What Once We Loved (40 page)

Savor the moment
, she told herself.
Hang on to what is.
It was a gift she could have. She just had to learn to receive.

16

“I really wish you'd reconsider, Mr. Powder,” Suzanne said. The handkerchief in her hand felt damp from her wringing it through her palm. Her heart was a broken melon, split open. He'd been so good for her boys. How could he leave them?

“I believe our parting of the ways is well advised. I'm sure your Mr. Forrester will amply fill my shoes.”

“Oh, you've misunderstood. Mr. Forrester's being here has nothing to do with your excellent tutorage. It ought not cause you to—”

“I've done what I could. Under the circumstances, I'd hold no hope for change while things remain as they are. Indeed, I believe you like the…distractions. It's the very thing that rankles against my teaching.”

Suzanne blushed. “I never meant to make your work with my sons difficult.”

“Indeed. What we intend is often not the impact,” he said.

She felt like a schoolgirl having disappointed her teacher.

“So then. It has been my privilege to serve you. I do hope you will grant me gracious letters of introduction for my next employer. I have been always honest, met your expectations, have I not?”

“More than I'd hoped in so short a time. I fear Clayton will lose his gain with you gone,” Suzanne said.

“Something that should have come to you before you made the decision to disrupt methods already in place.”

Esther brought the boys out to say good-bye. She heard the cats wail from their cages, listened while Sterling chastened the boys to pay attention to their mother, to follow Sister Esthers advice. What was that she heard in his words? Instruction, yes. A rightness. And compassion. But something more. Was his rigidity covering up a sense of failure? Was that why his words were as stiff as a disciplinary rod? She heard regret. He was going to miss them, too.

He clicked his heels. “Mrs. Cullver.” She felt a wash of breeze as he must have bowed before her, reached for her hand and kissed it. The boys pulled at her skirt. “Good lady, I bid you adieu.”

What was that Elizabeth sometimes said, about learning to do things differently if she wanted different results? She had to do something.

“Wait,” she said. “I…you are absolutely correct, Mr. Powder. I did not take the needed conditions for your work as seriously as I might have. But we were learning…together, I thought. Its part of living, isn't it? Making choices, adjusting, correcting? We can set the clock again, can't we? Give ourselves more time?” She thought she might start crying. “I tried to adapt. We all did. The cats were welcomed. Even after Pig…1 want so much to make this work, Mr. Powder. Especially now You're a good person, a fine man. So very honest and…right.” She knew he needed to have that acknowledged, understood. “Surely finding new strategies for continuing something important is as critical a lesson as teaching the value of routine?”

He'd stopped. She didn't hear his footsteps leaving.

“You've had many employers,” she rushed on. “They wrote kindly of you, and yet they let you go. You left them. Perhaps your…honesty, bathed in judgment as it sometimes is, came out as…rude. Inconsiderate. I've been told as much myself. Different results—”

“It has been said, by previous employers,” Sterling said quietly, “as you note, that I am often right.” He sighed. “But that my way of letting others know of their imperfections needs some attention.” Suzanne sniffed, squeezed the handkerchief wadded in her hand.

“Honesty is important,” she said. “But perhaps it could be cloaked
inside compassion and made easier then to hear. The way we say a thing can be as important as what is said,” Suzanne said. “I learn that lesson daily.”

“It is a sign of your graciousness that you would acknowledge your part in this, Mrs. Cullver.” She heard his heels click together in salute. “And risk such…honest words to me.”

“So you might reconsider?”

There was a long pause, and in it Suzanne sent a prayer. He wasn't the perfect tutor; she wasn't the perfect employer. But together, their efforts had helped her child make progress. She couldn't let that just drift away. What did it matter to her if she were right and ended up unhappy? She just hoped Esther would keep silent now, while she mediated this change.

“There must be no more moves. At least not without consultation. Can you assure me ofthat?” he said.

“Yes, oh, yes. But spontaneity must be permitted too. Children need to lead us, let us see the world through their eyes. That cant always be planned. And there may be other people…here at times. Their presence must be acceptable. It's part of a family life, people coming and going. Some may stay.” She hoped Seth might. “But children learn from adjusting, not just from routine. The world wont make changes for them, Mr. Powder. You know that. It will service them well to learn how to live with others.”

“It will,” he said. “You're quite right.”

“And I will do better at telling you when I believe you are right in principle, but your words make me want to disagree. If I feel judged unfairly or harshly—”

“I have never intended to be harsh,” he defended.

“I suspected as much. Would my telling you when that occurs make your being here easier?”

“Indeed.”

“We can both make alterations then,” she said, “together.” She put her hand out for him to take.

He accepted it. He would stay.

She would ask Seth to stay on too. Bravely risk telling him how she felt even if it meant he would back away. She would never know if he returned her feelings if she did not take the risk of asking. What mattered was that she could take care of herself and her boys… with help. There was nothing wrong with a little help. And nothing wrong with her. And for the first time in a very long time, Suzanne believed it.

Ruth and Matthew made their way back, zigzagging down the slippery trail and deciding to sit then slide on their bottoms for whatever distance they could. Ruth placed the canvas like a toboggan, the two sat and whooped until they spilled out and had to crawl again on hands and knees to the corrals, then gingerly make their way to the cabin.

Matthew pulled her up, holding her hand naturally.

Something had changed between them. Perhaps it was seeing the sun after sixteen days of frozen fog.

