Chapter Sixteen
A Strange Discovery
The next day we were even more eager to head out. We were convinced there was something up with Cal, and we wanted to know what it was. Her behavior had been suspicious and uncharacteristic.
Trick came up with a plan. She knew the area a little, whereas Oscar and I were less familiar with the surroundings.
“Let’s head out toward Wildman’s Creek and start there.
There’s bound to be some homesteads in that area, though I doubt there are any grand ones.
From what I know, ’tis where a lot of poorer folks are set up as best they can.
If we don’t find Cal’s place, we’ll ride out along the road where the wealthier folks live.
Maybe Cal was tellin’ the truth, and she lives in a fine home with a loving husband. ” Trick sounded doubtful.
“All right,” I said.
I watched as Oscar swung up on his horse and brought Onyx around to face the direction we wanted to go.
He had good form, and the two of them seemed right out of a horseman’s catalogue.
He had gained in confidence, and it looked real good on him.
’Twas a fact that I might have coddled him in the past, because we both enjoyed it in the sheets.
But maybe ’twas time I treated him like a man when we were in public.
That had been a difficult thing to wrap my head around back in Port Essington, but ’twas getting easier.
Oscar was clever and capable, and I had a mind to remember that.
“What?” Oscar said, noticing the way I was watching him. “You’re lookin’ at me all queer.”
Trick glanced my way as I smiled and shook my head.
“Simply admiring the view is all. You’re a handsome fucker, you know.”
“Aww, shucks,” he said, acting shy. But there wasn’t anything at all bashful in the look he threw me.
“Now, now,” I said, bringing Dixie alongside Oscar and Onyx. “Don’t get me all worked up when we got a long day of riding and searching ahead of us. I need to concentrate,” I said.
“You started it. Maybe keep your eyes on your reins and not my ass,” Oscar said, and Trick guffawed.
“Yeah, Jimmy. Jeez,” she said. “Try to control yourself now.”
I grinned, and we headed out toward Wildman’s Creek with hope and humor. The good feelings only lasted as long as it took to reach the first broken-down homestead.
“I told you,” Trick said, pulling Gus’s horse up and nodding toward a woman who was hooking a tired old mule to a plow, in clothes that had seen better days. “This ain’t the finest area. Lotta folks struggling.”
“No doubt,” I said.
“We should ask her if she knows Cal, though. Even though I sort of hope she don’t.”
I nodded toward Trick.
“You should go. E’en though you’re dressed mannish, I reckon you’re less intimidatin’ than we are.”
“Only because she don’t know you,” Oscar said with a grin.
We watched as Trick rode up to the woman, and they had a conversation. Wasn’t long before she rode back to us.
“Nah, she says most folk around here keep to themselves. She don’t know her neighbors and don’t want to. She got enough problems of her own, she says.”
“I reckon that’s true,” I said, gazing at the ratty looking home and the small barn. More and more, I appreciated the fine house Oscar and I had built with the help of our friends in Port Essington and understood how lucky we were. Not everyone was so fortunate.
We rode on and approached a few more people, with no luck and increasing feelings of melancholy at the sad state of most of the dwellings.
“This ain’t the kind of place where I’d want to have a home,” Oscar muttered, as we got back to the dirt road after speaking with a very thin man holding a gun, who’d spit on Trick and told us to leave him be, that they didn’t need strange folks snooping around.
I’d had my hand on my rifle in case things had gotten ugly, and I had to admit, I was ready to call it a day and head back to The Angel.
But as we rode past a large stand of conifers that opened up to a large field containing a barn with what looked like a weathered homestead tucked in behind, a small child darted out from behind the trees and headed toward us, a bold grin on the tyke’s dirty face and laughter bubbling from his lips.
We pulled the horses up and watched the wee thing run. ’Twas wearing a pair of ripped dungarees that were held up with one strap, and its small, filthy feet were bare. The child’s torso looked as begrimed as his face.
“Samuel! You get back here right now!”
The tone and timbre of that voice sent a chill up my spine, and I watched as a woman with dark hair almost to her shoulders came running, her skirts in her hand and her stride quick as she chased down the young runaway.
“It’s Cal,” Oscar said, before any of us could.
Cal glanced o’er and hesitated for a split second before surging forward and grabbing the child from the ground and swinging him up into her arms.
“Sam, I told you not to go near the road,” she said with some strictness, but the way she held the boy and the tenderness with which she patted his cheek and chuffed his chin, spoke of a care I wasn’t surprised to see from the woman we had known.
The child wiggled and pointed.
