The Glorious Prodigal (27 page)

“Separated from his wife, is he?”

“They’ll work it out.” Luke felt a sudden gust of caution go through him. “Cora,” he warned, “stay out of it.” When Cora did not answer, he said, “He’s living on the razor’s edge, Cora. His pardon comes with a condition—if he gets in any trouble he’ll have to go back to prison.”

“What kind of trouble?”

“A fight—anything like that. He can’t use his fists on another man.”

“What makes you think I would cause Stuart to do anything like that?”

Luke studied the woman carefully. Her blue silk dress fit her well, but somehow anything Cora Simms put on accentuated her appeal to men. Luke shook his head, unable to answer her question, but said, “You’re just what you are, Cora. Men are going to fight over you. There are plenty of other men for you. Leave Stuart alone.”

Something showed in her eyes at that moment. She was a woman who knew the ways of the world as well or better than Luke Garrison. Ordinarily she kept a reserve about her, but now, without meaning to, she let some words escape her lips. “I never loved Carter, Luke. It was always Stuart.”

Cora’s words shocked Luke. “Cora, it’s too late. He’s still married.”

“Not for long, if what I hear is true. And I’ll tell you this, Luke. If Leah divorces him, I’ll get him. I’ve got money enough for both of us.”

Luke could find no answer to this, and Cora, after giving him a calculating look, turned and walked away.

Later on in the afternoon Luke encountered Ace and repeated the conversation. Ace stared at him and shook his head. His lips grew tight and anger flared in his eyes.

“Luke, if that woman hurts Stuart again, I’ll break her neck.”

“I might beat you to it, Ace. She’s done enough damage to him. Surely he’s got more sense than to get mixed up with her again.”

Ace gave him an odd look and, after a moment, said, “Men are weak where women are concerned. You know that, Luke.”

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

A Surprising Proposal

“Leah, you shouldn’t be doing this kind of work.”

Mott Castleton had parked his car in the front, and not finding anyone in the house, he had gone around to the back. He had heard noises from the stable, and when he made his way across the lot and opened the door, he found Leah up in the loft shoveling down forkfuls of hay.

“Somebody has to do it, Mott. Merle is down sick. I don’t mind.”

“Here, let me help you with that.”

“You’ll get your clothes all dusty. I’m through anyway.” Leah stuck the fork into the hay and came down the ladder, then dusted her hands off. The dust from the hay had coated her hair, and she took a handkerchief out of the pocket of the overalls she had donned and wiped her face with it. “I’m a sight, aren’t I?” she said. “But the cows have to be fed.”

“We’ll have to get a man out here to help you,” Mott said. “I don’t like to see you doing this kind of work.”

“Oh, it’s just until Merle gets on his feet again. It was no trouble when Wash was here, but now there’s really no one to do all of this.”

Leaving the barn, she went into the house, where she washed her face at the kitchen sink and dried it off. She said, “Here, there’s some coffee on the stove. It’s still cold out there, isn’t it?”

“Maybe more snow.” Mott took the coffee absentmindedly and sipped it, studying Leah, who had moved across to cut a
piece of cake. There was a grace about her, he noticed, even when she was wearing a pair of oversized, worn overalls. When she sat down, he tasted the cake and said, “This is good. Did you make it?”

“No. Annie did. She does cakes better than I do.” Her eyes sparkled then, and she said, “But I can do pies better. What are you doing out here, Mott? I thought you’d be in Little Rock for a week.”

“I got my business finished. Besides, I wanted to be back home for Christmas.” He smiled, and putting his fork down, he reached over and took her hand. “What do you want? I can’t get a word out of you.”

“Oh, I don’t know, Mott. Maybe one of those new vacuum cleaners.”

“That’s not very romantic.”

For a moment a strange light flickered in Leah’s eyes. “I guess,” she said quietly, “I’m not too much on romance these days.”

“Don’t say that.” Mott squeezed her hand and held it tightly. “That’s not what I want to hear.”

Leah let her hand lie in his and knew that he had something on his mind. He was a man who usually came straight out with things, but being a lawyer, he had some shrewd ways about him. Now she said, “What are you thinking? I can always tell when you’re plotting something.”

