“I’m afraid he’ll quit fighting, and I know he’s going to have to fight for the rest of his life.”
“And you’ll be standing right next to him, no matter what he does.”
Jenny looked at the grubby face on the rail next to hers. The face still had a lot of boy in it, but the features were starting to sharpen into manhood. She wondered briefly what his father had been like, what kind of doctor he had been, what it had been like to pack his family up to travel across a wilderness to start a new life in a new town. “How did you get to be so wise?” she finally asked, reaching a finger out to knock off a chunk of mud that was sticking to his cheek.
“I had to, to survive.”
“I guess we’ll have to, too.”
Jamie was coming back, his stride long, his hat tilted at a jaunty angle. Jenny raised her head to watch him, and for a brief instant saw her father walking across the lawn with his self-confident step. She shook her head to clear it, then smiled when she realized once again how much Jamie was like their father. He’ll be okay, she thought.
“Are you done playing in the mud?” Jamie asked Marcus as he approached the pen.
“Yeah, let me get cleaned up, and then we’ll move your stuff.”
“I’ll see you at dinner, then,” Jamie said to his sister.
“Are you sure?”
“About dinner?”
“No, about.. . you know. .. .”
“Go on, I’ll be fine. I don’t need you hanging around.”
Jenny looked at Marcus, who nodded his head in agreement with Jamie. She looked back at her brother, but couldn’t see his eyes beneath the wide brim of the hat.
“Okay, see you at dinner.” She left slowly, hoping he would call her back, knowing he wouldn’t. She knew he was right—whatever was going to happen would happen, and he didn’t need to have her in the middle of it. Jenny’s mother had always told her that the Duncan men were full of pride, and this was Jamie’s way of showing it. As much as she wanted to follow along, she knew he needed her to stay away more. It was part of his healing, it was time for him to stand on his own. She went back to the infirmary. She knew he would have to show up there sooner or later to get his bag.
Jamie did show up at the infirmary. Jenny had just settled down with her needle and thread when she heard his long stride coming down the hall. She looked up expectantly and he came in, Marcus in tow, and grinned at her. He went into the room where he had slept, came out with his bag and tugged on her braid as he passed by. He stopped suddenly and came back to whisper in her ear.
“Don’t worry about the gun and stuff. We found a place to hide it in the barn.”
Jenny looked up in amazement, realizing that she had forgotten about the revolver altogether, with everything else that had been going on. Jamie went on his way, with Marcus chattering along beside him, his voice trailing off as they went down the hall.
Sister Mary Frances came in, having just passed them in the hall, with a smile on her face. “I believe those two will be good for each other,” she commented.
Jenny was still amazed that Jamie had tackled the move with such good humor, but knew that, once he made a decision, he stuck to it. He couldn’t change his scars, but he could change how he dealt with them.
The afternoon dragged on for Jenny. She was worried, but there was nothing she could do, and unless someone showed up at the infirmary with an injury, she had no way of knowing what was going on in the rest of the mission. Finally, after she had mended everything in sight, the dinner bell rang. She was out of the room like a shot, racing for the dining room. Sister Mary Frances shook her head behind her.
The group of older boys were conspicuously missing when everyone else had gathered for the evening meal. Jenny stood at her chair, her knuckles white from gripping the back, waiting for Jamie and Marcus to show up. A smile lit her face when she heard Jamie’s long stride in the hall. He drew the immediate attention of everyone, but he ignored the stares, just flashing his grin at Jenny as he took a seat at the boys’ table with Marcus to his left. Logan, Joe and a few more stragglers came in after them, the two bullies looking a bit out of sorts. Everyone remained standing for prayer, and then sat for the meal. Jamie and Marcus immediately put their heads together, and Jenny noticed that by sitting on his left, Marcus made sure that the healing wound was shielded from the prying looks that kept roaming their way. Jenny sent God a prayer, thanking Him for the presence of Marcus, then turned her attention to Mary, who was having trouble cutting her meat.
