We Will Not Be Taken Alive (part XIII)

I didn't see Aida during the picnic. I didn't expect to. A ranch full of young men no longer distracted with hard work would simply be too tempting for her. She couldn't resist commanding their collective attention. I didn't blame them. She radiated a golden charm. Hers was a magnetic quality that didn't require explanation. I didn't hold it against her either. It was just her nature. Nothing changed. Nothing ever changes much.

Henrietta handed me a plateful of pulled beef. A meal at the Bingham's was a rarity to those of in the employ of Andrew Bingham, and she served me with warmth.

"You can come sit with me." She said when she saw me scanning the yard. "No sense in you wasting this one special occasion we got sittin' off by yourself."

Henrietta was poor, but unlike most of the folks in town, the farmers especially, she had always been poor. She had always been what they called "servant class." She never had any schooling, but that didn't stop her from getting an education. I never could tell how old she was, and I never saved up enough nerve to ask. Some days, when the dawn sent tangerine light streaking across her face, cool blue shadows collected in etched lines surrounding her mouth and her eyes. At those times she may have sixty, maybe older. And now, in the grey shade of a tall thick oak, the breeze caught wisps of her hair and framed her face in salt and pepper curls. Her eyes were sharp and kind, and she barely seemed a day past forty, maybe younger. I think I preferred not knowing. The mystery gave her wisdom weight and the weight gave her wisdom substance.

"Oh," I smiled, embarrassed. I glanced around me one more time. My eyes darted across the yard, then back to Henrietta. They scanned the pasture, then returned to Henrietta. Daniel wasn't anywhere. His four followers, the other men in the horse collecting party sat contentedly, eating beef, dripping bar-be-que onto their clothes, laughing at stories from the hunt. I looked toward the stables from the corner of my eye, careful not to turn my head, and give myself away, but it was too late.

"Ah," Henrietta said with a broad grin. "It isn't exactly a seat you're looking for, is it?"

Daniel wasn't near the stables. He wasn't anywhere.

I blushed. "No ma'am. It sure isn't."

"Aw, honey, come and sit with me a while. He'll show up. And you won't hurt my feelings none if you get up and go running after him when he do." She put her wide arm across my stiff shoulders and pulled me deep into her soft fleshy self. Her embrace was convincing. Mama always told me you can't trust a skinny cook, and Henrietta was mighty trustworthy.

"Thanks," I said giving in. "And thanks for the bar-be-que. It smells incredible."

"Its nothing, girlie. Its just what I do."

I followed her to the pine laundry table. It had been converted into a picnic table for the occasion with the small addition of a red and white checkered cloth. Half way there I remembered how skinny Mama was. I let loose errant laugh. Henrietta turned to me inquisitively, one eyebrow arched high. The look she gave caused me to laugh again and harder. I passed her and sat down. She sat too.

"You wanna tell me what is so dern funny?" she asked.

"I'm sorry, Henny." I said. "I just remembered something Mama used to say."

Her smile was still warm, but her eyes sighed deeply.

"You're mama was a fine lady, and I 'spect she had many good jokes."

"That's true. She did. But this thing I just remembered, I didn't even know it was a joke until now. Even from beyond her grave she continues to surprise and impress me."

"Well, what was it, honey?"

I contorted my face into the very serious expression that Mama wore when she said it.

"Lucene," I took a deep breath to add emphasis like Mama had, "you can't never trust no skinny cook."

Henrietta mirrored my solemn expression. Her eyebrows furrowed into a knot low over her eyes. I was afraid I might have hurt her feelings, and I hated to think she might hold it against Mama. I was just about to apologize when the corner of her mouth cracked betraying her. I pursed my lips taught. I bit them to keep them straight. She squinted her eyes down into tight little slits, but her chest heaved. From deep within me, the laughter gurgled up, a low base tuned giggle. When she heard it Henrietta pivot her head far back on her neck and opened her mouth wide. Laughter peeled out of her as sure and as high as steam shoots out of a geyser. I doubled over to hold my cramping stomach as round after round of laughter erupted between us.

