Petite, blue-eyed, Melinda Sue Archer, now Mrs. Hayes, curly, sandy colored hair escaping from her straw bonnet, freckles on the bridge of her upturned nose, stood ram-rod straight, her gloved hands folded tightly to her corseted waist. The young woman, only seventeen, Paxton had said in his letter, announcing his nuptials, had been taking care of her father’s affairs of business and his home since the age of twelve. Still, Hank questioned Paxton’s choice.
Her pink lips pursed, nose pinched up in disapproval, Melinda approached Anora with all the enthusiasm of one about to shake hands with a pig. Hank took an instant dislike to her.
Paxton introduce the two females and stood back. Hank didn’t know what he expected, but he didn’t expect Melinda to go on the attack. Neither female extended a hand. Anora tucked in her chin, eyes unwavering from the young woman’s face.
Expelling her breath, at last the new Mrs. Hayes deigned to speak. “Mr. Hayes spoke well of you, Mrs. Talbot. However, when he told me of your decision to run this…this ferry by yourself, I had misgivings as to your character. To be truthful, I half expected to find you in men’s trousers and spitting tobacco.”
Drawing herself up to her full height of five-foot-two, the young matron continued on her theme. “This is no occupation for a lady, Mrs. Talbot. This is man’s work. Mr. Hayes has made you an offer, and I do hope, in time, you will reconsider. I understand you recently helped when dear Mr. Hayes lost his sister. That was very Christian of you. You have fine eyes, and beneath that atrocious costume, I’m sure there’s a fine figure. I’m here now, and you must allow me to guide you, Mrs. Talbot. I shall pray for you.”
∙•∙
Looking out from under the brim of her hat, Anora saw them coming and prepared herself for the presentation. Paxton Hayes, looking neat and dapper as usual, brought forth his bride, a human-sized -doll—small, hourglass, corseted figure, perfectly heart-shaped face, white and pink complexion, deceivingly delicate and slightly freckled. The young woman gave the impression of someone too fine to put her feet upon simple soil. Coming face-to-face with this doll, Anora thought the new Mrs. Hayes too young to have acquired such a hard, discriminating gleam in her china-blue eyes. She instantly felt pity for Paxton. He had no idea what he’d taken on, no idea at all.
Blinking, looking at his bride with startled, wide eyes, he turned to ask Anora. “What’s this talk of Indians? Do you have Indians over there, Anora? Where the hell did they come from? What do they want?”
She opened her mouth to give him the particulars, but he wouldn’t shut up. “You should’ve told them to keep moving. You don’t want to encourage them to hang around. They’re camped too close to town. We can’t have them so close to the ferry. We haven’t had any trouble with the Indians around here and we want to keep it that way.”
Before she answered, she made a production of removing her gloves and hat, combing her hair back from her face with her fingers. Ignoring Paxton, she addressed his bride first, a tight smile on her lips. “Welcome, Mrs. Hayes, to your new home. And thank you…Melinda, for your kind offer of guidance. You must not concern yourself, or waste your effort, on one so lowly as me. As for your prayers, they would be wasted on me.”
Dismissing the pursed-lipped Mrs. Hayes, who stood blinking in the face of rejection, Anora addressed Paxton’s admonition. “You make the presence of a half dozen men, an equal number of women, and a couple dozen children sound dangerous, Paxton. An acquaintance of mine, Mr. Joseph Comstock, Whit’s grandfather, is with them. According to Grandpa Joe, these people are of the Calapooya Siletz on their way to their summer camping grounds in the cascades. For years and years, they’ve crossed the river here. For years and years, long before you came, long before there was a town here, they camped here to gather the camas and replenish their game stores. I trust his opinion and his account of their history. These people are quite harmless if no one disturbs them. I’ve welcomed them, Paxton. They pose no threat to anyone. They don’t want to have anything to do with you or anyone from town.”
“Is Mr. Comstock a missionary?” asked Melinda.
Anora couldn’t help but laugh, even though she could see by the bride’s pursed lips she’d offended the bride. She wished very much Grandpa Joe were there to answer for himself.
