by Jae
"You're bringing me pie?"
"We're bringing you a new barn." Hannah winked.
Rika's gaze flew to the loaded wagons. She can't really mean...?
"We already had the wood ready for our new barn, but when we heard what happened, we decided that the old one will do for another year. The wood is yours if you want it. You can pay us back later in the year. No hurry."
The only one more amazed than Amy was probably Rika. All the neighbors came over, leaving behind their own work and bringing wood and baskets of food — all without asking anything in return. She couldn't believe it. Maybe, she dared to hope as she watched the men unload the wagons, maybe this is a good place to make a home.
* * *
"Isn't that dangerous?" Frowning, Rika shaded her eyes with her hand and stared at Amy, who was hammering away high up in the rafters. "Why would the men let Amy do this kind of work?"
Nora handed her a glass of lemonade. "Because she's the lightest and most agile. And because they remember the temper tantrum she threw when she was ten and they told her she had to stay at the food tables instead of helping her papa."
Next to them, two older men measured and sawed off planks while three of the ranch hands nailed boards to the sides of the frame that had been heaved up with ropes and long poles earlier. Other neighbors cleared away the charred wood of the old barn, which was now behind the new structure. Children ran around, shouting and making a game out of gathering waste wood and piling it up out of the way.
"There are no people like this in Boston," Rika muttered to herself.
Nora filled more glasses of lemonade. "In Hannah and Josh's first year of farming, there was a big flood in the valley. Josh's fields were swamped with debris, trees, and stones. Luke packed up our family and the ranch hands, and we helped Josh clear his fields so that they could plant in time."
"Ah." Rika nodded to herself. Now she understood why they were giving up something as valuable as a new barn. "They have a debt to pay."
"No. They're not doing this because they have to," Nora said. "They're doing it because they want to."
Nattie leaned over the pie she was arranging onto plates and laughed. "It's a strange concept called 'friendship,' Hendrika." She shook her head. "Haven't you ever helped someone just because you wanted to?"
"Oh, yes, of course." Her nose wrinkled when she remembered the smell of blood, sweat, and rotting flesh when she had bandaged the horrible wounds of soldiers. She had cared for others many times, but with the exception of Jo, no one had ever helped her. Not without an ulterior motive.
Nora took a tray of glasses and a pitcher of lemonade and carried it to where the men were working.
"Are people in the East so different from us?" Nattie asked. "Are they so uncaring that you'd distrust the friendly gesture of a neighbor? Then maybe the East is a place where I don't want to live after all."
"You want to leave and live in the East? But aren't you happy here?"
Sometimes, the ranch seemed unreal to her, like an idyllic place out of a fairytale. Sure, the days were filled with hard work too and people like Adam proved that not everyone was as friendly as the Hamiltons, yet still things felt different than in Boston. She could breathe here, and it wasn't just because she didn't need to work in the dust-filled weave room anymore.
"Of course I'm happy," Nattie said. "This is my home and my family."
The certainty in her voice made Rika wonder if she would ever have this kind of happiness and belonging for herself. "Then why would you want to leave?" she asked when only the noise of hammers and saws filled the space between them.
"I love it here, but maybe I could do more elsewhere."
"Do more?"
Nattie pointed at the new barn. "Look at Amy."
Rika did. All day, her gaze had been drawn to the young woman, who now put away her hammer and climbed down from the roof.
"She does things around the ranch that I could never do," Nattie said, admiration mingling with envy in her tone.
"Well, I don't see your mother up there on the roof either, and I'm sure your father would say she contributes a lot to the daily life on the ranch. And so do you. You're mucking stalls, taking care of the horses, milking cows..."
A grateful smile softened Nattie's expression. "Yes, but everyone can do that. It's not that I'm contributing something special. Amy will take over the ranch one day. She's the right person to do it. I love horses, and Papa and Phin say I'm a good rider, but I just don't have Amy's sixth sense for horses."
"Neither do I, yet I still hope to be a good wife for Phineas and prove myself useful. Maybe you'll marry in a year or two, fall in love, and be a wonderful wife just like your mother."
The words were meant to cheer Nattie up, but instead, Nattie's lips tightened and she shook her head. "I don't think so."
"What else could you do?" Rika liked the friendly girl and didn't want Nattie to end up working in a cotton mill back East.
"I'm thinking about maybe going to school in the East for a while. I want to find something that I could contribute to life in Baker Prairie. A neighbor studied in Boston to become a lady doctor. Maybe it would be the right thing for me too." Nattie directed an expectant gaze at her. "You were a nurse. Isn't it a good feeling to help others? Why didn't you mention it in your letters?"
Rika looked away from Nattie. Her gaze again found Amy, who shook shavings from her hair. Whenever Rika started to feel that maybe there was a place for her on the ranch, something reminded her that it was rightfully Jo's place, not hers. "I don't like to talk about the War," she said. It wasn't a complete lie. "Too many painful memories. When I started working in the cotton mill, I tried to forget about that part of my life."
