In the Shadow of the Mountains

by Rosanne Bittner

  “Now be fair,” Irene spoke up then to thirteen-year-old Sharron, who sat playing checkers with twelve-year-old Sam. Alex, also twelve, sat near the fireplace carving a piece of wood. He had inherited his father’s talent, and already talked about joining Vallejo Construction as soon as his schooling was finished. David wanted to be a teacher.

  What the rest of the children did with their lives was still undecided, most of them too young to really know. Eduardo was ten, Elena seven, Anna three, the two daughters named after Ramon’s dead wives. The new son in her arms had been named after Ramon’s grandfather.

  And then there was eleven-year-old Ben, whom Ramon and Irene had adopted off the streets of Denver in 1882, when he was only five. He was a little Italian boy who didn’t even know his last name. Joblessness, prejudice, and segregation had grown rampant in Denver, and Irene and Ramon were doing what they could to help. Chinese riots in 1880 had led to bloodshed and hangings, and now most of the Chinese had fled Denver. But there were still too many homeless children running the streets.

  In his quest to help curb the problem, Ramon had built an orphanage, his own labor and nearly all material donated free of charge, to provide a home for the children who ran wild through Denver’s alleys, a home where children of all races could find shelter. Slowly but surely the wealthy white community began to understand. Something had to be done or Denver would suffer the shame of it, as well as suffer from the rising crime rate.

  The last eleven years had been hectic, what with all the changes in the company, building the orphanage, Ramon’s busy schedule. Denver was now the warehousing center of the West; and K-E still held a warehousing monopoly. Denver had a sewer system now, and efforts were being made to try to clean up the Platte River. A new college had been built in Colorado Springs, which was now also a fast-growing city giving Denver a run for its money, but Irene was confident Denver would remain the Queen City of the West. The city now had parks, a museum, and a baseball team. There were annual fairs, rodeos, and horse races; Elitch’s Gardens offered roller coaster and carousel rides, and even a zoo for children, as well as concerts, operas, and plays for the older people.

  Along with rapid growth and progress, Denver had had its share of scandal. Bill Byers had been shot at in the street by an angry “other woman” with whom he had been …affair. The scandal had cost Byers a Republican nomination for Governor of Colorado.

  And there was the shocking scandal of H. A. W. Tabor, the silver baron who had come to Denver to build the grand Windsor Hotel, which not only had the elevator and the ballroom floor hung on cables that Ramon had told Irene had been proposed years ago, but even had a swimming pool and steam baths. Before coming to Denver, Tabor had built a firehouse, an opera house, a street railway and a telephone company in Leadville. Now a Denver citizen, besides the Windsor Hotel, Tabor also had a magnificent mansion in Kirkland Hills and had hired Ramon to build an opera house in Denver. The theater sported carved Japanese cherry-wood, huge French mirrors, a crystal chandelier in the entryway, embroidered silk draperies, one wall of stained glass, and a huge picture of himself that he had put up to replace a picture of Shakespeare.

  Tabor had left the wife who had supported him through their years of poverty and then modest wealth to marry a young blond divorcée named Elizabeth McCourt Doe, called Baby Doe by most.

  The Baby Doe and the Byers scandals were not the only sources of gossip for Denver citizens. Elly Kirkland McKinley had also provided news when she was caught by her husband, Red McKinley, in bed with the president of a railroad supply company. The divorce, two years ago now, had been so scandalous that Irene had retreated to the ranch with the children to get away from probing reporters. Elly had committed a grave error in demanding years ago that parts of K-E be put directly into her name, an even graver error in testing Red’s patience to the point of divorce. Property laws were in Red’s favor, especially since it was Elly who had committed adultery. Elly had lost nearly all her holdings, which had been awarded to Red. She had taken what little money she had remaining and had left Denver, announcing to Irene before she left that she was going to try to find Chad.

