Gather The Children (Chronicles of the Maca Book 2) (13 page)

Mama was waiting for them as they came down the stairs. She had a shirt and pair of trousers, both of which had seen better days, and a scissors. “Lorenz, stretch out your arms so I can measure.”

Lorenz looked at the size of the clothes and knew no matter how much cutting she did, they would flap around him. He looked at MacDonald. The big man's expression was completely bland and the twinkling far back in the brown eyes. He gritted his teeth and stretched out his arms.

“Mr. MacDonald, please hold the material at the shoulders.” Her words were more of a command rather than a polite request.

She snipped one sleeve, then the other. “Now the trousers” she muttered draping them against his waist. “Hold still,” she added to Lorenz. The pants she marked off with some of the chalk. “I'll cut these vhile du take your bath. Then ve'll do your hair.”

Lorenz stalked out the door with MacDonald. In his rush, he forgot his hat and turned to reenter the house, but MacDonald blocked his way. “The tub tis that way.”

“Ah know where it is. Ah put water in it.” He looked at the big man “No way out? he asked.

“Nay that I ken. Yere mither believes that cleanliness is next to Godliness. She twill brook nay argument, and nay twill I.”

Once Lorenz was in the tub, MacDonald collected his clothes. “I twill bring the others in a bit. I suggest ye wash the hair first ere the soap gets too thick in the water and twill nay rinse clean.”

At least he had privacy for the first time in a week. He tried sorting out everything, but nothing fit. Going against the big man was like ramming your head into a boulder. He couldn't beat him physically or mentally. No matter what he did, he would lose. His mother, it seemed, was more demanding, and MacDonald was backing her every play. Lorenz had tried to influence her mind once and a wall had slammed down. There were no words from her, yet she had known. He felt the sun burning at his skin and wondered where the hell MacDonald was. He grabbed at the towel. He had had enough water.

MacDonald appeared with the cut off clothing. “Well, ye have one benefit from all of this. There are nay of my drawers to cut down for ye.”

His new belt was barely long enough to hold the extra material and he felt like a fool. He slipped the boots over the last pair of clean socks that MacDonald had bought a few days before. They walked back, pass the kitchen door to the shade of the crabapple tree where one of the kitchen chairs sat. Mama was standing there with some sort of material draped over her arm, a pair of scissors, and a comb in her hands. Mina was playing with the doll at the side of the springhouse where there was shade from the western sun.

Lorenz thought about arguing again, looked at his mother's set lips, and gave up any thought of talking his way out of the haircut. He sat down. Mama flicked the material around him like a cape and stuffed the ends down inside his collar. He clenched his teeth. The scar would soon be out for the whole world to see as he heard and felt the scissors snip across the sides and back. She hadn't even tried to comb the tangles out first.

Mama stopped long enough to ask, “Do du vant a side part, or one down the middle?”

“Side part, ah reckon. Hit curls anyways it wants to.”

Now she vigorously applied the heavy comb to the snarls in his hair. “Ow!” he started to raise up and realized that MacDonald was beside him. He plopped back into the chair, and Mama continued with the comb and the scissors.

Finally she was satisfied and she handed Lorenz a mirror. “See, is gut?”

He barely bothered to glance at the wavy mirror. He didn't want to see. “Hit's fine,” he muttered and stood. The accumulation of hair slid downward to join the black nest on the ground.

Anna pulled off the cape and announced, “Du look so handsome. Just like your Uncle Kasper!”

Lorenz could only stare at her. Handsome? Him? With that scar? He looked at MacDonald lounging against the tree with that damned half-smile still on his face. Meanwhile Mama was using some sort of small brush on his neck. He almost yanked away and then thought the better of it. He could see MacDonald relax. The man was just waiting for him to do something stupid.

Mama began shaking the cape in noisy, flapping snaps. With another flick, she folded it and draped it over her arm. From her pocket she extracted a small jar and removed the lid revealing a golden wax. She dipped in her index finger, creating a slight film on her finger, and applied it to the scar. He stepped back to avoid her and slammed into MacDonald's bulk. He'd forgotten how quickly the man could move and how hard he was. Instantly MacDonald grasped him by the biceps, not really squeezing, just letting him know he could. “Stand,” came the command.