“No, I’m sure Mr. Comstock would be the first one to tell you he would never attempt to foist the white man’s gospel on anyone. He’s married a Calapooya woman; Mary Two Hats. Isabell is with them today. I think she’s up the hill there, digging up camas.”
Paxton turned on Hank. “Isabell? Hank? Were you aware Isabell is with these heathens?”
Paxton had acquired piety; this amused Anora. To repress the chuckle in her throat, she put her hand to her mouth but couldn’t repress the snort.
“Paxton, I was here this morning when they arrived,” Hank said, stepping up to stand shoulder to shoulder with Anora. “And I’m joining them for a celebration this evening. I supplied the venison.”
Paxton huffed, brows puckered together, jaw working, mustache twitching, giving the appearance of a man about to gather a militia and go to Isabell’s rescue.
Anora couldn’t help herself and cast out an invitation. “Would you two care to join us? It should be quite festive.”
Paxton huffed his response and shook his head at her.
“Mrs. Talbot,” Melinda said, in a tone sweet as sorghum, reaching out her white, kid-gloved hand, placing it lightly on Anora’s arm, “Mr. Hayes is concerned, you see. You probably don’t get a lot of news here. A group of missionaries, the Whitmans and several other servants of the Lord, were massacred less than two years ago by heathens; possibly not this tribe, but these primitive people don’t value human life as we do. They are an ungodly people, barbaric, child-like, and for the most part lazy, more apt to steal than work for what they need.
“I do wish father were here,” Mrs. Hayes said to her new husband. “I’m certain he would take the opportunity to go over and preach to them.
“My father, Reverend John Archer, is a member of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions,” she said to Hank. “Unfortunately, they’ve now disbanded due to the Whitman Massacre. You must be very careful, Mr. Reason, Mrs. Talbot.”
Melinda’s finger’s squeezed Anora’s arm, the pressure of it had Anora ready to run, escape the young woman’s overly zealous grasp.
Turning a deeply concerned and sympathetic face to her husband, Melinda asked for confirmation. “Isabell, she is your niece, Mr. Hayes?”
Paxton, taken by surprise nodded. “Yes, yes, Isabell is five years old.”
“Well then, Mr. Reason, I believe you have put your daughter in very dangerous hands. These heathens take children, you know. They are trainable, you see. They make slaves of them, and if they live to be of a breedable age…” She put her lace hanky to her pert little nose, batted her eyes, blushed and said, “Well…we have no need to go further.”
“No. No need to say one more word,” Anora said, having heard enough. Removing Melinda’s hand from her arm, she jammed her hat back on her head, and pulled her shoulders back. “There is evil everywhere, Mrs. Hayes, as I well know. But I’m going to have a little faith and believe in my fellow man, all colors and creeds, as God, your God, made them…at least for today.
“I wish you and Mr. Hayes a long life together.” She finished that thought in her head, adding a long life together in misery. “Please excuse me, I have a customer.”
Paxton and Melinda stepped aside to allow a farm wagon to board the ferry. Anora went to cast off the moor line.
“Come, Melinda, let me show you your new home.”
“Mr. Reason, perhaps as a possible solution, Isabell could spend the time while you’re at work in my care.”
Melinda moved back when the team of four rolled past her, but Anora heard what she said next. “Mrs. Talbot is busy here, and really unable to give a child proper supervision. I’ve conducted school; perhaps I could get the child started on her lesson
s. If she’s five, certainly she’s old enough to learn her alphabet and her numbers. I could even give her lessons in deportment. One day among heathens will not hurt her, but to be running wild every day is not healthy. You will agree, Mr. Reason?”
Hank helped Anora with the rope, handing it to her before she started to crank up the tongue. “Well, she’s not dull,” he said to her under his breath.
“Zealots give me the pip,” said Anora. Hank grinned at her and winked.
Behind him, Paxton had stopped in mid-stride to say, “That’s an excellent solution, my dear. Of course you must take Isabell under your wing. I’m a very lucky man to have found you. You have a generous heart,” he said, bringing her gloved hand up to his lips.
