't interesting enough to put in books, it seemed to her. None of them were capable of the kind of talk men managed in English novels.

  She longed, sometimes, to talk to a person who actually wrote stories and had them printed in magazines. It interested her to speculate how it was done: whether they used people they knew, or just made people up. Once she had even ordered some big writing tablets, thinking she might try it anyway, even if she didn't know how, but that was in the hopeful years before her boys died. With all the work that had to be done she never actually sat down and tried to write anything — and then the boys died and her feeling changed. Once the sight of the writing tablets had made her hopeful, but after those deaths it ceased to matter. The tablets were just another reproach to her, something willful she had wanted. She burned the tablets one day, trembling with anger and pain, as if the paper and not the weather had been somehow responsible for the deaths of her boys. And, for a time, she stopped reading the magazines. The stories in them seemed hateful to her: how could people talk that way and spend their time going to balls and parties, when children died and had to be buried?

  But a few years passed, and Clara went back to the stories in the magazines. She loved to read aloud, and she read snatches of them to her daughters as soon as they were big enough to listen. Bob didn't particularly like it, but he tolerated it. No other woman he knew read as much as his wife, and he thought it might be the cause of certain of her vanities: the care she took with her hair, for instance, washing it every day and brushing it. To him it seemed a waste — hair was just hair.

  As Clara watched the wagon the girls had spotted drawing closer, she saw Cholo come riding in with two mares who were ready to foal. Cholo had seen the wagon too, and had come to look after her. He was a cautious old man, as puzzled by Clara as he was devoted to her. It was her recklessness that disturbed him. She was respectful of dangerous horses, but seemed to have no fear at all of dangerous men. She laughed when Cholo tried to counsel her. She was not even afraid of Indians, though Cholo had showed her the scars of the arrow wounds he had suffered.

  Now he penned the mares and loped over to be sure she wasn't threatened by whoever was coming in the wagon. They kept a shotgun in the saddle shed, but Clara only used it to kill snakes, and she only killed snakes because they were always stealing her eggs. At times the hens seemed to her almost more trouble than they were worth, for they had to be protected constantly from coyotes, skunks, badgers, even hawks and eagles.

  "I don't see but two men, Cholo," Clara said, watching the wagon.

  "Two men is two too many if they are bad men," Cholo said.

  "Bad men would have a better team," Clara said. "Find any colts?" Cholo shook his head. His hair was white — Clara had never been able to get his age out of him, but she imagined he was seventy-five at least, perhaps eighty. At night by the fire, with the work done, Cholo wove horsehair lariats. Clara loved to watch the way his fingers worked. When a horse died or had to be killed, Cholo always saved its mane and tail for his ropes. He could weave them of rawhide too, and once had made one for her of buckskin, although she didn't rope. Bob had been puzzled by the gift — "Clara couldn't rope a post," he said — but Clara was not puzzled at all. She had been very pleased. It was a beautiful gift; Cholo had the finest manners. She knew he appreciated her as she appreciated him. That was the year she bought him the coat. Sometimes, reading her magazines, she would look up and see Cholo weaving a rope and imagine that if she ever did try to write a story she would write it about him. It would be very different from any of the stories she read in the English magazines. Cholo was not much like an English gentleman, but it was his gentleness and skill with horses, in contrast to Bob's incompetence, that made her want badly to encourage him to stay with them. He talked little, which would be a problem if she put him in a story—the people in the stories she read seemed to talk a great deal. He had been stolen as a child by Comanches and had gradually worked his way north, traded from one tribe to another, until he had escaped one day during a battle. Though he was an old man and had lived among Indians and whites his whole life, he still preferred to speak Spanish. Clara knew a little from her girlhood in Texas, and tried to speak it with him. At the sound of the Spanish words his wrinkled face would light up with happiness. Clara persuaded him to teach her girls. Cholo couldn't read, but he was a good teacher anyway — he loved the girls and would take them on rides, pointing at things and giving them their Spanish names.

  Soon all the mares in the corral were pricking their ears and watching the approaching wagon. A big man in a coat heavier than Cholo's rode beside it on a little brown horse that looked as if it would drop if it had to carry him much farther. A man with a badly scarred face rode on the wagon seat, beside a woman who was heavy with child. The woman drove the team. All three looked so blank with exhaustion that even the sight of people, after what must have been a long journey, didn't excite them much. A few buffalo hides were piled in the wagon. Cholo watched the travelers carefully, but they didn't seem to pose a threat. The woman drew rein and looked down at them as if dazed.

  "Are we to Nebraska yet?" she asked.

  "Yes," Clara said. "It's nearly twenty miles to town. Won't you get down and rest?"

  "Do you know Dee Boot?" the woman said. "I'm looking for him."

  "Si — pistolero," Cholo said quietly. He did most of their shopping and knew practically everyone in Ogallala.

  Elmira heard the word, and knew what it meant, but she didn't care what anybody called Dee — the fact that he was nearby was all that mattered. If Dee was near, it meant that she was safe and could soon be rid of Luke and Big Zwey, and not have to ride on the jolting wagon seat all day or be scared all night that they would run into Indians at the last minute.

