Gather My Horses (10 page)

Fielding dropped the reins and launched in. As he did, Lodge came into the scuffle as well, saying, “Hey, we'll have none of that.”

Fielding got between Selby and Mahoney and gave the kid a shove. As the kid went backward, Lodge appeared at Fielding's right, to stand between the fallen Selby and the aggressor, Pence.

Mahoney came back with a wild swing, which Fielding batted away with his left hand. He was about to counter with his right when Pence shoved past Lodge and clobbered Fielding on the right temple. Fielding staggered back and got his eyes on Pence in time to see the big man come up with a
roundhouse that rocked Lodge back on his heels. Fielding was getting his feet back under him and looking out for Mahoney when Cronin's voice blared.

“Stop it!”

Everyone settled back and held still. Roe had gotten well out of the way, as had all the punchers to Fielding's left and behind Mahoney. Cronin had his pistol drawn and had a clear line of fire on anyone he pleased. On the other side of the fray stood Adler, with his gun drawn as well.

His voice was cold and steady as he said, “Do what the boss says.” As if for emphasis, his silver watch chain caught the sunlight.

Cronin spoke again. “Get that man up off the ground. For Christ's sake, you act like a bunch of hooligans.”

Lodge glared. “It wasn't a fair fight to begin with. This pig hit him without any warning. Then it got dirty when this other one kicked him in the head, so you're damn right we jumped in.” He bent over and helped Selby to his feet.

Adler's voice came up from the other side. “Just watch what you say, fella.”

Lodge turned his anger at the foreman. “You're brave as hell, aren't you, when you've got a gun in your hand?” He faced Cronin and continued. “I'd think this was a setup, you hopin' that one of us would pull a gun.”

Cronin's face fell, but before he could speak, Lodge continued. “But I know you'd rather do your dirty work in the dark. That's your kind of courage. Band together, and hire it out.” He pointed to
Adler. “And that's the kind of egg-sucker you bring in to get it done.”

Cronin moistened his lips with his tongue. “That's more than enough, I think. Why don't you men get your cattle and go?” He put his gun in his holster.

Adler did the same and, nonchalant, said, “Everyone gets their blood up, there's no good comes of it. Let's just put this behind us and do our work. Fred, hand the man his hat.”

Mahoney, with his face flushed, picked up Selby's hat and handed it to him without speaking.

“Thanks,” muttered Selby. He put the hat on his head and turned to look for the reins of his horse.

Fielding tried to get a view of Buchanan, but the man had turned away. Fielding did, however, catch a glance at Cedric's long, expressionless face.

Selby found his reins, mounted up, and led the way to the small herd. The others followed.

The one remaining calf had shown up, so the four men closed around the herd and started it on the way.

Fielding, who was riding drag about ten yards away from Lodge, said, “It was decent of you to jump in, too. But I wonder if you went too far with what you said.”

Lodge wiped at his nose with his gloved hand. “Oh, I'm sick of these sons of bitches, and I'm not going to lick their boots.” Then he added, “It's a hell of a good thing no one pulled a gun, though.”

Bracken, the granger kid named Topper, Mullins, and his son, Grant, were all at their work as usual
when the men put their gathered stock in with the rest of the herd. No one spoke of the incident at the other camp, and Fielding hoped they could all put it behind them. But he remembered the man who had said it that way, and he had his doubts. It was more likely that Adler would just put it away until later.

The morning breeze soughed in the cottonwoods, rustling the leaves but not shutting out the tinkle of the horse bells in the meadow and the accompanying song of the meadowlarks. The sun had not yet cleared the young cottonwoods on the east side of the creek, so Fielding enjoyed the freshness of the morning.

The cast-iron skillet lay upside down on the log, and the coffeepot sat next to the embers of the fire. Specks of ash rose in the low eddies of air that formed in the fire pit as the haze passed over. Things were on a small scale this morning, which suited Fielding as he mended a shirt with a small needle and thread.