  Irene wondered what her mother would think of Red McKinley now owning a good share of what once belonged to K-E. How strange that the people she had tried hardest to destroy, Ramon and Red, were now rich, powerful men who, after Kirk’s death, would between them own all of K-E. She kissed little Miguel, remembering again Kirk’s explanation of the Indian belief in the circle of life. It was so true. Things always seemed to come around and catch up with themselves.

  “When can we go outside and play, Mother?” Eduardo asked. “I’m tired of playing with my counting beads.”

  Irene looked out the window again, a sickening dread moving into her soul at the horrible wind and blinding snow outside. The cattle! They had lost so many the previous year in the record forty-below temperatures. Now this. This was no ordinary storm. It had descended upon the plains in a matter of minutes, the day beginning with a calm, warm morning. In the last hour the temperature had dropped nearly one degree per minute.

  “There will be no playing outside today,” she told the boy. “I don’t want to see any of you outside. Is that understood? It’s much too dangerous. This is a very bad storm, children. You’ll just have to keep yourselves occupied in the house until this is over.”

  Ramon came into the great room then, smiling as he weaved his way among the seven children who sat scattered across the floor. “If David were here and that little one in your arms were on the floor, I could not get to you without stepping on a body,” he joked.

  Irene smiled as he came closer, putting his arms around Irene and Miguel and kissing Irene softly. Irene wondered how she would have survived the past eleven years of changes without Ramon, who had remained steadfast and true, her friend, her magnificent lover, a dependable father and a capable businessman. “Did you finish your blueprints?” she asked him.

  He turned with her to look out at the storm. “Sí, I am done. But how am I going to get back to Denver to present them to the man who asked for them? I have a feeling the little vacation we decided to take here at the ranch will turn into something much longer than we planned.”

  “I’m a little worried about David.”

  “He will be fine. He is inside those brick buildings at the university with many others around him. We are the ones who are isolated. If this keeps up, we’ll be pinned down here for days.”

  “We have plenty of wood and plenty of food.” She kissed the baby again. “It might even be fun for us and the children, a chance to really be together. It’s just that I’m worried about the cattle, Ramon. Most of them are out there on the range with no protection. This could be a disaster for the ranch.”

  At times like this she couldn’t help thinking about Hank, wondering what he would do. Her eyes teared. “This ranch is the only part of K-E I’ve ever really cared about.”

  Ramon rubbed at her shoulder. “Irene, when this is over and the snow is gone, the land will still be here.”

  “But so much has changed. So much has interfered with the cattle industry already. The government has forced us to break up and sell off some of the land, farmers are putting up that awful barbed wire—”

  “Irene, I said the land, all the land that still belongs to you, will still be here. If the cattle business is becoming too complicated, then do something else with the land. Your mother once farmed potatoes on part of this land. Why not do something like that with it again?”

  She watched the snow rapidly piling up under the window. “It’s strange that you should say that. I’ve been thinking about that very thing, but I didn’t know what you would think of it.”

  “Growing potatoes?”

  “No. Sugar beets.”

  Ramon grinned. “Sugar beets?”

  “Sugar beets have become big business in Colorado. K-E even owns a mill for processing them. Why not grow them ourselves, in addition to buying them from other farmers.
We could build another mill, gradually make sugar beets one of K-E’s biggest assets instead of beef. We could still raise Palominos, and some beef.” She shivered. “At least if we lost a crop, we wouldn’t be losing precious life. When you lose a cattle crop, you’re talking about a lot of poor, dead animals.”

  He smiled sadly, stroking her hair. “You are like your mother sometimes, thinking about ways to improve K-E. But your mother would not have thought that losing cattle was sad. She would think only of the monetary loss.”

  “We have already lost so many, but we’re still thriving. I don’t need to own it all the way Mother did.”

  He rubbed at her neck. “I know. By the way, isn’t it time for Miguel’s morning nap?”

  She sighed. “Yes. I’ve already fed him.”

