Chapter 13 #2
“Looks like they’re headed for the barn,” Tripp said as he stepped out into the snow again. “You go on back inside and get warm. I’ll run that rascal down and bring him straight to you.”
“You better, or I’ll match you up with a shrew of a woman,” Bernie threatened.
The only time Tripp had seen a trail like the one in front of him was when he was a little boy. His mother had been furious when she saw what a gopher had done to her perfectly manicured lawn. The gardener had finally flushed the critter out by flooding the original hole.
“It’s bigger than a gopher,” he muttered, “and water wouldn’t work.”
Pepper’s head appeared about ten feet in front of him, and the animal had the audacity to bark at him before he went back under to follow Pansy.
Evidently the pig was the snowplow, and Pepper was running behind her.
Like he thought, the animals were digging their way to the barn, so instead of following the trail they left behind, he headed off in that direction.
When he was inside, Willa Rose looked up from the area at the back of the building and frowned. “Are you stalking me?”
“No, ma’am,” he answered and began checking the perimeter of the place. “I found it!”
“What did you find?” Willa Rose’s voice echoed across the big, empty space.
“A hole,” he shouted.
“You are telling me that you waded through all this snow to find a hole?”
“Yes, and any minute, Pansy and Pepper are going to come through it. As soon as they do, you chase them away and I’ll plug the hole with a bale of hay,” he said.
“Are you ordering me or asking?”
Tripp dropped down on one knee, took Willa Rose’s hand in his, and said, “Miz Thomas, will you please chase a pig and a Chihuahua across the barn so I can cover up this hole? Aunt Bernie is about to have a heart attack because her dog is lost in the snow.”
She jerked her hand back. “Get up off the floor. If someone comes in, they’ll think…”
“That I’m proposing.” Tripp chuckled. “Today I just need help with a pig and a dog, but we can talk about the joys of matrimony in the future.”
She backed up and sat down on the bale of hay. “I will tell you no if that subject ever comes up.”
He sat down beside her. “Is that because you can’t have children?”
“It’s because I’m not staying here, and you would never leave. Shhh.…” She cocked her head to one side. “I hear Pansy grunting and Pepper yipping. They’ll be here soon.”
“Does that mean you are going to help me corral them?”
“Yes, I will, but I’m not trudging all the way to Bernie’s place to take Pepper home,” she answered.
“How about going with me out to the farm to take Pansy back?” he asked.
“Only if you don’t get down on a knee again,” she agreed.
“Fair enough. See that snow coming through the hole? They’re on the final stretch now.”
A white sifting landed on Willa Rose’s boot. “How do they know where the hole is? They can’t see it, and there’s ice under the snow so they can’t smell the trail in the dirt.”
“The heart knows what it wants, and Pansy likes all these new critters the carnival brought with them. I wonder if she grew up on a farm and misses it,” Tripp answered.
Pansy’s snout came through the hole first. Her round little body followed, and she took off in a blur toward the pen with the other animals. Pepper stopped long enough to shake away the snow that had fallen on him, and then he followed her.
“My job is done,” Willa Rose said.
“Oh, no, it’s not,” Tripp argued. “You said you would hold Pansy on the trip to the farm. She’ll take off as soon as the door is open if you don’t.”
“I did not agree to hold that pig,” she argued.
Tripp shoved the bale of hay over the hole and grabbed Pepper the next time he whizzed by. “Playtime is over. You have to go home now.”
The dog yipped and tried to wiggle free, but Tripp held on tightly. “I’ll be back as soon as I can. Close the door behind me or we’ll be chasing Pansy again.”
“You will be running her down, not me,” Willa Rose declared.
He heard the door slam shut when he had taken a couple of steps and smiled. Pansy could root out from under a pen, or into a barn with a dirt floor, but there was no way the silly pig could open a barn door.
Bernie met them on the porch and took Pepper from his arms. “If you ever do something like this again,” she told Pepper, “I won’t share my Irish coffee with you for a week.
I’d invite you inside, Tripp, but you need to take that pig home before I see to it that she goes with the carnival on Monday morning.
She’s a bad influence on my poor Pepper. ”
“I’ll tell Brodie that Pansy is on probation,” he promised.
“Next time she goes straight to jail. She does not pass Go or get to romp around with Pepper,” Bernie said and carried Pepper inside.
Tripp retraced his footsteps back to the barn and eased inside carefully so Pansy wouldn’t slip past him. He blinked several times before his eyes adjusted from the sun’s bright light creating a blinding effect on the snow. When he could fully focus, he couldn’t believe the sight in front of him.
Willa Rose was sitting on the hard dirt floor with Pansy snoring in her lap. He tiptoed over to them and reached down to pick up the animal, but Willa Rose shook her head. “You go get the truck and pull it up close to the barn. I’ll carry her out and pet her to keep her calm on the trip.”
“You didn’t like her when I volunteered you to watch her,” Tripp said.
“I never said that. I just didn’t want to babysit her for a whole week,” she protested. “She’s a sweetheart, but I’ve got an antique store to get organized so I can have a grand opening on Valentine’s Day.”
Pansy grunted a couple of times on the way to the truck, but she didn’t open her eyes. Tripp opened the door for Willa Rose and eased it shut when she and Pansy were settled into the passenger seat.
“She must like you,” he said as he started the engine. “Am I understanding right? You are warming up to the idea of starting your store?”
“I’m not sure, but all the stuff will be here, so I might as well give it a try,” she answered.
He drove slowly and kept in the ruts. “Valentine’s Day will be a good time to have a grand opening.”
“Why do you think so?”
“It’s on a Saturday.”
“I didn’t even think of that,” she said, “but how did you already know what day it’s on?”
“A customer ordered a saddle for her husband, and it has to be finished by Valentine’s Day. I marked it on the calendar before the storm and saw that it was on a Saturday.”
The pig’s snores were the only noise in the truck for a few minutes.
As if she knew Brodie was nearby, she woke up when Tripp saw Brodie coming toward them in the cab of a tractor with a grader on the front.
Trip pulled up beside him and rolled down the window.
“We found something at the Paradise that belongs to you. Bernie is so mad that flames are coming out her ears because Pansy led Pepper through the snow to the barn. You might want to chain her to your bedpost until Bernie gets over her mad spell.”
Brodie got out of the tractor and took Pansy from Willa Rose. “Thanks for bringing her home again. We probably need to get some more small animals in the spring to keep her company. I figure if we buy few goats, they could keep the ground under the fruit trees cleaned up for me.”
“Sounds like a good idea to me,” Tripp said. “But on a different note, you do know that the sun is supposed to shine for the next few days and nighttime temps are going to be in the fifties. You don’t really have to do this.”
“Maybe not, but the weatherman has been wrong, and I want folks to be able to get to the Paradise for the program,” he answered as he shoved Pansy into the passenger seat of the tractor.
“And on top of that, Audrey is dying to hold Endora’s new babies, and we’re going there for supper tonight.
See y’all later.” He got into the tractor and started the engine.
“One more job well done,” Tripp said. “You want to go on to the farm and visit with Audrey this afternoon?”
“Not really. Mary Jane invited me to have supper with the family tonight,” she answered.
“Okay then. I’ll drop you off and get back to work.”
“You won’t be coming in with me?” she asked.
“Only if you get down on one knee,” he teased.
Willa Rose air slapped him on the arm. “I’m not that kind of woman.”
“So, you don’t propose to men?”
“I do not,” she answered.