Out from the camp, coming into sunlight inch by inch as the sun rose, the clothing that Fielding and Bracken had washed the evening before lay spread out on clumps of sagebrush. It had been limp and damp before Bracken set out for town, but it would all be dry by the time he came back. Seeing that none of the garments had blown off, Fielding returned to his work. The change from sunlight to shade required him to blink his eyes and adjust, but within half a minute he had his
focus and was back at it. As he pulled the needle to tighten his stitch, he entertained a thought about how he might spend a couple of hours. Bracken was not due back until midafternoon, and no other camp work needed to be done at the moment, so Fielding had time to take a short ride.

The sounds of the Roe menagerie lifted and floated on the air as Fielding rode into the front yard. The two gray geese did not show, however, as Isabel herself appeared around the corner of the house and came forward. Her dark hair hung loose to her shoulders, and she wore a full-length, dark blue dress that was snug at the waist. Below the hem, her laced black shoes were visible.

“What a surprise,” she said. “I didn't expect you.”

“I didn't plan very far ahead. I had a little time free, so I thought I'd stop by. Are you too busy for a visit?”

“Not at all. Papa's not here. He went over to Bill's, to get ready for the get-together this evening. But you're welcome to visit if you'd like.” Her eyes had a soft shine, and her clean, even teeth showed as she smiled.

“More than happy to.” Fielding swung down from the buckskin and took off his hat, again disguising the move by rubbing his sleeve across his brow. “How have you been?” he asked. “You look as if you've weathered all right.”

She gave a demure half smile, then said, “I was here by myself, but Leonora Janken came out and stayed a couple of times. You know her.”

“Oh, yes.”

Her eyes moved in a casual glance past him. “Would you like to water your horse?”

“He can wait till we're ready to go. I'll just hold him.”

“Why don't you tie him? You can come around back, and I'll show you something.”

Fielding put on his hat, tied the buckskin to the hitching post, and followed Isabel. Past the back corner of the house, he found himself in the midst of more of her father's salvage. A rowboat-shaped galvanized bathtub sat next to a wooden icebox with a sagging door. A rusty corn grinder stood cheek-by-jowl with a clothes wringer, the latter mounted on a small vat with vertical staves and iron hoops. Isabel led the way past these hulks to a wooden lean-to next to the back door of the house.

At the entrance to the lean-to sat a kitchen chair, and next to it squatted the three-legged stool with chipped paint. On the yellowed stool, a dark brown leather case lay open to display a row of narrow, shiny instruments. Isabel picked up the case, closed it, and handed it to Fielding. Then she pulled the stool away from the lean-to but still in the shade and said, “Here, sit down, and I'll show you.”

She sat on the chair and reached forward into the storage area, where she pulled out a burlap sack that looked as if it was stuffed with rags. She set the sack against her knees and held her hand out for the instrument case. When he handed it to her, she opened it.

“See, these are my sack-sewing needles.”

He could see them now, gleaming pieces of fine polished steel, ranging in length from three to five
inches. The first three needles were straight all the way, like any normal needle but larger. The next two were straight also but flared out like a long spearhead and tapered back to a point at the tip. The last one in the row was flared as well but bent so that the last inch angled away from the shaft. Across the top of the row, two semicircular needles were hooked into folds of leather.

“These are nice,” he said, surprised to see something so neat and clean in the midst of all the junk.

“Thank you. I thought you might appreciate them. Most of them can be used for carpet and canvas as well. The curved ones are more for upholstery.”

He nodded. “And you sew sacks?”

“In the wheat harvest. It's just for a short while each year, but it gives me something for myself.”

“I see. That's coming up before long, isn't it?”

“Yes, it is. So I get out my needles and twine, and I take a few turns for practice. I've got different stitches I can make, but I start with the easiest one.”

She took out a four-inch straight needle, handed the case back to Fielding, pulled and cut a length of heavy cotton twine from a spindle on her left, and threaded the needle, leaving about six inches of loose twine coming out one side of the needle eye. Next she adjusted the sack of rags, twisted an ear on the right corner of the open end, wound three loops around the base, and pulled it tight with a half hitch. Then, after pulling another six inches of twine through the eye on the loose end, she held the seams with her left hand as she looped her stitches across the top of the sack. In less than a
minute she had reached the other end, where she twisted the left ear and tied it off.