Lorenz felt his jaw muscles tightened, but held still for the final indignity as Mama proclaimed, “Mr. MacDonald brought this salve. It vill take avay the proud flesh. That vill take some time, but in a few months, I promise, the scar vill almost disappear. See how much it has helped.” She drew away the hair covering her missing ears.

The sudden revealing of his mother's physical suffering was almost too much. He had been so wrapped in his own troubles, he'd never thought about anyone else and what they endured. Zale's death had not been the release for him that he had felt it would. Now who did he punish? He couldn't kill every Comanche that lived. Where was the salve for the heart? And how could his mother be so content and keep living as though life was something worth living?

It was a relief to be put to work again with MacDonald in the barn. MacDonald had grabbed a pail from the springhouse. “Tis time ye learned some of the chores around here.”

Lorenz paid scant attention to the milking and putting up of the milk. He was reeling from the week's events: mind and body became separate items. His brain was wandering, lost in memories and envisioning a life that should have been; his body moving only to fulfill the necessary commands, and somehow there was more water to be pumped for the evening wash-up, for dishes, and for drinking.

Supper was served in the dining room. A simple meal of hash made from the leftovers and more bread and gravy. The dessert Mama had promised was waiting for him. The others dipped some sort of white stuff into their bowls and placed the crabapple butter over it. He looked at it questioningly. “It's clabbered milk mitt apple butter for sweetening,” Mama explained.

Mina rubbed her tummy and exclaimed, “Und it's yummy.” She giggled.

He still couldn't get used to the way children were treated at the table and afterward was even more puzzling. MacDonald made him help carry out the dirty dishes. “We eat, we help, just as we did in camp,” was his explanation. He grinned at Lorenz, “After we've helped yere mither, we begin yere lessons.”

Lorenz was soon seated at the table with a sheet of blank, lined paper in front of him. MacDonald sat next to him with Mina balanced on one knee. It was MacDonald's turn to become Lorenz's teacher. “Reading and writing are based on symbols called letters. Each letter stands for a sound, sometimes two different sounds. The letters, or symbols, we use are called the alphabet, and it goes like this. Mina will help me as she is learning them too.”

Mina's little girl voice crooned with her father's each time he wrote a letter. Soon he had Lorenz tracing them and then MacDonald smiled deeply. “Tis now time for ye to practice till the letters are as neat as mine.”

Lorenz's fingers became cramped from holding the pencil and his frustration grew. It seemed impossible that a three-year-old child could make some of the letters on paper as well as he, but he kept at it and the letters gradually became evenly shaped symbols.

Mama appeared and collected Mina for their bath, and MacDonald sat back. “Ye twill be sleeping on the daybed this evening. Since ye have nay underwear, ye'll need to sleep in yere clothes. We twill head out the front way to the back of the barn and ye can relieve yereself ere I bed ye down.”

Lorenz looked at him. “Ah thought that warn't allowed.”

“Tisn't usually, but we canna go to the back since yere mither and sister are bathing.” Outside the sun was bidding the world goodbye with fruit-stained smears of gold, rose, and purple against a blue-grey sky. The air felt soft from the light breeze, and the foothills to the east were splashed with an improbable rosy purple. It was, thought Lorenz, a place he could spend his whole life. Why hadn't he found this place alone and un-peopled? He couldn't stay here. He couldn't bear the pain of losing his ma again. He absently rubbed Dandy's nose as they threw extra hay over to the horses and didn't really remember walking back to the house.

As usual MacDonald was efficient with the rope. As an extra precaution, he looped the rope behind Lorenz on the daybed's iron headboard before tying the hands and then around the iron footboard before tying the ankles. Lorenz stared stony-eyed at the ceiling. He wasn't falling asleep. He needed to know how bad Mama was treated before he made his plans. Mama was in the bedroom with Mina, and MacDonald had disappeared through the kitchen carrying his towel.

His mother appeared with her letter and newspaper. She was dressed in some sort of dark blue belted robe that swept down to the floor. With her white hair and grey eyes, she seemed to float into the room. Lorenz tried not to look. It was his ma, for Pete's sake.

She pulled out a chair and then realized her son was tied. “Vhat is this? Vhy are du tied?”

Lorenz turned his head to answer her. Her eyes were large and bewildered, her mouth slightly parted, complete wonderment on her face. “Because ah'll run,” he answered.

“But vhy?”

He looked at the ceiling again and gritted out his answer, “'Cause y'all ain't going to want me heah very long.”