"Oh." Nattie squeezed her arm. "I'm sorry. But wasn't it good to be able to help people?"
"Yes, it felt good, but it can consume you if you're not careful," Rika said. "You spend so much time helping others that there's no time to ask yourself what you really want." It was the story of her life, not just her three years as a Union nurse. Only now, while she waited for Phineas's return, was Rika forced to think about what she wanted in life. Was it really to marry Phineas, a man she would have to deceive for the rest of her life? What else was there for her?
Nattie nodded thoughtfully. "I might not have to worry about it anyway. Maybe my parents won't let me go. They act as if the East is an evil place."
Rika shrugged, not wanting to get in the middle of a family affair. "Well, your mother would know."
A frown carved a furrow into Nattie's smooth brow. "Why do you say that?"
"Isn't she from Boston? I thought I heard a familiar accent when she talks sometimes."
Nattie's frown deepened. "I don't know," she said as if she just realized it. "Mama?" She waved to her mother, who returned with a tray of empty glasses. "You're not from Boston, are you?"
The tray rattled as Nora abruptly set it down. "Why are you asking?"
Uh-oh. Answering a question with a question. Rika had mastered that technique early on, especially when her father was drunk and she couldn't do anything right, no matter what her answer was. Seems I'm not the only one with a secret around here.
"Is it true?" Nattie asked.
"I could kill for a glass of lemonade." Amy's cheerful voice interrupted. Sweat turned the soft locks sticking to her forehead into dark copper. She looked from Nattie to her mother and then to Rika. "Speaking of killing... Why do you all look as if someone had died? What's going on?"
Silence answered her.
Just to have something to do, Rika handed her a glass of lemonade.
"Mama?" Nattie asked. Her gaze remained fixed on Nora.
"Yes." Nora looked from one daughter to the other. "I did grow up in Boston."
"Right where Hendrika did?" Nattie asked.
Rika doubted that. If she wasn't mistaken, the hint of accent in Nora's voice indicated a wealthy family, maybe one with a private tutor. Even had they been the same age, their paths w
ouldn't have crossed.
"Why didn't you tell us?" Amy wrapped both hands around her glass of lemonade. "You and Papa never talk about your families or your childhoods. Why's that?"
Oh, good gracious. I think I stirred up a hornet's nest. So the Hamiltons weren't the perfect family they appeared to be. They were good people, though, and if Nora kept her past a secret, she probably had a good reason for it. Rika wanted to take back her careless question about Nora's accent, but it was too late now.
"I didn't have the happiest childhood," Nora said, and again Rika sensed that it was the truth — but only half of it. Rika knew because she told the same kind of half-truths when asked about her own childhood. "And I haven't seen or heard from any Macauley for seventeen years, so..." Nora shrugged.
"Macauley," Rika repeated. How many wealthy people with that name lived in Boston? She took in Nora's red hair and her green eyes, then looked at Amy's identical coloring. Both sets of green eyes didn't hold Mr. Macauley's cruel expression, but the color was the same. "You are not related to William Macauley, are you?"
Nora's gaze jerked toward her. "He's my father."
"Father?" Rika shook her head. No, that couldn't be. Nora was maybe in her late thirties, and William Macauley was about ten years older than that. He couldn't have fathered Nora. A sudden thought occurred to her. "Oh! William Senior was your father." One day, when Rika had complained about their hard-hearted boss, Jo had said he was a saint compared to his father, William Macauley Sr.
"Was?" Emotion colored Nora's voice, but Rika couldn't say which one it was — grief? Sorrow? Bitterness?
Rika wanted to squeeze her hand, but she had no right to be so familiar. "I'm sorry," she said. "I never met him, but I heard that he died about two years ago."
"Oh, Mama. I'm so sorry." Nattie reached for her mother's hand, and Amy wrapped her arm around Nora's shoulders.
"It's all right." Nora returned the soft touches of her daughters. "We weren't close. I left Boston after a big argument with him, and I never looked back. What happened to the rest of the family, Hendrika?"
I wonder what happened between her and her father. Was he anything like mine? Despite whatever might have happened, she sensed that Nora still cared about her family back East. "I don't know about your mother, but your oldest brother, William, owns the cotton mill now." Rika shook her head. Nora's brother is my former boss. What a coincidence! But then again, the Macauleys own half of Boston.
"We have an uncle in Boston?" Nattie's eyes shone.
Nora squeezed her eyes shut for a moment. No doubt she didn't want her daughters to meet any of the Boston Macauleys — and Rika understood why. What she had seen of William Macauley and his brothers made it hard to believe that they were related to the friendly Nora and her daughters. In William Macauley's cotton mill, Rika had been little more than a slave. Here on the ranch, she was treated like a family member, even though she had made some grave mistakes.
"I'm sorry to say this, but he's not a nice man," Rika said and caught Nora's grateful glance. "All he seems to care about is money and power."