“That's pretty good,” said Fielding. “It looks as if you could do one per minute.”

“If they came that fast. I understand they do, with some of these steam threshers. They can keep two sack-sewers busy at once.”

“There's not enough grain around here for someone to go to all the trouble of bringing in a steam engine, is there? That's what they tell me.”

“Not yet,” she said. “And I'm not in a hurry for it.” Then, as if she caught herself, she added, “Not that I mind the work. I just wouldn't want to live for it.” She motioned with her arm at the backyard. “It's like all of this. I can put up with it, but I don't want to live in the midst of it for the rest of my life.”

Fielding took heart. “It's not in your blood, then. All this stuff.”

“Not like Papa's. He can live in a run-down place cluttered with scraps, and it doesn't bother him. I can't say it bothers me greatly, not now, but I can't see it as the rest of my life, not any more than working for day wages on a threshing crew or in a factory. Don't you think?”

“Well, sure. It's how you yourself see it.”

She seemed to be in thought as she stood up, took the sack by the two ears, and set it inside the lean-to. As she sat down she smiled at him and said, “And how about you? I would imagine you're satisfied with what you do because you chose it.” She held out her hand for the case, and as he gave it to her, his fingers touched hers.

“Yes,” he said. “I'd say I like my work well enough.” He did not feel as if he had to be on his
guard with what he said, so he went on. “I've never had much of anything, so I'm not disappointed with what I've got. I've never had a place of my own, and I think I'd like to do that. Have a place where the rest of the world leaves you alone when you want.”

“That's a good way to put it.” She turned her dark eyes on him and added, “Oh, I hope you don't think I'm ungrateful for what I've got. After all, Papa does have a place of his own, and I've never wanted for anything. I work because I want to.”

“I understand that.”

“And there's nothing wrong with that kind of work. That's where we started, wasn't it? I said I just didn't want to live for the sake of working on a threshing crew.”

“I don't blame you. Some of those machines make a lot of racket, especially the steam engines.”

“Well, there's the racket, and then the drudgery.” She paused. “And the people you work with.”

“I've met some of them,” said Fielding. “Here and there. Packed supplies for a couple of 'em a while back. And this fellow Mullins and his kid, Grant, they worked roundup with us.”

“Oh, he's all right,” said Isabel. “There are others, though. You don't know Ray Foote, do you?”

Fielding shook his head. “Don't believe I've heard the name till now. Did you say Foot?”

“Foot
with an
e
,” she said. Then, with an impatient huff, she went on. “He's the one thing I dread most about this work coming up. He's a sack jig.”

“What's that?”

“Oh, that's the person who jigs or shakes the sack so it has a uniform weight—hundred and thirty-eight to hundred and forty pounds. He jigs it and
passes it to me to sew. I can't stand the way he looms over me, always making eyes at me, showing off how strong he is, hefting the full sacks. But he's got the mind of a slug. And when he counts the sacks, if he has four rows of five each, he counts them one by one.”

Fielding smiled. He didn't mind that kind of competition. “I guess that's the way work is,” he said. “You can't always pick who you work with. But if it's only for a while—”

“Yes, but he's taken to Papa, making friends with him. Buys him a drink in town, gives him a bottle to take home. I think he might be at Bill's this evening. He got himself invited, and Bill said he could come down with Mr. Mullins.”

“Oh, well,” said Fielding with a playful smile, “as long as he doesn't keep you tied up all evenin', showin' you the muscle in his arm.”

“Pooh,” she said. “If you don't mind, you can keep me away from him. And don't leave before he does.”

Fielding laughed. “I think I can do that much.”

“I'm glad you're going to be there.”

“I wouldn't miss it.”

Her dark eyes met his again. “I hope you don't think I was saying anything unkind about Papa.”