"Your mama couldn't never have weighed no more'n a hundred pounds!" She squealed.

"I know!" I wheezed.

Tears streamed down our faces. I crossed my legs to control my bladder. Henrietta planted her hand deep into my shoulder to brace herself as she struggled to catch her breath, her diaphragm still tremoring. I wiped tears from my chin and eyes with the backs of my fingers. Through the clearer vision I saw Daniel standing in the door of the stables. He leaned heavily, his shoulder pressed against the wood frame.  He held his Stetson in one hand, and ran the other through his hair and over his beard as thought it ached. I ached.

He watched us, watched me with patient concentration. His eyes were distant, buried deep under the weight of his private thoughts, but he wore the slightest of smiles. It was a departure from his usual deliberate and wicked grin, and it gave him a queer look of bewilderment.

The joy dissolved from my face as I looked back at him. His smile evaporated. Henrietta continued to chuckle unperturbed, but Daniel's face grew dark. He ripped himself from the door frame like a scab and blended into the shadow of the stable.

"Did I ever tell you I met your mama her first day in Morrison? She'd just come in that morning with your pa." Henrietta asked, but I didn't notice. "Honey can you hear me?" She followed my gaze out toward the empty doorway. "Did your fella show up? Which one is he?"

I shook my head and looked at my feet. "No. He didn't show. What were you saying?"

"Don't worry, child. He will."

I wanted to believe her. I wanted painfully to trust that she knew and spoke truth. But Henrietta always spoke from the heart, and the heart isn't always very frank. And the thing about my fella was he wasn't my fella. He was a crazed, poker playing, punch swinging, horse charming, wild eyed stranger. I had no idea what he might do next, what he was capable of.

"I asked if I ever told you how I met your mama the day she came to town with your pa."

"Came?" I asked. "What do you mean came? Weren't they always from here?"

"From here?" she asked with surprise, "No, no, girlie. Your mama came here." She stretched the word "came" far enough to break it. "She came with your pa when she was, I don't know, just about your age, I 'spose. I met her the day they moved in to your place. My brother Thomas used to work up at the Wilson stead just up the road from y'all. I happened to being walking him to work that morning when the craziest little white lady came running down the path at us. She was hollering to heavens and waving her arms all about. I'd like to have thunk she on fire 'cept I didn't smell no smoke. When she reached us at the road she was all raven curls and wide eyes. She wasn't no more than the merest sliver of a thing! But she wound around with the force of a twister.

'Excuse me!' she wailed at us. 'Excuse me!'

We stopped, Thomas, my brother, and I of course cause she was making quite the spectacle.

'Thanks for stopping' she said. She was pantin' just like an old hound, but she looked us straight in the eye. Don't everybody do that.

'I'm Rosalie, and we just moved here, today actually, and wouldn't you know it, but our pump just doesn't want to cooperate,' and that's just what she said, like the pump might have its own mind to make up.

'Could you take a look at it? Maybe tell me what I'm doing wrong here?' she asked us. So Thomas, my brother, went up and looked at it for her."

"Wait," I said. "Hold it for one hot minute. You're trying to tell me that Mama didn't know how to use a well pump?"

"Well, not on that day she didn't." Henrietta answered.

"Mama? My Mama?" I asked dumbfounded. The farm had been her home, her whole life.

"Yes, child your mama." Henrietta said patiently. "Wasn't really nothing wrong with it, 'cept one of the washers was rusted on tight. So Thomas, my brother, loosed it up for her and we was on our way. I ain't never had much occasion to talk with your mama after that, but do you believe that in all these years since then, she ain't never seen me once without stopping to say hello and ask after me and my brother, Thomas."

Questions roiled in my brain. Henrietta must have seen it in my eyes darting back and forth, jumping around like fleas. She took my hand softly.

"Your mama was a fine lady," she said.

"Henny?" I asked. "Do you know where they came from?"