“Horsey!”
Cal glanced o’er again and kept her gaze on us, nodding to the child and holding him still.
“Yes, that’s right. Nice horseys. But you need to stay away from strangers, Sam. It ain’t safe.” Cal said, giving us a glare that surprised me with its ferocity, before she turned and headed back toward the trees.
“Caliope!” Trick said, in a voice that held a contempt and anger that I felt in my soul. “Don’t you dare hide from us. We seen you.”
And Cal shriveled, hunched herself o’er the child, and stood stock still as if hoping to disappear.
Oscar and I exchanged a glance as Trick dismounted and strode up to Cal and the child, who peeked from behind Cal’s arm with wide eyes and a look of fear on its plump face.
“Cal, I’m sorry,” Trick said carefully. “I didn’t mean to yell, only I want to talk to you.”
Cal kept looking at the ground. Then she shuddered and turned as she straightened, presenting to us a carefully constructed expression of surprise with an underpinning of annoyance and fear.
“I’m sorry. You startled me,” she said, reassuring the child, who struggled to be put down. Cal clicked her tongue. “You hold my hand, Samuel, and I will put you down. You gotta stay with me.”
Samuel grinned, and Cal set him down on the grass, holding tight to his small hand and gazing at Trick and Oscar and me.
“He likes to run. I’m tryin’ to teach him to stay where it’s safe.”
Trick smiled. “I reckon that’s a tricky one for a child his age. How old is the little one?”
“Almost two.”
“Where’s his momma?” Trick asked.
Perhaps the question was insensitive, for Cal pulled herself up and said, “ I’m his momma,” in a voice that brooked no argument.
“Momma,” Samuel repeated, swinging their joined hands and grinning.
“Oh,” Trick said, with a smile. “Well, then. All right.” She glanced our way as if she wasn’t sure where to take the conversation.
“This your homestead, Cal?” Oscar said, swinging down from Onyx and walking toward her. “We been ridin’ all mornin’, lookin’ for you.”
Cal held tighter to Sam’s hand and seemed like she wanted to run. Oscar stopped walking and scratched his chin.
“I’m awful thirsty,” Oscar said. “Do you think we might come in for a bit?”
“Tirsty!” Samuel said, tugging on Cal’s hand.
Cal took the measure of us. “My husband’s not home, but I s’pose it’d be all right.”
“Thank you, Cal,” I said. “It’d be mighty kind of you. I’m a bit parched myself.”
Cal nodded, and I saw a flicker of something, perhaps a memory of the friendship we used to have, before she turned and started toward the stand of trees.
We glanced at each other and followed.
The house, when it became visible, was barely more than a sizeable shack, with walls that needed shoring up and a roof that probably leaked when it rained or snowed hard.
As if she knew how bad it looked, Cal kept her head down and took her time, reluctant to take us there, I supposed.
But now that I was aware of it, I wanted to see inside.
I needed to see how bad it was and what kind of a situation Cal was in, through no fault of her own.
“This is fine land, Cal. What do you and Albert grow?” I asked. The fields looked like they’d been abandoned and not tilled for a while, but I thought I’d ask, in case I was missing something.
“This is the house, here,” Cal said, ignoring my question and stating the obvious, in a morose tone of voice, as the door opened and a girl child of about six or seven peeked out, strands of brown hair escaping from uneven braids.
“Elizabeth,” Cal said, “where’s Peter?”
The girl gaped at us while she answered Cal. “He’s out back, tryin’ to fix the washing line.”
“Can you go get him please? We got some visitors.”
Elizabeth gazed at us with wide eyes and shrank behind the open door.
“It’s all right, Lizzy. They’re kind folks. They only want a drink.”
Lizzy looked as if she didn’t truly believe Cal, but she nodded and pulled the door wider as Cal took Samuel in, and we followed.
As we stepped inside the dark space that smelled like spoiled milk and urine, Cal sighed. “It ain’t much, but it’s ours.”
“Sure,” Trick said, gazing about us at the sorry state of Cal’s home. “Better ’n I got.”
Cal’s gaze flashed to her, assessing. Did Cal regret not being at The Angel?
The Angel was more comfortable, and cleaner by far, than this place, and didn’t have the demands of three children and an absent husband to worry her.
But Cal had worked hard while she was there, and ’twasn’t necessarily a life to strive for either.
“Get Peter, please,” Cal reminded Lizzie with a gentleness of manner I remembered.
“Yes, Momma,” Lizzie said, her eyes huge and her manner subdued as she slipped into the kitchen and out of the back door.