“I’m not plotting anything.” Mott laughed shortly. “All lawyer tricks aside, Leah. I hate to keep hammering on this, but things have got to change.” He put his other hand over hers and held it imprisoned between his two. “Get a divorce, Leah,” he urged. “It’s the only way.” He saw her start to speak, then overrode her answer. “I know. It’s not what you like. It’s not what I like, either. Neither of us believes in divorce. It’s just not acceptable, but this is a different kind of situation. You have to admit that.”

“Brother Fields doesn’t think so.”

“Naturally not. He’s a preacher. He has to be strict in such matters as this, but he’s wrong in this case.”

“I don’t know, Mott.” Leah freed her hand and shook her head briefly. “All my life I’ve seen people who got divorces, and they were never happy. Usually they got into a marriage even more unhappy than the one they were in.”

“That may be true sometimes,” Mott argued, “but not always. Look at what’s happening. The kids need a father. You need a husband. You need to move back to Fort Smith. You like my house, don’t you?”

“It’s a beautiful house, but I’d miss the farm here.”

“You wouldn’t have to miss anything. If you want a place to get outside, we’ll buy a little piece of land. We can go to it every weekend if you want to. The kids can have ponies. You can have your own horse.”

Leah listened reluctantly as Mott painted a rosy picture, and finally she said, “Mott, I’m not sure I’m in love with you.”

“Well, I love you, and I can make you love me. I know I can, Leah.”

They had had this conversation before, but Mott was more persistent now. Leah listened to all his reasons why she should divorce Stuart and marry him soon. Finally she said, “Please, Mott, don’t urge me anymore. Things are so hard right now.”

Mott started to speak, then closed his mouth and nodded. He stood up and said, “Well, I’ll be getting on. I’ll be looking forward to our Christmas, though. I got the kids some surprises. They’ll like them. I know they will.”

Leah walked to the door with him and waved good-bye as he got into the car and drove away. She glanced at the clock and saw that it was almost time to go get the children, so she went upstairs and changed clothes. She ran into Annie, who had come in from the back where she had been gathering up the washing off the line and was folding it. “How’s Merle?”

“I don’t see he’s no better. This flu is bad.”

“I made some of that soup he likes so much. I’ll take him a bowl of it while you do the folding.”

“Try to make him get it down. He’s gotta keep his strength up.”

Putting a generous portion of soup into a large bowl, Leah covered it with a towel, then, putting on her coat and hat, she left the house. When she reached their home, she knocked on the door, then stepped in, for she knew Merle would be in bed. “Merle!” she called out. “I brought you some soup.”

“Yes, ma’am. Come on in.”

Leah moved on through the main room of the small house into one of the two bedrooms and found Merle flat on his back. His face was an ashen color, and his cheeks were drawn in. “Sit up there. You’ve got to eat some of this.”

“I ain’t real hungry, Miss Leah.”

“I don’t care whether you are or not. You’re going to eat it one way or another.” Leah fussed around helping Merle to sit up, then urged him along until he had eaten some of the soup.

Finally he said, “I can’t eat no more. I just don’t feel hungry.”

“You’ll feel better tomorrow. The doctor said you didn’t have a bad case.”

“Well, I don’t know how he thinks he knows what I feels like.”

Leah laughed suddenly. “I think you’re right. Doctors always talk big, but they don’t know what’s going on inside of us, do they?”

She took the bowl and sat down for a moment, and Merle studied her. “You look tired, Miss Leah. I feel bad ’cause I can’t do none of the work. I wish Wash was still here. You got to hire somebody soon.”

“Well, we’ll see about that later.”

“Things ain’t goin’ too good, is they?”

Indeed Merle had hit on it, for it was not going well. The breeding farm had lost money last year. They had sold plenty of stock, but somehow the expenses had been higher or the prices had not been right. Leah could not figure it out. Night
after night she had sat up going over the books, and she realized that this year was going to be even worse.

“You know what, Miss Leah?” Merle said. He coughed, and then turning his head away, he covered his mouth and said, “These tractors, they’re gonna put folks like us out of business.”

“I don’t think so, Merle. A lot of people have tractors, but they cost a lot of money. The poor folks are still gonna have to have mules and horses.”

“But the poor folks ain’t got the money to pay prices for good stock. I been thinkin’ about it a lot.” He hesitated, then said, “Why don’t you go ask Mr. Stuart’s daddy to help you? I know he wouldn’t mind.”

“It may come to that, Merle, but we’ve kept this place going, you and me, for years now. We can do it again.”