A wave of nausea washed over Anora, observing the couple billing and cooing, Melinda blushing, hearing her twitter. But nausea turned to empathy when she heard the bride’s response to her husband’s show of affection, “Please, Mr. Hayes, not in public.”
Hank tipped his hat to Anora. In a voice only she could hear, he said, “Makes me glad Isabell and I have moved out of Paxton’s house. Managing Melinda is going to turn that house, and Paxton, inside out and upside down.”
Anora pressed her lips together to keep from snickering and lowered her head to cast off.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Isabel, exhausted from working, gathering, and playing with the other children, fell asleep in the middle of telling Anora about the pretty flowers she’d picked. After sleeping soundly for a couple of hours, wrapped in a blanket on the floor of the shack, she ran off to help gather more wood for the fires.
Traffic had slowed by the end of the day. Deserted, the Willa Jane bobbed beside the dock at the Takenah Landing.
Beside her shack, Anora sat mending the hem of her denim dress. Hands stuffed down deep into his pockets, Grandpa Joe sauntered over, squatted on the ground, folded his legs Indian style, and said, “I come over to talk a bit. Want to hear how you come to be here.”
Anticipating the question, dreading the moment he would ask, she set aside her sewing, deciding to tell him everything she could remember of what had happened to her aunt and herself. At the end of her tale, unlike Whit’s dismissive response, Joe Comstock wept with regret. “Should’a never left you there. Thought for sure Ruben set out right after we did. Guess he’d planned on gettin’ behind, that’a way there’d be no one to doubt his telling of the tragedy. Whit and me should’a loaded you and your aunt onto our raft, that’s what we should’a done. We talked about it…should’a done it.
“I knew Carrie was gettin’ a rough time from the bastard. I seen the bruises. Pretty little thing, your Aunt Carrie. I never saw him hit her. Ruben made sure of that. What I didn’t know for real certain, was he after you. Sometimes I saw him lookin’ your way like you was a piece of fresh meat, and he a starvin’ cat, but then he’d turn ‘round and call you clumsy, or plain as a rock, and I’d think he didn’t have no use for you.
“I sure never would’ve thought he’d murder anybody on purpose, maybe beat a body till they died, but not plot it out careful. Mean—hell, yes. But there were others on that wagon train…Mrs. Howard, now I saw with my own eyes her old man kick her teeth out, then he made her get up his supper right in front of a passel of folks. I wouldn’t put it past that son-of-a-bitch to kill, not for a second.”
Anora surprised herself by saying, hardly waiting for Joe to finish speaking, “I think Ruben murdered my mother and father too. I keep remembering things. Their illness came on right after supper. Ruben knew they liked cider. He never shared any of his liquor, but that night, he served mother and father a tall glass of his special cider. I don’t remember seeing him drink any himself. Looking back, I should’ve suspected something. But he could be so genial and jolly sometimes, he could fool everyone—did fool everyone.”
The old man looked around. “You said the skunk left…why are you still here? Ain’t you afraid of what he’ll do when he comes back? You best be gone, darlin’. You come on with us. We’ll be moving in a day or so. He won’t find you where we’re goin’.”
Uncoiling himself, Joe sprang to his feet and paced back and forth outside the shack door. Stopping to kick a stone he said, “I don’t see how that grandson of mine could up and leave you here to work that darn contraption. This ferrying business is a lot of work for a man; you’re a slip of a girl, gal-darn-it. I’m gonna give him what-for if I ever get the chance to clap my eyes on his good-for-nothing hide again.”
Rising from her stool, Anora said, “Don’t be too hard on him. I didn’t really want him to stay. It was good to see him, talk to him. I…I’d already started to get my memory back. Whit forced me to get back up on my own two feet and fight.”
Silence hung between them, unspoken regrets left unsaid. Anora took one of his rough, warm, veined hands in hers and looked him in the eyes. “I can’t leave. I believe Ruben bought this ferry and the land with my father’s money. He took my mother’s jewelry. Everything I have is here. We were going to have this together, Mama, Papa, and me. I’m going to hang on to it for them. I can’t, I won’t, let go of this. If Ruben comes back,” she closed her eyes and shook her head, “when…he comes, I’ll have to face him. I’ll never be free of him if I don’t.”
