Chapter 2 #2
“I don’t know. Sometimes he wanders down the road. Sometimes he goes to the trees over there or there.” She pointed west and then north. “Sometimes he just sits and stares into space. But if you call him, he doesn’t answer.”
“I’ll find him. Can you watch Poppy for me?” Amelia hesitated over leaving the little one with Kat.
Kat studied the wide-eyed child in her arms. “Do you think she likes me?”
“Of course she does. What’s not to like? Just don’t let her wander away. You might give her some water and maybe a biscuit or a piece of bread and jam.”
“All right.”
Amelia took Poppy’s face between her hands. “You stay with Kat until I get back. Be a good girl.”
Poppy peered around. “Kitty?”
Amelia chuckled. She turned Poppy’s face toward Kat and rested her hand on Kat’s head. “This is Kat.”
“Hi, Poppy,” Kat said.
“Hi, Kitty.” Poppy stroked Kat’s hair where it draped over her shoulder.
Kat and Amelia grinned.
“You two take care of each other. I’ll be back when I find your pa.” She stood in the middle of a vast landscape. North, west, trees, rocks. Where would he go? How far would he roam?
I found him five miles from home, sitting on a fallen tree, looking lost and forlorn.
She’d try the trees first. As she walked, she took in the scenery.
Zach’s letters had been full of praise for the rolling hills, the richness of the grass in the draws, the abundance of trees and water, and the mountains, so blue and majestic—like guardians of the land.
She smiled at the memory of those words.
Who had written them? And why?
She traipsed down a hill. The grass was brown.
Little puffs of seeds and yellow fluff blew up at each step.
So dry. In his last letter, the writer had mentioned his concern for the drought.
He’d said he wished his pa had chosen a place to the west, closer to the mountains, where they got more rain instead of the foothills of the eastern slopes.
The ground rose, and she climbed to the top of the rise. A thick grove of trees lay to her right.
“Mr. Taggerty,” she called and listened.
No answer. She didn’t know his given name.
She called again. “Mr. Taggerty.” Kat had said he sometimes stared straight ahead and didn’t seem to hear, so Amelia circled the trees of mixed deciduous and evergreens and then went deeper.
“Pa, Pa,” she called. The title would more likely elicit a response.
She searched the entire grove to no avail. He must have gone elsewhere. Then she saw him, almost invisible in the dappled sunlight beneath a towering tree.
He seemed unaware of her presence. Not wanting to frighten him, she approached with measured steps. “Mr. Taggerty.” No response. “Pa.”
His head came up.
Excellent. She knelt in front of him. “Hi, how are you?”
He smiled and touched her shoulder. “Do I know you?”
“Maybe not. My name is Amelia, and I’ve come to take you home.”
His lips trembled. “I can’t remember how to get back.”
“That’s okay. I know the way.” She held out her hand. “Will you come with me?”
He took it, and she led him from the trees. “We go down this little hill and up the other side, and then you’ll see home.”
Pa was a big, strong man. It seems he’s shrunk since his mind started to go. I miss the father I knew growing up. I enjoy the moments he’s his old self, even if it’s only for a brief spell.
It was one of the heartbreaks Amelia had hoped to offer comfort for and share the load.
“How long have I known you?” Poor Pa, struggling to decide if he’d forgotten this information.
Loading him with details wouldn’t help the situation. “Not nearly long enough.” They climbed to the top of the hill and paused to catch their breath. She pointed. “Do you see home?”
“Oh yes. Yes, I do.” He set off at a trot.
“Slow down. Wait for me.”
He stopped. “I’m sorry. I got excited.”
She tucked her hand around his elbow. “Let’s walk together.
” As they approached the house, she glanced over the yard.
Where were Kat and Poppy? She gave the corrals a quick study and eased out her breath when she didn’t see them there.
The big wild horse stood against the fence with no girls nearby.
Mr. Taggerty rushed for the door and into the house. He stopped and backed up a step.
“What’s wrong?” Amelia asked.
“Maybe this isn’t my home.” He pointed toward the table. “I don’t recall a baby.”
Amelia patted his shoulder. “That’s my little girl. Her name is Poppy. Poppy, say hello.”
“’Lo.” She waved. Red jam circled her mouth and dotted her fingers.
“Hi, Pa.” Kat watched her father with a dose of wariness. The poor girl had been dealing with the uncertainty of his behavior for a long time.
“Thank you for taking care of Poppy.” Amelia led the man to the table as she spoke. “Kat, would you give your pa some bread and jam?”
Kat sprang up to do so and poured him coffee from the pot on the back of the stove. The liquid was black and thick. How long ago had it been made?
Amelia would make some fresh as soon as she got things under control. “Now, where can I find Gil?”
Kat nodded to the side of the house.
“Will you keep an eye on these two while I deal with him?”
Kat’s eyes lit up. “I’d sooner see how you handle him.”
Amelia didn’t say anything, just waited for Kat to answer her question.
“Oh, very well.” The words were anything but gracious.
“Thank you.” Amelia went outdoors and around the house. She could have followed her nose to the man. He sat with his knees drawn up, and his head lolled to one side. A bottle hung from his hands. He didn’t hear her approach.
She stood in front of him. “Gil.” She spoke sharply, not knowing if the man was passed out or sleeping. Either way, he was drunk as a miner in town with a poke of gold and nothing to spend it on but liquor.
Gil jerked. His legs jolted outward, and he squinted at her, struggling to focus. He opened his mouth, then closed it.
Before he could find his voice, she spoke. “Zach was good enough to bring you here, give you a home and some dignity in exchange for cooking and watching his pa. You agreed not to drink while you’re here. Now look at you. You’re a mess.”
He patted his pant legs, sending up puffs of dirt.
“You’re sitting here drinking while Mr. Taggerty roams away on his own.”
Gil found the bottle where he’d dropped it when she frightened him awake. Before he could lift it to his lips, she grabbed it and poured the contents on the ground.
“Tha’s mine.”
“Not while you’re here.”
Gil struggled to his feet, swayed, and groaned. “Maybe I won’t stay.”
In Zach’s letters, she learned about Gil.
Zach had found him behind the saloon, where he begged or scavenged food from what the hotel dining room threw out.
Zach had taken him to the man’s mother, and she’d begged Zach to give him a job.
With Pa’s approval, he’d done so, but only because his ma was close friends with Gil’s mother.
His ma excused his behavior, saying he wasn’t always like this, but he’d never recovered from the accident that took his pa. She thought he was hurt in the head in that crash and never got better.
I soon learned he was of no use out with the cows.
He could cook. But not on the range. Too much time on his hands.
He’d take a horse and ride to town. I was ready to give up on him, but after Ma died, I needed someone to keep an eye on Pa and do the cooking, seeing as Kathy refused.
Gil does fine so long as he stays away from the bottle.
“I ain’t nothing but a drunk.” The exact words Zach—only it wasn’t Zach—had written in his letter.
She repeated the answer “Zach” had given in those same letters. “You can change that.”
“Trying.”
“Sitting at the side of the house downing the contents of a bottle isn’t trying. Now this is what you’re going to do.” As she spoke, she urged him to his feet and steered him toward the house. “You’re going to get sober and stay sober and do the job Zach hired you to do.”
They entered the kitchen. “Kat, would you take Poppy out to play, please?”
“Aw. I’d like to see what you do.”
“And I don’t want Poppy to witness this. Please.”
Kat sighed, a sound that carried a whole world of grievances. “Come on, Poppy. Let’s go.”
Pa remained at the table. He blinked at Gil as he sat across from him. “You smell awful.”
“But I feel good.” Gil’s laugh wobbled. “Mostly.”