“Annie said you was talkin’ about lettin’ Mr. Winslow sell it and gettin’ a job.”

“Oh, I was just feelin’ down that day, Merle. It won’t come to that.”

Leah rose and patted Merle’s shoulder. “You just lie there and take it easy. You’ll be up by Christmas eating that turkey Annie and I are going to cook.”

****

Leah stopped dead still when she got a look at Raimey. His eye was discolored, and dried blood stained the front of his shirt. “What in the world happened to you?” she demanded.

“He got into a fight,” Merry said.

“You shut up, Merry!” Raimey said through stiff lips.

“Got into a fight! What about?”

“Nothing! Just a fight.”

Leah studied Raimey’s ravaged features and knew well the stubborn cast that was set on his face. When he got like this, nothing in the world could change him. There was that much of Stuart in him. Now she said, “Well, get in the truck. We’ll talk about it later.”

She said no more about the fight, but she got the truth of it from Merry while Raimey was out doing his chores. Leah did not ask, but Merry said, “It was that old Samuels boy that did it.”

“What was the fight about?”

“Burt Samuels called Daddy a jailbird, and he said bad things about you. Raimey jumped right onto him, but Burt Samuels is two years older than he is, and Raimey couldn’t whip him. If I had had a stick, I would have beat him with it.” Merry’s face was flushed, and she said, “Why do people have to be so mean, Mama?”

“I don’t know, sweetheart. They just are. Don’t pay any attention to it.”

“Raimey says he’s going to beat Burt Samuels if he has to hit him with a baseball bat.”

“No. He can’t do that.”

Later on, after supper, when Merry was in bed, Leah drew Raimey aside. “Merry told me what the fight was about.”

“You just wait, Mom. I’m going to get that Burt Samuels.”

“I know you’d like to. Nobody likes to hear their family abused, but it would be better if you didn’t.”

“I don’t care what he said about Dad,” Raimey said stubbornly. “But I won’t put up with him talking about you.”

Leah wondered what Burt Samuels could have said, but she knew that she could not pursue it. Reaching over, she hugged Raimey and said, “I’m proud of you that you’d take up for me and for your father.”

“It wasn’t for him.”

“Maybe not, but you’re going to hear more of it. Do you want to tell me what Burt said about me?”

“He said only a bad woman would get a divorce. That all divorced women were bad.”

“Well, that’s not true.”

“I know it ain’t, but I’ll make him eat it. You see if I don’t.”

****

“I hear that the Sanderson family has all got the flu,” Annie announced as she came in with two tin buckets full of milk. “I expect we’d better take somethin’ over there. I’ll go after I get Merle taken care of.”

“No. I’ve got to go that way, anyway, to pick up some feed at the mill. You just take care of Merle. Don’t worry about supper tonight. We’ll have leftovers.”

“This flu’s gonna kill half the population, it do seem like,” Annie said mournfully.

“How is Merle this morning?”

“He’s some better. He’s settin’ up now. I got him to eat a bowl of grits, but he’s still gonna be a few days before he be back to his normal self. That flu just takes the strength right out of a body.”

“I’ll take plenty of food for the Sandersons,” Leah said.

“How many young’uns they got now? Six?”

“Five, I think. Are Mr. and Mrs. Sanderson both down?”

“Both of ’em, from what Bessie tells me. You’d better let me go. They’re bound to need some washin’ done. You know how it is if you miss a washin’ one day around here. And with them five kids and two adults, it don’t take long to get a real mess on your hands.”

“I’ll take care of that. You just watch out for Merle.”

****

Leah stopped the truck in front of the Sanderson place and saw fire curling up out of the chimney. “At least somebody’s able to make a fire,” she said. Getting out, she went to the back, picked up one of the two boxes she had brought packed with food, and walked up to the porch. She mounted it and knocked, but nobody answered. Opening the door cautiously she stepped inside. “They might all be asleep,” she said.

Going on into the kitchen, she heard someone on the back porch, so she set the box down and stepped outside. She stopped at once, for there at one end of the porch she saw Stuart with his shirt sleeves rolled up and running clothes
through a ringer. He did not see her and probably had not heard her over the chug of the noisy washing machine that was agitating the clothes. A huge mound of clothes rested on a table, and obviously he had been at the job for some time. Glancing out, she saw that the line was filled with clothes put out to dry.