  “Then come away from the window and stop fretting. You cannot stop the storm, so you might as well try to think about something else.”

  She agreed, turning to go to their bedroom, where they kept little Miguel’s bassinet. She heard dear, dependable Rose talking to the children then, offering to read to them, trying to find a way to keep them occupied. The bedroom door closed as she lay Miguel down for his nap. Ramon came over to put his arms around her from behind. Because of the weather Irene had not even gotten dressed yet, and still wore her satin robe. Ramon slipped a hand inside it to caress one milky-full breast gently, feeling a trace of wetness at her nipple.

  “Ramon, I have to get dressed. The children are all up.”

  “Rose is watching after them. We will be snowed in for days. There will be plenty of time to spend with the children.”

  She smiled. “We can’t do something this hour of the morning.”

  “Is there a law stating when a man can make love to his beautiful wife?”

  She closed her eyes as he pushed her hair aside and began kissing her neck. He pulled the robe away and kissed at her shoulders. After eleven years she still could not resist his touch. He had remained romantic and persuasive, still a virile, handsome man at forty-seven. She was proud that at forty-two she was still beautiful, at least in Ramon’s eyes. After bearing a total of nine children, including the three who had died, her waist was a little thicker, and her breasts and hips bore stretch marks, but none of that seemed to matter to Ramon. With each child she always worried she would lose her ability to please him sexually, but every time they had intercourse after another child, Ramon seemed to fill her to ecstasy. She supposed that what youth and firmness she had lost through childbirth, they both made up for in simple love and desire that seemed to help them overcome any physical changes. Now, after a long recovery from giving birth to Miguel, she wondered if that would again remain true.

  He pulled her robe open. “The bed is not made yet,” he told her softly. “I came to bed last night late and tired, and you were already asleep, so I did not disturb you.” She breathed deeply as a strong hand moved over her belly. “We have not made love in nearly four months, Irene. Do you think you are finally healed and recovered enough from Miguel’s birth?”

  She turned, moving her arms around him. “I always think each time that we’ll be able to abstain so there won’t be any more children for a while.” She leaned back, looking up at him and smiling. “But what God wants us to have, He will give us, Ramon. I waited too many years for you. I don’t intend to waste one moment of these years we’ve had finally to be together.”

  He met her lips. “It is the same for me,” he told her between kisses. “But I worry, after what happened with Anna. If something happened to you in giving birth, I would blame myself.”

  “No, Ramon.” She touched his hair. “It would be just as much my fault, because I want and need to be one with you as much as you need it. If I can’t make love with my Ramon, I might as well not even be breathing.”

  He picked her up and laid her on the bed, then stood up and removed his clothes. Already that most manly part of him was swollen in magnificent desire. He climbed into bed beside her, smothering her with kisses as his fingers began to work their magic, urging forth the silken juices that helped him slide his fingers inside of her to prepare her for what was to come.

  This was always an anxious moment for her, the first time after having another child. He sensed her fear of pain, her bigger fear of not pleasing him, and he searched her mouth suggestively as he gently probed her lovenest, awakening the wonderful urges he was always able to bring forth so magically. He moved on top of her then, carefully entering her, knowing by her gasp that he had brought her some pain, but that he also could still fill her to her satisfaction. She did not realize that he had his own fears of not pleasing her after so many children, but always both their fears were alleviated with that first intercourse that told them nothing had been lost.

  They moved in sweet rhythm, their love as strong and beautiful as ever, their desire as intense as that first night of their marriage. Understandably, with their busy schedules, their many children, and the years they had been together, they did not do this as often as they had that first year of marriage; but when they did make love, it was just as thrilling, just as exotic and fulfilling as ever.

  He surged deep inside her, and the groan of the wicked winter wind outside died away for both of them. They were warm and cozy, their bodies soon heated to a steamy sweat, as they both discovered this most important part of their marriage was as good and sweet as ever. Little Miguel had not changed a thing.