"Not for certain, no, but I heard it once upon a time they might have come here from New York City. The way they struggled on up there, its a wonder they didn't go back to New York whether they came from there or not. But I guess it wasn't no time really 'til she was 'specting you. After that they just found a way to make it work, I guess."

"New York," I repeated barely audible.

"Frankly I'm surprised you never knowed. You's always the one who knows so much about everybody in town."

"I just like to talk to people is all," I explained absently. "Do you know why they came?"

Henrietta looked away from me quickly and bristled. "Maybe that's some'n you oughta talk to your pa about."

"No," I muttered. "If he wanted me to know, he'd have told me by now."

"Well if he don't want you knowin' then it ain't my place to be tellin'. Besides, I don't know much about it anyhow, and some'n tells me I done gone and told you too much already. My brother Thomas always said I got too big a mouth and it ain't no good for nothing but cacthin' flies in."

Worry settled over her like a damp sheet.

"Its ok," I assured her. "I won't say anything to Pa. That's a sweet story about Mama. Thanks for sharing it with me."

"I guess I just thought you could use to hear how good a lady she was."

We sat quiet for a moment. I watched the stable. The door frame yawned hollow.

"Henny, I have to go." I said. "Thanks for the beef and the laugh."

"Sure, honey, sure," she said. "You go see about that fella of yours."

"Yeah," I said. "Right."

I walked across the sprawling lawn through the thick easy laughter of the others, swirling sonorous. Mama came here. She came from New York. She left New York. She left a home, a family, a life. Daniel came here. He left Abilene, and where ever he had been before that, he'd left there too. Independently, each made a choice. They held firmly to a faith in themselves, in the world around them and in their places in it. My faith was a hollow myth. From a tended distance I latched a misdirected fantasy to Philip's impotent vision. He had never seen me and never threatened to. I hoped he would take me away, and I slept easily knowing he never would. It was nothing more than a charade.  

The stable was empty. I looked in every stall expecting to see Daniel, back hunched, painfully focused on measuring a hoof or brushing a knot out of a tail, but each horse was alone in its stall. I walked down the corridor peaking in at and under each creature as I went. He wasn't anywhere. The closer I came to the last stall the slower I stepped. Dry straw crunched under my boots and echoed down from the rafters, like secrets whispered by ghosts. Daniel's grand draft stallion was housed in the far stall, nearest the opening to the pasture. Daniel might be able to tame the beast, but I had little desire to be left alone with it. A chill crawled over my flesh in spite of the dark heat. I could see nothing of the black giant from the aisle. I timidly put one foot out and pulled myself another half a step closer. Still the high wooden wall blocked my view. My feet frozen, refusing to move another inch, I bent from my waist and leaned my head far forward. My eyes stretched around the wall and into the stall. It was empty. No beast. No Daniel.

He must have gone for a ride. He must have needed some time, some air, some light. Mr. Bingham offered Daniel liberal use of the stallion. "You're the only one who can ride him anyway," he'd said. "Use him until we can break him in." Bingham liked the word "we." Nobody would concern himself with their mutual absence. No one would even notice they were missing. No one but me.

The hay in the stall was fresh and soft. It beckoned to me to come in and lay my head down, to wait and to rest. The high worn walls offered up their sanctuary and promised to hide me as long as I'd like. He could find me here when he returned. He could speak to me softly, tenderly as he had with the mare. I could try to allow and embrace it. If his eyes fell upon me here, there would be no more hiding, no more pretending. He would know the truth. He would see everything, all of the fear and the hope, all of the desire and the grief. He would see me.  The thought pressed its leaden hand down onto my chest. I could give in and give it all up. I could gift these things to him, bundle them up and hand them over. I could be honest and exposed and lay my self and my soul at the mercy of dark cowboy.

But not here, not at Bingham's ranch. When it was all over I would be known or alone, and I would not tolerate either here. I determined to intercept him at the Inn.









.