Shadows of the past darted over Nora's face. "Then he's truly his father's son." She turned to her daughters. "I'm sorry you had to find out this way, but I didn't want them to be part of your lives. Your father and I swore to be better parents than our own were."
Nattie exchanged a quick glance with her sister, who stood motionless, the glass of lemonade clamped in her hand. "And you are," Nattie finally said.
"Mrs. Hamilton? Amy? Nattie?" Hannah's husband called from the new barn. "We're hanging the barn door now, just to see if it fits. Do you want to do the honors?"
"Go on," Nora said. "I'll be there in a minute."
The Hamilton sisters exchanged a quick glance. Amy pressed her glass of lemonade into Rika's hands before she hurried to the barn, followed by Nattie.
Rika stared at drops of lemonade spilling over the rim of the glass. "I'm sorry." She lifted her gaze to meet Nora's. "If I had known —"
"It's my own fault, not yours," Nora said. "Lying to your family is stupid and hurtful for everyone. Those lies will keep you prisoner, because you are so afraid that one day, they'll find out. With every day, with every lie, the fear becomes stronger." Her eyes, darkened with sorrow, seemed to look right through Rika into something in her own past.
Nora wasn't talking about Rika, but the words hit home all the same. Fear had guided Rika all her life — fear of her father, fear of the War, fear of Willem gambling their money away, fear of losing her job, and now fear of being sent away from the Hamilton Ranch. Her life was filled with lies, and Nora was right — the lies didn't make the fear go away. They just made everything worse. The truth trembled somewhere deep inside her, wanting to be told, but Rika couldn't.
If she did, she might lose everything, just when she was beginning to feel at home on the ranch.
"Come on," Nora said. The color returned to her cheeks. "Let's go watch them hang the door. We might just have a new barn by the time the sun sets."
The Dalles, Oregon
May 2, 1868
LUKE STARED INTO the swirling waters of the Columbia River. A series of foaming rapids and waterfalls accompanied them for miles as they drove their herd of horses downstream.
When she had been stationed at Fort Dalles during the Cayuse War, Luke had seen the waterfalls tumble fifteen feet until they hit the rest of the water. Now the river carried so much water that the falls were partially submerged and turned into a long line of roaring rapids.
I hope the rivers at home aren't running so high. Thoughts of her family were with her every mile of the way.
"Boss, look!" Phin shouted and pointed.
Before them, wooden platforms dangled on scaffolds over the falls. Indians leaned over the edge of the platforms and dipped nets on long poles into the foaming river. Downstream, where the river was calmer, fishermen in canoes drove spears into the water.
"They're fishing for salmon," Luke shouted over the roaring river.
On the high bluffs to both sides of the river, dozens of lodges had been erected — not as many as there had been twenty years ago, Luke noticed.
The fort was gone now too. Only a few abandoned buildings remained. The town that had grown around the fort was bustling, though.
When Luke's herd crowded into town, people jumped back from the busy main street.
A big sign hanging from one of the false fronts caught Luke's attention. "Baths," the sign declared in capital letters. Her skin itched in reaction. She hadn't bathed in almost two weeks.
At home, bathing wasn't a problem. Every Saturday night, Luke dragged a tin tub into one corner of the kitchen and filled it with hot water. Nora hung a sheet from the rafters, and then it was bathing time. Luke always bathed last — "Because Papa is the dirtiest," Nora said. The girls never questioned it.
When the girls were little, Nora had put them to bed right after their own baths, and now they knew that every person should be given privacy while in the tub.
Her ranch hands had no such restraint. Bathing with them anywhere near her was too dangerous.
Later, Luke promised herself. She urged Dancer on and drove one of the geldings away from a lovingly tended garden, stopping him from making a meal of some woman's first spring flowers. "Keep them away from the gardens, boys," she called. She had no money to pay for trampled flower beds and vegetable patches.
They drove the herd toward the livery stable, and Luke dismounted to negotiate with the stable owner. With hordes of miners in town, she wanted to hurry before all the baths were reserved for the night.
* * *
Luke slung her new saddlebags, full of supplies, over her shoulder and left the dry-goods store. Her boots pounded down the boardwalk as she hurried toward the baths.
A Chinese man carrying a stack of towels opened the door. "We all full," he told Luke. "You wait outside."
While Luke waited, she took in the busy town; then her gaze wandered to the horizon, w
here white-capped Mount Hood loomed in the distance. The familiar sight made Luke feel less separated from her family, but at the same time, it increased the longing to be home.
The door to one of the bathing cabins opened, and a man stepped out, twirling his still damp mustache.
Luke waited while the Chinese man disappeared into the cabin with two buckets of steaming water. Her skin prickled in expectation of sinking into the bath. She hoped the cabin had a sturdy bolt so that she could enjoy her bath without worrying about anyone barging in. She would place a chair beneath the door handle, just in case.
After two more trips with the heavy buckets across his shoulders, the Chinese man gave a nod, allowing Luke to enter.
