The Unplowed Sky (29 page)

Garth would be home tomorrow night. Surely, surely he would like what she had done.

It was hard to tell whether he did or not. Rory whistled when they entered the kitchen and went back on the porch to wipe his feet on the mat. Garth had wiped his feet well the first time. After kissing Meg and greeting the rest of them, he glanced about the room.

“You'll tell me the cost of the curtains and whatever you used on the floor,” he said. “I'll add it to your wages.”

Reminding her that she was hired help, that it was presumptuous of her to do anything without his permission. Hallie felt blood heat her face, but deep as the humiliation was her disappointment. She didn't speak till she thought she had her voice under control, but it betrayed her by fraying a little.

“Waxing the floor makes it easier to keep clean and take care of.
I
like curtains, but since I seem to be the only one who does, let's just consider them mine. I'll take them with me when I leave.”

“They look spiffy,” Rory approved. “Guess us heathens just never thought about having any. Or waxing floors.”

“It does look different,” Garth said. His face was unreadable, and whether he meant his remark as a compliment or a complaint, Hallie couldn't guess.

Very early the next morning, she found him gluing felt rounds from a dilapidated hat on the bottom of the chair legs and tables. He blushed, as if caught at something shameful.

“No use you spending all your time on floors.” His tone was gruff, but his words were sweeter to her than all of Rory's blandishments. “This'll keep the wax from getting scratched so easy.”

“Thank you, Garth.”

He slanted a half-grin at her. His hair was tousled, as if he hadn't combed it yet. She had an almost irresistible urge to bury her hands in the silvery gold mass and let her fingers trace the contours of his head, smooth away the lines at his eyes, and mouth. The mouth she longed to feel on hers.

“It's for me to thank you, Hallie. Even an old bachelor like me can see this place looks a sight more like a”—he searched for another word, couldn't find it, and said doggedly—“like a home.”

He bent to his work. Hallie wished she were brave enough to put her arms around him but she was afraid of being repulsed. Better just be grateful for what he said, the care he was taking to protect her labor. But someday—Someday, maybe.

Monday had been washday at the MacReynoldses, and Hallie resumed the custom here. She might have lamented the MacReynolds' electric machine more if she hadn't had a summer of washing with the stomper and wringing by hand. After that, it seemed luxury enough to simply turn the lever that propelled the rotating apparatus in the High Speed Wizard that had a corrugated lining inside its wooden outer tub. It could wash six sheets at a time. Hallie ran the laundry through the hand wringer, drained the machine through the drain cock at the bottom, filled it up with water from the pump, rinsed white things twice and coloreds once, and hung them out on clotheslines that ran from the machinery shed to two steel posts.

She was battling a flapping sheet when she heard a motor. A hacking one, not the smooth purr of Raford's Pierce-Arrow that could scarcely be heard from a distance. Subduing the sheet with more clothespins, Hallie turned as a roadster churned up to the house. Cotton Harris got out.

Hallie froze. She was sure he hadn't forgotten how she'd swung the mop in his face. Shaft was fixing fence on the north boundary. Except for the children, she was alone. She glanced around in vain for a handy weapon. The willow clothes basket wasn't formidable. There were lots of tools in the shed, but she didn't want to show her fear by running in search of one.

She started for the house, heartily wishing for a butcher knife, hammer, or any such defense. Her only comfort was that if Cotton was working for Raford, or hoped to do so again, he would know of Raford's interest in her and be afraid to do her any real harm.

“Does my heart good to see a woman doin' woman's work.” Cotton's twisted grin revealed tobacco-stained teeth and though the summer was past, he still was sunburned. “It was a plumb disgrace, the way you wore overalls and drove that engine.”

“What do you want?”

His pale, pink-rimmed eyes slid over her. “What I want and what I'm here for are two different things. Reckon you know Quent Raford's running for the state legislature.”

“I'd heard that.”

“You aimin' to vote?”

“I can't. I'm not twenty-one.”

He spat in the dust. “It's a scandal women can vote at all. But Mr. Raford's hired me to go find him votes, so I thought I'd be neighborly and stop by.”

“You know no one here would vote for him.”