We Will Not Be Taken Alive (part XII)

Bingham's ranch swarmed with agitated excitement. A scout had appeared at dawn to announce the return of the party and the harras of Mustangs they were dragging back from some distant edge of the Western plains. For all of his money, Bingham preferred his horses free and wild, and he had deployed five men for his purpose six days prior. Daniel had been among them. Since the scout's breathless arrival, neighbors, friends and debtors began collecting in clusters around the ranch, waiting to see the team in. 

For six days I was cast away, lost awash a foreign ocean tide, and drifting further every day. For six days I avoided Philip with a fear that seized me in a vice's grip. For six days I succumbed to the insatiable turbulence that would only be quieted when I could see that devilish stranger, when I could see Daniel again. Six days was an eternity.

I slipped unnoticed into the yard. At least I thought I did. Aida sidled silently up to me. She waited for me to notice her before she spoke. 

"They're bringing the new Mustangs in," she said. 

"So I heard," I answered coldly. I had no room in my mind for Aida at that moment and I knew it would drive her mad. I don't know why I derived so much pleasure from driving her mad. 

She stood there without a word for some time, but she didn't move. We both watched the horizon. 

"He likes you, you know," she finally said sheepishly. "You shouldn't be so mean with him." 

"Who?" I asked, pretending not to know.

"You know who," she answered calling my bluff. "I've tried to get his attention. I've tried hard, harder than I have with most men. But he doesn't have eyes for me at all. He just clams up and works around me. It's only when you come around that he gets any color in his face, any vitality to him at all. Be kinder to him, even if you don't like him. Its hard enough to be in love alone without being humiliated for it."

I took a deep breath and let out a sigh. She was speaking from experience, from her heart. She was showing more insight than I had ever known her to have. She didn't love Daniel, not really. But she thought she did, and that was enough to give her a new perspective. I wondered if the irony might be lost on her, if she could stomach it. I softened and consented to take my chances.

"I guess we all know that too well." I said. 

"What do you mean?" she asked. 

"Adia," I said turning to her and regarding her with more respect than I ever had, "There's a lot more love and loss being bandied about than you know."

She looked at me blankly. 

"Philip loves you," I added plainly, "always has."

She closed her eyes heavily and nodded. "But you love Philip," she said softly.

"No," I answered. "Not really. Not anymore."

She opened her eyes and looked deep into my face, searching. When she found the answer she was seeking, that for everything she and I are the same, that we're both fortunate and jealous and stubborn, that we all have our hidden demons, and that we will all survive them just the same, when she understood me and I understood her, she turned her eyes back to the horizon.

"They'll be here soon," she said. "You won't be able to get any work done today anyway. Wanna come watch from the fence with me?"

"Yeah," I said. "I do." and I meant it.  

We walked to the coral without a word and climbed the planks. I looked back at the Bingham home and wondered what my life might have felt like if Aida and I had remained friends. I imagined us looking out across the fields that were such shades of viridian, emerald and jade when we were young. I could almost see too small heads peering out from the upstairs window, one light, one dark. We might have played hide and seek in the rafters of the attic, or read to each other well into the latest hours during overnight visits. Perhaps with more direct access to her, Philip might have made his love for Aida known sooner, and saved us all so much time and pain. I was ripped from this alternate past when Aida stood suddenly on her beam, pointing and crying, "There! There they come!"

And indeed, balanced there between the earth and the sky bounced several of the tiniest, happiest black specs you ever saw. My throat tightened and my blood rushed as the anticipation on the ranch bubbled and percolated. 

Henrietta, the Bingham's cook, lit the fire under the vat of grease and water for the bar-be-que before rushing inside to boil pot after pot of strong, dark coffee. By mid morning there would be a great feast to welcome the men back and honor their efforts, but first hard work was to be done. Room would have to be made for the 16 mustangs the scout reported. The harem would have to be sorted, branded and stabled. Then, in the coming weeks Daniel would have to break those to be used for riding and work. One stud would be pastured with several mares, reserved for siring. 

