Albert sighed and set his fork down. “It’s a nice dilemma to have, two families both wanting their granny to live with them. There are people turned out by children when they can’t do for themselves anymore. Maybe she’ll spend time with both.”
Clover said, “Sort of like the rich folks in town who go up the Catalina Trail to the mountains for the summer. Part of the year with us, part with Aunt Sarah.”
Savannah said, “We’d better ask Mother Prine. I believe she already needs to be with somebody all the time, to make sure she’s safe. That sort of thing.”
That sort of thing, and selling your land to the railroad. We talked awhile longer, and eventually Albert made me feel better about the land deal that our mama had made. Still, I’ll wait for Mr. Baramon to write back whether the sale is legal and binding, and whether it means the tracks are going straight through Granny’s parlor.
Ezra and Zack followed me home. I planned to have them explore some poetry and percentages. “Your mama says she’s kept you up on your schooling,” I said. Both boys nodded and I caught them eyeing each other. You can never guess what may be going on in the minds of little boys, but it doesn’t pay to let them out of your sight very long. So while we walked to my house, I explained about percentages and what they were. Then I told Ezra to take out his slingshot, and we lined up a row of ten pebbles on the top rail of my front gate. “That’s a hundred percent,” I said. As he shot them down, we figured what percent he had taken down and what was left.
Zachary asked if you always had to start with ten for it to work, and when I said no, he wanted to know if you had fourteen and shot two, what percent that would be. So we had to do that one in the dirt with a stick. It took some explaining, but after about three times, I think they both understood it. Then I told them I planned to continue lessons down at the pool where the Cienega runs under some rocks and a ridge.
They shouted for joy while we walked down to the stream’s edge, where there wasn’t any flowing water, although still plenty of mud. Up a little farther, we thrashed out the brush growing at the edge of the pool. It was more shallow than I’d ever seen it, but it still might draw snakes at the edge. The only thing we chased out was a little striped racer. Then I let them get in. I’d just taken off my shoes and put my feet in the water when I felt more than saw someone move nearby.
It was a small figure, sitting, arms about the knees and head tucked low. Mary Pearl. She might have been crying or sleeping—I couldn’t tell which. “Mary Pearl,” I said quietly, “what are you doing?”
She raised her head, looked toward me through the leaves only for a moment, then stared straight ahead. She definitely was not crying, but she looked angry. “Just trying to be by myself for ten blessed minutes,” she said. “I just want to be alone.”
“I see,” I said. “Well, you come here for privacy, and here I am bringing these rascals to break up your thinking time. I wanted to let them cool off a bit. We’ll be gone in a few minutes.” I turned away, trying, much as I could while being only five or six feet away, to ignore her. The boys played and splashed. The water was warm, but having their summer overalls wet would cool them off, and the playing would wear them out, both good measures for little boys.
“Aunt Sarah?” Mary Pearl said. She’d come no closer. Wasn’t even looking in my direction. She watched Ezra and Zachary as if they were just animals gamboling in the water. Spoke as if I weren’t there, too, the way I talk to Jack sometimes. “Why would they do such a thing? I’m so embarrassed. I’d like to die.”
I said, “What are you talking about?”
“Mama and Papa. I—it’s horrible. I can never go to town—if people find out.”
I turned to face her, though she still faced the water from her vantage point. “What have they done?” I asked.
“Mama said you knew already.”
“Knew what? Oh. Are you talking about the baby?”
Mary Pearl shuddered. She turned her face as if she had to study something on the ground. I saw then the hard blush on her neck. “How could they?” she said angrily.
I put my shoes back on, leaving them unbuttoned, and walked around the brush until I could sit next to her. The boys hollered and I waved at them so they’d know I hadn’t left, and they went back to playing. I said, really soft, under my breath, “You figure you’ve got enough brothers?”
“It isn’t that. You know. It’s not decent.”