“Plenty will. Sophie Brockett's organizin' ladies' meetings and socials and such.” He tilted his head—he hadn't removed his sporty felt hat—and squinted through narrowed eyes. “Mr. Raford can charm females, and we'll sure take their votes, but I'll promise you one thing. Bein' in the legislature is just a leg up toward runnin' for governor.”

“Mr. Raford's plans are none of my concern.”

“They will be.” Cotton drew himself up but he was still only a few inches taller than Hallie. “I have his solemn word that he'll make it so hot for Catholics and Jews and niggers and red niggers like your friend Luke, and draft dodgers like Henry Lowen that they'll be glad to get out of Kansas alive.”

Hallie's scalp crawled at the hatred in his eyes and voice. “You
do
belong to the Klan, don't you?” she whispered.

“I do, and I'm proud of it. Just a few years ago, there weren't hardly any of us, but now we're everywhere and gettin' stronger.” He crossed his arms. His slow appraisal was an insult. “We're goin' to make America decent again. Down in Texas, I've helped whip women who divorced their husbands or voted or cut off their hair or wore face paint or men's clothes. One gal who led me on and then tried to play righteous and pure, we fixed her good. Mr. Raford's told me he's got plans for you, but if that ever changes, I'll make you sorry you ever swung that mop at me.”

“I don't want to tell Garth MacLeod you've been here, but I will if you don't get off this place and stay off.”

“Got no reason to stay. But I'll just leave you a handbill.” Hallie wouldn't take the yellow poster. He swaggered to the door and thrust it in the screen.

Raford's likeness smiled at her. A PATRIOT WHO DARES TO SAY AMERICA'S FOR AMERICANS! trumpeted the lines above his head. Beneath was lettered:
A NEW DAY FOR KANSAS
.

Hallie tore the offending handbill from the door and crumpled it. Cotton just laughed. “You'll get what's coming to you,” he called as he got into the roadster. “I hope I get to give it, but one way or another, it'll come.”

He drove away, tires flailing up dust. A Klansman! One of the hooded cross-burning hate group that lynched blacks and etched their victims' foreheads with KKK or a cross. Hallie had seen them on newsreels in their white sheets and peaked hoods. If they weren't so scary and horrible, they'd be ridiculous.

Shaken and dizzy, Hallie leaned against the door. Cotton's eyes had glued themselves to her in a way that made her feel slimy, soiled. That poor girl down in Texas—what had he done to her? The idea of someone like him judging and punishing was such a travesty that Hallie wanted to believe it couldn't happen—but she knew it could.

That night after the children were in bed, she got Shaft to promise not to tell Garth or do anything himself, and then told the cook about Cotton's threats.

“Do you think there's a chance Raford could get elected by catering to the Klan?” she asked. “If there are any of them around Hollister, I certainly never heard about it.”

“That no-account Cotton could be starting groups wherever he finds some likely prospects.” Shaft's bushy eyebrows met above his crooked nose. “The Klan's spreading. It's not just in the Deep South.”

Hallie nodded. “Yes, last year, the governor of Oklahoma called out the National Guard to control Klansmen. When he lost the election a few months later, most people believed it was because he stood up to the Klan.”

“Yeah, and remember this July when they found a minister dead in Michigan with KKK branded on his back?” Shaft's voice thickened with disgust. “And in August, about the time Henry Ford was praisin' the KKK as patriots, six Illinois folks got killed in some kind of Klan uproar.”

Hallie shivered. “Cotton said he'd helped whip women down in Texas.”

“He'd get a kick out of that. But Texas has outlawed masks, and Ma Ferguson, who's running for governor, sure gives the Klan the devil.”

“Coolidge won't say where he stands, though.” Hallie worried.

“No, but folks like his “Silent Cal” act, and they're sorry for him because his young son died. He'll win.”

“It's so awful! If Cotton had his way, he'd kill people like Henry Lowen and Luke, or run them out of the country. And what he'd do to women!”

“He's a mean one, but too ign'rant to swing much weight except with his own kind. I doubt if Kansas has too many of 'em since so many folks came here from other countries less than fifty years ago. It's the smooth customers like Raford that we have to worry about.” Shaft tugged disquietedly at his beard. “I sure don't like that varmint comin' around you, Hallie. Maybe I better forget the fence and work close to the house.”