  The blizzard of ’88 became known as the “schoolchildren’s storm,” since it hit during the middle of a schoolday and trapped many prairie children in their remote one-room school buildings. Many died trying to get home; some teachers became heroines for finding ways to protect the children from the horrible cold, even if it meant burning school desks for heat.

  It was the worst winter storm the United States had ever seen. Many lives were lost, both human and animal. The B&K lost ninety percent of their cattle, and the following spring the air was filled with the stench of thawing carcasses. The storm had virtually put an end to the era of ranching magnates and the overabundance of beef. Some big ranchers did not even know how many cattle they owned. Several of the most powerful ranchers went bankrupt.

  Irene refused to fold. Her mother would not have given up, and neither would she. She turned to sugar beets, and within two years the B&K was a thriving sugar beet farm, and whenever she visited Hank’s grave, she could not help wondering what he would think of what she had done. She was almost glad now that he had not lived to see the kind of life he had loved most slowly fall away to new government regulations, farmers, and the terrible blizzard. A good deal of Colorado’s eastern plains remained cattle country, but the industry would never know the tremendous power and success it had enjoyed in the sixties and seventies and early eighties.

  In 1890 Denver was a thriving metropolis, with buildings now rising to seven and eight stories, electricity lighting the entire city, telephones connecting them to Wall Street. Churches became more numerous, finally meeting the strong competition of the saloons, and prostitution had been outlawed. The population rose to one hundred thirty-five thousand, and street cars were run by electric cables instead of horses.

  The Dawes Act of 1887 had brought more devastation to the Indians. The government had ruled that reservations should be broken up into parcels of land to be awarded each Indian family outright, to be farmed. The idea was to civilize the American Indian and bring him gradually into white society. As Kirk once predicted in an angry fit when the law was passed, it was a dismal failure. No one in Washington understood the Indian’s nature, that it was not in the Indian’s blood to be a cultivator. He was a hunter. His social form of living was communal, not individual. No Indian wanted to become a homesteader. The average Plains Indian gave no thought to tomorrow, did not know how to plan ahead and still did not know how to farm.

  Landgrabbers and speculators took advantage of the act, easily convincing many Indians to sell them their parcel of land for whiskey, food, and beads.
In a single year the total acreage of Indian lands was reduced by 12 percent. Some Indians were allowed to lease their land, which real estate developers would rent for eight to ten cents an acre, then turn around and lease to white farmers for one to two dollars an acre, making huge profits while the Indians who had leased the land originally were left shiftless and homeless. More and more turned to whiskey to drown their sorrows, and in 1890 the Sioux came upon one last hope—the Ghost Dance religion—by which they believed that one day soon their ancestors would all rise, as would the buffalo, and they would be strong again and would chase the white man out of their land.

  This belief, and the wild dancing that accompanied the new religion, led to new fears of an Indian uprising and to misunderstandings that culminated at Wounded Knee, South Dakota, in December of that year, when soldiers massacred over two hundred Sioux, mostly women and children. It was considered the last great Indian “uprising,” the last Indian “battle.”

  Fifteen-year-old Samuel was already planning to go to college to become a teacher, like twenty-year-old David, who now taught black children in Denver. Samuel intended to go and teach on what was left of the reservations, to help his people learn how to take care of themselves so that they would not be financially raped by land grabbers and developers.

  “They need their own schools instead of being sent away from their families,” he often lamented. “They need teachers of their own race, so they feel they can trust them. They need someone who understands white society like I do, but who also understands how they think and feel.”

  Samuel was just one small, bright hope for his people, and Kirk could not be prouder of his grandson, glad that indirectly, through Samuel, he would one day be back with the Sioux and Cheyenne, that he would be doing something to help them. He thought what a wonderful job Ramon and Irene had done with all their children, how he could go to his grave knowing K-E and what was left of his family would be in good hands.