I reckon to a girl Mary Pearl’s age, the idea of her parents having more children might seem, well, irregular. But this was more personal, I believed. Mary Pearl herself had only just found out the truth about marriage and what it meant to share a bed with someone. And she was right: Folks in town might talk or say something low-down about the family. To a lot of busybodies, a new baby coming to parents with a son as grown as Clover was proof of a lack of restraint and good manners. I said, “Well, it’s a good thing we don’t live in town, so we don’t have to hear folks’ ridiculous chatter.”
She glared at me. “Just because we don’t hear don’t mean they aren’t saying it.”
“Since when do you care a flip about gossip?” I picked out some pebbles at my feet and ran them back and forth from one hand to the other. “It’s not the gossip that’s needling you. It’s the whole idea of your parents—”
“They’re old!”
“No, they’re not.”
She crossed her arms and stiffened her back, staring again to where the boys were playing. “They should be like you. Just be smart and be single. Before Elsa left for the convent, she told me her parents each had their own bedroom.”
Well, that closed my mouth for a moment. It would do no good to argue or try to explain life to a girl already head up about the idea of her parents’ nesting habits. After awhile, I said, “Maybe I want to be like them. Did you think of that?”
“That is disgusting.”
I threw my handful of pebbles into the pond at the water’s edge. “I remember feeling that way when I first learned about it. Eventually, you get over being sickened by the thought. Then you get curious. After awhile, you sort of look forward to it.”
She breathed loudly, her face deep crimson. “I prayed all morning never, ever, to do that.”
I said, “When it’s the right man, you’ll quit praying that. Until then, keep it up. You’ve lived around animals all your life, Mary Pearl. You can’t make me believe you are that shocked and surprised. Say, you want to come stay a few days? The boys are in the bunkhouse; it’d just be you and I and Grampa Chess.”
“I don’t ever want to go home again. I can’t stand to look at them.”
It hurt to hear the bitterness in her voice. I said, “Well, that’s probably temporary, too. Ezra! You fellows get on home now. Tell your papa you found out what fifteen percent of fourteen is, and that Mary Pearl is staying the night at my place.” Ezra and Zack got out of the pond after a few more splashes toward each other. They went up the road toward home; then I locked arms with Mary Pearl and we strolled up to the house.
Suppertime, Lazrus showed up late, taking a chair so far removed from the table, he hardly seemed to be seated with us. With Mary Pearl at the table, he was surly and quiet, and he kept glancing at her with those beady little eyes. Mason Sherrill blessed the food good and long, so it was near stone-cold, but it got done in a way that would have made Savannah proud. Soon as he’d eaten a chicken wing and a spoonful of squash, Lazrus muttered, “Scuse me,” and left.
The rest of us finished our meal in peace, talking about what a good thing it would be if he truly did find us water. All the while, I was thinking about what a blessing it would be to see the last of him. After supper, Charlie wanted a haircut, and then I did Gilbert’s, too. Mary Pearl offered to sweep out the kitchen as we trimmed. I wrapped an old sheet around Gil’s shoulders to catch hair, just as I’d done with Charlie. When we were done, I took the sheet outside to shake it out. With one snap of the cloth, there was no one standing there, and with the next,
Mr. Lazrus was standing in front of me. I caught my breath with a sound.
“Hello,” he said. “Crept right up on you.”
I frowned at him. “Yes, you did.” I realized he was eyeing the scissors and the sheet in my hands. If he thought I was going to cut into that vermin-crawling nest of hair on him, he was going to have to think again. Nevertheless, he kept staring at them.
After a bit, he said, “We’ll be going to the west tomorrow.”
“Fine,” I said.
“Did you send for the drill?”
“You haven’t pointed out any water to me.”
“Send for them tomorrow. I’ll be ready to dig in a couple more days, and the rig needs to be ready. Tell them to bring only twelve-foot pipes.”
“Everything comes in twelves for you?”
He smiled. “Yes, ma’am, it does. Works out that way. Twelve days. Twelve years. Earth goes around the sun in twelve months.”
“Twelve apostles.”
“Oh, yes. The sermon on the mashed potatoes this evening. Very effective.”
“My brother’s wife thinks you are a sorcerer.”