  "Get down — at least you'll want to water your stock," Clara said. "You're welcome to stay the night, if you like. You can easily make town tomorrow. I'd say you all could use a rest."

  "What town would that be?" Luke asked, easing down from the wagon seat. He had twisted a leg several days before, running to try and get a better shot at an antelope — it was all he could do to walk.

  Elmira didn't want to stop, even when told that it was still over half a day to Ogallala, but Zwey had already dismounted and unhitched the horses. I wish I could get to Dee, she thought — but then decided one more day wouldn't matter. She got slowly down from the wagon seat.

  "Come on up to the house," Clara said. "I'll have the girls draw some water. I guess you've come a ways."

  "Arkansas," Elmira said. The house didn't look very far away, but as they walked toward it, it seemed to wobble in her vision.

  "My goodness, that is a ways," Clara said. "I lived in Texas once." Then she turned and saw that the woman was sitting on the ground. Before Clara could reach her she had toppled sideways and lay face up on the trail that led from the house to the barn.

&n
bsp; Clara was not too alarmed. Just tired, she thought. A journey all the way from Arkansas, in a wagon like that, would wear anybody out. She fanned the woman's face for a while but it did no good. Cholo had seen the woman fall and he ran to her, but the big man lifted the woman as easily as if she were a child and carried her to the house.

  "I didn't get your name, or her name either," Clara said.

  The big man just looked at her silently. Is he mute? Clara thought. But later the man with the scarred face came to the house and said no, the big man just didn't talk much. "Name's Zwey," he said. "Big Zwey. I'm Luke. I got my face bunged up coming, and now I hurt this dern leg. Her name's Elmira."

  "And she's a friend of Mr. Boot?" Clara asked. They put Elmira in bed but she hadn't yet opened her eyes.

  "Don't know about that, she's married to a sheriff," Luke said. He felt uncomfortable in the house after so many days outside, and soon went out again to sit on the wagon with Zwey. He happened to look up and see two young girls peering at him from an open window. He wondered where the man was, for surely the good-looking woman he had talked to couldn't be married to the old Mexican.

  That night she asked if they would like to come in and eat supper. Zwey wouldn't — he was too shy — so the woman brought their suppers out and they ate in the wagon.

  The girls were disappointed at that turn of events. They seldom had company and wanted a better look at the men.

  "Make 'em come in, Ma," Sally whispered. She was particularly fascinated by the one with the scarred face.

  "I can't just order men around," Clara said. "Anyway, you've met buffalo hunters before. Smelled them too. These don't smell much different from any of the others."

  "One of them's big," Betsey observed. "Is he the lady's husband?"

  "I don't think so, and don't be a busybody," Clara said. "She's worn out. Maybe tomorrow she'll feel like talking."

  But the girls were to hear Elmira's voice long before morning. The men sitting in the wagon heard it too — long screams that raked the prairie night for hours.

  Once again, Clara had reason to be glad of Cholo, who was as good with women as he was with horses. Difficult births didn't frighten him as they did most men, and many women. Elmira's was difficult, too — the exhausting journey over the plains had left her too weak for the task at hand. She fainted many times during the night. Clara could do nothing about it except bathe her face with cool water from the cistern. When day came, Elmira was too weak to scream. Clara was worried — the woman had lost too much blood.

  "Momma, Daddy's sick, he smells bad," Sally said, peeking for a moment into the sickroom. The girls had slept downstairs on pallets, so as to be farther from the screams.

  "Just leave him be, I'll take care of him," Clara said.

  "But he's sick — he smells bad," Sally repeated. Her eyes were fearful.

  "He's alive — life don't always smell nice," Clara said. "Go make us some breakfast and take some to those men. They must be hungry."

  A few minutes later, Elmira fainted again.

  "She's too weak," Cholo said.

  "Poor thing," Clara said. "I would be too, if I came that far. That baby isn't going to wait for her to get strong."

  "No, it's going to kill her," Cholo said.

  "Well then, save it, at least," Clara said, feeling so downcast suddenly that she left the room. She got a water bucket and walked out of the house, meaning to get some water for Bob. It was a beautiful morning, light touching the farthest edges of the plains. Clara noticed the beauty and thought it strange that she could still respond to it, tired as she was and with two people dying in her house — perhaps three. But she loved the fine light of the prairie mornings; it had resurrected her spirits time after time though the years, when it seemed that dirt and cold and death would crush her. Just to see the light spreading like that, far on toward Wyoming, was her joy. It seemed to put energy into her, make her want to do things.

  And the thing she wanted most to do was plant flowers — flowers that might bloom in the light. She did plant them, ordering bulbs and seeds from the East. The light brought them up, and then the wind tore them from her. Worse than the dirt she hated the wind. The dirt she could hold her own with, sweeping it away each morning, but the wind was endless and fierce. It renewed itself again and again, curling out of the north to take her flowers from her, petal by petal, until nothing remained but the sad stalks. Clara kept on planting anyway, hiding the flowers in the most protected spots she could find. The wind always found them too, in time, but sometimes the blooms lasted a few days before the petals were blown away. It was a battle she wouldn't give up on: every winter she read seed catalogues with the girls and described to them the flowers they would have when spring came.