Bingham's crew of temporary help numbered nearly twenty, and with the five returning, there would be only one, maybe two men for each horse.  The cacophony shrank down into a concentrated, silent electricity. The party galloped closer. The crew stood, poised as soldiers, to move into action. Aida and I held steady to our place on the fence, stiff and silent. Thunder grew up from the ground, sprouting defining pulses as the party galloped closer. Hooves stomped, sending roaring reverberations past us. My breathing grew heavy. All five faces were screwed up in gritty determination, staring dead ahead. Daniel led them. His expression was the fiercest of them all. 

He looked at no one thing specifically, but he concentrated ferociously just the same. This was the first thing I noticed. In the next instant I saw the beast underneath him. The rest of them saw it too. My chest heaved as I panted. Jaws dropped in awe. The massive draft stallion was as much a stranger to us as Daniel had been. It snorted through nostrils bigger than walnuts as it propelled them both over strides spanning fifteen feet. His onyx coat glowed indigo under the sun. The beast was majestic. 

"Aida!" Mr. Bingham called. "Come over here and hold these stable doors open." She slid down the fence like rain.

"Wait here," she said. "I'll be back." She ran to the stable never taking her eyes from the team. 

As they reached the edge of the property Daniel pulled ahead, pushing the purplish monster headlong into a sprint. He glided over the ground as if he had wings, covering twenty feet in a bound. The party broke right, herding the mustangs directly into the coral. Men leaped in every direction, grasping for ropes and lariats and manes, anything they could get their hands firmly on to direct and redirect the wild animals. Cries flew out in all manner of tones and volumes as the men struggled to work in conjunction with one another. 

Still Daniel persisted forward, gaining speed by the second. Leaving the others he steered the giant brute dead for me and the place where I sat frozen to the fence. His mouth broke into a fiendish snarl. The stallion's eyes grew wide and rolled with terror, but still faster they came. The horse's thick shoulders bulged as it lunged forward. Faster. Sunlight gleamed off the sweat on Daniel's arms as he gripped the reigns tighter, his forearms flexing and contracting. Mucus and saliva flew from the horse's nostrils and lips. 

My own eyes grew wide and rolled in terror. In one more breath man and horse, fused into one, would be upon me, plow through me, smash us all into unholy oblivion. My heart froze. My pulse stopped. My eyes remained wide. Daniel clenched every muscle in his body. His arms and neck rippled. His thighs collapsed in on the ribs of the beast. His sternum contracted, pulling him into a tight ball upon the stallion's back. In a fluid flash, the centaur bounded, soared through the sky, clear over my head, and landed thirty feet behind me and behind the fence with sickening grace. 

Daniel slowed the steed and turned to face me. The creature reared in protest, determined to rid himself of the psychopath in his back. On that point the magical monster and I stood in solidarity. But Daniel casually stroked the beast down its long, regal neck and face. The stallion acquiesced. I would not. 

I exhaled, and trembled as the blood rushed back into my face and my brain. Daniel merely grinned his lopsided grin and winked. 

"Was that meant to impress me?" I hissed, finding my voice absent, my throat dry. I clutched the fence post for support, my nerves shattered.

He chuckled, a little out of breath himself.

"Why? Were you impressed?" 

"A little, yes" I admitted watching him warily. "But mostly terrified."

He laughed outright this time, deep and from his belly. 

"Then it was a little meant to." He turned a circle on his compatriot, tipped his hat to me, and galloped off toward the stables. I remained there, melting and bristling and alone for quite some time.