At that, Lazrus laughed aloud. “Oh,” he said, “I haven’t laughed like that in a long, long time.”
“Mr. Lazrus?”
“Yes, ma’am?”
“Do you bathe? Ever?”
“Not when my host is short on water. My business is finding water, which naturally means there isn’t any to spare where I’m at.”
I said, “Well, in your line of work, I suppose that passes for an excuse. Nevertheless, it’s amazing what you can do with a bucketful. I have hauled a hundred gallons today for the stock, and there’s some in that barrel yet. There’s a washtub in the barn and homemade soap on the back porch. Use it. Or you’ll be having your meals outside, downwind.”
“Mrs. Elliot, if you’re trying to insult me to get rid of me, I assure you I’ll not leave without my forty dollars. I won’t take it until I’ve earned it. And I won’t have earned it until you produce the drilling rig. Good evening.”
It’d be hard to say why I felt a bit sorry to have hurt his feelings. Still, I asked my boys to sleep at the house that night. In the middle of the summer, as if the heat just cannot leave the land, the sun goes down late, and it stays fairly light past nine o’clock at night, so there is plenty of time for chores after supper. Last month, Chess and I moved our beds to the back porch. Ever since Lazrus has been here, I just cannot make myself lie in mine, and have gone back to sleeping inside. With the men home, though, it felt fine to be out in the cool night air. We were good and crowded, with a blanket up between men and women, so Mary Pearl could have her privacy.
Late into the night, I awoke with a start. Mountain lion, screeching in the night. They sound like a human being, half screaming, half moaning. A chill moved through me. The boys mumbled. Chess said he’d hunt in the morning and see if it took down one of our animals. The cat had probably come down from the mountains, searching for water just like the rest of the critters. What made me wonder, worry even, was that Nip and Shiner were under the house; they didn’t growl or even come out. It wasn’t like them to ignore so much as a prairie dog, much less a puma growling. It could be near the barn. In the dark, with all the little hills and cliffs around here, the sound travels, so the puma could be half a mile away, or it could be at the barn door. The yard cats usually slept in the barn, and Pillbox and Hunter were in there, too. Rose was out in the pasture with old Dan and the other retired horses.
Suddenly, in a burst of noise that made me let out my breath with relief, the two dogs came barreling from under the house, barking and snarling. Now we were all awake. I heard the cry again, more distant now. Chess called the dogs back. It was still dark. He went back to bed. In just a few minutes, he was snoring again. Nip and Shiner prowled outside the house, grumbling and growling, as if they were planning to stay extra vigilant, having been caught off guard before. I got up and made some coffee, then sat myself on the porch, my rifle across my lap, and watched the sun come up.
While I sat there, first thing I planned was to chase that Lazrus off my land at daybreak. If I didn’t get a well, I knew I’d better make a list of everything I had to sell. The land, of course. Maybe Rudolfo would buy a lease. There were still eighty and some years left on a couple of them. Then there were between four and six hundred head of cattle, and the horses, probably four dozen if we rounded up the wild ones from out beyond Majo Vistoso. Yet it would take an ocean underground to keep things going if it didn’t rain. There was the south windmill! I could build a house there. I heard a dog growl beneath my feet. “Shiner,” I whispered. “Come here, girl.”
Shiner slipped from under the porch and looked suspiciously at me. Then her tail began to wag. I don’t know how anyone can get by without a good old dog. This dog is really the second Shiner I’ve had. I named her after her mama, who was a pup from my dog Twobuddy. I tapped my lap, and she came and sat beside my chair. I petted and scratched behind her ears. She lay down and went back to sleep.