  Coming back with the bucket from the cistern she noticed the two dirty, silent men sitting on the wagon — she had walked past them without a thought on her way to the well.

  "Is it born yet?" Luke asked.

  "Not yet," Clara said. "She's too tired to help much."

  The large man followed her with his eyes but said nothing.

  "You've got too much fire in that stove, you'll burn everything," Clara said, when she saw how the girls were progressing with breakfast.

  "Oh, Ma, we can cook," Sally said. She loved to get her mother out of the kitchen — then she could boss her younger sister around.

  "Is that woman real sick?" Betsey asked. "Why does she yell so much?"

  "She's working at a hard task," Clara said. "You better not burn that porridge, because I want some."

  She carried the bucket up to the bedroom, pulled the smelly sheets out from under Bob, and washed him. Bob stared straight up, as he always did. Usually she warmed the water but this morning she hadn't taken the time. It was cold and raised goosebumps on his legs. His big ribs seemed to stick out more every day. She had forgotten to bring fresh sheets — it was a constant problem, keeping fresh sheets — so she covered him with a blanket and walked out on her porch for a minute. She heard Elmira begin to moan, again and again. She ought to go relieve Cholo, she knew, but she didn't rush. The birth might take another day. Everything took longer than it should, or else went too quick. Her sons' lives had been whipped away like a breath, while her husband had lain motionless for two months and still wasn't dead. It was wearying, trying to adjust to all the paces life required.

  After she had stood for a moment on the cool porch, she went down the hall, just in time to hold Elmira down and watch Cholo ease a baby boy from her bloodied loins.

  The baby looked dead, and Elmira looked as if she were dying — but in fact both lived. Cholo held the little boy close to his face and blew on it, until finally the child moved and began to cry, a thin sound not much stronger than the squeak of a mouse. Elmira had passed out, but she was breathing.

  Clara went downstairs to heat some water and saw that the girls had taken breakfast to the two men. They were standing around while the men ate, not to be denied the novelty of conversation, even if only with two buffalo hunters, one of whom wouldn't talk. It made her want to cry, suddenly, that her children were so devoid of playmates that they would hang around two sullen men just for the excitement of company. She heated the water and let the girls be. Probably the men would go on soon, though Luke seemed to be talking to the girls happily. Maybe he was as lonesome as they were.

  When she went up with the hot water Elmira was awake, her eyes wide open. She was pale, almost bloodless, no color in her cheeks at all.

  "It's a miracle you got here," Clara said. "If you'd had that baby down on the plains I doubt either one of you would have lived."

  The old Mexican had wrapped the infant in a flannel robe and brought it to Elmira to see, but Elmira didn't look at it. She didn't speak and she wouldn't look.

  She didn't want the baby. Maybe it'll die, she thought. Dee won't want it either.

  Clara saw the woman turn her eyes away. Without a word she took the infant from Cholo and walked downstairs with it, out
into the sunlight. The girls still stood by the wagon, though the men had eaten. She shielded the baby's eyes with the robe and carried it over to the group.

  "Oh, Ma," Betsey said — she had never seen a newborn child. "What's its name?"

  "The lady's too tired to worry about naming it just now," Clara said. "It's a boy, though."

  "It's lucky we got here, ain't it?" Luke said. "Me and Zwey would have had no idea what to do."

  "Yes, it's lucky," Clara said.

  Big Zwey stared at the baby silently for a time. "It's red, Luke," he said finally. "I guess it's an Indian."

  Clara laughed. "It's no Indian," she said. "Babies mostly are red."

  "Can I hold it?" Sally asked. "I held Betsey, I know how."

  Clara let her take the child. Cholo had come downstairs and was standing at the back porch, a cup of coffee in his hand.

  "Zwey wants to get to town," Luke said. "Can Ellie go yet?"

  "Oh, no," Clara said. "She's had a bad time and she's weak. It would kill her to travel today. She'll need to rest for about a week. Maybe you could come back for her, or else we could bring her in our little wagon when she gets well."

  But Zwey refused to leave. Ellie had wanted to get to town, he remembered, and he was determined to wait until she could go. He sat in the shade of the wagon all day and taught the two young girls how to play mumblety-peg. Clara looked out at them occasionally from the upper windows — there seemed no harm in the man. Luke, bored, had ridden off with Cholo to check the mares.

  When Clara took the child in to nurse, she began to see that Elmira didn't want it. She turned her wide eyes away when Clara brought it near. The infant was whimpering and hungry.

  "Ma'am, it's got to nurse," Clara said. Elmira made no objection when the baby was put to her breast, but the business was difficult. At first no milk would come — Clara began to fear the baby would weaken and die before it could even be fed. Finally it nursed a little but the milk didn't satisfy it — an hour later it was crying in hunger again.