Wild Horses (5 page)

Of course you went by looks. They never told Mam this, but it was a universal truth. The way a courtship began was with physical attraction. Even birds chose just the right one by the beautifully-colored plumage or the best song or the most intricate dance. It was the same way with katydids and bats and frogs and squirrels and every living thing on God’s earth.

That was the way it was.

But Sadie wasn’t sure if she would tell Leah about Mark after all. She wanted to laugh and giggle and talk and dream, but, somehow, this was not like the other times. This seemed to be something more dangerous. Also more embarrassing. And more hopeless. It was truly horrible. Whoever heard of one’s knees becoming weak from looking at another person?

Oh, it was awful.

She glanced over at Jim, almost sure he could tell what she was thinking. Instead, he was frowning, shifting his wad of chewing tobacco from one cheek to another, which always made Sadie swallow hard.

So she looked out the window to her right and watched the snow swirling and the trees and the hillside being converted from dull browns and earthy sage-green to a pristine winter wonderland.

Sadie truly loved Montana. The scenery was absolutely breathtaking almost the whole year-round. Her favorite season was the long winter because of the skiing, sledding, and snowboarding. Another favorite pastime for the youth in Montana was piling on a huge inner tube from a tractor and being pulled with a sturdy rope attached to the saddle of a horse. A good horse lunged through deep snow, easily pulling a person on an inner tube until they were completely covered with snow, like a peanut butter cracker dipped in chocolate—only it was white. And there was nothing that quite matched the exhilaration of riding a horse on an endless sweep of sparkling snow, especially if the horse had been bored from standing in his box stall and was aching to run.

Sadie’s thoughts returned to the day as they ap­proached the magnificent entrance to Aspen East.

Elaborate brick pillars rose on both sides of the wide driveway with scrolls of beautiful ironwork across the top. Bronze statues of cattle were cemented into the brickwork—truly a testimony to a local artist’s talents. Heavy trees bordered the driveway, bent with the weight of the snow, and the long, low ranch house came into view.

It was built with the finest logs and the shingles resembled old, gray Shaker ones, although they were only replicas. Huge windows and doors completed the look of the house, and the wonderful scenery enhanced the matching barns, stables, and sheds. There were also fences, gates, paddocks, bunkhouses, and garages. Everything was kept in fine form by the many employees that worked around the clock to keep this vast enterprise running efficiently.

The truck stopped, Jim grinned, and Sadie hopped down.

“Try and have a good day.”

“Jim, if you find out one thing about the horse, would you let me know?”

“Sure thing, little girl.”

Sadie was comforted by his words. Jim was such a good man. He surely deserved to be treated well in return.

The resounding voice of Jim’s wife greeted her before she pulled on the door latch.

“…where she got to! Ain’t never seed nothin’ like it. You get ten extra hands for breakfast, and that Sadie don’t show up. Them Amish havin’ no phones in their houses is the dumbest rule of ’em all.”

Sadie walked in amidst this tirade and grinned cheekily at the tiny buxom woman.

“Here I am!”

“Sadie! Now you heard me yellin’ about ya!”

“It’s okay. You love me.”

“I do sometimes.”

“I’m hungry.”

“Go get your apron on. How come you’re late?”

“If I told you, you wouldn’t believe me.”

“Try.”

“Huh-uh. We don’t have time, Dottie.”

“Don’t Dottie me.”

Sadie slid an arm across Dottie’s shoulders and whispered, “Good Morning, Dottie.”

“Hmmpfhh.”

S
ADIE IMMEDIATELY FELT THE
pressures of her job, which were unusually demanding today. Dorothy had not arrived at her usual early morning hour because of the snow, which meant there were no potatoes cooked for hash browns, no sausage gravy, and no biscuits made for a count of 44 men.

Sadie grabbed a few tissues from the gold box by the food warmer, blew her nose because of the cold, windy morning, and turned to wash her hands with antibacterial soap from the dispenser mounted on the wall. Then she rolled up the sleeves of her green dress and compressed her lips, ready to start in.