I tried not to let myself think about Mary Pearl and her shock at the revelation that her mother was expecting another baby. But that’s about like trying not to think about a cricket chirping, the more you don’t think about it, the louder it gets. Those were long ago days, before I knew what went on between a man and a woman. I felt a flush rise on my own face. A breeze stirred my hair, and I pulled the long braid that hung down my back to the front and loosened the hair from it. Then I put the back of my hand against my lips and remembered Jack kissing me. Strange how I rarely even noticed the mustache, although it was a good-size one. Reckon I was a long ways down the road from girlish embarrassment. Not far enough down that road not to feel the desire I used to know, that was for certain. I shook out my hair and flung it back behind me. Pure lonely, sometimes. Surrounded by people and lonely for the love of a singular man. The quiet talk in the night, when you’ve both wakened and can’t sleep. The arm across your ribs, or your knees bumping into another set of knees if he’s turned the other way.
About the time the sky went from indigo to green, I took the long stick I use to check for rattlesnakes, and walked up the rise to our little graveyard, with Shiner on my heels. The one blessing about this time of day is the weather. It is cool and dry. No breeze, but the morning bristles with doves and quail waking up and hunting seeds, rustling in the brush, calling to each other. Shiner followed me partway but then got to chasing a lizard and ran off toward the creekbed. I felt wide-awake but drained, as if my heart had dried out like my land.
I walked among my people, lying there, and I took joy in remembering them. I always save visiting Jack for the last, so I can spend some time. A cholla has sprouted behind his headstone, and it had three soft yellow flowers on it this morning. Such an odd plant. It’s about the worst thing on the range for riding through, man or beast, but the flowers are delicate and lacy, and just beautiful. They smell nice, too. I suppose I ought to pull that thing out before it takes over the whole cemetery, but I reckon I’ll wait until it is done blooming. At least Jack might like to look up at it now and then.
I knelt before his grave and smiled, leaning on the stick. “Jack,” I said aloud, “I miss you sorely. The day isn’t begun, but I’m already plum wore out. All I’d hoped to do this summer was look forward to April and Morris and their children visiting. Instead, I wrote them to stay put. The well has gone dry, Jack. The cattle are near dead of the drought, and five chickens died yesterday of heat. I need you home. Granny has gone and hired a lunatic, who’s stealing her money to run around here looking like John the Baptist come to life. Even calls himself Lazrus, like he was some kind of preacher, and I know that’s not his real name. And she’s sold sixty acres to the railroad to pay for a well for me. Never in my life would I have asked anyone to sell that much land for me. I told Mama to get it back, and I’ll make do, but she won’t hear of it. Lands, Jack, I’m tired. Wish you’d just come on home.”
A quai
l swooped up onto a wooden cross a few feet away. It was one of those soldiers’ graves. The poor man’s name is about gone. I’d better paint it again before I forget it and can’t read it any longer.
“Where’s the other one?” a voice said. I near about jumped up in the air. Lazrus stood not six feet in front of me, square on, like he’d been there the whole time, but I never saw him. He said, “There was another girl. You’ve got one buried here, but the age is wrong. Not the one living with you now, either. There’s an older girl. She’s gone, then, not dead.”
I was shaking so, my teeth rattled. “What the devil are you doing out here? You just come to scare the living breath right out of me?”
“Moved away? Married maybe. Yes, she’s old enough to marry. That’s it.”
“How do you come to know so much about my family?”
“As I said, you learn more dirty than you do clean. It puts a touch on things.”
I was thinking it puts a stench on things, but I only said, “Who are you?”
“Lazrus. God’s Lazrus. Come to life again to walk in the desert. Almost like John the Baptist. You were right.”
I tried to calm my breathing. “What are you doing out here?”
“Where should I sleep but among friends?”
“These aren’t your friends.”
He cast his arms about. “Over there, five men of different names. Little wooden crosses. Strangers who died close by, no doubt. Here’s a Maldonado, and a Cujillo, both from down the road about two miles. This one, this was your baby. Big marble stone with two angels guarding her little bonesies. Suzanne Elliot. Just a baby. So sad. You can still feel the curve of her little head in your hands, smell the womb’s fragrance on her little neck. Sometimes you cup your hands and remember holding her head, feeling the hair on it, softer than a fairy’s whisper.”
I pulled the snake stick in front of me. I wondered if I could thrash him enough to beat the pain into him that he was putting on me. “Get away from here,” I said. “Get off this place, away from me, before I whip you.”