“Its sunny? Just up the hill?” Jason said, aghast. “Its just cold down here?”

“So we have to get them up there,” Mariah said. “How far is it?”

“Quarter mile. Uphill and all ice,” Matthew said. “This is where your thinking caps come in good.”

Each joined in with possible solutions: Make a trail with dirt dumped on the ice. Burn more wood so more ashes could be spread. Cut branches and lay them down. Cut grass and lay it down. All had some merit. “None of them promises manna in our wilderness,” Burke noted.

“We could cut up our slickers and make boots for the horses. Take a mare at a time and lead them up,” Jason said.

Jessie awoke then, her lips white and pale. Ruth didn't think she'd ever get used to the fiery child lying spent as ash in her bed.

“We're thinking up ideas for how to get horses across ice,” Ruth
said. She ran the backs of her fingers across the child's forehead. It didn't feel hot. “Got any?”

“Give them skates,” she said. Everyone laughed.

“That would do it, Sweet Pea, that surely would,” Matthew said.

“Or claws like a cat's,” Jessie added.

A clock ticked.

“I'm liking what Jessie said,” Ruth said, an idea growing wings.

“About skates?”

“No, about a cat's claws. What would it take to put something on a horseshoe, something to keep an animal from slipping? To give them a grip, say at the toe?”

“A calk,” Matthew said, striking the side of his head as though he were a dolt.

“A calk. We could calk all four shoes and lead them out, one by one, with rubber on our own feet so we won't slip as much,” Ruth said. “Could you do it?”

“They put forged calks on stage horses. I've seen it done back in the States.” Matthew ran his hands through his dark hair. “I don't know. These are young animals. Some ain't never been shod.”

Ruth resisted correcting his grammar. “But they've been worked with, their feet trimmed and all.”

“I don't have enough horseshoes,” Matthew said. “We'd have to forge the calks, if we've got enough nails from the roof shakes left. Or pull some of the shakes for those shorter nails.”

“I can help,” Burke said.

“You've done horseshoeing?”

He grinned. “It's a pastor's job to keep things from slipping.”

“We'd have to pull the shoes as soon as the animals got on top,” Matthew said. “Only nail them on with two on each side instead of the usual four. We can reuse the shoes that way and it wont do so much damage to their hooves. We'll be making ‘em up, putting ‘em on, then taking ‘em off.”

“It's a lot of work, and it just might thaw tomorrow,” Lura said.

“I'm tired of the waiting,” Ruth said. “I'd rather do something, even if we later have to change our course.”

“Agreed,” Matthew said.

“I think I can pull the shoes off,” Ruth said. “If you can forge the calks and Burke can shoe them, Mariah and I can lead them up and bring the shoes back down while you're making up others.

“You and Ned might try the plan of cutting grass and bringing it down,” Matthew said to Jason. “It'll feed those left behind here and maybe give them the idea there's more where that came from. That's worth some effort.”

“Sarah,” Ruth said, “you'll stay with Jessie and Lura, keep them company and help Lura fix us vittles. We'll be starved before this day is through.”

They had plans, the direction giving them excitement they hadn't felt for weeks. Matthew fired the forge before he sat down to eat breakfast. No one wanted to waste time eating while the call to action waited. But Lura insisted. Then with bellows pumping, Matthew began shaping the calk. The shorter house nails were bent over like cat's claws at the arc of the horseshoe, then heated to a fiery red. Matthew smacked them onto each shoe. Heat welded nail and shoe together. Four or five “claws” per shoe.

“A forged calk,” Matthew said, holding up the finished product with the tong, then plunging it into the water to cool and set. Steam and the bitter smell of iron reached Ruth's nose. “You know, a real horse-shoer would have thought ofthat right off,” he said.

“We needed a child to show us the way. It'll make for a better story, when you tell it by the fire next year,” Ruth said.

“Whose fire? At your house or mine?”

Ruth swallowed, didn't answer. Instead, she watched Matthew pull the shoe out, turn it this way and that. The steam caused beads of sweat to form on his forehead.

“Ready,” he said.

Burke took the set of calked shoes and lifted Koda's foot across the leather apron that reached almost to his boot tops. He pounded just two horseshoe nails on each side of each foot. “Hope they hold,” he said while Matthew worked on a second set.

Koda would go first. Ruth figured he'd make a good leader for the mares, and if it worked for him, maybe they'd trust more that it would work for them.

Matthew had suggested they take Ewald first. If a jack went, they could count on the plan being considered safe by a “cautionary expert.”

“Huh-uh,” Ruth said. “If he doesn't like it, we'll never get the horses to even consider it. I'm counting on them wanting to please us; the jacks don't care so much. We'll will the horses to do this, scared as they'll be.”

“You're the boss,” he said, and she'd held those blue eyes of his, turning away before she blushed.

Burke finished pounding the last shoe on, and Ruth led Koda around the paddock a time or two to give him the feel of it in the crusty mud. He pressed through the day's ice, and then she took a deep breath. “This is it, Koda. You're my special one now.” She rubbed in that place between his ears he liked. He nickered low.

“I think he knows how important this is,” Mariah said.

“Let's go,” Ruth said, nodding agreement. “Watch your step.”

The horse followed gingerly, ears moving front to back as she led him out through the frozen wasteland. She could see his ribs, he'd lost so much weight.