She was starving, having skipped supper the evening before. Mam had made fresh shoofly pie yesterday morning, and when Sadie came home from work a bit early, ravenous as usual, she had eaten two slices. She doused them in fresh, creamy milk from the doe-eyed Guernsey in the barn—completely spoiling her supper.

Shoofly drowned in milk was simply the best, most comforting taste in all the world no matter whether you lived in Montana or Ohio. Mam made huge, heavy pies piled high with rich, moist cake, then covered with sweet, crumbly topping. The brown sugar, molasses, and egg mixture on the bottom complemented the top. Eaten in one perfect bite, all three layers combined to give you the most…well…perfect taste. It was wonderful.

Mam’s pie crusts were so good you could eat them without the filling. She always made some
schecka hauslin
when she made pies, and Sadie thought they were better than the pies themselves.

Schecka hauslin
were “snail houses”—little bits of pie dough rolled around brown sugar and butter, then popped in a hot oven for a few minutes. Sadie always burned the tips of her fingers and her tongue tasting them, but it was all worth it.

“What do you want me to do first, Dottie?”

“I’m Dorothy. Now don’t you go Dottie’n me all morning.”

That voice came from the interior of the vast, stainless steel refrigerator, and Sadie turned to see Dorothy’s backside protruding from it.

Sadie never ceased to be amazed by the size of this little person and her stamina. She practically ran around the huge kitchen on short, heavy legs clad in the “good expensive” shoes she knew Dorothy had purchased at the Dollar General in town.

“They only cost $29.99!” she had told Sadie proudly. “Them shoes is expensive but they’re worth it. Good arch support.”

She had them worn down on one side in a few months but still bustled about the kitchen, never tiring, saying it was all because she wore “them good shoes.”

Dorothy turned, her face red from bending down.

“Go ahead and make that sausage gravy. I’ll tend to the biscuits.”

Sadie smiled to herself, knowing Dorothy would never allow anyone else to make the biscuits. She never measured the ingredients—just threw flour, shortening, and other ingredients into a huge, stainless steel bowl, her short, heavy arms flapping, working the dough as if her life depended on the texture of it. She talked to herself, whistled, sang bits of a song, and pounded away ferociously at the biscuit dough as if each new batch she made had to be the best.

And it always was! Dorothy’s biscuits were light, yet textured with a velvety solidity. They were unlike anything Sadie had ever tasted. They were good with butter and jam or honey or loaded with gravy or, like Jim did, eaten cold with two thick slices of roast beef and spicy mustard.

Sadie reached up to the rack suspended from the log beam above, grabbed the 12-quart stockpot and set it on the front burner of the commercial stove. Reaching into the refrigerator, she unwrapped a stick of butter, deposited it into the pot, and turned on the burner beneath it. After it had browned nicely, she scattered an ample amount of fresh, loose sausage into the pot. The handle of the long wooden spoon went round and round, keeping the sausage from sticking to the flour and butter. Her thoughts kept time.

Surely the horse was someone’s pet. Why was it out there in the deserted forests and vast empty acreage if it couldn’t feed itself? Was there simply nothing there for it to feed on, or was it too sick to search for food? Was it neglected at the home it had come from? Why was it loose and alone?

Wild horses were not uncommon in the west, though they were centered mostly in Wyoming. Bands of them roamed free, but the government kept them from becoming a threat or nuisance to the ranchers and farmers in the area. Helicopters would herd them into man-made ravines and corrals, always met with outrage by the animal-rights activists. But to Sadie’s way of thinking, it was a necessary evil. You couldn’t let wild horse herds grow too large. They could do lots of damage or graze areas meant for cattle, which was almost everyone’s livelihood here.