They caught up with each other on the way to chapel that night, Jenny wanting to hear everything that had happened. Jamie just shrugged his shoulders at her inquiry, and started talking to Mary, who was batting her big brown eyes at him. Marcus grabbed her arm and looked at her with a big grin on his face.
“You should have seen him,” he whispered.
“What happened?”
“Logan and Joe came in while he was putting his things away and started in on him, calling him names and such. He just stood up, kind of towered over Logan and said, ‘If I can survive this, I can survive anything you can throw my way.’ He just stood there, daring them to say something or do something, and they were struck dumb. It was great.” Marcus had obviously enjoyed the moment, he just kept grinning as he told the story. “I think they didn’t realize how big he was until he was standing there looking down on them.”
Jenny looked ahead at her brother, who was walking with his long index finger grasped in Mary’s hand, her head barely coming to his waist. Being with him every day had made her forget about his great height, and since her father was also tall, she just took it for granted. A delicious smile hit her face as she imagined Logan and Joe staring up at Jamie’s handsome features and every thought in their vacant heads scattering before his size.
“Do you think they’ll leave him alone?” she asked.
“No, but they’ll think long and hard before they do anything.”
They went into the chapel, boys on one side, girls on the other. Jenny took Mary into the pew with her, Marcus slid in on Jamie’s left, to help shield him once again. The service started, little heads began to nod, and Jamie looked over at Jenny and signed that he was bored, which made Jenny roll her eyes. Soon he was silently teaching Marcus Indian signs, and they began flashing messages back and forth, while Mary slept with her head on Jenny’s shoulder.
The next day in class, the lines were drawn: Jamie, Jenny and Marcus on one side, Logan and Joe on the other. The nun who was their teacher looked from one armed camp to the other with an expression of bewilderment on her homely face. Once again, she decided that ignorance was bliss and began the first lessons of the day. Jamie caught up in no time, and the twins and Marcus sped through the lesson, then waited patiently for Logan and Joe to finish so they could move on to something else. Jamie perused the small selection of donated books, found a few he hadn’t read and asked the sister for permission to read while he was waiting. The nun seemed astonished by his request but granted it and he settled down at his desk, his long legs stretched out before him, and began to read David Copperfield. Logan and Joe looked at him with something close to disgust on their faces and returned to their lesson, still struggling with the words. Jenny looked over at her brother, who had quickly lost himself in the book, and decided that he was going to be okay in spite of everything. Now she just had to talk him into leaving.
Talking to Jamie about leaving turned out to be harder than Jenny had first thought. He managed to evade the subject every time she brought it up by saying he hadn’t healed enough to think about it. Sister Mary Frances had removed the splints from Jenny’s arm and pronounced her fit, and Jamie’s burns had healed over into raw, ridged skin. He wore the hat whenever he went out of the mission, and pretty much ignored the stares of those inside. His world consisted of the classroom and his duties in the barn, the rest of the time was just an inconvenience to be endured until he could get lost in his books, or lost in the gentle solace of th
e animals.
Jenny finally cornered him in the barn one day in late spring where he was brushing one of the huge draft horses, talking to him in the gentle tones their father had used when he had worked his magic with the animals. Jenny stood outside the stall and listened for a while, closing her eyes and letting her memories take her back to the days when she had lain in the straw and listened to her father speak in the same manner to Storm.
“What are you mooning over?” Jamie asked, tugging on her braid.
“Nothing. I was just remembering.”
Jamie looked around the cool confines of the stall and at the huge brown horse, which was daintily nibbling on a straw. “Yeah, I know what you mean.” He leaned over the stall door, letting his arms dangle down the front. Jenny leaned her back against the wall near the stall so she could see him.
“Let’s leave now,” she said.
“Why?”
“Why stay here?” she retorted.
“We have a roof over our head, and food in our bellies, that’s why.”
“I feel like I’m in prison.”