Suddenly she was gripping his shoulders with a strength he hadn't dreamed a woman would possess. “Vhat nonsense is that?”

He had no answer, and she shook his shoulders. “Du are mein sohn! I vanted du as a baby and all of those long years du vere gone. Did Margaretha tell du such a thing?”

Lorenz closed his eyes against the hurt in her face and in her voice; and yet her hard, screaming voice from long ago kept echoing in his mind. “Du cannot do such things. Du cannot ever, ever get so angry again. Do du hear me?” If he could cause that reaction when he was four, he knew he would do it again.

His mother suddenly released him and went flying out the door to where MacDonald was bathing, and he eased his shoulders. God, the woman had a grip like a man. From outside their voices floated in: her voice excited, MacDonald's low and steady. They were probably quarreling about him. Good, that meant he would be leaving soon. He knew MacDonald wasn't a man to allow feuding in his own home.

He heard the kitchen door close behind the couple as they walked in and heard them move across the floor. He looked at MacDonald and gaped. The man was in his summer underwear and boots, the hard muscles bulging underneath the cream-colored linen. Lorenz blinked and looked away. Damn. The man left no doubt as to what his intentions were that night.

His mother stood over him. “Lorenz, tell me vhy du vould run away from here, from me, from this home.” Her voice was demanding, yet edged with desperation.

He shrugged. “It ain't natural for me to be cooped up in a house. 'Sides ah don't belong heah.” It was words he wanted to disbelieve, but couldn't.

Anna gasped and stepped back. He realized his words had hurt his mother. Damn. That was the last thing he wanted to do. Why couldn't he say things right? “I mean, I don't think I know how to live your way. I'll make everyone glad to be rid of me.”

Anna stared at her son. “That is nonsense,” she stated. “Du have things confused in your mind because du vere so young. Du vill see in a few days how wrong du are.” She turned to MacDonald.

“Zeb, du finish your bath, and I vill write to Margaretha and read my letter and paper.”

MacDonald looked down, smiled, and hugged her. “Aye, that I twill.” He looked at Lorenz and almost snapped his words out. “Ye twill nay cause another disturbance.” He then stomped out of the house.

Lorenz relaxed as his mother took her seat and opened the letter. Damn. How did he get blamed again? He hadn't started the ruckus, if that was one. His mother had been the one upset.

Anna began reading the letter aloud in German, laughing softly to herself, then in English she said, “Hans, the baby just turned two. He has learned the vord, no, and says it to everything they say. He does this even vhen it is pie.”

Lorenz puzzled on that one and asked, “Y'all have a brother that's two?”

“Oh, ja, Pappa's wife is just three years older than I. He vas a very handsome catch at forty vhen they married. I did not vant to live at home with them. I had been running the household, du see.” She sighed and put the letter down and took up the paper. From outside came strange, deep, booming sounds exploding in a rhythmic pattern.

“What's that noise,” he asked.

“Ach, that is Mr. MacDonald singing. He does enjoy his bath.” She smiled complacently and continued to read.

Lorenz sank back. How could she be so content? Wasn't she worried about what would happen? It made no sense. He tried to remember what it had been in camp and hurriedly shut the screams out of his mind. He could wait until tomorrow. For some reason, MacDonald had left the shotgun hanging over the front door. Was it carelessness?

Quiet slipped over the household as Anna read. Occasionally, she murmured in German, usually a “Ja, das ist recht.” Finally she set the paper aside and began to use the pencil on a very, thin sheet of paper. “Do du have any greetings for your sister, Margaretha,” she asked.

Lorenz was almost asleep, but he roused long enough to say, “Ah don't think she wants to hear from me.”

Anna raised her eyebrows at her son. “Du are wrong. She vill be vorried about du. I vill tell her that du say, 'hello,' ” and she returned to her writing.

MacDonald stomped back into the house, the outside door banging behind him. Lorenz gritted his teeth at the sound and looked at his mother. She was calmly folding the letter, a slight smile on her lips. As MacDonald came into the dining room, she looked up and patted the paper, “Pastor Walther writes with such clarity. Du must read his article.” It was as though she did not notice that he had not bothered to put on a shirt, nor the top of his summer johns. His hair glistened, wet from the water, his skin, almost a milk white, looked damp as though the small, rough towel was inadequate for his massive body. As usual, a half-smile lit his face and eyes.