Their gazes locked, Joe patted her hand. “You’ve grown old too soon, your youth stolen from you. You’re in your prime, a fine-lookin’ girl. Hell, you should be kickin’ up your heels, breakin’ hearts, makin’ babies; instead you’ve chained yourself to this hard course. I know better than to try to talk you out of what you think you gotta do. But know this, you got a friend in me, and as long as I’m alive, if you need a place to run, I’ll take you in, no questions asked. We’ll be back this way in a few months. We’ll be down in the valley here for a time to stock up on game. I’m right glad to have caught up with you again. Keep in mind, I’m gonna be worried about you, how you are, what you’re doin’. You have a look out for yourself.”
“Oh, Grandpa Joe,” Anora said, falling into his arms. “It’s going to be hard when you’re gone. I know you don’t want to leave me here, but I’m going to be fine.”
After a moment, both shedding tears, Joe removed himself, saying, “No time to stand around blubbering, got to help with the wood gatherin’ and settin’ up for the celebration. I gotta tune up my fiddle and rosin up my bow. I haven’t played in a while. I hope my fingers remember what to do.”
Anora, keeping an eye out for Hank, walked down to the water’s edge. Isabell came running down to her. “Mary says to tell you the meat’s done.”
“Good, I’m hungry.”
“Me too. Where’s Papa?”
“I’m going to take the ferry across and wait for him. You go back, stay close to Grandpa Joe and Mary.”
Head down, Anora drew a line in the sandy bank with the toe of her shoe, thoughts of Hank on her mind. Afraid and frustrated, refusing to speak, she’d taken her anger out on him and Paxton. She hadn’t been mad at Hank, not really. She’d put distance between them to avoid heartache. But she reserved the right to stay irked with Paxton, pleased he’d never fully understand why.
A sharp whistle from across the river brought her head up. Hank, on his horse next to the shore, waved at her. Coming to attention, she raced to set the ferry in motion.
Drifting closer to the landing, she heard him holler, “Hey, thought you’d fallen asleep over there.”
Answering, she called back, “No, weak with hunger. We’ve been waiting for you.”
The ferry sidled into shore. Anora let down the tongue, and Hank led his mount onto the ferry deck. “Sorry I’m late. I got waylaid by Paxton and his bride. They insisted I join them for supper. I kept telling them I couldn’t tonight, but they refused to listen. Had to promise them Isabell and I would come to supper tomorrow night before they’d let me go.”
“Well, you’re here, and your timing is perfect. Isabell says the venison is done.”
Hank beat her to the crank and star
ted to bring up the tongue. She rang the bell twice, and the ferry started on its course back across the river.
For a few moments, negotiating the current, Anora didn’t say anything, but as soon as they hit smoother water, she brought up the topic on both their minds. “Bet he couldn’t wait to give you a lecture on proper playmates for children. Indians being at the top of the list of companions to avoid.”
“Hmm, yep, that’s about it.”
“How could he do that? He didn’t even see the Indians, he just heard they were over here.”
Hank shrugged his shoulders. “What’s your impression of the new Mrs. Hayes?”
“I don’t think it proper I voice my opinion one way or the other.” She pressed her lips together and concentrated on the current. She shook her head. “All right, I have to state the obvious—she’s young, too young for Paxton. She’s attractive, pretty hair, wonderful blue eyes, lovely smile, when she isn’t being a Miss-Pissy-Pot. All in all, I’d say Paxton may have met his match.” She said directly to Hank, “Melinda Hayes knows exactly what she’s doing and saying at all times.”
Laughing at her, he crossed his heart. “I promise I won’t repeat your opinion to a soul. It closely matches my own.”
“Oh, fiddle, now I’ve started talking to you, I don’t know when to shut up.”
“I’m glad you’re talking to me again. You had me worried.”
She shrugged and righted the rudder.
Hank nodded, accepting her response. “Melinda lamented over and over the fact her father hadn’t journeyed with them. He’s on a crusade to bring the word of the Lord to all heathens. A benign band of Calapooya would be right up his starched collar.”
The Widow's Ferry Page 27