“You’d feel worse out there on your own.”
“How can you say that?”
“Jen, think about it. We have no place to go, no money, no way to make a living. No one would hire us, we’re too young.”
“Jamie—”
“No, I know I’m right. We have to stay here until we’re old enough to make it on our own. It’s not bad here. You just need to quit thinking about what we used to have.”
“How can I, when every minute of the day I just want to jump on the back of a horse and go tearing out of here?”
Jamie looked out the door of the barn to the plains beyond. The sun was high in the afternoon sky and the heat of it rippled in the distance, creating the illusion that he was looking through a thick pane of glass. Occasionally, the warm breeze stirred the tufts of the long grass that covered the rolling land, turning the stems over so that the land looked like waves coming into shore, each one disappearing into itself.
“I know,” he said simply, “but you can’t, so get over it and get on with your life.”
“Get on with my life?” Jenny could not believe her ears. “How am I supposed to get on with my life when I’m stuck here?”
“It won’t be forever, Jen. I promise. We just have to wait until we’re older. Then we’ll go, we’ll get jobs, and we’ll get our own place.”
Jenny tried to look into the deep blue eyes that were hidden within the shadows of the hat. She could not see them. He was good at hiding them from her now, and hiding all the things that were concealed in their depths. She wondered how much of what he said was coming from his practical nature, and how much was coming from his fear of rejection because of the scars. One thing she was sure of: he wasn’t ready to leave. No matter what she said, she wouldn’t change his mind.
He was back at work now, bent over the hooves of the giant horse, bracing his knee under a trunk-like leg that could snap his in an instant, confident in the knowledge that the horse would not harm him. I wish I felt that safe, she thought to herself as she watched him work. She felt as if she had been waiting on the edge of some precipice ever since she’d arrived at the mission, and she knew that someone was anxious to push her off and watch her tumble into space with nothing to hold on to. The feeling had been keeping her awake at night and followed her through her days as they melted into weeks and then months. But Jamie was content, and as long as he stayed, she would stay. She left him to his animals and went back to her mending life at the mission soon became as routine as life at the ranch had been. Jenny still was restless, longing to leave, but not willing to go anywhere without Jamie, who managed to stay hidden in the deep recesses of the barn. Soon the long, hot, hazy days of summer were upon them and they found a small pond where they would sneak off on Sunday afternoons when they were supposed to be resting and studying God’s word.
Jamie and Marcus would shed their clothes with great joy and splash around in the cool water while Jenny and Mary dangled their feet over the rocks and let the water wash the heat away. Jamie tried to get Jenny to join them in swimming, but she refused, now self-conscious about the differences in their bodies. After awhile, Jamie and Marcus would come out and take Mary to sit under the nearby trees, allowing Jenny privacy to swim at her leisure. It seemed a lifetime since she had shed her clothes and swam, and she splashed around in the stream with joyous abandon. She submerged herself in the pond, the water coming up to her chin, and turned graceful circles, watching the murky water ripple away from her.
They had been sneaking out every Sunday since the end of June without being caught, but Jenny knew it was just a matter of time before this pleasure would be taken away from them, either by Father Clarence or the weather, as it was now coming to the end of August. She was determined to enjoy these outings while she could, so she closed her eyes and let her feet come to the top, the water carrying her up until she was floating on her back, little ripples breaking against her ears. She felt her hair fan out around her, the golden tendrils dancing around her fingertips and spreading out behind her like giant wings. Jenny lost herself in the sensation of floating, her body cooling until she didn’t know where her skin ended and the water began. She cleared her mind of all the turmoil that was constantly nagging at her and concentrated on the moment, seeing nothing behind her closed lids but blue sky and cool water.
Something foreign caught her attention, the sound of a breeze rustling the branches of a tree, but when she opened her eyes, the leaves above her were motionless in the heat of the afternoon. She heard it again, so she planted her feet in the muddy bottom and ducked down until the water hit her chin.