But, oh, horses were so beautiful! There was no other animal on earth that Sadie could relate to quite as well. She could lay her cheek against a horse’s, kiss its nose, smooth that velvety skin beneath the heavy waterfall of mane, and never grow tired of any of it. They smelled good, were intelligent, and came in all different shapes and colors. There were cute, cuddly ponies and tall, big-boned road horses, as the Amish referred to them.

The steady, brown or black, Standardbred driving horses were the backbone of the Amish community. They obediently stood in forebays of barns while heavy, leather harnesses were flung across their backs and then attached to thick, heavy collars around their muscular necks and shoulders. A horse allowed itself to be led to a carriage, backed into the shafts, and attached to the buggy. They waited patiently while family members clambered into the buggy, then trotted off faithfully, pulling them uphill and downhill in all sorts of weather.

The most amazing part of hitching up a horse was the fact that these docile creatures allowed that hideous steel bit to be placed in their mouths. This is the part that goes between their teeth and attaches to the bridle that goes up over their ears. Good, responsible horses never seemed to mind, lowering their heads so the bit could easily slide into their mouths.

There were some horses, of course, who were cranky and disobedient, but Sadie always felt sorry for them. Very likely, at some point in their lives, these horses had been whipped or kicked or jerked around simply because they were born with a stubborn nature and made their owners’ tempers flare like sticks of dynamite. This destroyed the trust and any thread of confidence they had once acquired.

Usually, a calm, obedient horse had a calm, quiet owner and vice versa. Horses didn’t require much of their owners: a quiet stall and a bit of pasture, decent feed and hay, water, and enough attention to know they were cared for and appreciated.

Sadie browned the sausage until it was coated all over with the butter and flour mixture. Then she went to the refrigerator for a gallon of milk, which she poured slowly into the sizzling sausage, stirring and stirring after this addition. She added the usual salt and pepper, then reached up to the rack again for the huge cast-iron skillet.

“Watcha getting’ that for?” Dorothy asked.

That woman has eyes in the back of her head. Seriously, Sadie thought.

“Hash browns.”

“Them potatoes ain’t even cooked. How you gonna make hash browns? That’s what happens when young girls moon about boys and stuff.”

Sadie suppressed a giggle. She knew Dorothy always got a tiny bit miffed when the pressure was on. She never failed to let Sadie know when she did something wrong, implying that Sadie’s misstep was the reason for the pressure to begin with.

After working with Dorothy for almost three years, Sadie knew she had the best heart and kindest demeanor of anyone she had ever met. Her scoldings were sort of soft and harmless beneath all that fuss, and Sadie often suppressed her laughter when Dorothy was bustling and talking and scolding.

“Oh, I forgot.”

“You forgot. Moonin’ around, that’s what.”

Dorothy went to the pantry, which contained 50- pound bags of potatoes, lugged one out to the sink, and proceeded to throw the potatoes in by the handfuls. Grabbing a sharp paring knife, she set to work, the peels falling into the sink in rapid succession. Sadie joined her.

“I’m hungry,” Sadie announced for the second time that morning.

“Make some toast. Didn’t you have breakfast? You need to get up earlier. Set your alarm 15 minutes earlier.”

“No, thanks.”

“Hmmpfhh. Then be hungry.”

She slid a pan of perfectly-rounded, precisely-cut biscuits into the oven, and Sadie hid another grin.

The kitchen door banged open, and Jim hurried in, a box under his arm. Snow clung to his greasy Stetson, and he took it off, clapping it against his legs. Snow sprayed in every direction.

“Jim Sevarr! You borned in a sawmill? Whatsa matter with you? Gettin’ my kitchen soakin’ wet. I’ll fall on them puddles. Now, git! Git!”

She waved both arms, then her apron, as if her husband was a huge cat that needed to be chased away from her work area.

“Don’t you want a doughnut?”

Immediately Dorothy’s expression changed, like the sun breaking through clouds, spreading warmth through the kitchen.

“Now, Jim, you know if there’s any one thing I can’t resist, it’s them doughnuts. You got ’em at the Sunoco station?”

“Sure did. Coffee on?”