“I don't think he'll be back. If he is, I'll tell Raford.” At Shaft's puzzled look, she explained. “Raford evidently told Cotton that he's got plans for me and not to do me any harm.”

“I don't like the sound of that!”

“Neither do I. But, after all, he's not a robber baron who can kidnap me. I don't see that he can do much.”

“If Garth knew—”

“He mustn't! The last thing Garth needs is more trouble. If he got in a fight with Raford,
he's
the one who'd wind up in jail or fined for assault.”

Shaft heaved a long sigh. “I'm afraid you're right.”

“I'm sorry,” Hallie repented. “I shouldn't have told you, either, and got you upset, but I—I just had to talk to somebody.”

“Aw, honey, you can tell old Shaft anything. If it makes you feel better, I'm at least good for somethin'.”

“You're good for a lot!” Hallie gave him a quick hug. “I just can't tell you, Shaft, how glad I am you spoke for me that day we met and got Garth to hire me. It was the luckiest day of my life, and Jackie's, too!”

Shaft's rough old hand caressed her cheek. “I hope you'll say that a year from now, Hallie girl. I reckon I was in luck the day my deputy cousin let me go out the back window and again the day Garth hired me on, but the luckiest day of all my born days was when you and Jackie turned up to be my family.” He looked into her eyes, as if searching for answers. “If Garth wasn't so blamed scared of women! You be patient with him, honey.”

“I have to be.”

When Shaft looked a question, Hallie met his gaze and said, blushing, “I—I love him.”

Shaft caught in a delighted breath. “So you finally admitted it!”

“Not that it helps—”

“He'll come around.”

Hallie grimaced. “Even if he does, I don't think Meg ever will.”

“Maybe not. She's mighty used to having Garth be all her own. Love's like picking blackberries, honey. The fruit's sweet and juicy, but you get a lot of scratches.” Shaft gave Hallie a level stare. “Can you wait five years? Till Meg's old enough to make her own home?”

Five years! It seemed forever. But again, listening to her heart, Hallie said, “I don't have any choice.”

XV

Shimmering clouds of white-breasted, black-bibbed, dusky-backed horned larks with their plaintive tinkling call and bolder fluting yellow-breasted black-necklaced meadowlarks rose from or descended on the stubbled fields. White-crowned sparrows trilled as they hopped briskly in search of seeds and goldfinches in gray-brown winter plumage swayed thistle stalks as they fed and sweetly called
per-chik-oree
as they flew. Shaft tied chunks of tallow to the naked black locust tree. This attracted several gossipy long-tailed magpies, mockingbirds, and flickers. A pair of cardinals, the male jaunty crimson, the female duskily modest, devoured the last of the dried sandhill plums. Red-tailed hawks soared above, sometimes circling before plummeting down for a rabbit or mouse.

Jackie's wagon arrived, shining red with balloon tires. He brought coal from the cellar, though he got to pull it only about fifteen feet before loading it into a bucket to carry inside. He hauled the mail home from the mailbox, and foraged the Old Prairie for dried yucca stalks, which made good kindling.

“There was a St. Louis company bought them soapweeds for a while,” Shaft remembered. “They made rope and cord and soap, but the freight cost so much that the company couldn't make a profit. In the spring, when the soapweed shoots are nice and tender, they're good eating. Boil 'em and slap on butter and a little salt and pepper.”

At the end of October, Garth and Rory finished in the Arkansas River bottoms and brought the engine and corn sheller home. They moved what would soon be brown-eyed Sally Thomas's home from Hollister to her parents' farm and returned to the MacLeod farm with Rory tootling exuberantly on the whistle as the engine chugged up the lane.

“We're going to help build a railroad across the Texas Panhandle!” Rory shouted as he jumped down from the platform. “It'll keep us working till spring at good pay. They wanted us to leave tomorrow, but I said this is my first year to vote, and I sure aim to do it. Want to see William Allen White get in as governor and don't want old Careful Cal to be president.”

William Allen White was the longtime editor and owner of the
Emporia Gazette
. When Hallie was in school, her class had studied his famous 1896 editorial, “What's Wrong with Kansas?,” which brought White national fame and was used by the Republican campaign to help elect McKinley.