“Jamie?” she called. There was no answer, so she turned slowly, thinking she would catch some animal that had come to the pond for a drink. Another rustle, low to the ground, behind her. “Marcus, you better come out!” Then she heard a snicker that could only have been made by Joe, and she knew that Logan had to be there, too. She heard Mary’s laughter in the distance and felt a sinking feeling when she realized that Jamie was out of sight.
“I know you’re watching me, Logan,” she said to the bushes as she crossed her arms over her breasts. She heard a rustling again, then saw Logan stand, with Joe coming up behind him.
“Why don’t you come on out?” Logan was holding her shirt in the crook of his finger; behind him Joe held up her skirt.
“Why don’t you put my clothes down and leave before my brother kills you?” She hoped she looked confident, and she prayed that Jamie would get bored with waiting and come for her.
“I ain’t afraid of your brother. He ain’t gonna do nothin’ to me.”
“Yeah,” Joe added.
“Come on out, or are you scared?”
“I’m not afraid of you, or your little weasel of a friend,” Jenny retorted, hoping to buy time before the situation got out of control. She scanned the shoreline to identify the quickest escape route with the most cover available. Unfortunately, Logan and Joe were occupying the bank with the most shrubbery; the rest of the pond was surrounded by cattails which would do little to shield her from their avid eyes. The cattails would, however, offer minimum coverage until she could reach the trees beyond, and she was not above sacrificing her modesty to save her dignity.
She slowly began to move about the pond, feeling the bottom with her feet for any stout piece of wood that might have been blown in by a storm. All she felt was mud, and the occasional nibble of a fish tasting her toes. Logan stood before her, taunting her with her shirt. Joe, who had been scrambling around behind him, came up with her camisole and pantalets, waving a garment in each hand. He let out a whoop at his discovery, and Logan turned and began to curse him.
“Jenny?” Jamie called from the trees.
“Jamie, come quick!” she yelled. In the next instant she was rewarded with the sight of his determined face scowling at Logan, who flipped her shirt up in the air and took off through the underb
rush, with Joe on his heels. Jamie’s long legs overtook the pair in seconds, and he shoved Joe out of the way before he brought Logan crashing down by diving and tackling him around the knees. Marcus was coming behind him and hauled the protesting Joe up by his collar. Jenny took advantage of the diversion and splashed out of the pond, gathering her clothes before disappearing behind a tree. Jamie hauled Logan to his feet and sent him sailing into the water head first. Marcus had Joe on the ground, and Jamie promptly picked him up and flung him squealing into the pond, too. Joe crashed into Logan, who had just come sputtering to the surface, and they both went under in a tangle of arms and legs. Jenny had scrambled into her clothes, and she joined the two on the bank as they dissolved into laughter at the sight of Logan and Joe spitting and cursing in the water. Jenny was wringing the water out of her hair as she watched them shake their fists and fill the air with empty threats. Mary joined them on the bank and began to giggle.
“We’d better get out of here,” Jenny suggested and took Mary’s hand. She led the little girl back towards the mission, and Jamie and Marcus joined up with them after they made sure the two bullies took an alternate route home. They knew that their wet shoes and clothes would slow them down, but the four hurried anyway, Jamie taking Mary on his broad shoulders and Jenny braiding her hair as they walked briskly towards the orchard. They came up on its back side and walked beneath the branches which were heavy with ripening fruit. When they reached the clearing that led to the mission, they separated, Jamie and Marcus heading towards the barn, Jenny taking Mary and hoping to reach the shelter of the dormitory before they were discovered.
Logan and Joe were not as lucky. The first person they ran into while trying to steal back into their dormitory was Father Clarence, who personally escorted the twosome to his office by grabbing on to their ears. He quickly sent for Jamie, Marcus and Jenny when Logan and Joe told how Jenny had tempted them with her body and her cohorts had then attacked them without mercy.
Chase the Wind Page 19