While I recovered, bedlam unfolded in the coral. The hands were leading the mares from the coral into the stable. One by one the girls had followed the men's prompts with little more than a fuss. Now and again, one horse or another would stiffen or whinny out her complaint, but sooner or later they all accepted their directive. Eventually, only one mare remained, a beautiful painted girl.She was a rusted out sunset. Her coat was bronze flame, flecked with gold and black on her flank. Her legs were beveled, and her coat flared royally into wide golden hooves. As her hand attempted to lead her in she began to resist. The harder he yanked at her ropes the more violently she reared. She twisted her long neck and flung her vermilion mane about. The man began to shout and spit at her. He whipped at her hind quarters. Time after time he lashed at her. My spine jolted with every crack. She threw her ears back and bared her large square teeth. It promised to be her last warning. More men came and together they yanked at her with ropes, lashed at her, prodded her with sharpened sticks. Her warnings came to an end. She bucked and she kicked and she clamped her great jaw down on any flesh in her way. They swarmed around her like flies, desperately whaling on her back and face. Finally, she arched her enormous back, threw her head high into the air like a wolf, and as she reared and let out a blood chilling scream. 

The cruelty was too much, the men too vicious. I sprang from the fence, and bolted into the stable. Daniel was serenely putting the black stallion into a stall, looking proud as a papa. 

"You have to come!" I panted clutching his elbow. Sweat beaded on my face, rolled down my neck and pooled in my collar. 

"Lucene, what is it?" he asked with more sincerity than I had ever before seen in him. 

"The mare, the painted one! Can't you hear her screaming?" 

He dashed through the stable. I followed closely behind. Once in the coral he broke through the mob, pushing men aside. The first man still stood holding the rope and yanking hard on the mare's face. Daniel gripped him by the wrist and pinwheeled the man's arm high up against his back until he groaned.

"How do you like it?" He held his face close to his captive's, breathing hard. His words dripped venom. The man squinted and gasped in pain. Daniel released his hand and shoved him away. 

"What in the goddamned hell is going on out here?" He shouted at rest. Several of them had been out with him in the party. They deferred to him immediately. He had become a sort of leader, a hero to them.

"She won't come in," one of them said. 

"Course she won't, not like that, you damned fools!" Daniel answered. 

"We was just trying to do like you did with that stallion, show her who's boss is all," another man answered. 

"That ain't gonna work on that mare, you idiots, and she's trying to tell you so. Stallions are easy. They're used to being bossed most of the time. You show 'em who's boss and they just say, 'ok, I guess you's boss now' but you know who usually does the tellin? The lead mare. Right here's your lead mare, and she can't be convinced by bossin'."

The men stood stupidly holding their ropes and saying nothing. 

"Go on, now," Daniel said. "There's plenty else to be done this mornin'. I'll take care of this little filly."

The men dispersed, leaving Daniel alone in the coral with the painted beauty. She continued to snort and circle and stomp. But she stopped screaming. He stood still as a post in that coral for more than an hour, watching the horse from the corner of his eye while she slowly settled down. His hat sat so low on his brow I could hardly see his face. He forgot me entirely, but I watched him as silently still as he watched her. 

When he did move, he stepped slowly, deliberately, toward her. He kept his head bent low as he approached. She shook. He stopped and waited. Then, again he moved slowly, gently. When he came to her, he came to her side, not to her front or her back. With his head bent, he carefully placed one hand on her flank and one on her neck. The two stood there still, but for their breathing. Neither stirred. They were communicating, becoming acquainted without word or motion. He began to pet at her flank and at her neck. Nothing changed. He continued to pet and pat at her. Her ears loosened and came up from her head. He leaned his face close to hers like he did with the hand, but this time he dropped his forehead into her jaw and gave himself to her completely. She snorted, or rather sighed her consent. He loosely fingered a loop in the lariat around her neck, and stepped toward the stable. She followed him.  

"I didn't know you had it in you," I said softly.

"Yeah, well, I guess there's a lot of things about me you don't know," he answered just as softly. 

"Mr. Bingham's gonna want you to break her. She's the prettiest one. He'll want her for Aida," I said. 

"You're probably right," he answered, "but he might just have to be settling for that stallion."

"No one can ride that stallion but you, and you know it," I said. 

"You're probably right about that too." 

"Don't you think you can break her?" I asked. 

"I know I can," he answered. "but I don't know if I will. Some creatures just aren't meant to be tamed."

He walked out of the stable without looking at me.